Oh, goodie, it’s time for the Friday night follies again.

The cooking sherry has destroyed your brain.
Obviously, you’re surviving without a brain but the next thing it will destroy will be your liver and you can’t survive without a liver.

They both suck.

Jean Quan, etc.

Oakland and SF have instant run-off a/k/a ranked choice, not Top Two. If Oakland had had top two, Perata and one other candidate would have emerged from a primary to face off in the general election. Perata got the most “first choice” votes but still lost. My guess is that Perata would have won in a runoff election.

It gave them the wonderful Mayor Jean Quan, the target of not one but two recall drives.

As you say, we’ll see how it plays out.

Hopefully, with the combination of redistricting, the open primary and the “top two,” we will get (a) greater voter participation in the primaries; (b) general election candidates who aren’t beholden to the extreme base of their respective parties and (c) more general election races that are truly competitive, rather than being just a formality to anoint the winner of the primary of whichever party dominates a district.

As for the minor parties, the current system serves mainly to set them up as potential spoilers (Ross Perot in 1992 and Ralph Nader in 2000) rather than as potential election winners. Arguably, the new system increases chances that the final two might include one major and one minor party candidate. Minor party candidates need to figure out how to game the system to make that happen. If a minor party or independent candidate does make the final two, chances of actually getting elected increase, since they will then be in a one-on-one race.

I believe that SB 6 (Top Two Primary) puts political central committees into the Constitution.

Will confirm, modify, or retract on Tuesday.