I've ranted recently about crossover voting crossover voting in
primaries. As anyone who reads a site like mine should know, Iowa is a
"closed" (sic) primary state, meaning you have to be registered in a
party to vote in a primary, and you vote only in one party's primary
at a time. You can't for example participate in a Republican primary
for governor and a Democratic courthouse primary. It's a soft version
of "closed," because you can change party on the spot, and a lot of
people do. Leaving aside my opinion on that law, let's look at how it
can impact a statewide race. In a sense, Vander Plaats and Rants and
Fong aren't just running against each other--they're running against
the interesting local Democratic contests.

Labels: elections