Politico Story on Democratic Fears About Cornel West and No Labels Misses Important Points

Posted on by August 3, 2023

Two prominent journalists, Holly Otterbein and Jonathan Lemire, have this new story at Politico about Democratic Party fears over the 2024 presidential election in relation to Cornel West and No Labels. Although the story is lengthy, there is almost nothing new in it.

A truly original story on this subject would make these points: the two nations most similar to the United States are Canada and Great Britain. Like the U.S., Canada and Great Britain do not use proportional representation nor do they have general election run-offs. But it is unthinkable in Canada for the governing Liberal Party to try to keep the left-leaning New Democratic Party off the ballot, even though Liberal Party candidacies are presumably hindered in their campaign against the Conservative Party by the presence on the ballot of the New Democratic Party. The same point is true for Great Britain, where the Labour Party does not try to keep the British Green Party off the ballot. Ballot access for all candidates in Canada and Great Britain is exceedingly easy and no one ever talks about making it difficult.

There is something wrong with the dominant political culture of the United States. Supposedly neutral commentators seem to think there is nothing wrong with restricting competition. The Politico story could have mentioned that the Democratic Party has taken action to keep its competitors off the ballot in the presidential elections of 1936, 1940, 1948, 1952, 1956, 1960, 1976, 1980, 2004, 2020, and already 2024.

The Politico story could also have mentioned that bills to use ranked choice voting in presidential and other general elections have been introduced in various states with Democratic legislative majorities for 24 years, but no legislature had passed such bills until this year when such a bill passed in Oregon, which has a Democratic majority in both houses of its legislature. If Democrats have been worried about “spoiling” for so many decades, why haven’t they passed ranked choice voting in past decades, in states where they had the power to do so?

The one new piece of information in the Politico story is the mention that close associates of Cornel West have been trying to persuade him not to run for president. The article says so far West has rejected such advice.

Comments

Politico Story on Democratic Fears About Cornel West and No Labels Misses Important Points — 50 Comments

  1. They seem to be particularly concerned that some blacks might go fugitive and escape their plantation.

  2. Though I haven’t read the entire long Politico article yet, I suspect that it is missing what all other news commentaries and interviews on the subject have overlooked: Exactly HOW are these Democrat operatives and PACS planning to, as the article notes, “dull” and stop third-party attempts to get on state ballots? Upping petitioner-signature requirements, restricting collection time and district distribution, etc?
    Also it’s ironic that sage political NoLabels officialdom (and others), like Jay Nixon (former Missouri governor), are now suddenly seeing the light and speaking out about the right of humble third-parties to get on state ballots and simply offer competition and choice to voters, and that such is a bedrock principal of our system!
    Yes, of course! We BAN readers know this all to well; So where were these pious NoLabels spokespeople during all our third-party-struggling decades?
    Anyway, big kudos to Rich Winger for a sterling commentary (international perspective) to what has tragically been taken as the undemocratic norm in contemporary politics: that the two-party duopoly naturally tries to protect their turf and “dull” competition thru myriad ballot-access hurdles.

  4. “There is something wrong with the dominant political culture of the United States”

    The key flaw in the US Constitution is that the President is too powerful, and has too few restraints on expanding that power. Both major parties expand the power of the office by executive decree whenever they possess it. Both major parties have come to find it intolerable when the other party holds the office.

    Hence, both major parties conspire to restrict any potential third party or independent candidates who might tip the election one way or other from running.

    The short term solution to this problem is to have some sort of run-off voting for President in each state when no candidate gets 50% of the vote.

    The long term solution is to replace the office of President with a joint multi-member executive, such as in Switzerland, such that the government almost always has a national unity government that includes all significant parties, creating checks on the power of the executive within the branch itself.

  6. @WZ,

    When the uniform election date for president was set, explicit provision was made for states that required majority for election.

  7. Sounds like we’re both fed up with the both ruling parties (but especially the “Democratic” Party’s) efforts to sue/legislate/intimidate opposition candidates and parties off of ballots. I wrote a Letter to the Editor of my area’s regional newspaper with some of the same points. Hopefully many more people also start pushing back against the ruling parties’ authoritarian efforts. https://thesouthern.com/opinion/letters/voice-of-the-reader-theres-still-time/article_4e4c896c-2262-11ee-8690-d7962ecbbecb.html

  9. Joshua H. is a communist so of course he is going to push for a communist voting system.

  10. Clearly some folks like Tom are so off the rails fascist that they believe everyone who isn’t fascist like they are is a Communist. That, or they’re trolling. Hard to tell sometimes. Regardless, RCV isn’t perfect, but it’s a heck of a lot better than the current rigged electoral system here.

  12. Joshua H. is a fucking retard. He admitted to being Green Party, which is interchangeable with communism. He can’t hide what he is.

