Rand Paul for Joe Sestak? Anti-corporatist electoral cooperation, anybody?

[metamars]

Howdy. I often post at OpenLeft.com, and posted the following (http://www.openleft.com/showComment.do?commentId=179194) in a thread where many were lamenting the corporatist Democrats:


God willing, that is. What progressives could do, right now, is start a transpartisan dialog. To be specific, a transpartisan dialog which focuses on electoral strategies, and probes openness to cooperate at the ballot box. (To which end a healthy dose of relating tales of betrayal from party bigwigs, by both Democrat and Republican rank-and-file, would help create a constructive, if humbling, atmosphere.) There have already been significant efforts at constructing tranpartisan solutions, but my (admittedly sketchy) reading of "Voice of the People: The Transpartisan Imperative in American Life", by Chickering and Turner, (references here (http://openleft.com/diary/13883/references-from-voice-of-the-people-the-transpartisan-imperative-in-american-life)) revealed no electoral strategy, at all. An electoral strategy is necessary, of course, because what if your wonderful Congress critter doesn't give a hoot about your wonderful transpartisan proposal, perhaps because it's at odds with his big donors' desires? It's also necessary, IMO, because getting non-corporatists Dems and Republicans into office would empower the electorate, even if the compromises hammered by such Congress critters bear no resemblance to the transpartisan proposals created outside the halls of Congress, that Chickering and Turner pointed to.
For those who can't handle talking to libertarians, e.g., they should still be able to handle talking to Green Party members.

There's also groups like the PDA which don't abandon their principles just because they get pressured by Democrat bigwigs to do so, and that work within and without the Democratic Party. I wonder if they are amenable to embracing a trans-partisan electoral strategy, perhaps solely with the Green Party, for starters?

From a libertarian's perspective, an enticement from the lefty side, I strongly suspect, is an offer to get Rand Paul (son of Ron Paul) elected. (I don't know the details of the demographics of the state he's running for, and don't want to bother looking them up, so don't beat me up for this.) What sort of help lefties would expect, in return, is just the sort of question that a dialog could answer. Maybe getting Sestak elected in PA?

Trouble-maker that I am, I think I'll go float this idea at ronpaulforums.com, myself. :-)

My question to the ronpaulforums community, will follow after I describe a mutually beneficial, transpartisan electoral strategy:



Suppose a web site was set up, where progressive Democrat types living in Kentucky would que up on one side, and libertarian Republican types living in Pennsylvania would que up on the other side. Call these ques, Que A, and Que B. The ques have these constraints:

Everybody in Que A, who finds a matching person in Que B, pledges to vote for Rand Paul in the primary, and to donate 40 hours of their time in grassroots efforts towards getting him elected in his primary.

Everybody in Que B, who finds a matching person in Que A, pledges to vote for Joe Stestak in the primary, and to donate 40 hours of their time in grassroots efforts towards getting him elected in his primary.

Finding a match is simple: just look at the other que, for a person in exactly the same place in their que, as you are in yours. So, if you are #10,000 in Que B, if there is a #10,000 in QueA, then that is your match, and you are their match.

If no such person exists (i.e., if their que is shorter than your que, and you are towards the end of your que), then you are not obligated to support Sestak. And vice versa.

All participants can vote for whoever they want in the general election (well, another way to go about this, perhaps in the form of an additional que, is to require participants to support Paul/Sestak in the general elections, also. Further variations on the basic idea is to have an additional que for voters who will commit their votes, but not their time. Etc.)

I don't know what the requirements are to vote in a primary in Pa or Kentucky, but my guess is that you need to be a registered party member. Let's assume that's the case. In this case, in order to carry out your obligation, que participants would have to register for the appropriate party, to which the primary candidate belongs.



My question to the ronpaulforums community is: Assuming the above, would there be interest on the part of libertarian Republican types to actually participate in such an electoral strategy? If you read the OpenLeft thread I linked to, you will see that participants there are very frustrated with the corporate sellouts in the Democratic Party. I can't imagine that there is a lot of "joy in Mudville" on the Republican rank-and-file side, either, especially amongst libertarians.

