The results are in and Hillary Clinton won OH in a big way and TX by not so much. Earlier in the week Rush Limbaugh’s calls for Republicans to cross party lines, TX and OH are open primaries, and to vote for HRC made big news. He appeared on the O’Reilly Factor to explain his rationale.
Texas is open. And I want Hillary to stay in this, Laura [Ingram, who was interviewing him]. This is too good a soap opera. We need Barack Obama bloodied up politically, and it’s obvious that the Republicans are not going to do it and don’t have the stomach for it.
I first heard of this particular push when I stumbled across Dan Abrams challenging Lars Larson (who is that? and can that really be his name?) that such a strategy was unethical. Now, before anyone (like Abrams) think that this is just a Republican thing I seem to recall that one of the reasons put forward for Huckabee winning IA was that Democrats, thinking their slate was safe, voted for Huckabee in order to try and ensure that the Republicans would have a nominee so conservative as to push away mainstream voters in the general election. As it has turned out, the Democratic primary is so tight that supporters of HRC and Obama cannot afford to divide their attention (thus fulling Limbaugh’s wish, ironically).
All of this is, of course, completely legal in states with open primaries. I think it is ridiculous to have such primaries since the very purpose of a primary is for the party in question to select their own candidate. Allowing anyone to vote for any party is called a general election and we have one of those. Still, it happens and it is legal but is it, as Dan Abrams contends, unethical?
[poll=9]
