a rare political post

[arcanology]

I'm really vexed that the filibuster has forced me to vote for someone who is able to take a gold plated sure thing on a silver platter with spangles and brass band and drop it on the floor and then run it over with a truck. A loss to learn again the lesson that you have to nominate someone who has done more than work his or her way up in the

Comments

[marcusmarcusrc]

Yeah, I was hoping that we'd have learned the lesson in the Romney election: 3 Democratic primary candidates back then, and my recollection is that the primary winner was the one of the 3 with the worst chance to beat Romney. (I didn't vote in that primary, and boy did I learn my lesson. I _would_ have voted in this primary if I were still voting in Mass...)

Also, I have a sudden desire to go buy basketball shoes now...

[arcanology]

I think the problem is that the primary is about turnout via the party machinery, which all votes for the official party favorite, and you don't get to be the official favorite by offending anyone, so we get bland with bland sauce.

[marcusmarcusrc]

Except occasionally you get the reverse, where in order to win the primary you've got to appeal to the base, giving either a) an extreme, and therefore unelectable candidate, or b) an extreme, and therefore uncompromising individual actually elected. (b seems to happen a lot in the Republican party... the Democrats, for all their not being good at cattle-herding once they get into Congress, seem to have a more effective machine for selecting primary candidates... maybe its the union influence?)

[fredrickegerman]

The folks I back in primaries almost always lose. Pity, because I vote for folks I'd like to see winning the general.

[harrock]

Well, it appears it will be educational. Whether the party machine is paying attention remains to be seen.

[arcanology]

They're pretty incurably stupid, it's true.

[greyautumnrain]

I'm sure in the senate she will have a long career...

I wouldn't be so sure about that given that she apparently was busy conceding the race around the time you were posting.

[psychohist]

I think it's naive to blame this on Coakley. Lots of independents voted in the Democratic primary - and they voted for Coakley because they disliked the other options even more.

The fact is, it wasn't Coakley who lost this election, it was Obama and his policies. A health care plan that prohibits most private plans from covering abortion, and would increase the number of uninsured in Massachusetts? Not a winner.

[marcusmarcusrc]

But the exit polls that I've seen show that Obama had a 53 to 59 percent favorability among the voters, so I'm not sure that an Obama-based explanation necessarily makes sense... http://mediamatters.org/research/201001200006

(I grant you, if Obama had been able to lower unemployment in Mass, or possibly if he'd really stuck it to the bankers, or other popular activities, that probably would have helped Coakley)

[arcanology]

Probably helped, but I don't think this is about Obama, this is about the local Republicans nominating from the heart while the local Democrats nominate from the party roster.

[kirisutogomen]

What gives you the idea that the Republicans nominated from the heart?