The California GOP is about to enter open warfare over whether to support Open or Closed Primaries. Moderates, including Abel Maldonado, as well as gubernatorial candidates like Meg Whitman, and Tom Campbell prefer open primaries that allow moderates to appeal to independents for votes.
In contrast, the weakening leadership of the California Republican Party hoped to ban decline-to-state voters, currently 20% of the California electorate and growing, from participating in choosing Republican candidates for statewide and federal office.
John Fleischman, a sycophant of Tom Del Beccaro, the party’s vice chair and vice chair of the clearly failed Contra Costa Republican Party, proposed the ban that will be voted on at the Party’s convention later this month, September 25-27.
Many, like Maldonado, believe that such a ban would be suicide. Meanwhile, the struggling party leadership hopes to keep out unwanted new ideas, new citizens, Ron Paul activists or anyone hoping the party would align itself more with the U.S. Constitution, as well as moderates and independent voices; maybe even conservatives that don’t believe (gasp!) that the U.S., and California in particular, are God’s chosen nation and lost tribe. Amen.
Now we learn that Fleischman has withdrawn his proposal because “the matter was becoming extremely divisive due to a lot of misinformation being spread about the proposal, and its effects.”
Lordy if this doesn’t sound like Obama and the left-wing-nuts complaining about tea baggers.
Normally, I would support closed party primaries just on principle. And a good one. But this move is to reduce the choice of even party members; as leadership circles the rapidly disappearing wagons to promote some candidate of their own choice, as witnessed in the recent endorsement of one candidate, David Harmer, from among six during the CD-10 Special Election Primary.
History shows that Del Beccaro has already driven the Contra Costa GOP into the ground and now it seems he and his rg-tag gang of fifth-tier bloggers like Franks, Fleischman and hot-talk cronies like Brian Sussman intend to ruin what’s left of the party statewide.
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Hi Richard, the post was written and scheduled, then added the recent news. I left the original headline because, In the context of the other bylaw proposals that seek to restrict membership and participation, the debate over how open the GOP wants to be is hardly over.
Readers should follow Richard’s site for Ballot Access News.
BTW, One source reports that feedback on Facebook to the proposal was overwhelmingly negative.
The title of this blog entry is very misleading. The only real news in the blog post is that the battle is over, and the Republican Party will continue to let independent voters vote in its non-presidential primaries for public office. So the title says just the opposite of what the real news is.