I believe your point was, “when was the last time California had anything to do with electing a president? Primaries or general election?”

You have a point when it comes to the primaries. That’s a scheduling issue. As for the “general,” try moving CA’s electoral votes from D to R in any year a Dem has won the presidential election and see just how irrelevant the state is.

Agreed, CA is normally not in play in the general. However, we are not unique in that regard. Only about one quarter of states are in play in a typical presidential election year. But I still take my vote seriously. I get psyched by voting as if my ballot is the one that will decide the outcome. I do that with all the down ballot offices and ballot issues too. If a couple million Dems decided not to vote on the basis that CA was not in play, then the state WOULD be in play. If 100 percent of eligible Republican voters showed up to vote while only the typical half of eligible Dems showed up, that would probably be enough to hand the state’s electoral votes to the GOP candidate.

We could move to a popular vote system for the presidency, but that would create as many problems as it would resolve. And it would actually make a big state like California LESS relevant. Getting 60% of the votes cast in CA would mean that a candidate just got a lot of votes added to all the other individual votes acrosss the country — instead of winning or losing a big state’s bloc of electoral votes.

Sure, you bring up 2000 and 2004, but the fact that California was going to vote Democratic was never in doubt. California wasn’t even remotely in play, as is also the case this year.

Yet newspaper space devoted to that one race will probably be far greater than all the other races combined.

Here’s what’s been killing our state:http://bit.ly/QSfujA

“Lots of probably…”

Only a couple, but it is interesting to contemplate the last 44 years without a Nixon or a Reagan.

Real point was California can count, even in presidential elections. It wasn’t that long ago that this state elected both Republican and Democratic governors, and voted for both Republican and Democratic presidential candidates. So, what happened? Instead of showing up for primary elections, voters left it to the hard core base of each party to pick candidates. So, in the general, we get to choose between candidates owned by the public unions or right wingers.

Reminds me of the story how if the dog hadn’t stopped to take a crap he would have caught the rabbit.

CA has been relevant several times.

Had RFK lived, his 1968 primary win in California would have given him the momentum to win in Chicago. He probably would have beat Nixon in the general.

Ronald Reagan almost beat President Ford for the GOP nomination in 1976, and his primary win in California almost gave him the delegates he needed. Had Reagan been nominated to run against Carter in 1976 instead of 1980, Carter probably would have beat him; and Reagan never would got a second chance to run. Carter might well have been re-elected in 1980 had somebody other than Reagan run against him.

Hillary Clinton almost beat Obama in 2008. The contest would not have been that close without her primary win in California.

As for general elections, Ford won California’s electoral votes in 1976 and almost had enough electoral votes to beat Carter. California’s electoral votes weren’t in doubt in 2000 and 2004, but they would have been decisive had Gore carried his home state in 2000, or if Kerry had carried Ohio in 2004.

In all the other contests, the Top Two is great.
Look at this year.
Stark/Swalwell
Quirk/Ong
Bonta/Guilliam(sp)

At least those are real November elections for the first time in ages.

Plus, though not top two, we have the District 2 Supervisorial race. Valle, Green, Hayashi.
Plurality wins. Could be a squeaker.
Mailers destined to be suitable for framing.