  13. LOTS OF FATAL ROT CARRIED INTO 1776-1789 STATE/USA REGIMES FROM OLDE ENGLAND/UK

    F-A-T-A-L PARTS OF CURRENT REGIMES —

    UNEQUAL BALLOT ACCESS LAWS FOR PARTISAN OFFICES

    MINORITY RULE GERRYMANDERS FOR USA CONGRESS / ALL STATE LEGIS / 12 AMDT EC

    ALL SORTS OF MAJOR SOP VIOLATIONS- CONGRESS IMPEACHMENTS, PREZ VETOES, PREZ PARDONS, PREZ TREATIES, PREZ LEGIS EXEC ORDERS. PREZ LEGIS AGREEMENTS WITH FORN REGIMES

    PARTISAN HACK EXECS

    USA- NO ELECTION OF USA ATT GEN, USA SOS, USA TREASURER, USA MARSHALS AND USA DAS

    PARTISAN HACK JUDGES – ELECTED OR USA APPOINTED [BY HACK PREZ EXECS]
    —
    PR
    APPV – NONPARTISAN EXECS/JUDICS
    TOTAL SOP

  15. AZ is such a hypocrite. He wants the treasurer to be elected, yet not a replacement for a resigned or dead person. What a fucking retard.

  17. Except Communists tend to not believe in a multiparty electoral system, but rather a single party state. I strongly believe in multiparty politics, which is why I read and comment on here. I don’t have to hide from what I’m not. And despite my differences and disagreements with communist political thought, I have a far dimmer view of fascists. Fascist ideology by all accounts is based around totalitarianism and hatred of other people, with no redeeming qualities.

    I really do not understand how a website focused on free and fair democratic elections can attract fascists. Perhaps trolling is just that fun for you guys. In which case, I’m done with this thread as I do not want to feed the wild animals.

  18. Joshua H. has no idea what a fascist is. It’s pretty much communism only slightly different. Joshua H. is a commie retard.

  21. AZ. Joshua H. is a commie retard, but at least he knows how to type complete sentences.

  22. Joshua H doesn’t want us to know that commies love multipartisan elections, free expression, and oftentimes even gun rights until they get in power. After they’re in power it’s a whole different story. Communism in power is an even more extreme form of communism. The reason Joshua and AZ keep calling people who are nowhere near fascist “fascists” is because communist propaganda tries to falsely associate traditionalist conservatism, nationalism, and right wing populism with fascism. In reality, leftard commies like Joshua Hellman, Aborted Zombie, Beijing Biden and Obama Bin Laden are way closer to fascist than those of us who are Trump supporters, Christian Nationalists, and rightwing patriots are.

  25. I’m not friendly to the Politico story’s argument, but the 3 key differences I’d point out between Canada and the UK to the U.S. is:

    1.) They don’t elect their leader in those countries. There’s no such thing as a singular national election. The American equivalent to the Prime Ministers of Canada and the UK would be the Speaker of the House.
    2.) Those districts for Parliament are significantly smaller in population size than House districts in the U.S., which means they’re extremely smaller than statewide and national districts. That makes it significantly harder to close gaps per percentage point.
    3.) Party leaders in those countries exercise far greater control on who their candidates are compared to here where the parties’ control once primaries came to be prevalent is minimal beyond attempting to control fundraising.

  26. ““There is something wrong with the dominant political culture of the United States”

    The key flaw in the US Constitution is that the President is too powerful, and has too few restraints on expanding that power. Both major parties expand the power of the office by executive decree whenever they possess it. Both major parties have come to find it intolerable when the other party holds the office.”

    I would not say it’s a key flaw in the Constitution that the President is too powerful more than the legislature has devolved off its responsibilities for political reasons, and the President captures it by default. Look post 2020 elections, Democrats controlled both houses and responded by telling Biden do as much by executive order as possible so they would not have to deal with the Republicans in both chambers, and let’s be real, it’s not like Republicans are much better. People have finally caught on that they don’t like the Supreme Court having so much power, but that’s down to the legislature doesn’t do much law-making so everyone gears toward creating lawsuits that forces the Supreme Court to rule on its constitutionality. The superpowered Supreme Court that has occurred in the early 21st century is explicitly down to Congress can’t or won’t write laws to resolve problems.

