I caught this in my facebook feed this evening; where State Senator Michael Rohl came out and expressed his support for the Jungle Primary measure that we’ll be voting on this fall, Amendment H.
In several instances in the past, the prior versions of the jungle primary effort hadn’t been ready for prime-time. However, in this election, despite opposition from the political parties, the measure seems to have both more money, as well as more support, as evidenced by Rohl’s breaking the ice when it comes to current elected officials willing to support it.
You have to admit that Michael’s argument is the same one that many Republicans, including myself, used this last session in support of the political parties casting aside the convention nomination process for constitutional offices, and putting those positions on the ballot, as nearly every other partisan elected office is; allowing them to be nominated by all the voters in the Republican or Democrat Party, as opposed to the few who show up to convention?
That was narrowly rejected, despite multiple attempts. And it still remains misguided.
Admittedly, it puts a number of people in a logical quandary. The arguments against both the jungle primary and the candidates for constitutional office being selected in a primary are largely the same; that it takes the grassroots out of the process, and people will come in and buy elections.
But… isn’t that what just happened this past June when voter turnout was at rock bottom? A few special interests came in – in some cases flagrantly ignoring state laws – and bought elections quicker than you could say “Tammanay Hall.” Campaign finance limits? Pfft! They could just file a new report with creative accounting. No disclaimers on materials? We’ll just ignore that!
If all the bogey-man arguments that had been used against the easy reform measures to expand voter participation came to pass despite the attempts at reform failing, then they’re not really much of a scare-tactic anymore, are they? “Special interests are going to come in and buy elections if we let more people vote?” TOO LATE. They just did that.
Maybe Michael Rohl is the first elected official to say the quiet part out loud. That the system might need to be shaken up a bit more than we would have guessed.
And I’d agree that more people participating in the election process is always better than just a few coveting it.
