February 17, 2012

Why Can’t Republicans Figure Out How to Hold a Primary Caucus?

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Adam Sorensen on the embarrassing spectacle of the Republican caucuses so far:

Sure it took a month to declare the actual winner of the Iowa caucuses, tallies from eight precincts were lost altogether and vote counting in Nevada dragged on for days, but you can’t really understand the depth of dysfunction in the caucus system until you behold the caricature of incompetence that is Maine.

A nickel summary of the Maine fiasco follows. So what’s going on? I don’t remember anything like this on either side in 2008. Is it just an artifact of a bunch of close contests? Are Republicans trying to prove that we need tougher election laws by holding lots of seemingly corrupt elections themselves? What the hell is going on?

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BEFORE YOU CLICK AWAY!

“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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