Jackie Passey for Secretary of State because she's a crazy blogger with nice glasses. If nothing else, it'd be hilarious to see her in office.

http://jacquelinepassey.blogs.com/blog/campaign/index.html

I'm a fan of the 2 past the post primary - its a crock that the party primary system is "good for third parties" - it just means that the same two-bit third parties that get 2% of the vote show up on the ballot at voters expense. How does this help? However, with the 2 past the post program, lots of more interesting voting games could get played like they use to in the open primary. Republicans in Seattle could vote for Libertarian candidates since to run against safe Democrats. Democrats in the suburbs can vote for the less evil Republican running against a more evil one.

I can't imagine a real argument for how third parties are "helped" by going to the general automatically. The new primary would still let them all have access to the primary, and would only let the top 2 get to the general. Joe's from Boston right? What's he doing telling Washingtonians how to vote? When was the last time Boston had a third party anything!

I'm a local, born and raised. Never even been to Boston. Regardless, I'm not telling anyone how to do anything. I started that post as an "open forum" (my words) to hear other bloggers' opinions on some of the issues and candidates I was undecided on at the time.

If your logic is correct, you better tell the Green and Libertarian parties to change their I-872 endorsement pretty quick! The Washington State Libertarian Party, Washington State Green Party, and Green Party of Seattle have all endorsed a NO vote on 872. In fact, the Greens and Libertarians even wrote the argument against the measure in the voter's guide! Not sure why they'd want to shoot themselves in the foot like that, if what you say is right.

Sorry I had the wrong Joe - thought you were someone else. The folks who run third parties want to appear on the general ballot because they run political parties. Folks who vote for third parties might have interests different than those who run parties. That was the whole logic of Washington's open primary system. Most Washingtonian's loved the system because we don't have especially strong ties to parties. People who run political parties (and this includes Greens, Libertarians, Democrats and Republicans) are pretty much all in favor of the closed primary system. And why not, now the folks who run parties can all be on the tax payer paid for ballot in both elections. But how does this closed primary help people who want to vote for 3rd parties? It seems pretty unlikely that it is going to lead to Greens or Libertarian candidates pulling larger percentages of votes (in fact the Libertarians did so poorly in the last election they had to sue to keep their ballot status). But in a conservative district, it's easy to believe a Libertarian could out poll a Democrat, or in a liberal district a Green could likely out poll a Republican.

If you find the case put forward by the 3rd parties against the 2 past the post primary, vote to have the closed primary system. But to my mind, we lost a good thing in allowing people to vote across party lines, and I find their arguments self-serving (perpetuating, not really serving) rather than in the voter's best interests. And it's particularly shameful Libertarians are accepting tax supported elections for what is effective private primary voting in the closed primary.

Hey - when you pointed out the Greens and the Libertarians were for this, you didn't point out that the Democratic govenor and past chair of the Republican party were too. Its' pretty much politicians (who all want to maximize their chances of getting to campaign more) against the people of Washington (who have long favored the open primary) on this one. All parties would have access to the primary ballot, and only all voters would get to pick who to vote for with out being restricted to party in either election. People vs. politicians on this one - I'm sad to see the "progressives" arguing for party politics at taxpayer's expense.