Ouch, Obama barely won against a man in prison in WV Dem Primary

[Hayabusa Rider]

Yes and no. WV allows voters to declare a party preference at the polling place. It seems highly likely that at least some of the voters in this primary were not in fact Democrats. There is little remaining motivation for Republicans to bother voting in primaries, and I'm sure at least some of them voted in the Democratic primary instead just to turn this into a "story."

Enough to take 40%?

Perhaps people feel that elections are a joke and pulled one.

I would love to have a chance to vote for this guy in ny. An honest crook for a change.

 

[woolfe9999]

Not just a random unknown Democrat, but a felon in prison in Texas!

Re-read my post. You missed the entire point.

 

[hal2kilo]

West Virginia

I was going to say the same thing and embellish it using the Chinatown quote but yea anyway.

Only state I've ever driven through where I saw a two story house with a trash pile running up to a second floor window.

 

[Paul98]

LOL, out of how many people voting?

 

[umbrella39]

LOL, out of how many people voting?

Counting the banjo player?

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Re-read my post. You missed the entire point.

A better point is that the system isn't representative. A President running for reelection will get the chance and those who identify with whatever party have no real say, no alternative but the other party. Thats not democracy in action, it's a sham.

 

[her209]

A better point is that the system isn't representative. A President running for reelection will get the chance and those who identify with whatever party have no real say, no alternative but the other party. Thats not democracy in action, it's a sham.

So you'd rather have a slew of candidates come time to vote? What happens if the winner doesn't get a majority of the votes?

 

[woolfe9999]

Another point here that bears mentioning. It should go without saying, but this article is low propaganda even by Fox standards:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries,_2012#cite_note-oklahoma-15

The Fox article first mentions this result in WV, making a big deal of the fact that the opponent was an inmate but failing to mention that this fact was not well publicized to voters there. It also goes on to say this:

Voters in other conservative states showed their displeasure with Obama in Democratic primaries last March.

To illustrate what they imply by use of the plural is a trend, it then goes on to mention just ONE other state, Oklahoma. In that state, Obama did only receive 57.1% to his opponents' 42.9%. The trouble is, that 42.9% was split among 4 opponents, with none getting more than 18%, meaning Obama got better than 3x his closest opponent. But that isn't the biggest problem. The biggest problem is that apparently it isn't within Fox's vaunted journalistic standard to report on the results in any other state. Just look at the wiki I linked. The results in those states range from Obama getting 76% to 100%, 76% to 98% in the states were he had an opponent on ballot.

Apparently, the results in all these other states aren't worth reporting.

- wolf

 

[woolfe9999]

A better point is that the system isn't representative. A President running for reelection will get the chance and those who identify with whatever party have no real say, no alternative but the other party. Thats not democracy in action, it's a sham.

That doesn't resurrect the refuted premise of this thread. It was nice try though. You care to explain why it's relevant that an inmate got 40% of the vote in WV when in fact this inmate merely got on the ballot by paying a fee and no one even knew he was an inmate?

 

[DaveSimmons]

Here in WA you didn't need to be registered for either party to vote in the primaries. Depending on the year, you:
- just checked "prefers R" or "prefers D" and voted in that party group, or
- were allowed to vote either party on an office by office basis

So at least in WA if you knew Romney had a lock and wanted to make a statement, you could either vote Ron Paul or vote on the Dem nominations to cause some mischief.

It probably does show Dems in WV aren't 100% happy with Obama, but those voting knew it wasn't going to matter how they voted, Obama is certain to get the nomination. And some of them might have been Rs in D clothing.

 

[Jpark]

It's all relative.

If there was a dumb@ss response of the week award, you just won. Congrats. Go upstairs and have your mom bake you a cake.


Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

 

[Paul98]

Just goes to show how idiotic and ignorant the general public and voters are. But then again these votes don't really matter so who cares.

 

[crashtestdummy]

West Virginia.

In 2008 Obama lost to Hillary by 41 points, and 1 out of 5 voters mentioned race as being a factor in their decision. (those mentioning race going overwhelmingly for Hillary)

Darn, Obama's not going to win West Virginia now. He was so close in 2008 too.

This. WV very often votes democrats into office (coal miners like unions), but they're still racist there. They skew old, white, and poor. Not exactly Obama's best set of demographics.

 

[woolfe9999]

This. WV very often votes democrats into office (coal miners like unions), but they're still racist there. They skew old, white, and poor. Not exactly Obama's best set of demographics.

It might be this to some extent. However, I think something is amiss here because Obama did considerably better than this where he ran opposed in other southern deep red states. The Oklahoma result was understandable because he had 4 opponents there and 2 had some funding and actually campaigned. In Tennessee and Alabama he got 88% and 80% of the vote. This guy in WV was a total unknown and AFAIK did little or no active campaigning.

