Howdy, peeps, from the Land of Enchantment. Five months or so ago I went on hiatus to join the Richardson for President campaign staff and help coordinate volunteers all over the country. Though the campaign ended unsuccessfully, I am so proud of what we accomplished, most notably keeping the dialogue about troop withdrawl at the forefront. But end it did, and I am back! My blogging fingers have been mighty itchy!!!
So here we are, it is mid-February, and we are in the thick of the race. Edwards is out, and I know that saddens a lot of you the way Richardson's withdrawl saddened me. We true believers invest ourselves emotionally into a candidate, and it can be really hard to adj52 ust and realign. I have chosen a candidate to back in lieu of my most esteemed Governor Richardson, one I feel is inspiring and will bring about a whole new spirit of involvement and community and revive our national pride.
More importantly, though, I have embraced a cause. After witnessing the various ways each state runs its particular primary selection, and all those states scrambling to be first, to be relevant, I realized just how wrong the whole process is.
First of all, the cost is out of control. The amount of money being spent on this thing is beyond obscene, it is profane. I think of how many children could be vaccinated, textbooks purchased for schools, families insured, homes created, jobs created...doesn't it just blow your mind?
Secondly, it is appalling to me that rural Iowans have more impact on the choice of our leader than do New Yorkers, Californians, or even wee little New Mexicans. How is that justice? And isn't justice what we really want in electoral politics?
People, we have got to do two things. First we need to remove money from our political system by publicly funding our elections. Where there is no consistency, there is no justice. For example, where one state's primary is run by the secretary of state and bureau of elections, another is paid for by the state party, one paid for by tax dollars, and another by contributions. This is not justice. States with fewer delegates and smaller populations are not as valued, and therefore get less information about the candidates. Also, as we all know, candidates are so dependent on money they become beholden to their donors. If the funds are public then guess who they become beholden to? A clue: it isn't the insurance lobby!
Secondly we need make election days uniform and national. A national holiday for elections, one day for the primaries, one day for the general, with public funding to keep a cap on the costs and bring justice to our candidates and voters alike. Sure opponents of this will argue that a national holiday will be bad for our national productivity and hurt our economy, but shucks, you know that every merchant in the country will have a big "Election Day Blow-Out Sale!" so I don't see that argument holding water.
The fact is, those opposed to public funding of elections and national election days are those who benefit from political injustice, so don't let them tell you otherwise. Our nation needs this, if we are to get the changes we want to health care, education, worker's equity, and all the other issues we progressives care so deeply about.
It is good to be back and I thank you for taking the time to read this, and look forward to the discourse...
Cara aka LTS