Posted on 08/22/2024 7:00:44 PM PDT by george76
The Alaska Supreme Court affirmed a lower court decision Thursday that allowed a question on whether to keep the state’s new voting system to appear on the November ballot.
Alaskans narrowly adopted a 2020 ballot measure that put in place open primaries and ranked choice general elections. The voting method was first used in 2022 and is again being used this year. Supporters of the method say it yields more centrist candidates willing to work across the political aisle. But a group filed a petition earlier this year seeking to repeal the voting method, arguing that the voting system is too confusing and disadvantages partisan candidates.
The petition was certified by the Division of Elections, but three Alaskans who support the new voting system filed a lawsuit against the Division of Elections arguing that the division incorrectly counted signatures that should have been disqualified. The voters, represented by Anchorage attorney Scott Kendall, argued that if all the deficient signatures were thrown out, the petition would fail to meet the threshold necessary to put the question on the ballot.
A Superior Court judge ruled last month that some of the signatures on the initiative were deficient, but it still had enough to qualify for the ballot. The voters appealed the case to the Alaska Supreme Court, asking the court to rule on whether the Division of Elections was correct in allowing the ballot group organizers to correct errors in dozens of signature booklets after they were submitted to the division.
Shortly after oral arguments, the Supreme Court affirmed the lower court’s decision and stated an explanation of the decision would be issued at a later date.
(Excerpt) Read more at adn.com ...
It is not the job of the voting system to ensure election of "centrists willing to work across the aisle". SHEESH! The voting system must be policy neutral. And one person, one vote.
Our Founding Fathers were not idiots.
Lisa Murkowski’s sorry ass wouldn’t still be in the senate if not for her corrupt underhanded maneuvers. No way she could have won the senate seat straight up. She cannot exit stage fast enough.
Dis Alaskas already have their primary?
If not then this could make the November election normal for the first time in years.
In Idaho that rank choice will be on the ballot, and I expect it to be defeated.
All the Democrats have to do to win is only run one candidate and plant two or three false-flag candidates on the Republican side to split the vote.
And if a second Democrat candidate shows up the Democrats are good at destroying people to get them off the ballot.
I hear ya there. She is an absolute disgrace. I hope the Alaskan people vote for that voting system to go away, and also finally vote her out of office, once and for all.
Cost Sarah and her comeback. She shouda took on Murkowski-afraid to lose. Lost anyway.
Maine 2nd District. I was up there during the 2016 election cycle in Boothbay Harbor, watching a football game in a crowded bar on the water, couldn’t hear the television, but a political commercial came on.
The guy was young clean-cut guy, on the shooting range with an AR-15 (IIRC) and talking about his military service in Iraq. I couldn’t hear it, but it was pretty clear, showing him shooting, then in uniform in Iraq as the commercial progressed. A combat veteran. Gun owner. Seemed pretty good.
I was impressed from the commercial visuals, and even though I had no idea, he seemed to be marketing his campaign to people like me.
So, armed with a strictly visual impression (remember, no sound) I looked him up later that night when I got back to where we were staying, and was aghast at that candidate.
He was the complete antithesis of every single principle I valued. Everything. It was astonishing, the gulf between the visual impression and the facts of the candidacy.
That was the first time I had ever heard of Jared Golden.
And it was the first time I ever heard the term “Ranked Choice Voting”.
When I looked it up, it was clear that Ranked Choice Voting was a Leftist construction to slant elections in their direction.
That has been confirmed for me when I hear it being advocated for by Leftists all over the country.
Ranked Choice Voting is a wholly Leftist construct, and is meant to tilt the field permanently in their favor.
“ All the Democrats have to do to win is only run one candidate and plant two or three false-flag candidates on the Republican side to split the vote.”
**********************************************
Hey! You didn’t write their playbook by any chance? /sard
Ranked BS changes absolutely nothing. The parties still back their main person. If a party is dumb enough to allow multiple people from their party on the ballot, they will lose. It is how we got a stupid Rat Peltola 2 years ago.
This year again, we have multiple Repub’s, and only 1 Dim. Guess who is going to win?
Alaska suffers from Election Murky Pox.
It takes too long to get a count. Also when there’s a recount, the recount is exactly the same as the original count. That doesn’t happen in other elections.
Thank God they are looking into that sadistic Rank Choice total crap, invented by some crazy Leftist lawyer and used to guarantee that HORRIBLE LEFTIST, COMMUNIST DEMOCRATS WILL BE SURE TO BE ELECTED.
