If McCain Wins . . .
If John McCain goes on to capture the Republican nomination for president this year it will not be because of the conservative base of the Party it will be because of a severely weakened party that lost its way somewhere between Richard Nixon and George W. Bush with a brief shining through of principle with Ronald Reagan.
I’ve heard the “crossroads” analogy so many times it has become meaningless. But this time, no fooling, we really are at those crossroads, no, better, we are at the precipice, looking down.
It’s not just about party affiliation; it’s about the unity of a nation. A great number of voters want that longed for “free lunch” and are pushing the rest of us closer and closer to the edge and to a whimpering oblivion.
A victorious John McCain or either of the Democrats could be that last, definitive shove over the cliff.
Governor Schwarzenegger has spoken for a more “open” Republican primary election. He wants independents and presumably crossover voters to be able to vote in the now closed Republican primary.
The governor has it exactly wrong.
Why a partisan primary election at all? It greatly would cut down on the number of elections, in fact, only one election in the fall with runoffs would be necessary. This means that in non-partisan elections the numbers of candidates vying for each office could be considerable (from “Green to Mean”). Presently, a party’s primary function is to winnow down the choices through partisan elections and to support those primary winners in the general election.
If all elections were nonpartisan, there would be no need for parties. Agenda driven groups, conservative or liberal, then would determine who wins and if you think that voting for president is a “crap shoot” today (which it is not), it would be practically impossible to figure out candidate qualifications without some partisan help and would, therefore, be just a guess. Voter participation while low today would be even less evident because of the belief that it is “the powers that be” that makes the selections, sliding further into a socialist/fascist state.
While we still have partisan elections, we should protect the parties from dilution or dirty tricks by another party. In California’s case, the February 5 closed Republican primary should be clear enough evidence of the electorate’s choice for president. Many electoral votes are at stake.
But nothing is beneath the zeal of political operatives to take advantage of say, “decline to state” voters to skew a party’s true choice. (Note: only registered Republican voters can vote in the 2008 presidential primary February 5). If Gov. Schwarzenegger had his way this time, the results most certainly would have been skewed as they were in the Florida primary.
Here’s a major example of where messing with another party’s primary changed Georgia history. In the 1960s, Georgia was by far a Democratic state but the parties held separate party primaries on the same day. Out of nowhere came a very attractive Republican, Howard “Bo” Callaway, who became the first Republican congressman from Georgia since Reconstruction. The Republicans were ecstatic and pushed him into running for governor after only one term in the House.
The 1966 election was rife with excitement and Callaway seemed a shoo-in for Georgia’s first Republican governor in nearly a hundred years. But then, something happened on the way to the gold-domed capital. No one else could compete with the Callaway persona in the primary election so the Republicans held a convention in a phone booth and came up with this strategy:
Republicans were told through the grape vine to “cross-over” and vote in the Democratic primary for the perceived weakest Democratic candidate to assure further a victory for Callaway in November. And that was Lester Maddox, who, sure enough, won over a large slate of Democrats including Jimmy Carter.
That upset former Georgia governor Ellis Arnall and a campaign began for a write-in to elect Arnall. The result was a plurality vote for Callaway, next Maddox, and Arnall got enough votes to keep Callaway from receiving a majority vote.
Georgia law provided that if a candidate did not receive a majority of votes, the legislature would decide between the top two vote getters.
It took two generations for the Republicans eventually to win majorities in both houses and the governorship, which it holds today.
The setback is generally attributed to the botched “cross-over” voting. After all, it is a party’s right to choose their own competitive candidate and not have the process skewed by another one.
Yes, mischief happens.
Ernest Norsworthy
emnorsworthy@earthlink.net