Incumbent primaries have extremely low turnouts and are generally not well publicized. Most voters pay no attention and may not even be aware that their primary took place. A small grass roots effort could conceivably sway such a vote to an outlier result like this. I don't know exactly what happened here, but I suspect there is more to this story.

 

[monovillage]

Re-read my post. You missed the entire point.

I did, not quite the entire point, but a part of it. Sorry.

 

[shadow9d9]

Not towing the republican line doesn't make someone or something a "liberal." There is nothing liberal about Obama. He middle/right.

 

[Jhhnn]

Enough to take 40%?

Perhaps people feel that elections are a joke and pulled one.

I would love to have a chance to vote for this guy in ny. An honest crook for a change.

Start from a position where 20% of the voters regard race as an "issue". Add the perception that the Obama Admin is anti-coal, and the fact that Judd has played this game before in Idaho...

Obama didn't win their 5 electoral votes in 2008, and he won't this time, either.

To quote Forrest Gump, "Stupid is a stupid does." Realize that few places in this country are any dumber or poorer than W Virginia, and, well, there you have it.

 

[MomentsofSanity]

Let's see... coal industry hating on Obama? Check
Hillary won by over 41% in 2008 AFTER she dropped out? Check
20% of voters who state race is a factor in how they vote? Check


Really not a shocking result here.

 

[monovillage]

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shadow9d9
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Not towing the republican line doesn't make someone or something a "liberal." There is nothing liberal about Obama. He middle/right.
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Stop using that quote from me in your signature. It is an intentional misrepresentation of what was being discussed.

 

[woolfe9999]

Start from a position where 20% of the voters regard race as an "issue". Add the perception that the Obama Admin is anti-coal, and the fact that Judd has played this game before in Idaho...

Obama didn't win their 5 electoral votes in 2008, and he won't this time, either.

To quote Forrest Gump, "Stupid is a stupid does." Realize that few places in this country are any dumber or poorer than W Virginia, and, well, there you have it.

Sounds like a perfect storm to me. We'll find out how much Obama cares when we see how much he bothers to campaign there later this year. Probably as much as Romney will campaign in California.

 

[Hayabusa Rider]

Start from a position where 20% of the voters regard race as an "issue". Add the perception that the Obama Admin is anti-coal, and the fact that Judd has played this game before in Idaho...

Obama didn't win their 5 electoral votes in 2008, and he won't this time, either.

To quote Forrest Gump, "Stupid is a stupid does." Realize that few places in this country are any dumber or poorer than W Virginia, and, well, there you have it.

Which is entirely irrelevant to my point which is that the system offers no option. That's means democracy, representative or not, is a sham.

 

[Ausm]

Attila the Hun would lose a primary in WV so what's your point?

 

[woolfe9999]

Which is entirely irrelevant to my point which is that the system offers no option. That's means democracy, representative or not, is a sham.

You're off topic here, but you're persistent, so I'll bite. How is it a sham? People can vote for third parties. People can donate to third parties. They do not. That is their democratic choice.

Moreover, what makes you think that countries with more than two viable political parties are better off than we are? Those systems are messed up in myriad ways, some similar and some different from the ways ours is messed up.

 

[werepossum]

Yes and no. WV allows voters to declare a party preference at the polling place. It seems highly likely that at least some of the voters in this primary were not in fact Democrats. There is little remaining motivation for Republicans to bother voting in primaries, and I'm sure at least some of them voted in the Democratic primary instead just to turn this into a "story."

Unlikely, since Republicans voting in the Democrat primary would lose their chance to chime in on the Republican nomination. (Well, in theory - this IS West Virginia.) Even now that Romney has all but locked up the nomination, voting fro other Republican candidates strengthens their wings within the party. It is becoming common to vote in the opposition party's primary when your party's candidate is the incumbent, but there would be no point in giving up your chance in your own party's primary to meddle in the opposition party's primary with o chance whatsoever of having any effect.

This does go to show the importance of research even in a protest vote - that would have been very embarrassing to West Virginia had the state voted for a felon rather than Obama. As it stands, I doubt Obama cares either way. I do want to know how this cat qualified fro the election while in prison (apparently out of state), and why the media was not screaming about his incarceration. Looks like the West Virginia media is as anti-Obama as the national media is pro-Obama. Do they get a leg cramp rather than a thrill?

 

[werepossum]

Let's see... coal industry hating on Obama? Check
Hillary won by over 41% in 2008 AFTER she dropped out? Check
20% of voters who state race is a factor in how they vote? Check


Really not a shocking result here.

That was 20% of 2008 Democrat primary voters, thank you very much.

Attila the Hun would lose a primary in WV so what's your point?

Well, at least you recognize that Attila the Hun would be running as a Democrat.