ONE OF THE WORST THINGS INTRODUCED INTO THE ELECTION SYSTEM.
HOPE IT IS...OUTLAWED!!!!!
In 2020 the voters of Alaska allowed themselves to be bamboozled by a slick advertising campaign bankrolled by tons of out-of-state liberal money, and approved Rigged Choice Voting (RCV) by the margin of 50.5% to 49.5%; it took effect with the 2022 elections. Under RCV as it is still being used in Alaska in 2024, all candidates for an office run together on a single primary ballot, with the top 4 -- regardless of party -- advancing to the general election ballot. If no candidate gets over 50% on the "first" ballot in November, votes are shuffled around and many voters are disenfranchised, and then the Democrat (or ultra-liberal Republican) wins. At least that's how it works in practice.
The primary goal of RCV is to marginalize conservative candidates and prevent them from winning an election, and RCV therefore attempts to force Republicans to move drastically to the left in order to have any chance. Mendacious proponents of RCV claim that the same thing theoretically happens on the other side too -- with radical leftists being forced to the center as well -- yet ultra-liberal Democrats are somehow never affected. Not one Democrat has yet lost a federal election because of RCV, but several Republicans or conservatives have.
For example, RCV was directly responsible for the otherwise highly-unlikely Republican loss of the Alaska U.S. House seat in 2022, and this new convoluted way of counting votes assisted immeasurably with the Senate re-election of far-left "Republican" Lisa Murkowski over underfunded conservative challenger Kelly Tshibaka that year. Democrats did not even bother to contest that Senate election aside from the tiniest token effort, since Murkowski is for all intents and purposes one of them anyway; she votes more often with Democrats than she does with Republicans.
One thing which is of paramount importance in this rigged system is for a major party to enforce discipline among its potential candidates, making sure not to split the vote among party rivals. The Democrats, who don't exactly have a lot of candidates in Alaska anyway, understand this; the Republicans -- who are known as the Stupid Party, and for good reason -- have repeatedly failed to grasp this concept.
In 2022, Sarah Palin and Nick Begich split the GOP vote and allowed a liberal Democrat to steal the election even though Republicans took over 60% of the open primary vote. The Palin-haters within the GOP who initially supported Begich then "won" in November by throwing their support to the Democrat instead of to Palin.
Buyer's remorse regarding RCV has set in, and this November the repeal of that abomination will probably be on the ballot if it survives court challenges from the left. Even so, Republicans on August 20 took one (perhaps) last opportunity to demonstrate their stupidity. They once again ran multiple candidates for the House -- Begich is back for another shot, opposed by gadfly candidate Nancy Dahlstrom -- and once again have created a damaging intra-party rift which is likely to be costly in November.
Liberal Democrat incumbent Mary Peltola, who has been furiously faking to the center with her House votes this year, even achieved a tick more than 50% of the vote in last Tuesday's all-party primary. If this happens again in 2 1/2 months, the Rigged Choice Voting provisions won't even be necessary for the Republicans to be defeated once more in their quest for Alaska's lone seat in Congress. The disarray among the GOP in The Last Frontier may even result in the permanent retention of Rigged Choice Voting, since Republicans are the ones who oppose this Democrat scheme while Democrats (obviously) strongly support it, and the Republican fracture at the House level may carry over and jeopardize the repeal of RCV.
Those Republicans who support the repeal of RCV are currently being outspent by a 2:1 ratio by Democrat forces which desperately wish to keep it in place. Do not take this issue lightly simply because it's happening in a state which is as far away as possible from most American voters, and not normally considered to be politically significant.
Maine and Alaska have been the guinea pigs for Rigged Choice Voting and liberals couldn't be happier with the results they have achieved so far. Though a handful of states have pre-emptively banned RCV, there's still a good chance that it will be approaching a state near you in the not-too-distant future.
I think top two rematch are worse. We lost two Georgia senate seats because of that in 2017. Only red states seem to have it which is dumb.
It is because of the blithering idiot Palin that we wound up with Peltola.
Ranked Choice in Alaska was implemented to eliminate, once and for all, Sarah Palin.
It was the play from their corrupt state Republican Party who Sarah was defeating, and their corrupt state Democrat Party.
FrozenAssets
Since Mar 25, 2023
Just another form of cheating for the rats
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