[evilfunnystuff]

i dont think most libertarians would be comfortable voting for much less caampaigning for someone who doesnt support most of our ideals

[Young Paleocon]

Sestak is anti-Free-market in healthcare and a plethora of other issues.

[metamars]

i dont think most libertarians would be comfortable voting for much less caampaigning for someone who doesnt support most of our ideals

Even if it meant the difference (via parallel voters on the other que) between Rand Paul winning and losing?

I didn't say anybody had to do things enthusiastically. :) The basic ideas are :
a) it's better to get something than nothing and
b) is what you can get worth what you have to give up (including comfort level)?

[metamars]

Sestak is anti-Free-market in healthcare and a plethora of other issues.

Yes, sorry, I thought it was implicit that Sestak is nowhere near a libertarian, being favored by progressives.

For sure, there are many things that Rand Paul stands for the the progressives would be against, and many things that Sestak stands for that libertarians would be against.

[amy31416]

I'm in PA, and considering my choice will likely be between Toomey and Sestak, neither of whom I'm very excited about, and I absolutely want Specter out--I'd be willing to play ball. Despite Toomey being a Republican, he'd be no better than Sestak in representing my views.

However, having Rand win in Kentucky would definitely be of great interest to me.

Tell me more, grasshoppah.

[Epic]

Sestak is not for liberty - and besides it doesn't really matter what he believes in - he'll be whipped in voting however the dem. leadership wants him to vote.

Some people underestimate just how much suffering there would be if we had a "progressive" socialist society - they are called progressives, but if their policies were actually implemented it would lead to the destruction and regression of our entire civilization, due to the violations of economic law.

[amy31416]

Yes, sorry, I thought it was implicit that Sestak is nowhere near a libertarian, being favored by progressives.

For sure, there are many things that Rand Paul stands for the the progressives would be against, and many things that Sestak stands for that libertarians would be against.

Yup. I get it.

Thanks for bringing this up here, it's an intriguing idea.

[Epic]

I'm in PA, and considering my choice will likely be between Toomey and Sestak, neither of whom I'm very excited about, and I absolutely want Specter out--I'd be willing to play ball. Despite Toomey being a Republican, he'd be no better than Sestak in representing my views.

However, having Rand win in Kentucky would definitely be of great interest to me.

Tell me more, grasshoppah.

The big issues are economic right now, and on those Toomey will be better than Sestak, if for the only reason that republicans are decent on economic issues when they are out of power.

I'd say suck it up and vote for Toomey (if you aren't gonna vote libertarian), the democrats are trying to kill the country right now (basically whoever is in power is trying to kill the country, but right now we need to focus on economics).

[amy31416]

The big issues are economic right now, and on those Toomey will be better than Sestak, if for the only reason that republicans are decent on economic issues when they are out of power.

I'd say suck it up and vote for Toomey (if you aren't gonna vote libertarian), the democrats are trying to kill the country right now (basically whoever is in power is trying to kill the country, but right now we need to focus on economics).

My intention was to "waste my vote" and vote libertarian as I always do when there's nobody good to vote for, but if I can use that "wasted" vote and help get Rand elected? I have absolutely no qualms about that.

[Epic]

My intention was to "waste my vote" and vote libertarian as I always do when there's nobody good to vote for, but if I can use that "wasted" vote and help get Rand elected? I have absolutely no qualms about that.

How about an alliance just for the primary?

Cause then it would be Toomey vs. Sestak, and Toomey would have just as good a chance against either specter or sestak.

Meanwhile, Rand can win the general pretty easy I think, we just need to win the primary.

[amy31416]

How about an alliance just for the primary?

Cause then it would be Toomey vs. Sestak, and Toomey would have just as good a chance against either specter or sestak.

