And the candiates are...

[Archer 007]

As was stated by Sultan in another thread, there was a need for an outline of the Democrat nomittees for 04. And here they are:The 04 Democrats

Edit:Each of the major candiates have the own pages, which there are links to in small print near the top.

 

[Inter4]

what others??...who is the most important candidate???
sorry I don´t live in the US

 

[Ohwell]

The most important candidates are Lieberman, Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Edwards, Sharpton, and Graham.

 

[Archer 007]

Yeah, for some reason the site feels Kucinich and Braun should be on that list, Ohwell.

 

[onejayhawk]

Originally posted by Ohwell
The most important candidates are Lieberman, Dean, Gephardt, Kerry, Edwards, Sharpton, and Graham.

Don't forget Hillary. She is floating trial balloons even though she is not declared.

J

PS Sharpton is high visibility, but not a leading candidate.

 

[Ohwell]

Yeah, for some reason the site feels Kucinich and Braun should be on that list, Ohwell.

They are major candidates, but they aren't really the main runners. I doubt they will get many votes.

Don't forget Hillary. She is floating trial balloons even though she is not declared.

I'm doing my best to forget about her.

And your probably right about Sharpton. He's obviously the loudest of the bunch but of those listed on the site, he'll probably get the least votes, or second least.

 

[Archer 007]

And now for more campaign 04 news:

The Green Party is trying to convince Former Rep. Cynthia McKinney to be their candiate for president.

link

 

[Moss]

I personally wish that there would just be two canidates for president, since you know that the Green and Independence canidates aren't going to win.

Take the 2000 election for example, without the green party canidate, Al Gore wins the state of Florida and the election. Not to mention it would be nice for once to have the president be elected by at least over half of the American people.

 

[Archer 007]

But limiting the candiates isnt in the spirit of democracy If anything, the system should be changed to give third parties more importance.

 

[Moss]

True, it isn't the spirit of Democracy, but no one ever said Democracy was perfect.

Getting third party canidates more importance would be nice, but even Teddy Roosevelt couldn't get a win with a third party. Third Parties just don't have enough money.

 

[SeleucusNicator]

Braun is in the race for the sole purpose of stealing votes from Sharpton and thus neutralizing him as a political threat. Many felt that if Sharpton gained support among the African-American community and lost the Democratic nomination (the latter being a certainty), he would run as an independent to stop it from being a whites-only contest. If the African-American vote is split between Sharpton and Braun, who has more experience, more charisma, and is female, and, most importantly, is a loyal party member, Sharpton may be discouraged from an independent run, which would be disastrous for the Democrats.

Personally, I support Edwards, but if I had to bet money on the nomination, I would bet on Kerry.

 

[Archer 007]

I support either Lieberman or Graham, im still undesided. I think Kerry will get the nod.

 

[Tragdor]

Don't forgert the libertians I love those guys.

2004 LP

 

[Greadius]

I thought someone had saved me the trouble but its just a joke.

When c-span is done doing its profiles of the candidates I'll post a REAL 'chose your own Democrat' post with voting records, past quotes on top issues, and other useful stuff

Originally posted by archer_007
But limiting the candiates isnt in the spirit of democracy

The French do it in their presidential election
They just have a week between the two so we pretend its one big election, as compared to the decentralized primaries but open presidential ballot.

Originally posted by archer_007
I support either Lieberman or Graham, im still undesided. I think Kerry will get the nod.

If telling you I support Graham improves your chances of supporting him, I am a major Graham backer. If telling you I support Graham makes you less likely to support him, I have nothing to do with the man.

 

[Tragdor]

I support Alferd E Numan

 

[Kinniken]

Originally posted by Greadius
The French do it in their presidential election
They just have a week between the two so we pretend its one big election, as compared to the decentralized primaries but open presidential ballot.

Are you saying that the first round is meaningless, and that only the second one counts, which would mean that the small candidates cannot take part in the vote that matters? Because if you do, you are utterly wrong.
Quick reminder for people not familiar with the French presidential elections:

-First, there is a vote between all the candidates, small one included. Everyone cast one vote for the candidate of his choice.
-Second, there is a "run-off" two weeks later between the candidates who got the most votes in the first election.

Anyway, since France is not a two-party state, who gets to the second round is not at all a forgone conclusion. In 1995, while it was about certain that the leading left)wing candidate (Jospin) would make it, the right-wing vote was split between Chirac (Gaullist) and Balladur (Centrist). Chirac ended second and went on to defeat Jospin in the second vote.
More dramaticaly, in 2002 the votes of both the mainstream right & left where split between a multitude of parties, which led to the terrible result of the far-right candidate getting a bit more voice than the mainstream left one (Jospin again) and going to the second vote to face Chirac (and lose 82% - 18%).
So the first round does matter...

What is more, usualy it enable small parties normaly allied with the main left or right-wing parties to present an independant candidate, and to mesure their electoral strength that way, while having their elector vote in the second round for the "big" candidate they want to win.
With such a system in place in the US, it would allow a Green Party member to vote Nader in the first round, and still get to vote for the Democratic candidate in the second.

On the whole, it's a good system, which allow small parties to compete by avoiding the "vote-wasted" problem, and makes sure the candidate who wins is picked by half the electors, at least by default.
It also mean that when a non-democatic (as in "in favour of democracy") candidate manages to get though to the second round with only 16% of the vote due to vote division, the rest of the electorate can vote massively for the other candidate.

 

[Drewcifer]

It doesn't really matter to me. I've been talking to the other people on my block and we are going to seceed from the union.

 

[Greadius]

Originally posted by Kinniken
Are you saying that the first round is meaningless, and that only the second one counts, which would mean that the small candidates cannot take part in the vote that matters? Because if you do, you are utterly wrong.

No, I was drawing a comparison between the systems because they use similar principles in a different manner. For the U.S., the major party primaries are the equivilent of the first run-off, with far-left and right-wing nutballs included in the proceedings. Then the General Election in November has the big two squaring off. The difference is that the U.S. has two large losely ideological practically permenant coalition parties as compared to the 'many party' system, which once coalition, resemble a big party. I know from the French system, for example, that the mainstream socialist and Gaullist have faced off in every major election except the last one (with people apparently sick of the same two candidates more than the same two parties), with the exception being a blow out. It could be argued that the French system simply creates the illusion of being more inclusionary when the outcome is much more predictable, than, say, who is going to win the Democratic primary for 2004. Will the party lean left or right, favor the unknown or the reliable? Meanwhile, Nader simply throws his hat in as a spoiler since he knows perfectly well he can't win the Democratic primary (or as it would be in France, the first round ballot), but still wants to feel important.

 

[Archer 007]

Originally posted by Greadius
If telling you I support Graham improves your chances of supporting him, I am a major Graham backer. If telling you I support Graham makes you less likely to support him, I have nothing to do with the man.

Well, i respect your opinion very much, so youir helping the case .

 

[John-LP]

Here are your only major players:

Republicans will run Bush (duh!)

Democrats will likely run Lieberman or Kerry
At the moment I`d like to predict Lieberman will win out, but I
wouldn`t be surprised to see Kerry take it. No one else has a
snowball in hell`s chance.