Democratic caucuses and primaries

Stacyhs said:
Despite your totally ridiculous over the top and childish retort, you did imply that only the Dems use the caucus in Iowa when you said "It's not our voting system. It's the voting system of Iowa Democrats, for indicating their preference."

Why you had such a juvenile response to my simply pointing out the fact that Iowa Republicans use it, too, I can only guess.
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What's your point, Stacyhs?
 
pgwenthold said:
What does the outcome of the coin flip actually determine? How to appropriate a single delegate when there are an odd number or something?

And, if so, what is the alternate solution? Cut the delegates in half?

(delegates are actual people, of course, who go on to vote in the next round)
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From what I'm seeing in all likelihood it won't make a difference in the final math (the delegates sent to the national convention). It'll be less than a rounding error probably. But, you never know. When was the last time the result of an election hinged on one single vote?
 
theprestige said:
It's not our voting system. It's the voting system of Iowa Democrats, for indicating their preference. And apparently they do love it. Why so judgy? It's not like they're forcing your state party to do it their way.
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Voting systems all over the country are stupid. From states to federal, from caucuses to FPTP. Then you have the disaster that is electronic voting machines.

And yes I'm forced to live with the terrible results and politicians that such systems produce and the awful effects we see from them.
 
I have absolutely no problem with the caucus system and thinks it works very well. It's the automation that I don't trust.
 
d4m10n said:
Do you think it will assign the 41 delegates with a reasonable degree of proportionality relative to what the 150k voters indicated?
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Well, compared with states that assign their delegates on a "winner-takes-all" basis, yes, it's likely to be more proportional than that.
 
d4m10n said:
Do you think it will assign the 41 delegates with a reasonable degree of proportionality relative to what the 150k voters indicated?
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I have no idea. Having been involved in caucus held in my state, I know that isn't how they worked in Washington. The caucuses elected delegates to attend the state convention and the delegates at the State convention decided the allotment of delegates to the National convention. Horse trading can and does take place. I don't like the primary system. I'd rather return to caucuses in all the states.
 
Meadmaker said:
So,here's what I read on the internet, and if you can't trust the internet, who can you trust?

They count the votes, come up with a fraction of total votes for each candidate, multiply by number of delegates, and that's how many each candidate gets. Except, what about fractions? If Joe gets 4.6 delegates and Amy gets 3.4 delegates, what then? Some of you might see an obvious answer, but that's not how they do things in Iowa. Instead, all fractional delegates are settled by coin flip, regardless of the size of the fractions.
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That is not correct. You can view the rules here:

https://acc99235-748f-4706-80f5-4b8...d/5af8f4_3abefbb734444842ae1abf985876cce8.pdf

The fractions are rounded up or down based on whether the fraction is more or less than .5. But then you can end up with more delegates assigned than there are delegates, or to few.

If there are too many assigned, somebody has to lose one. The person with the smallest fraction that was rounded up loses a delegate. If there are to few, the person with the largest fraction that was not rounded up gets the extra delegate.

The coin flip comes into play when a delegate has to be removed or added and there is a tie in the fraction.
 
acbytesla said:
I'd rather return to caucuses in all the states.
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Ok, I'm really curious to hear how this would be superior (in terms of your own values and goals) to sending ballots to every registered voter at their place of registration, and using the results to assign DNC delegates based on relatively simple arithmetic.
 
d4m10n said:
Ok, I'm really curious to hear how this would be superior (in terms of your own values and goals) to sending ballots to every registered voter at their place of registration, and using the results to assign DNC delegates based on relatively simple arithmetic.
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Because I don't think that primaries produce the best candidates. I don't think it will happen though.
 
acbytesla said:
Because I don't think that primaries produce the best candidates.
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The best at what?

1) Representing the voters from the relevant party and contested state

2) Representing the stated values of the national party

3) Winning in the general election

4) Other
 
Media heads are still waiting for an update to precinct reporting. It's still at 62%. The same stat page has been up for hours. My guess is that this last one will be the Final, which is why it's taking so long.
 
I almost referred to that exception myself just to say it's obviously an exception, but figured it wasn't really needed because everybody here's already familiar with the concept so it would just be an insult to everybody's intelligence.
 
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