If you've ever wished that politics weren't so boring — well, careful what you wish for, because both parties are heading toward two of the ugliest conventions in recent memory. In both the Republican and Democratic parties, two outsiders are getting awfully close to the nomination, and their supporters are going to be SUUUUUUPER pissed off if they don't get it.
Oh and also there may be a bunch of guns at one of the conventions, so what could go wrong?
So Bernie did pretty well this weekend, huh? He scored about 73 percent of the vote in the Washington caucuses. About 230,000 people participated in that, which is a pretty high number considering what it entails — long conversations/arguments about politics with a bunch of strangers. I'm honestly surprised that a quarter million Washingtonians were willing to endure what is essentially a real-life version of the comment section of a blog.
And if you are one of the 92 percent of registered Washington voters who did not participate in the caucus, don't feel too bad. You'll have another chance to vote on May 24, when Washington holds it presidential primary. That vote will not actually have any effect — the delegates were chosen at the caucus, and our primaries are basically fun surveys that don't mean anything. You may be asking, "Why even bother holding a primary in that case?" That is an excellent question! Let's move on.
Despite the wins, Bernie's still trailing Clinton by 250-ish delegates (700 if you count superdelegates), so the odds are still against him. But not as against him as they were a few weeks ago. Hillary's lead over Bernie seems pretty stable — not getting any bigger, not getting any smaller.
As The Stranger has scientifically determined, between the two Democratic candidates, Bernie's supporters are far more strident. And while the chances of Bernie securing the nomination are still low, the chances of his supporters making a lot of noise about it are very high.
Usually, by the time the convention rolls around, consensus has settled on one candidate and all of the weirdos who care enough to attend a convention are more or less in agreement. But this year is looking different: This year, we may have two sides ready to duke it out in real life the way they normally only do in comment sections.
The last time this sort of thing happened, Dan Rather got belted in the stomach.
It's because of that chaotic 1968 convention that the Democratic Party developed the delegate system that we're saddled with today: the thinking was that if the nomination process was more responsive to voters, voters would be less likely to slug each other. Can't wait to see that put to the test.
And over on the Republican side, things are a million times worse (as always). Forty thousand people have signed a petition to allow guns at the convention in July. As fervent as the Hillary and Bernie supporters can get, Trump is the only candidate whose rallies are a regular forum for violent attacks. So if you can only attend one convention this year, I'd recommend skipping the one with armed lunatics.
