Some Measure 65 Supporters:

Earl Blumenauer Ben Cannon John Kitzhaber Vic Atiyeh Norma Paulus Phil Keisling Ben Westlund Allen Alley Frank Morse Avel Gordly

They also might subscribe to Oregonian?

Paul G. you said: Sorry, the argument that primaries = polarized legislatures simply doesn't hold up either.

All I did was list some of the noticeable names in support of this ballot measure. I just wanted to show that there is as diverse group of folks in support of this as there are against. The arguments against (on Blue O) seem to far outpace the arguments in favor. I just wanted folks to see some of the other names is all.

I keep trying to stay somewhat neutral on this ballot measure and each time I bring it up folks and friends keep jumping down my throat?

PS, You didn't exactly jump down my throat but it seems hard to even bring up (or point out) the other side without being hit from all sides.

A question and a comment for Oregon Independent, from your second post:

You wrote to Paul: "Essentially, your claim is that we have no way of knowing whether voters turn out in greater numbers when given the opportunity to vote on more relevant races."

Paul's claim (actually, his point of fact) is much simpler: the turnout for self-identified independents is historically lower, compared to partisans. That's it. It's irrefutable.

That reality may, or may not, weaken the overall case for Measure 65. It would be reasonable and honest for supporters to say: "more people can participate in the primary, which is the important outcome. The turnout rate, if it goes down, is just a statistical artifact of adding more people to the denominator." But dubious claims that the percentage turnout of eligible voters will necessarily increase, doesn't strengthen the case, or the debate.

Not saying that claim was YOUR claim, but it was the unfiltered hocum from the Washington SOS and the Oregonian.

Regarding third parties: respectfully, not gonna happen. Or I guess a top two system must explain the robust 3rd party culture in Louisiana. Or the robust 3rd parties in Washington state, which had blanket primaries until very recently.

Regarding the joy of one party elections in some places: are the party haters really seeking an even stronger party monopoly and less party competition in the general? What if Steve Bucknum and the Democrats had been completely banished from Crook County general elections in recent years? Does that make the Democrats more competitive there?

Regarding cross endorsements: I don't understand the argument very well but I'll ask this: do you think someone like, say John Frohnmayer, could have beaten Gordon Smith for a top two position this year with crossover support? Especially since Smith (or someone more radical) would get the "R" on the primary ballot? Not me.

To Measure 65 supporters in general: I'm faintly hoping for answers on two basic questions as the pro-Measure 65 case unfolds this fall:

• Why do we have primary elections, and what are these elections supposed to accomplish?

• What are parties? In the best of all possible worlds, what would successful and helpful parties look like? Why do you think we have two big ones, and not, say, 5, or 20? What would these idealized parties do? And how does M65 get us closer to this ideal, and not further from it?

Ian, great theory. But the people I know think in simpler terms--re-elect Gordon Smith or vote for Speaker Merkley? Erickson or Schrader? Westlund or Alley? The incumbent (sometimes snide, seldom problem-solving)legislator or the outspoken challenger? The person who came to the house, or the person who sends out mailers?

And I submit the case of Kim Thatcher as a reason to consider open primary.

Kim Thatcher had no connections to the Republican Party, she was part of the Measure 30 operation (a measure which got on the ballot because Dick Armey came to Oregon from Texas to push it, it had right wing radio support, etc.). When it passed, that group stuck together and she defeated an incumbent Republican legislator in Dist. 25 primary who had been on the "wrong" side of Measure 30--Vic Backlund.

For whatever reason, after Backlund lost the primary and it thus became an open seat, Pike never got support from the House Dems or the party. Thus we are stuck with Kim Thatcher as a legislator from Keizer.

Had open primary been in effect, would Dist. 25 still have been Thatcher vs. Pike? I don't think so--Backlund had a lot of friends, but they weren't going to vote the whole Republican ballot if they weren't already Republicans just so they could defeat Kim Thatcher. I believe Top 2 would have been Backlund and Thatcher Backlund and Pike. And that Backlund would have won that general election.

But that is too concrete a story for most people. They'd rather discuss theory than an actual case.

LT: I had a theory? Moi? Honestly, I'm not seeing that.

The example is great. I have a basic question though. Couldn't Backlund have simply run as an independent, if his friends were numerous enough? Let's leave that aside for a moment.

