The Democratic Party began the formal vote to nominate Vice President Kamala Harris for president on Thursday, kicking off a virtual roll call that will cement her status as the party’s standard-bearer heading into November.
The Democratic National Committee opened the vote to the delegates who will decide the party’s nominee at 9 a.m. Delegates are emailed a personalized and watermarked form, and they can either send the form back or have the DNC call them to cast their vote. Ballots are being sent on a rolling basis, and the process is expected to take several days, with the voting window closing at 6 p.m. on Aug. 5.
I live in Canada and I have never and never will get to vote for the head of the executive or my head of state. And yet parliamentary systems are still considered democracies.
Parliamentary systems are clearly fucking better - it’s insane that president is a directly elected office in the US… That all said - it is a directly elected office so an election should happen.
I’ll vote for Harris if she wins the roll call but I’m still disappointed there wasn’t a mini-primary or at least an open convention.
Not sure about Canada specifically, maybe you could shed some light, but the US president has a lot more power than in a typical parlimentary system. This is typically why it’s seen as essential that they are voted in directly. Would the US be better under a parlimentary system? Very valid debate.
Couldn’t you join a party and then you get to vote for the parties leader ? Don’t see much of a difference between that and the primary system other then you have to officially join the party, which I’m not sure what that entails, as opposed to just registering to vote for it.
I would never bother. Party membership isn’t common. About 1 to 2 percent of Canadians are registered since there are usually fees and other requirements. Justin Trudeau was elected party leader in 2013. Around. 104,000 party members voted.