Chuck Gould wrote:
On Jan 30, 3:30�am, "Jim" wrote:

Hope you're right. There's just something wrong when a political party can
deprive any voter of the right to have his vote counted in the selection
process. Might even be unconstitutional.


A party primary is not a state election. It's a polling of party
members to see how the state delegates should be appportioned and
assigned.
Talk aout depriving people of the right to vote.......you can't even
vote in a political primary (in most states) unless you are willing to
proclaim that you are either a Democrat or a Republican. Independents,
libertarians, socialists, etc are turned away from the polls.

We had an open primary in WA until a few years ago. I am no longer
allowed to participate in the primary elections in this state because
I am unwilling to lie and claim to be a D or an R. The justification
is: the parties have a right to pick thier own candidates.
Unaffiliated voters have the right to vote for whomever they choose in
the actual election.

The Constitution doesn't guarantee anybody the right to participate in
the pre-election processes of any specific political parties- and
that's what a primary election is about.


On the other hand, I believe in closed primaries, and, to take it a step
further, I believe in voting-booth primaries only, not caucuses. Voters
should be able to decide on their own, in the privacy of a voting booth,
who they want to support.

Independents should be able to vote in primaries, too, but only to
indicate a preference, not to pick a party's candidate.