Monday, August 3, 2009

Petitions...PETITIONS!


Well, it's August in an odd-numbered year. As sure as the sun rises in the East, as sure as either the Red Sox or the Yankees will be on top in the AL East (and as sure as the other will be right behind), so West Haven Democrats are fighting and pulling petitions to get on the primary ballot. By my count, there are at least 8 different petitions circulating for a September 15th primary. In addition, there's another 4 petitions to get on the November ballot.

It's almost getting to the point where we need Jimmy Carter to negotiate a peace agreement...though I doubt Mother Theresa could pull that off here.

7 comments:

THREEFIFTHS said...

We need to do away with this Two party system,Both are crooked.One does the bank job,The other drives the getway car!!!

West Haven Bob said...

You'd be right.....IF there was a true two party system in this town.

But there isn't. The best we have is one faction of the Democrats acting as watchdogs over the other faction.

Hardly a recipe for good government.

Threefifths said...

This is why we should have proportional representation which would do a way with this twwo crooked party system.
http://www.worldpolicy.org/projects/globalrights/democracy/abcs.html

West Haven Bob said...

The proportional system would give us the worst aspects of the parliamentary system, with few or none of its strengths.

Case in point: Israel or Italy, where extreme fringe parties can dictate to the more moderate (and far larger) parties.

THREEFIFTHS said...

And the two party system we have now have done nothing for the people and more for the Corporatist.All you have to do is look at the money that these corporate vampires put into the coffins of both the crooked two partys.Also let us take a look at this countrys election laws.We do not have a single uniform set of rules for voting or even 50 separate state election systems. There are 4,600 different election systems.Look at the crooked town committees system which most of the time is control by the Incumbent,Who in turn looks at for there family and friends with jobs.Look at the mayor of New York
Bloombreg who got the city counicil
to drop term limits so he could run
again. Also why should a person have to petitions to get on the ballot.Also under this crooked two party system we are force to vote for the one of the two evils.Last this two party system is noting more than a corporate plutocracy,This is what is happing here in West Haven,Look at how skull and bones ie: yale is taking over this town.Bottom line we need to give proportional representation
a chance.But the sad part is that most constituents know only about the two party system.In fact most don't even know how the voting system works.

steve risher said...

It was the wonderful "two party" system that gave us the current economic meltdown. It took a bipartisan effort by W, Barney Frank and the rest of the wretched crew.

Comparing the US to Israel and Italy is apples and oranges to the nth degree. Israel has been in effectively in a state of war since it was founded and it has unique constituencies like the ultra-orthodox religious parties and the ultra-militant settlers on the West Bank. Italy is probably ungovernable under any system (except a dictatorship like Mussolini's)because of the North-South divide.

Germany and the Netherlands seem to manage Proportional Representation without too many problems. Netherlands does have problems-but mainly because of Islamic immigration, not PR.

West Haven Bob said...

Steve -

I have my own problems with the "two party" system as practiced in the US...even as a liberal Democrat.

However, the solutions (or alternatives) you suggest can't be practical in our country...specifically because of how we were created.

For one, Germany's proportional system was born out of the Weimar Republic (a liberal democracy); and the result was Hitler. After the Second War, it was re-established, but with controls on speech, party affiliations, and the like. Do you REALISTICALLY believe that a majority of voters, in two-thirds of the 50 states, would vote to overturn the First Amendment? As a practical person, I should think not.

Democracy's weakest moment is when the people are panicked about threats they do not understand. This is when demagogues step in.

The answer is to fully inform the people.