Practice Management

The Third Wave Manifesto On Election Reform

By chucknewton

It occurs to me that back in 2000 and 2001 everybody, especially the Democrats, were talking about election reform because we ended up with a President that simply was not elected by anybody other than Antonin Scalia.  And, there was some money appropriated, and there were some machines bought and argued over, and all the while both the Democrats and the Republicans are sitting on a dilapidated system of caucuses and vote counting that makes Florida (and now includes Florida) look sane.

How did we get here?

The easiest answer is the argument that a giraffe is nothing but a horse designed by a committee.  A bunch of partisans get into a smoke filled room and play games.  Although the games are different in Republican Party and Democratic Party, both are meant to be tactical in ways that simply disenfranchise voters.  Both systems devised are inhibited, maladjusted, bootless, impractical, ineffectual and fruitless.

Maybe we simply did not notice it now because most primary elections and causes have not really been that close.  There has been a President or Vice President running, and the other party had a few standard candidates whose turn it is to take on the other.  That is not true this time around and the shenanigans have become obvious.

First, caucuses have to go.  I understand these are a series of 50 separate elections.  But, our tax money is paying directly or indirectly for a lot of these elections, and the national parties have to approve the schemes for these elections in order for the delegates to be counted.  Caucuses are more inclusive these days than are the old smoke filled room varieties.  But, we have to face the fact that caucuses do nothing but disenfranchise votes.  People cannot attend. People are intimidated in subtle ways by the public spectacle of its all, or in not to subtle ways as evident in the attempts of the bombastic leadership of the SEIU to threaten and cajole its members to manipulate, dominate and vote for Obama.  We saw a surge in the caucuses on the part of all candidates, and that is good.  But, we viewed Obama as the winner simply because Clinton's and Edward's key constituency, were lower income working women and families that had different priorities on that cold caucus night, such as taking care of their young children.  Students came to dominate, their participation finally being good and a benefit to Obama, but ultimately their vote ended up counting more than those with greater family responsibilities and little resources.  That is not democracy, and that is not the Democratic party.  We all want to win, but this is manipulation and this is wrong.

Now Obama and Clinton are simply better than this.  Every primary needs to be an actual election, which is open, and transparen,t and accessible electronically, and conducted over a longer period of time to allow everyone who wants to to vote and be counted to actually vote and be counted.

This issue is analogous with Third Wave law.  One, we are against purely tactical defenses in law.  Two, we are all for technology in its most basic setting (in the home or office) to provide society all they need to participate in the law and in the World.  The same is true here.

To make voting open and transparent, it needs to go online over several days or a week, that allows people to vote from their personal computers as a preference, but on on computers set up for their benefits in public if necessary.  Now is the time to make elections completely electronic, and allow voters to cast their ballots from home, over the internet, using a number of devises like their home or office computer, TiVo, their game station, or their PDA.  The technology is here to support this.  It is really just a matter now of the political will and the will of the people to make it happen and to allow the Third Wave to take its rightful position in our elections.

There is no better place to start than in open, transparent and honest primaries.  In 2000 the Arizona Democratic primary was the first binding election that offered online voting and fully 41% of the voters -- Third Wavers -- or 39,942 people voted online.  The 2004 the Michigan Democratic caucus was conducted by online as well as in person and 46,000 people out of the 163,000 who participated cast their votes online.

Further, Switzerland, Estonia, England and Canada have all run successful trials of internet voting, and Estonia is planning to use national internet voting for its parliamentary elections.

Each of these test seem to go off without a hitch.  And, it cannot be said that we cannot keep the vote honest because there are systems in place such as  Vote Here that help us do this.

States, and counties and district and municipalities are all investing in this overly complicated voting equipment.  It is so unnecessary when the issue is not the voting equipment, but the backbone or system behind it that collects and tallies the vote.  We need to progress quickly to a time when all anybody needs is temporary access to  a slightly more sophisticated cell phone or  something as simple as  One Laptop Per Child to vote effectively.  Where the voting authorities can simple set up a one or two hundred dollar laptop in every grocery store, Wal-Mart, school, church and anyplace where there is broadband to get the job done.