  27. RYAN –

    CONSTITUTION SUBVERTED BY SCOTUS ALMOST SINCE DAY 1- APPROX TIME ORDER

    1-9-4 DIRECT TAX ON ASSETS VS INDIRECT TAXES ON NEW GOODS/SERVICES
    1-8-11 MANY UN-DECLARED WARS — DE FACTO FRENCH NAVAL WAR IN 1798, ETC
    3-2-1 INTERNAL STATE RIVERS AS BRING HIGH SEAS
    3-2-1 STATE CORPS AS BEING STATE CITIZENS
    1-8-5 PAPER MONEY IN USA CIVIL WAR
    1-8-3 SO-CALLED DORMANT INTERSTATE COMMCE CL
    1-8-12 SO-CALLED MILITARY DRAFT
    1-8-16 SO-CALLED NATIONAL GUARD – SUBVERTING MILITIAS WITH STATE OFFICERS
    1-8-1 GENERAL WELFARE CL 1936 ONWARD
    —
    CONGRESS ALMOST DEAD
    STATES ALMOST DEAD
    ALMOST LAWLESS TYRANT PREZ
    —
    P-A-T

  29. WZ-

    DO A SEARCH OF THE US CODE FOR “PRESIDENT”
    — UNDER 10,000 MENTIONS ???

    MOST PREZ STUFF DELEGATED BY PREZ TO LOWER HACKS IN THE CHAIN OF ROT COMMAND.

  31. Jim Riley wrote:

    “When the uniform election date for president was set, explicit provision was made for states that required majority for election”

    I’m not sure to what you are referring. Clearly states are not required to select their electors by majority vote. Many states have chosen them with a mere plurality, which, in fact, is part of the problem.

  32. Ryan wrote:

    “The superpowered Supreme Court that has occurred in the early 21st century is explicitly down to Congress can’t or won’t write laws to resolve problems.”

    The way that the Constitution is supposed to work is that if Congress doesn’t pass laws, everything reverts to the status quo. If anyone is unsatisfied with that, then solutions ought to be sought at the state or local level. And, even then, if that doesn’t “work”, a truly liberal society would allow for non-government, non-compulsory remedies.

  33. I’m also for gradual movement towards my plan. Implementing it immediately would be extremely disruptive.

  34. The key flaw isn’t so much this or that provision as generally leaving room open to have things drift in the direction they did along multiple vectors, which I subsequently tighten up in my plan to prevent.

  35. AZ wrote:

    “MOST PREZ STUFF DELEGATED BY PREZ TO LOWER HACKS IN THE CHAIN OF ROT COMMAND.”

    Even the President doesn’t know how much power he has, and what’s being done in his name.

    If we had 7 “Presidents”, like the Swiss, each would have some knowledge of what’s going on that the others don’t have, and can bring issues up among them that our sole, monarchical President doesn’t have time for.

  36. The US Constitution is a great constitution. We just have to make it work the way Madison intended. Power must be distributed to the states and municipalities, and checks and balances must be maintained between the branches at each level.

    Of primary importance is to resist the drift of power to the executive branch. This is virtually a universal problem globally. Throughout history, the tendency to monarchy disrupts the best constitutions everywhere.

  37. WZ —

    THE OLDE ROMAN REPUBLIC ROTTED FOR ABOUT 500 YEARS BEFORE JULIUS BROKE IT AND THEN AUGUSTUS CAESAR

    KILLED IT IN 27 BC — TYRANT ROMAN EMPIRE TO 476 AD – THEN 1,000 PLUS YEARS OF DEEP DARK AGE.

    ONLY BY POLITICAL MIRACLE — ENGLISH HOUSE OF COMMONS VS KC 1 AND LATER VS. KJ 2 IN 1600S, USA VS KG3 IN 1761-1784.

    2023-1776 = 247 YEARS AND COUNTING – ESP — THE NONSTOP MINORITY RULE GERRYMANDER ROT IN
    USA CONGRESS / 12 AMDT EC / ALL STATE LEGIS / MANY LOCAL REGIMES

    PREZ TYRANT WORSE AND WORSE ROT SINCE 1929-1933 — SEE TRUMP– SEE BIDEN
    —
    HOW ABOUT TRY AND WAKE UP THE KNOW-IT-ALL TYPES IN THE USA/STATE/LOCAL BRAIN DEAD / ZOMBIE MEDIA WHO LOVE MONARCHS ABOUT THE T-O-T-A-L POLITICAL MINORITY RULE ROT AND DANGER TO THE SURVIVAL OF HUMAN LIFE ON MOTHER EARTH. TIME IS OBVIOUSLY RUNNING O-U-T.
    P-A-T

  38. Even the most cursory glance at history from the most ancient times to the present, or even around all the cultures of the contemporary world should reveal to even the weakest intellects that the most dangerous enemy of peace, freedom and prosperity is the accumulation of executive power at the highest levels everywhere.