Suppose that the Republican party leadership, in a Measure 65 world, still decide they want to take down Backlund. How would they go about it? Here's what I would do:

• Mobilize the usual groups of conservative activists who would prefer a Thatcher over Backlund in any event.
• Throw a strong negative campaign at the independents.
• Reasonably presume that lots of ordinary Democrats will support Pike, for the perfectly plausible reason that he is the one and only labeled Democrat on the ballot.

And if Backlund had made me really mad, my inner Nixon would have fun doing this.

Can you persuade a bunch of sophisticated Democrats to take their chances that, by voting for the unlabeled Backlund, risking that the general will be Backlund vs. Thatcher? Not me.

Conceivably in a small state legislative race, Backlund has enough "friends" to bail him out. But in a big, statewide or congressional district wide race? Where name recognition is sketchier and the willingness, in a situation like you described, to throw ammunition against an apostate is truly significant?

Let's say the Republicans decide to abandon Greg Walden in Oregon-2 for, I don't know, Atilla the Hun. Sure, Walden has some name recognition, but he's also a semi-conspicuous sitting congress member. If the Republicans really wanted to mobilize conservative voters district away from Walden, I bet they could, with ease, especially if Atilla had any unique appeal, and Walden really made any number of rank and file Republicans mad enough. And there aren't many Democrats who would help bail Walden out. I sure wouldn't, at any rate.

Now, you might say "what about the case of Joe Lieberman in 2006? Lots of people voted for him and the party didn't endorse him." But guess what: with a top two system, Lieberman may not get to the general election. This is a difficult comparison, but suppose they had a top two primary and we think that the Republican (Alan Schlesinger) would gets as much as 25% percent less than the 44% that Bush won in 2004, a profound drop. Given that Lieberman and Lamont essentially split the Democratic vote, the losing Democrat (Lieberman) is out. And if Lieberman does make it, he's not going to run against Lamont; he'll run against the Republican and no one else.

Or, look at this way: if you're a self-labeled progressive, Lieberman is, arguably, the centrist you DON'T want. If you think Lieberman is bad, and you think this system promotes his chances, why is that a good thing?

I am suspicious of examples; they illustrate but don't prove very much. If they did, I could simply say "Louisiana!" and the discussion would be over. I think the District 25 example is really helpful, though.

OI: Thanks for the response. You wrote:

Voters tend to look favorably on Independent and non-affiliated candidates in one-on-one races, and not nearly so well in three-person races because of the spoiler issue.

But the primary would be, in essence, a three person race, and the GOP would have, presumably, designated Thatcher as the endorsed Republican. Backlund would have been the spoiler, but in the primary.

All you have done is time-shifted the general election into the primary. And the party endorsements in this new de-facto general election? They will now be decided in smoke-filled rooms. Ideologues, if anything, will have more influence, to the extent they are a bigger part of determining primary election outcomes. And the benefit is...what?

BTW: I'm sure that the upcoming, and more generalized Measure 65 posts/discussion threads will be a better place for my type of question. I'm guilty of taking Paul's original post way off track, so I will leave it there.

This is BlueOregon. Fuck what Washington's doing, they'll even let morons involved in gun duels to run for office (something that is very rightfully unconstitutional here... we don't need CB radio wingnuts meeting each other in parking lots shooting each other thinking they can ever be elected to public office).

Are you saying that there is no difference between a system that gives us 3 candidates, top two advance, versus 3 candidates, winner take all?

No. But I am saying this: parties still have tremendous leverage under this proposal. In some ways, they have even more. To the point where I think party-haters are shooting themselves in the foot.

Bottom line: I think this proposal looks like a gimmicky attempt to do something (anything!) that has an anti-party/reformist sheen and passes constitutional muster. If I were your guru or consultant, I would say: step back and redefine the problem.

Good luck. Looking forward to hearing the case as we go along.

Paul: "(This is a critical element in evaluating the top two. In a three candidate race, about 30% of the vote will allow you to move on. With four candidates, about 23-25% will work, and so on.)"

True if you assume all you need is one more than (total votes divided by total candidates.) But why would you assume that?

You don't have to go to Louisiana or even Washington to find the analagous system. The closest analog is actually Oregon's own non-partisan system. In fact the Open Primary Act of 2008, Measure 65, starts by saying essentially "all Voter Choice offices will be elected just like non-partisan offices, except" and then adds two different kinds of party information on the ballot, and provides that the top two always go to the general.

Look at the history of Oregon non-partisan elections, at races with multiple candidates. For example - Portland's last mayorial election. There were 13 candidates; the top two together split more than 90% of the vote.