Meanwhile, Rand can win the general pretty easy I think, we just need to win the primary.

I'm open to options, in fact I considered switching to Dem because it's almost assured that Toomey will win the GOP primary and I want to make sure that Specter is gone.

[metamars]

I'm in PA, and considering my choice will likely be between Toomey and Sestak, neither of whom I'm very excited about, and I absolutely want Specter out--I'd be willing to play ball. Despite Toomey being a Republican, he'd be no better than Sestak in representing my views.

However, having Rand win in Kentucky would definitely be of great interest to me.

Tell me more, grasshoppah.

Well, if you read the thread that my post was in, I am anticipating the creation of tools to make "we the people" have a more responsive government. Right now, it's pretty obvious that corporations and banksters are driving the ship.

I have sketched out some ideas, and am working on one of them, myself. (See my sig.) But the million dollar idea is Nancy Bordier's Interactive Voter Choice System, (see here (http://www.reinventingdemocracy.us/)and, and a non-working prototype interface here (http://www.citizenswinninghands.net/)) which will allow for easy creation of voting blocs and pressure groups (with the implicit threat that a pressure group can become a voting bloc that will bounce a Congress critter out of office, if they insist on defying their constituents).

In the thread I posted in, I was responding to Bordier's post:


So, now that we all agree that the Democratic Party is a party of corporate hacks, (4.00 / 3)
what must we progressives do to enable the emerging progressive majority to get control of elections and legislative policy-making in the U.S.?
We here at Open Left have now figured out a couple of dozen ways of expressing the reality that the Democratic Party and the large majority of its candidates and elected representatives, as well as newly elected Democratic president Obama, do not represent the current progressive electoral base and can not be made to represent this base or the emerging progressive majority.

And now that HHS Secretary Sibelius has indicated this morning that Obama and his corporate fellow-travelers in Congress have killed the public option (Obama's disingenuous town hall disclaimers aside), what are we progressives going to do about it?

More talk, hand wringing and whining?

Continued impotence in the face of legislative acts and omissions by Congress, the president and the corporate special interests that control both, which have brought the U.S. to the brink of economic and financial diaster?

Or are we going to get to work to use the tools at hand to empower progressive voters to get control of government by getting control of existing political parties or starting new parties?

I thought this was a little unfair as the "tools at hand" aren't functional, yet. So, I suggested that some people take the initiative, and, anticipating a more capable tool for forming voting blocs, start a trans-partisan dialog to develop (or at least brainstorm) mutually beneficial electoral strategies, that could be accomplished without a more sophisticated tool. Starting now. Thus, when the Bordier invention is ready to go, there will already be a forum for transpartisan electoral strategies, if not working first attempts. My 2 que suggestion is not sophisticated, but, with enough support, could provide the difference to get both Paul and Sestak elected. Crude but effective is fine with me!

I'm not a wonky political guy, so I can't personally discuss details about whether or not Sestak for Paul is a good trade. I just happen to know of them from the more limited readings of politics that I do make, and I know that progressives strongly favor Sestak, and I know that libertarians strongly favor Rand Paul.

Right now, that's all there is to it - a suggestion. However, being the "troublemaker" that I am :) , if there's serious interest exhibited by libertarians, I could at least ask a Front Pager at OpenLeft to push a reciprocal response amongst the readers, there, in the form of a front page article, with an accompanying solicitation of early adopters/evangelists. My guess is that, initially, you'd only really need a few early adopters/evangelists on both sides, and even a half decent web site (for the ques). You'd probably also need some simple but cheap way to verify voters are real people. My thoughts in this regard are to verify via a small (say, $1.00) charge, using a credit card, to verify that John Smith of 20 Abilene Drive really does live there, according to his credit card company. The money could be donated to a non-political charity (after deducting for web hosting fees, say). The idea isn't to make money, the idea is to get people elected who aren't whores for corporations. But we also want to do what we can to make sure that Democrat and Republican party hacks don't ruin the effort by 'volunteering' a lot of people who don't exist.