  39. JR/WZ

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidential_Election_Day_Act

    On January 23, 1845, the 28th US Congress passed “An act to establish a uniform time for holding elections for electors of President and Vice President in all the States of the Union.” The act selected “the Tuesday after the first Monday in November” as the day on which all states must appoint electors. However, if a state fails to appoint electors by that day, then “the electors may be appointed on a subsequent day in such manner as the State shall by law provide.” This standardization greatly increased the speed of Presidential elections; the previous election of 1844 lasted from November 1-December 4. From 1848 onward, every Presidential election has been held on this date.
    Citations
    Presidential Election Day Act ch. 1, 5 Stat. 721

    ——
    AFTER THE 2022 EC MACHINATIONS ACT — BASED ON THE 6 JAN 2021 ATTACK ON THE CAPITOL BY TRUMP GOONS

    US CODE TITLE 3 –
    §1. Time of appointing electors

    The electors of President and Vice President shall be appointed, in each State, on election day, in accordance with the laws of the State enacted prior to election day.

    (Added Pub. L. 117–328, div. P, title I, §102(a), Dec. 29, 2022, 136 Stat. 5233 .)

    ******
    §21. Definitions
    As used in this chapter the term-
    (1) “election day” means the Tuesday next after the first Monday in November, in every fourth year succeeding every election of a President and Vice President held in each State, except, in the case of a State that appoints electors by popular vote, if the State modifies the period of voting, as necessitated by force majeure events that are extraordinary and catastrophic, as provided under laws of the State enacted prior to such day, “election day” shall include the modified period of voting.
    (2) “State” includes the District of Columbia.
    (3) “executive” means, with respect to any State, the Governor of the State (or, in the case of the District of Columbia, the Mayor of the District of Columbia), except when the laws or constitution of a State in effect as of election day expressly require a different State executive to perform the duties identified under this chapter.
    (Added Pub. L. 87–389, §2(a), Oct. 4, 1961, 75 Stat. 820 ; amended Pub. L. 117–328, div. P, title I, §§102(b), 104(b), Dec. 29, 2022, 136 Stat. 5233 , 5235.)
    —

    force majeure events that are extraordinary and catastrophic — FATAL LOOPHOLE BY THE GERRYMANDER HACK MORONS OR WHAT ???

    ABOLISH THE FATAL EC
    P-A-T

  41. “Power must be distributed to the states and municipalities, and checks and balances must be maintained between the branches at each level.”

    Municipalities have no power in the Constitution. The way it’s setup is the federal government and the states are “partners” of a sort with each having responsibilities. In contrast how states are setup in relation to municipalities is it’s very much a top-down relationship.

  42. “In contrast how states are setup in relation to municipalities is it’s very much a top-down relationship.”

    This is true, but, nevertheless, devolving power to municipalities, and leaving them a wide latitude prevents the state legislature from having to decide every issue. Why shouldn’t a municipality be able to decide on its own voting method without petitioning the legislature?

  43. WZ-

    state monarchs/oligarchs do not want any local competing monarchs/oligarchs

    part of p-a-t — one form of local govt- the city — see ***citizen***

    all cities with equal legs and exec powers —- judic only state courts.

  44. So what about folks who live rural? No counties? What sense does that make? What about very large cities which are bigger than many states, no local government smaller than the city? Count on AZ to have a remarkably idiotic “solution” to anything and everything to make it worse.

  45. SAM – LARGE / SMALL SIZE RURAL CITIES

    RURAL VOTERS WILL GET PR REGIMES LIKE URBAN VOTERS

    —
    P-A-T

  46. Rural cities? What are you babbling about? They’re called counties. They contain towns and unincorporated areas. Each naturally has its own forms of government. What Damn fool business is that of the federal government’s ???

  47. ARBITRARY DEFINITION OF POLITICAL SUBDIVISIONS IN ALL STATES.

    OBVIOUSLY IN ALL COLONIES/STATES EARLY ON ALL LOCAL GOVTS HAD LOW POPULATIONS.

    CURRENT AT LARGE / GERRYMANDER REGIMES ARE LIKELY MORE OPPRESSIVE IN LOW POPULATION RURAL AREAS THAN IN *BIG* CITIES — OUT OF SIGHT STUFF MILES/MILES AWAY.

    SMALLER CITIES = MAX ZIM UTOPIAS ???
    —
    P-A-T
    —–
    P-A-T

  48. In New England, you can barely drive five, maybe ten, miles, at most, and you are in another town, except for the upper, forested regions of Maine. And, each and every city and town,has its own form of government, of which there are a wide variety, from open town meetings, representative town meetings, council-manager, and mayor-council, and various hybrids of them. No need for one-size-fits-all municipal government in any state, IMO. ,

  49. Anyone who thinks big cities are less oppressive is severely out of touch with reality.

  50. THERE ARE NO MAXZIM UTOPIAS. RURAL AND SMALL TOWN AREAS ARE RELATIVELY MORE SANE VIS A VIS BIG CITIES.

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