No challengers for President Obama in Florida primary

[Freddie Stubbs]

Fla. puts 9 GOP contenders on Jan. 31 ballot

TALLAHASSEE — Florida Republican voters will get to choose between nine presidential contenders during next year's primary.

The Republican Party of Florida today submitted the names of nine candidates for the Jan. 31 ballot: Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Jon Huntsman, Gary Johnson, Ron Paul, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum.

These are the same nine who appeared at the Presidency 5 debate held last month in Orlando. Two days after that debate nearly 2,700 party delegates participated in a straw poll that Cain won and helped turn him into a front-runner.

Today was the deadline to submit names for the ballot. Florida Democrats submitted the name of President Barack Obama.

more: http://www2.tbo.com/news/politics/2011/oct/31/fla-puts-9-gop-contenders-on-jan-31-ballot-ar-299634/

[TheWraith]

1. So where's those primary challengers?

After all, I'm told Obama is weak and any Democrat with a pulse could beat him. Don't any other Democrats want to be President of the United States?

[Pab Sungenis]

2. It's not that he's a weak candidate

(although Romney could probably beat him). The problem is that he's a weak PRESIDENT.

[progressoid]

4. +1

[Martin Eden]

3. Who told you those things?

You might be confusing expressed desire for Obama to be primaried with views on whether he could be beaten in the primary. I think it's very likely that most in this forum who'd like to see a primary contest understand it is very difficult to unseat an incumbent president in a presidential primary and that there are very few if any prominent Dems well-positioned for such a challenge.

Whether Obama is weak as a president or within the Democratic Party is a matter of degree and very debatable. What is truly weak (or dysfunctional) IMO is a political/electoral system in which healthy challenges on matters of policy and leadership are discouraged and carry negative consequences.

[TheWraith]

5. It's all part of the same delusion.

The selective blindness which lets people say absurd things like describing Obama as a Republican, or that he's a failure, or weak, etcetera, is the same delusion which tells people that a primary challenger would easily beat him, or that far left candidates that would make DU happy would win in states like Florida and Ohio.

Oh, and yes, people right here on DU have said all the things I've mentioned. Look around you.

[banned from Kos]

7. Not only is some weakass Dem straggler not challenging - Dem voters get to

crossover now and fuck up the GOP vote (in some states).

I know I will vote strategically for the sorriest anti-Romney with a chance to win.

[Martin Eden]

8. People said ...

... yeah, there will always be some people who expose how uninformed their opinions are, but there's a lot of knowledgable and politically savvy people in this forum who would like to see a healthy primary challenge who also understand the difficulties of such a challenge the way politics are these days.

[TheWraith]

9. "Politically savvy" and "primary challenge" are mutually exclusive.

Claiming a primary challenge would be a good thing would be like saying that diving head first through a window is good, because it makes your skull stronger. It postulates something that has NEVER been the case at any previous time in history, but now suddenly doing the same thing will create a different result. Primary challenges to sitting presidents have NEVER had a positive result: they've either been total failures, or destructive.

[Martin Eden]

10. Your response and your reading comprehension are "mutually exclusive"

I specifically said those who are politically savvy understand the difficulties. I bemoaned the fact that "healthy" primary challenges do not take place.

Hint:
A "healthy" primary challenge would not automatically hurt the candidacy of the nominee it produced. It's an awful shame that political precedent dictates an incumbent almost always goes unchallenged and that primary voters aren't given more choices. The political process in this country is severely dysfunctional.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

6. The challenge against establishment politics has shifted to the streets.

[Ichingcarpenter]

11. I'm willing to debate him

He needs somebody from the real progressive left
not his world that looks sweeter as compared to republicans

So your choce is wha?