Process Problems Redux
A commenter to my original post is confused as to how all the issues I raised with respect to the election process are connected. Since I didn’t make the original post painfully obvious for the comprehension impaired, I’ll dumb this down even further. The election code is written in such a fashion to empower and benefit the Republican and Democratic parties. It is not written to benefit voters, candidates, or anyone else but the parties. You, the individual voter, are pretty much irrelevant when the code is written. What is important is maintaining the stranglehold on politics enjoyed by the two major parties. If you follow this concept all the way through to the bitter end, it will belatedly occur to you that any provision that privileges the parties in the process is on a level with all the other provisions that privilege the parties.
So, in our particular instance, the GOP gets to run the selection process for the replacement candidate for CD22. Who does this benefit? The GOP. The GOP can make this process as convoluted, obscure, and secretive as they want and it’s exactly the same as every other section of the election code that gives the parties special treatment when it comes to ballot access. I mean, really, let’s think about ballot access. The state of Texas, in its less than infinite wisdom, automatically grants a place on the ballot to the winners of the party primaries. The state even lends the parties equipment so they can run the primaries. Hell, I worked the primary and my check came from Harris County, so the state is paying for the poll workers. In short, the state is colluding with private organizations to determine who gets on the ballot. If you’re not a member of one of those organizations, the state makes it exponentially more difficult for you to get on the ballot in the fall. How is this process fair and democratic? It’s not, and it’s essentially the same as the process for determining the CD22 candidate. The party will decide who’s going to get to play and is going to try like hell to make life difficult for everybody else.
It’s especially funny to me when the comments on the process come from somebody who claims to be a lifelong Republican, but has no idea what the party executive committees are. Didn’t get real involved in the party, did you, buddy? Casting a ballot twice a year doesn’t make you a member of the party faithful. It makes you no more special than anyone else who votes. You want the party to give a baboon’s behind about you, get more involved in the party. Otherwise, you’re just another one of the people who the party and politicians pay lip service to and ignore once the elections are finished. That may hurt, but it’s the way things are. The people involved in a substantive way with the party are the ones determining the direction of the party, not the random schmucks who just show up and vote.
If you want things to change, you need to do the hard work of making it happen. Figure out a better solution and get it implemented. Whining about the way things are going way too late to affect the process doesn’t really qualify on either count. It might help your argument if you display some idea of what the current process is, though.
Oh, yeah, I almost forgot: fuckity fuck fuck fuckity fuck. This apparently makes my whole argument more juvenile in whatever bizarro-world some people live in. In fact, that makes this post 5 times as juvenile as the original post! Five times the profanity, five time the juvenilia! Who says we can’t do fan service? Yes, we try hard to please at YPS. It’s just that we’re not trying to please you. Keep it in mind next time you feel obligated to comment on my word choice, mmkay? I could make the argument that an inability to look past the word choice to focus on the substance of the argument is a greater sign of intellectual immaturity than using the word fuck. However, that could be construed as petty and not nearly as amusing to me as gratuitous profanity right now. Assweasel! Check back in a day or two and see if pettiness has scored a surprise comeback. In the meantime...
Choadlicker!
So, in our particular instance, the GOP gets to run the selection process for the replacement candidate for CD22. Who does this benefit? The GOP. The GOP can make this process as convoluted, obscure, and secretive as they want and it’s exactly the same as every other section of the election code that gives the parties special treatment when it comes to ballot access. I mean, really, let’s think about ballot access. The state of Texas, in its less than infinite wisdom, automatically grants a place on the ballot to the winners of the party primaries. The state even lends the parties equipment so they can run the primaries. Hell, I worked the primary and my check came from Harris County, so the state is paying for the poll workers. In short, the state is colluding with private organizations to determine who gets on the ballot. If you’re not a member of one of those organizations, the state makes it exponentially more difficult for you to get on the ballot in the fall. How is this process fair and democratic? It’s not, and it’s essentially the same as the process for determining the CD22 candidate. The party will decide who’s going to get to play and is going to try like hell to make life difficult for everybody else.
It’s especially funny to me when the comments on the process come from somebody who claims to be a lifelong Republican, but has no idea what the party executive committees are. Didn’t get real involved in the party, did you, buddy? Casting a ballot twice a year doesn’t make you a member of the party faithful. It makes you no more special than anyone else who votes. You want the party to give a baboon’s behind about you, get more involved in the party. Otherwise, you’re just another one of the people who the party and politicians pay lip service to and ignore once the elections are finished. That may hurt, but it’s the way things are. The people involved in a substantive way with the party are the ones determining the direction of the party, not the random schmucks who just show up and vote.
If you want things to change, you need to do the hard work of making it happen. Figure out a better solution and get it implemented. Whining about the way things are going way too late to affect the process doesn’t really qualify on either count. It might help your argument if you display some idea of what the current process is, though.
