Many years ago someone with whom I was acquainted told me who he was going to vote for. His choice happened to be leading well ahead of his opponents in the polls. When I asked him why his reply was "I might as well vote for the winner". This person was not the brightest, and was definitely not politically aware, but aren't we doing the same thing when we pay attention to endorsements? The purpose of an endorsement is to induce voters to base their decision, not on who will be best for the job, but on who the endorser thinks is best for the job. Voila! Thinking-free decision making!
Related to this is way our primary/caucus system of choosing the presidential nominees of the major parties works. There are a number of things wrong with it, but first, let's look at the system it replaced:
A major point to remember is that political parties, despite the great influence the two major parties have in providing candidates, are not part of the government, but are private entities. Theoretically a political party can nominate whoever they choose for a government office without first finding out what "the people" want. They can throw their weight behind one candidate over another, like the Democratic National Committee (DNC) is alleged to have done in 2016, they can cancel primaries in some states, like the Republicans did in 2020 and there's nothing illegal or unconstitutional about it. In fact, the current system, where the results of primaries and caucuses were binding upon the parties only goes back to 1972. Until then varying methods of choosing nominees have been used. Initially the members of Congress in each party nominated their standard bearer. National conventions soon became the main venue where candidates were chosen by delegates sent by state and local parties. Party "bosses" held outsize power to decide who the candidates would be. After 1901 states began holding primaries, some primaries determined delegates, some locked those delegates into supporting a specific candidate, others were simply preferences that were not binding on the delegates. Starting in 1972 state primaries and caucuses determined who that state's delegates would vote for at the national convention. Of course each state party still set the rules on how delegates would be allocated. Some states were winner-take-all - all delegates went to whoever received a plurality of votes; other allocated delegates on a percentage. Then there are "superdelegates", i.e. elected officials and party leaders, who were not pledged to any candidate. Primaries and caucuses are spread out from January to June, with Iowa traditionally the first caucuses, currently in mid-January, and New Hampshire the first primary in February.
Most people thought that this system was an improvement over the older methods of nominations, since it was more democratic. And, to a certain extent, it is. Except for the fact that by the time we get to the later primaries most of the hopefuls have dropped out and candidates who might be a voter's first choice are no longer running. It's a vicious circle. Whoever wins (and winning, in a crowded field, might mean a plurality significantly less than fifty percent) in the earliest contests (in states that are hardly representative of the nation as a whole) has perceived momentum. This results in donors reconsidering who they will be financially supporting, and those candidates who face shrinking war chests have to drop out. We have a situation similar to what I described about the influence of endorsements - donors are making decisions, not based on who is the best candidate, but on who other people think is the best candidate.
The practice that has sprung up in the last few elections to conduct candidate "debates" in the months leading up to the first primary has made matters even worse. To start with, only the candidates whose poll numbers exceed a certain minimum percentage are allowed to be part of the debates. So we start off with candidates without immediate name recognition being kept out of consideration. Mainstream media contributes to this problem as the gatekeeper, deciding who is a serious candidate and who isn't. As the debates go on low-polling candidates are excluded, so we are only presented with "serious" candidates who other people have decided are the best to choose from. I'm sure we've all noticed how polls have become increasingly unreliable as people elect not to participate, or even lie to pollsters. Yet we still act as if polls mean something. These debates have been functioning as unofficial pre-primaries, weeding out an "excess" of choices, so that as the actual primaries and caucuses begin, we are left with the predetermined assumption that former president Trump will be the nominee and that Governor DeSantis and Ambassador Haley are his only viable challengers. All before one vote has been cast. Former Governor Christie, the only candidate who seemed brave enough to admit his error in supporting Trump, and who is possibly one of the few who could reasonably be expected to govern, dropped out.
What's the solution? (However unlikely to be enacted)
One alternative would be a national primary day. That way, those of us at the end of the schedule get a voice. Anyone who meets the qualifications and fills out the requisite paperwork is on the ballot. Since this is a primary and not a nationwide general election, the Electoral College need not factor in. The total popular vote would determine the winner. What about the very real possibility that no one receives a majority of the vote, which is likely if there are 15-20 candidates in one or both major parties? Ranked choice would be my preference. In ranked choice voting each voter would pick a set number of choices from the candidate list and would rank them in order of preference. For example, let's say you could pick your top five. Once the votes are counted, if no one received a majority of "first choice" votes, then the candidate or candidates with the lowest vote totals are eliminated. The second choice votes for the remaining candidates are then added to the original totals. If there is still no candidate with over 50%, then we repeat the process with the third choice, fourth choice etc. until we have a clear winner. When the dust settles you'll have a nominee who may not be the first choice of the majority, but has some support from a majority of voters. The problem with this is that sometimes the candidate with the most votes, but not a majority, in the first round is not the ultimate winner. This happened in 2020 in Iowa. The caucuses had a setup similar to ranked choice voting and Senator Sanders had the most first round votes, but not a majority, however when the subsequent rounds were tallied up, he was no longer the winner. A second alternative is a national runoff, like Georgia does with its statewide elections. The top two vote getters face off one-on-one in a second election. It's like a playoff, but it's possible that neither of the top two received more than 20% of the votes.
With the ridiculous debates now over and the first caucus in two days it will be interesting to see how this broken system serves the needs of the Republic.
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