Which means to be sure to win, based on history it isn't enough to just appeal to a suitable (votes divided by candidates, +1) number of your core supporters. That strategy falls to someone who collects voters from all over the map.

Paul - yes, it is snarky to suggest that all those folks were elected under the current system, but we all like a good snark. The problem is, it's false -- not just for the crossover reasons already noted, but because Alley is running for the first time, as an R.

The benefit to shifting the general to the primary, if you like to think of it that way, is that in the general under the Open Primary, we get a run-off. And with the party labelling provisions, that run-off generates a fundamentally different dynamic.

Even if you assume it'll always be two candidates from the Ds and Rs in the finals -- and I don't -- remember it is essentially impossible to get a minor party candidate actually elected in this state today. They are always spoilers. Spoilers don't collect enough votes to win - just enough votes to skew an election, usually against the minor party voters' second choice candidate.

But under the Open Primary Act, although there will only be two candidates in the final -- the endorsement of a minor party will be something that candidates might logically seek out. Suddenly it will matter whether the Independent Party endorses someone -- because their weight will be added to their preferred candidate of the top two, instead of, almost inevitably, subtracted from it.

Paul -

I believe the reason the Open Primary produces independent mindedness -- which may or may not equate to moderation -- in office is not that different people will run. The people we have now are by and large motivated by a desire to do good, even the ones whose politics I don't happen to share. They can do fine, under a better system.

I believe the Open Primary produces more independent thought because good clear thinking, including wise compromise, appeals to more people than extreme behavior does. But if you know that next time, you have to first get nominated by a skewed subset of the electorate even to get on the ballot, you better plan on appealing to their more extreme nature first and foremost, instead of the more generally attractive wisdom you might otherwise exhibit, or you'll never even reach the larger audience.

There are plenty of examples of politicians who have made the hard votes, much appreciated by the majority of the electorate, who have then been tossed out by their own party in the next primary. That doesn't tend to encourage compromise.

But if in the next primary, effective compromise were viewed by a plurality of the voters as a badge of honor instead of betrayal -- it would change the calculus. People would understand they hadn't just been elected by their party, but by all the people -- because, in fact, at each election that's who would be voting.

For this reason I think we start seeing the impact of the Open Primary right away in the 2009 legislative session, even though all the legislators were elected under the old system.

When the Open Primary passes, the political calculus changes at once, and for this generation of legislators. They will know that the next election they need to survive is not with just the primary voters in their own party -- it will be with the whole electorate.

Final comment, Paul.

You note that the minor parties might like their own "line" for full fusion voting better than an endorsement -- maybe so. But NO party has their own "line" under this system -- the candidates aren't running as party nominees. Every party gets to endorse on the same line, and it doesn't "belong" to any party.

I think the new system is much friendlier to minor party formation and growth than the old.

Under the old system, any major party could run a primary, but to become a major party, you have to get 5% statewide voter registration. The catch 22 was always that anyone registered in a not-yet-major party, of course, couldn't vote in the primaries for what the Open Primary calls "Voter Choice" offices. That was a big penalty to pay for the privilege of helping nominate a spoiler, whose presence on the ballot most often undercut the election prospects of the minor party member's second-choice candidate anyway.

Under the new system, by contrast, minor party endorsements in the primary and general actually can have a positive effect, and there's no penalty (other than in presidential election years) to belonging to a minor party. You might well have more impact registering as a minor party member and helping shape the endorsement of that party, than as a member of a major party.

Similarly there's less advantage to being a member of one of the traditional majors.

That will make it much easier for people to register with the Pacific Green, and much less necessary to be an R or a D.

I don't know if we'll have more or fewer major parties as a result. But I know it'll be easier to get a major party formed.

And once they've become major? They get to run a presidential primary just like Rs and Ds. That's not nothing, but that's it. Except for presidential primaries, there will be no electoral distinction in Oregon between how major and minor parties are treated, under the Open Primary Act.

Under ORS 248.008(4), to maintain status as a minor party, all you need to do is to maintain membership equal to one half of one percent of the total number of registered voters. Since to become a party in the first place, you need to have members equal to 1.5% of the voters in the last general election for governor, and since Oregon tends to have about 70% turnout in such elections, you can maintain a minor party just by keeping roughly half the members it was necessary to have in the first place.

That's not a hard standard -- especially since the penalty for not being an R or D will be much less.