Today is primary day and 3.5 million Flori

Monday, November 28, 2011

Ron Paul, New Hampshire Open Primaries, and the Future of the Nation


AMERICANS ELECT
What is Americans Elect All About? (CHARLES ELLISON, Politics 365) Some observers are speculating that it’s a front for a potential Independent bid from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who 1) has lots of cash and 2) is not a big fan of President Obama. And who has the most to lost from this effort?

2012
  • Ron Paul’s strategy for winning: Independent and cross-over voters (By Brad Knickerbocker, Christian Science Monitor) Still, the same one-on-one fake elections show other Republican presidential hopefuls in the field – Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry, Herman Cain, and Michele Bachmann – losing to Obama among independents. Only GOP front-runner Mitt Romney comes close, tying Obama among such partyless voters (but losing overall, as do the others). Why is this important? It’s because independents are the fastest growing segment of our nominally two-party system, swelling the ranks of voters as the Democratic Party and the Republican Party alike lose trust and loyalty.
  • Do New Hampshire endorsements really matter? (By ADAM SILBERT, Nashua Telegraph) The state’s open primary allows independents to vote in either party’s contest. This makes a state already known for its independent streak even more unpredictable. And party-affiliated voters tend not to listen to what party leaders tell them to do. Sure as their snow-covered mountains, they certainly don’t obey what happens one week prior in the Iowa caucuses.
  • The GOP’s Supercommittee Backlash (by John Avlon, Daily Beast) This corresponds with a CNN poll taken the week before the supercommittee decided to wave the white flag. It showed that 40 percent of independent voters would blame Republicans more for a supercommittee failure, while 24 percent would blame the Democrats. Likewise, 47 percent of self-identified centrists said they would blame the GOP, while 25 percent said the Dems would be most at fault.

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