Although pretty ignorant of party mechanics, my guess is that voters need to collaborate completely outside any formal party structure. My reasoning is that if the Republican Party finds out that the Rand Paul campaign is cooperating with the Sestak campaign, the repercussions from both the Democratic Party and the Republican Party, against their respective candidates, might be vicious.

Anybody interested in taking this idea, further?

[RM918]

This sort of wheeling and dealing is what led to the two party system in the first place. Perhaps not realistic, but I'd remain against it.

[Imperial]

I'm in PA, and considering my choice will likely be between Toomey and Sestak, neither of whom I'm very excited about, and I absolutely want Specter out--I'd be willing to play ball. Despite Toomey being a Republican, he'd be no better than Sestak in representing my views.

However, having Rand win in Kentucky would definitely be of great interest to me.

Tell me more, grasshoppah.

Right now it looks like Specter-Sestak will be a tossup. Sestak is still far-behind right now but lots of that is name recognition. Sestak has been gaining in the polls as time passes.

[metamars]

The big issues are economic right now, and on those Toomey will be better than Sestak, if for the only reason that republicans are decent on economic issues when they are out of power.

I'd say suck it up and vote for Toomey (if you aren't gonna vote libertarian), the democrats are trying to kill the country right now (basically whoever is in power is trying to kill the country, but right now we need to focus on economics).

Well, I don't view all Democrats as being alike, nor all Republicans as being alike. When I read your comment, the thought that comes to mind is "Why prefer a Republican corporatist over a Democratic corporatist, or vice versa?" Because the disease that affects both of them is the corruption that comes from a culture of ingratiation via Big Money.

I don't see a bright future for this country with either Republican or Democrat corporatists in charge.

Speaking for myself, I'm mostly concerned with destroying the Big Money control of Congress. What emerges out of that will be interesting to observe, but at least (I feel), it's not going to kill us, or make us debt slaves.

(BTW, Kucinich's economic advisor, Michael Hudson, was interviewed by Gary Null, recently (http://www.garynull.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/GaryNullShow081109.mp3). He didn't predict even a mediocre economic recovery, but rather debt peonage and a bad depression. I simply can't listen to a guy like Hudson rag about the Democrats, and then act like all Democrats are the same. But you won't get Hudson saying nice things about what the Bush administration did to us, economically, either.)

[Epic]

I think this whole episode should reinforce that radical decentralization is the best option. Neuter the federal government, and then when people want to try to change the government, they would just have to gather with like-minded people and act on a state or local basis, instead of trying to conquer the federal government and subject everyone in the entire country to your plans.

Of course, saying this is just expression of our political philosophy (limited federal government and localism) - but this episode should show the big-government authoritarian progressives that decentralization would help them achieve their goals.

[metamars]

How about an alliance just for the primary?

Cause then it would be Toomey vs. Sestak, and Toomey would have just as good a chance against either specter or sestak.

Meanwhile, Rand can win the general pretty easy I think, we just need to win the primary.

There's many variations possible, not all mutually exclusive. In fact, my main suggestion of a transpartisan electoral strategy only involved primary votes.

Although the subject of this thread regards Senate campaigns, therefore a state-wide domain, in terms of the House of Representatives, gerrymandering guarantees something like an 85% chance of re-election by an incumbent, if he runs, and an 80% chance of re-election by a member of the same party, if he doesn't.

If we only consider House races, cooperative electoral strategies make a lot of sense even for strongly partisan voters. If you're a Republican living in a strongly blue voting district, or vice versa, what difference does it make if you lose the ability to select the primary winner from your own party, since he only has a 15% chance of winning the general election, anyway? For exceptional candidates, fine, that would be a loss of opportunity to think about. My opinion of most Congress critters, however, from either party is rather low. If I can vote in a way that seems likely to result in a corporatist (D or R) getting replaced by something less corporatist, then I'm interested.

