Almost time to start paying attention

[gwendally]

Roughly speaking, my father is a midwest-Republican factory worker who didn't go to college, and my mother is an East-coast liberal Jew with a master's degree. There's an improbable story to explain how they formed zygotes. Anyway, I'm the genetic result: politically DEAD CENTER. I see why reasonable people would vote for candidates in both

Comments

[gwendally]

http://www.cato.org/publications/commentary/donald-trump-supporters-think-about-morality-differently-other-voters-heres

[chess]

Here's a UK newspaper's take on the candidates, which is at least a fairly arms-length viewpoint and surprisingly even-handed given their usual left-wing bias (the UK media not being quite as howlingly polarised as the US media yet):

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/01/us-presidential-election-2016-republican-candidates-donald-trump-ted-cruz-marco-rubio

I've had a quick read through it and it looks like it has most of its facts straight as far as I know them, and doesn't fall into too many of either side's 'talking points'.

If I had to vote in the Republican primary it'd be for Rubio - he has a decent chance of winning and isn't likely to do anything too heinous, by the standards of the field - but I am definitely a card-carrying pinko.

[gwendally]

Thank you!

Which reminds me that I decorate my mail intake area with piles of unread Economist magazines. Perhaps they have some profiles, too.

[froggoddess]

Here's a quiz with lots of issues and sub categories and options:
https://www.isidewith.com/elections/2016-presidential-quiz

[crazyburro]

Interesting. My top (ranging from 77% to 81%) are

Bernie Sanders: social, foreign policy, domestic policy, immigration, healthcare, electoral, science
Jill Stein: social, foreign policy, domestic policy, health care, electoral, science
Gary Johnson: social, economic, domestic policy, immigration, education

Voted for Gary Johnson last time.

Everyone else is substantially lower, with Clinton, Bloomberg, and Bush being clustered at 63%, and Trump at 61%.

[exvapi]

If you are neither a Dem or Rep., don't vote at all. Primary elections are for a party to decide who they want to put up for President (or dog catcher, which is the case here in the swamp this year.) They are not general elections, that's in Nov. Vote then.

But be careful. Local gov. likes to put things they don't want to talk about on these primary ballots, like BIG bond issues and state constitutional changes.

[crazyburro]

MA allows independents to briefly register in a party to vote in the primary.

[gwendally]

I don't think it's "briefly registering", is it? I could be wrong. It's more like they ask me which ballot I want each time. I can't pick and choose once I'm there by office, i.e., I can't vote for the Republican presidential candidate but the Democrat senatorial candidate; but I don't register as a Republican. I just ask to vote in that primary.

[froggoddess]

You are unenrolled like me, right? You just show up and ask for one or the other ballot and vote whatever options are on that page. There's been a bunch of confusion online (mostly from Bernie supporters from out of state) not understanding that in MA there's a difference between independents and unenrolled. Unenrolled gives you the most options! :)

[admnaismith]

Honestly, by your criteria, you're probably best off going with Clinton.

You know me on other forums, you know she's not my choice, but she probably best represents what you want in the Federal government.

There is no republican "not crazy" vote. Their Not-crazy vote is for Libertarian or Indy or Blue Dog. They got seven candidates remaining as of this writing, and they run the gamut from dangerously unhinged to Apocalypse.

[crazyburro]

+1