Primary process
gregladen | June 7, 2016This is an excellent moment to revel in the complexity of life, and argument, and to appreciate the value of the honest conversation.
A candidate is the presumed nominee when she or he obtains the required number of pledged delegates to be at 50% plus a fraction in the total pledged delegate count. This is because a candidate must have a true majority to win the nomination when the delegates are all counted up at the convention, and the pledged delegates are required to cast their lot with the candidate they are pledged to, assuming that candidate exists at the time of the convention.…
gregladen | April 21, 2010 ... continued ...
In the US, political parties have what is called a "platform" which is a list of assertions ... "we want this" and "we want that" sort of assertions. The "platform" is made up, quaintly, of "planks" with each plank being about one issue. Like for my local Democratic Farm Labor party unit, one of our Planks is to get the damn road fixed over at Devil's Triangle, a particularly bad intersection down on Route 169. That's a local plank, but if we go to a party event, and a gubernatorial candidate is answering questions, she or he is expected to know what the heck is being…