Oh, yeah, I almost forgot: fuckity fuck fuck fuckity fuck. This apparently makes my whole argument more juvenile in whatever bizarro-world some people live in. In fact, that makes this post 5 times as juvenile as the original post! Five times the profanity, five time the juvenilia! Who says we can’t do fan service? Yes, we try hard to please at YPS. It’s just that we’re not trying to please you. Keep it in mind next time you feel obligated to comment on my word choice, mmkay? I could make the argument that an inability to look past the word choice to focus on the substance of the argument is a greater sign of intellectual immaturity than using the word fuck. However, that could be construed as petty and not nearly as amusing to me as gratuitous profanity right now. Assweasel! Check back in a day or two and see if pettiness has scored a surprise comeback. In the meantime...
Choadlicker!
posted by T at 3:11 PM
3 Comments:
You didn't seem to comprehend my question when you read it. You stated that anyone who was silent when Kinky (or OTG for that matter) faced barriers to the ballot should not comment on the opaque selection process for TX22.
Presumably, a person who did speak up when Kinky faced barriers to the ballot retains the right to comment on the opaque selection process.
I don't see the logic in your position. When you read my comment, your comprehension led you to believe I wanted you to restate that there are barriers to the ballot. That is inaccurate. I want you to explain why some people retain the right to speak out about the opaque selection process and why others don't.
Yes, I notice that you can ratchet up your juvenile behavior, too. That, along with your poor reading comprehension skills, makes you a less effective writer.
Greg,
The point is simple and apparently goes right past you. If you have spent the majority of your life supporting the way the major parties have co-opted the process to their benefit, it's a little bit late to bitch now when it produces a result that makes you unhappy. There is no principled position that I am aware of that can reconcile these two facts. If you have one, articulate it and explain why one means of controlling the ballot is somehow different and more moral than controlling the ballot the other way. There is no fundamental difference in the degree of control the parties try to exert over the process. Yeah, I tend to think all the people that are whining now after a lifetime of supporting the process need to sit down and shut up. The issue is one of ballot access, which is why I commented at length about it. The parties have controlled ballot access so long through a process that seems entirely reasonable to people like you that when the brutal reality of just how much the parties do control hits you in the face, you get mad. If that's the case, you need to think long and hard about your support of the process as it is in all aspects, not just the current candidate selection process.
As far as a right goes, you have the right to do whatever you want. What you don't have is a convincing argument or any real reason that I can see for getting upset.
Define Irony:
In this case, the Republican establishment are for all intensive purposes doing their best to be good liberal democrats in following this Texas Election Code process.
This section in the code, from what I hear, and have seen was written years and yeas ago by a democrat, and has never been utilized till now, and ironically its the Republicans who are having to follow the law on this one...
This process creates almost everything a conservative base of people don't what to have to do. But since some say, to which I agree, now is not the time to change it, lets roll with it as best we can and get this person on the ballot for November.
What still amazes me is the focus and attitude of those actually in this process. If you have time to play chess with the state offices that could be vacated with the results of this election, then you're cutting your nose off dispite your face. And I hear that hurts in the long run.
If those who wish to make a play for one of those coveted "elector" positions want to focus on that being a feather in their cap, I would say they have either too much time on their hands, or are not focusing on the long-term effect this will have on the district as a whole, and they should seek life and entertainment elsewhere.
From what I see its difficult to maintain a nuetrality, or make ones self as unbias in the process as you can be, but I believe it can be done. You don't get to be at this point in the game without have close ties to politicians from all sides of the idealog spectrum.
Its when people see where the alliances are, and know that the focus is on the trickle-down effect this election will be to benefit a few who want to jockey (themselves or someone else) into a political office, that really cheapens everyones efforts.
So if the Republican Party is so fragmented with all of these internal groups that have varying degrees of conservatism and positions on issues want to leave and form parties like the Constitution Party (which I know they're already out there) or the Libertarian Party (they too are out there) etc etc.
I see that as a destruction of any conservative force to be reckoned with in the future.
I don't think the democrat party will fragment on us like that. For whatever sick and sordid reason they are hoping and manuevering to take advantage of this internal fragmentation.
I'd like to prove everyone wrong on this one.
Focus on the one thing we have to do, and thats get the best candidate on that ballot in November and keep this district in conservative hands.
Whoever that may be. If you have to hold your nose a bit before hitting that "cast ballot" button, just do it, we've done it before, and can do it again.
And do it with the right attitude, and not worry about who's going to get what seat if this happens, and that seat if this happens. Thats the wrong focus.
And from what I hear, those individuals that are seeking the elector position that come from the ranks of the SREC, I would float this out there for all to consider.
Why would (even though they'll tell you the opposite, sound familiar?) they have any reason to resolve this ballot issue at this committee of four? When they can fail at that level and become the center of attention at a statewide gathering of their "club" and have someone from Amarillo or El Paso decide who goes on the ballot?
If you ever desired for this process to get completely out of control, by all means allow these reward (assumption) appointments of SREC members to load up in that committee. That organization is a back-up to this process, and many believe that to be a conflict of interest, and undue influence.
We've compelled other "officials" and politicains to back off of processes like this for less obvious reasons. There is no difference in this case.
The result of our failure will be very simply this:
U.S. Congressman Nick Lampson (Democrat) Texas Congressional District 22
I would like to avoid that, mmmK?
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