And, voting should be in real time as a result.  We should know what the voters are doing, as apposed to listening to the guesses and insults of all of the pundits and pontificators who ask Obama if he is black enough, or McCain if he is too old, or Huckabee if he is too liberal, or state things like Chelsea Clinton is being "pimped".  They offer no more than the trash on the street.  Think how much money it will save to send all of the pollsters home and deny the press the exit polls, most all of which have been wrong in this last voting cycle to some extent.

Contrary to the opinion of the pundits, elections are not a sport. They are very serious business.  And, even if they are a sport of sorts, would we not prefer the play-by-play commentary of the actual vote coming in, as opposed to the guessing and trash talk we now receive by so many experts that are not in fact experts?

Then, of course, votes need to count.  What is obvious today is that not everybody's vote counts or does not count as much.  The problem in Nevada was that it was a caucus, but the bigger issue at the time was that the election was rigged so that SEIU votes could have counted up to 5 times what the votes of others in the state might have counted, if the SEIU had followed its leadership and depending on the turnout.  It is shameful that Clinton could win the popular vote and then Obama brag about winning the delegates.  You cannot be about change if you espouse the same conduct that caused George W. Bush to become president and support voter suppression.  This can be sugar coated, I guess, but you cannot deny what it represents, and you cannot truthfully state that it does not represent change.  In the Third Wave, and in a democracy that espouses one man (or woman), one vote, that should never every happen. What is the difference in this than what happened in Florida in 2000? Do not tell me these events are different.  Florida was just proportionally worse.

In the Republican primaries (no caucuses) we have to stop the winner take all system.  This has now where it appears that a majority of the party does not want its candidate, but he can sew up the election by simply winning a few select states by 36% to 38% of the vote.  Here, the voters are denied their fair representation.  Right now something like 36% of the Republican electorate actually wants McCain and he gets what is essentially 100% of the vote.  If McCain gets 36% of the vote, then he should get 36% of the delegates from that state.  It is that simple.

And, the Democrats are no better.  Although their primaries are more proportional the math will drive Einstein crazy.  Proportionality takes place at the state level, the county level, the precinct level, the congressional district level, with districts getting a number of pre-determined delegates without regard for the number that actually voted, or certain jurisdictions in the state getting a higher percentage of delegates than their population would dictate.  It is unfair and, again, it denies people the benefit of their vote.  It would seem as simple as saying that the delegates will be assigned at the state level, based upon the number of delegates allowed for that state, based upon the percentage of votes actually achieved.  No add ons, no remittitures. 

And, then everybody talks about wanting a big tent.  So, what do many of these states do?  They turn away people who are wanting to vote in their primary.  Do not most churches enlarge their congregation by inviting people in to see, to try it out, to see if it is a good fit? The same has to be true for the parties.  Maybe people should only be allowed to vote in one party at one time, but they should be able to chose to vote, and chose that party right up until the time they actually vote.

Then there are the Super Delegates.  I think all elected officials should be able to caucus with their parties at the convention.  But, to allow them a Super vote is simply wrong.  Again, it simply denies the voters of their state the right to chose the party's nominee.  If their state votes overwhelming for Obama, they should not be able to show up and cast a super vote for Clinton.  The same is true if the state goes for Huckabee, they should not be able to show up and cast a super vote for McCain.

Lastly, I am just sick of Iowa and New Hampshire (and South Carolina and Nevada for that matter).  Retail politics is important.  I think the parties need to chose four or five states to hold earlier primaries (not caucuses), one at a time, and a month or two apart, that represents every part of the country.  Each of these primaries need to be truly proportional, open and online and transparent so that real people can get a real feel for the candidates.  Then, we need to move on to a national primary of sorts in which all of the remaining states participate, with voting occurring at locations or online, over a one week or two week period.  The votes can be instantly tallied and the delegates immediately proportioned as to states.

Closed, blind, low tech, inconvenient, and disproportionate primary elections, and no-count straw poll causes a no longer an option in a Third Wave world.

To all four remaining candidates of both parties preaching change, I say that change starts at home.  For you this means the party.  You cannot hope to build coalitions for change if you cannot even change your dysfunctional systems of voting.

Full post as published by Chuck Newton on February 11, 2008 (boomark / email).