Of course, when you factor in the Senate, and the fact that you can't register as a Democrat for a House of Representatives primary, and as a Republican for a Senate primary, it gets more complicated. Ultimately, what'd be cool is to have tool that could calculate optimal voting strategies, automatically, using mathematical game theory. (See this link (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/16/magazine/16Bruce-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2) for a recent, fascinating article about the use of game theory in politics). However, we are not there, yet, and we've got to start somewhere.

My concern is starting soon enough before the country disintegrates.... The banksters have to go, the sooner, the better.

[metamars]

I think this whole episode should reinforce that radical decentralization is the best option. Neuter the federal government, and then when people want to try to change the government, they would just have to gather with like-minded people and act on a state or local basis, instead of trying to conquer the federal government and subject everyone in the entire country to your plans.

Of course, saying this is just expression of our political philosophy (limited federal government and localism) - but this episode should show the big-government authoritarian progressives that decentralization would help them achieve their goals.

My preferred journey out of the political mess we are in involves pushing more decisions down to the states. It's really impossible to predict, with confidence, whether an e-democracy 2.0 would help this process along, or even possibly hinder it, but my guess is that it would help it.

My reasoning is as follows: when an Interactive Voter Choice System is fully operational, there will have to be a pruning down of core policy options that a concensus candidate must embrace, so as to be more inclusive - i.e., more acceptable to a larger voting bloc. (this is my belief, not that of Nancy Bordier, I hasten to point out. Also, please keep in mind that she has a Ph.D. in political science, not me). That implies more policy options which don't make it into this reduced set, than otherwise. Hence, the set of policy options up for grabs increases, and that raises the question for candidates of what to do with them.

Well, if 2 candidates agree to embrace the concensus, core policy options, and one says "Well, I'll support X, Y, and Z of those that remain", while another candidate say "Well, I will push all remaining policy options down to the state level", then speaking for myself, at least for wedge issues that don't have any intrinsic Federal scope, that's not only fine with me, it'd be my preference. I'm not sure, but my guess is that this will also be preferable for most people, most of the time.

So, my prediction is that an e-democracy will increase variability from state to state, and decrease the control of the Federal government. State governments can also be tyrannical, but, as far as I know, none of them stop you from escaping the problem by just moving to another state. :)

[NYgs23]

metamars: This idea a tall order. There's no real communication between these groups, no desire for such communication, how would you form a coalition large enough to make a difference?

I think you might at least find it easier if you'd instead people to give money donations or to vote in the general, assuming your guy wins the primary. Like a same-day matching money bomb? Maybe you guys don't do those. But people would find it a lot of hassle and bother to join parties they don't really like and whoop for candidates they don't really support.

Sestak's probably a poor choice too. He won't support the Audit the Fed bill, which is practically item #1 of the day here. Maybe Alan Grayson? We liked how he chewed out the Fedsters. But he's not running for Senate.

[NYgs23]

I think you might at least find it easier if you'd instead people to give money donations...Like a same-day matching money bomb?

Actually, that's a dumb idea. Why would people give their money to some other candidate in hopes for a trade when they could just as easily give their money to their candidate? Forget I said that. But I guess a coalition of cross-state voters voting in the general is theoretically conceivable.

[metamars]

Actually, that's a dumb idea. Why would people give their money to some other candidate in hopes for a trade when they could just as easily give their money to their candidate? Forget I said that.

OK. :)



But I guess a coalition of cross-state voters voting in the general is theoretically conceivable.

Wouldn't it be much, much easier to dump an incumbent if a voting bloc of the sort I suggested focussed on primaries? In a recent primary day in PA, turnout was something like 20%. I've asked members of my family if they have ever voted in a primary, and they all said "no". That includes a cousin of mine who is an in-your-face kind of Democrat.

