I'm sure a lot of people are going to read that headline and think: 'what the heck?'.
That's right. Today I switched parties, officially changing my voter registration from (R) to (D).
It's a strange thing, here in Kansas. There are a large number of the most progressive people I know who chose to be registered Republicans.
Why? Because in Kansas, we've spent years feeling as though the vote that really mattered was to impact our primaries.. to make sure the wacky conservative didn't win. We've formed political groups and funds to stop them.
Everyone knew that in the general election you'd vote (D), but staying registered (R) for so long as the golden parachute. Today, I cut the cord.
There are several people in the background who know more about this, but in the last four years I've taken a lot of time to trying to help motivate democrats to field campaigns. It's always been easy when it was another state. Sometimes, it was easier in state.
In primary seasons I could say, with some level of honesty I was the 'moderate' who wanted a 'moderate' candidate. I was that oddball atheist who put work in on women's issues, LGBT issues, and fielded democratic candidates in the last few years.
In other primary seasons I just voted against the nut.
Over the last 18 months, though, I've invested serious time and resources into improving and changing the outcomes in the two states I care about. All the while, in the back of my mind I realized: I'm still hedging my bets. I'm staying a registered (R) with my only reason being to have some say in their primaries.
I talked to friends, Democrats at heart all, who were in the same boat as I was... registered (R)s, hardened (D)s who felt as though they had to stop the Republican primaries from being too crazy.
Today all of us changed our cards. We've spent a decade hedging our bets to try and stave off the crazy. But at this point, there is very little sanity left, and our thought process of at least having a vote in elections where there is no general election Democrat on the ballot isn't worth it if we want to make real change.
I've met with candidates, worked on design, and have tried to build something here. It's put up or shut up time.
So today, I cut the parachute. No more hedging my bets, no matter how red of a state I'm in.
So, before I get too much grief for taking so long to switch ;) at least I am hopeful some of my email fliers and doorknockers may change.
Edited: bad thing about voice dictation.. Homophones