This week’s Connecticut primary election was interesting both in a positive and in a negative sense. It was positive because it showed there is definitely an anti-Bush anti-war faction in this country, which hopefully will begin to show its clout in the November federal elections. It was negative because it showed that while independents are the majority of voters in this country, the primaries are dominated by the extreme wings of the parties (liberal Democrats and conservative Republicans), so that often the nominees do not reflect the overall will of the people, but rather the choices of the minority.

Perhaps elections would be fairer if primaries were eliminated and elections open to all candidates. Thus, in the 2000 presidential election for example, all four major candidates (Bush, McCain, Gore, and Bradley) would have run side-by-side, with the top two candidates having a subsequent runoff. Since McCain had much broader appeal throughout the country than Bush did at that time, I suspect the runoff would have been between McCain and Gore, with McCain probably winning the election fairly and legally.

I suspect we would not be stuck in the current Iraqi quagmire if John McCain had been president of the U.S. the past six years!