Once an incumbent is dumped, it's inevitable that the state party will rally around whoever did win the primary. Thus, while Obama may want Specter to go unchallenged, once Specter is thrown out, both Obama and the PA Democrats will support Sestak. Likewise, the Republican political machine in Kentucky may not care for Rand Paul, but once he wins the primary, they will certainly back him. (Actually, it's possible to get another Lieberman/CT outcome, but I expect that will be the exception.)

Ladies and gentlemen, if you really want to 'make trouble' and start a sea change in American politics, the primaries are the place to do it. If a 20% turnout is typical, and if independents weigh in at 39% of the electorate, then theoretically if all independents register with the dominant party in their district, and 100% voted in the primaries (while traditional party members still voted at a 20% rate), the independents could throw out the entire House of Representatives.

I think you have a point about asking people to "whoop it up", when it's not really in their heart. At a minimum, a work exchange que could simply involve passing out flyers. Also, this should be a separate que - the key thing if the primary vote.

So, I'll take back what I said, and instead say that an optimal strategy would be to emphasize only a primary voting que, and anybody so inclined could also sign up for a 40 work que, where it's understood that you don't have to sell the candidate, verbally (you can let the campaign literature do that).

The "rubber meets the road" at the ballot box. And the beauty of it is, it only takes a few hours to vote in the primary (well, your mileage will vary, but excessively long poll lines are atypical in general elections, so I assume the lines for primaries are even shorter.)

[metamars]

metamars: This idea a tall order. There's no real communication between these groups, no desire for such communication, how would you form a coalition large enough to make a difference?


The mechanics of setting up a web page with two lists is easy-peasy. (I'm a programmer, BTW.) Getting some sort of legal structure in place, which can accept $1.00 donations to verify voter identity through credit card charges, and then donate any excess to a charity, would require a lawyer, I suppose. Not sure, but maybe a PAC could handle that, though I have to admit that I have no idea if a single PAC can be used to support candidates from two different parties. (In a worst case scenario, I suppose that 2 PAC's could be set up, and they simply share the expenses of running the web site. Maybe you'd have to ask people to donate $1.00 to one PAC, and $1.00 to the other.) My guess is that only a couple hours of work on the part of the lawyer is required. Please bear in mind that I'm not a lawyer, and know basically nothing about campaign law, so perhaps I'm not seeing some major difficulty.

Getting the word out could be done for absolutely nothing via word of mouth (more likely, 'word of email'). Actually, that does suggest a better use of the $1.00 donations - instead of a charity, apply them to ads targetting voters in PA and KY.

[brandon]

Interesting idea, but not effective enough to be worthwhile.

A handful (or even a few hundred) of inter

[specsaregood]

Interesting idea, but not effective enough to be worthwhile.
A handful (or even a few hundred) of inter

True that. And I predict this thread title gets picked up and ran with by some pro-grayson blog.

[metamars]

Interesting idea, but not effective enough to be worthwhile.

A handful (or even a few hundred) of inter

What if the ques each get 10,000, or even 100,000 voters? I can't say that will happen, but how can you say that it won't?

[brandon]

^^I guess my post above got cut off and only half of what I wrote is showing up, but sounds like you guys understand what I was saying.

If you could really get like 50,000 voters interested in this idea, then I think it would be a good idea. The problem is, not that many people care about politics or voting. Elections are decided by the huge population of people that only care about politics one day per year (or one day every 4 years). The masses aren't on the internet reading and learning everything they can before making a decision. Only a few people do that.

[metamars]

^^I guess my post above got cut off and only half of what I wrote is showing up, but sounds like you guys understand what I was saying.

If you could really get like 50,000 voters interested in this idea, then I think it would be a good idea. The problem is, not that many people care about politics or voting. Elections are decided by the huge population of people that only care about politics one day per year (or one day every 4 years). The masses aren't on the internet reading and learning everything they can before making a decision. Only a few people do that.

Can anybody give us an estimate of how many voters Rand Paul would need, based on a recent poll + historical turnout for primaries, of how many additional voters Paul would need to show up to secure a primary victory? Of course, I'd also be curious about what analogous numbers would be in PA.