“This anonymous clan of slack-jawed troglodytes has cost me the election, and yet if I were to have them killed, I would be the one to go to jail. That’s democracy for you.”
–C. Montgomery Burns
For those who hadn’t noticed, it’s election time in America. I’m filling out my ballot and it reminds me once again of just how MUCH people in this country are expected to vote on.
President, Senators and Representatives at the national and state level, Governor…sure. Maybe even an initiative or two – though my distaste for the direct ballot measure grows the more I experience it in action.
But on my ballot, in addition to those races I’m also being asked to vote for Lieutenant Governor, Secretary of State, Controller, Treasurer, Attorney General, Insurance Commissioner, and Member for the State Board of Equalization. And those are the easy ones because they’re all partisan. I don’t have to know a thing about Betty T. Yee to vote for her for the Equalization Board because it says “Democratic” next to her name.
But then there is the judicial races. It takes some digging to find out who these people are. You certainly can’t read the official statements because they’re blander than bland. “I will uphold the law, etc.” Which is nice to know I guess, but has nothing to do with what actual decisions they would make. Fortunately, there are conservative blogs who care about this stuff a lot. All you have to do is flip their recommendations and you’re golden. It turns out the LOVE Ming Chin. So he’s a ‘no.’ And they think Carlos Moreno is the devil incarnate. So he’s a ‘yes.’ But then you get down to the race for Court of Appeal, Presiding Justice, 6th Appellate District. And I have zero useful information about Conrad Rushing.
And then there’s the race for Superintendent. Which is one of the few places where I can’t even just look to the unions for support. Because I kind of distrust teacher unions. So the fact that they support Torlakson doesn’t really help me.
And then you get to the city level, where the only truly relevant information I’ve been able to suss out is that one of the 8 candidates is a Republican. It doesn’t say that on the ballot or anything. I had to go read some articles in the local newspaper for that. So I’ve narrowed the field down to seven. All of them want to help local business, maintain public safety, and preserve the local environment. Because who wouldn’t want to do those things?
And THEN, there are all the propositions. Nine of them statewide this year. I know for sure how I’m voting on most, but still am not sure about a couple.
Ones I’m certain about:
19 (marijuana legalization) – YES
23 (kill AB 32 law on emissions reduction) – NO
24 (repeal the corporate tax loophole) – YES
25 (can pass a budget with a simple majority) – YES
26 (make it even MORE impossible to collect the money necessary to run a government) – NO
Ones that still puzzle me a bit:
20 and 27 (redistricting) – my union tells me to support 27 (which would kill the redistricting commission), and I see the argument. The commission is equally weighted in partisan terms which doesn’t match up to the actual makeup of the state. But I remain a bit troubled by the general sense of entitlement: that parties ought to have ownership over redistricting and that this ought to be part of the spoils of electoral war. I don’t know that the commission is a particularly good way of dealing with that, but surely there have to be more procedurally fair ways of thinking about this matter.
21 (increase licensing fees to pay for state parks) – Obviously I’m sympathetic to the cause. But this seems like a very strange use of the initiative process. And I really don’t like the attitude that the appropriate response to our budgeting breakdowns is to pick and choose a few specific things and create specific revenue streams for them. I’ll probably vote yes, but the whole process feels a bit icky.
22 (prevent raiding of local governments) – Honestly, this one has me a bit baffled. I’ll probably vote no on the general principle that the budgeting process does not need to be made any more complicated.
So what can we make of all this? Well, my general feeling is that I’m a big political nerd. And even I felt a bit overwhelmed. If we want people to make informed judgments, our system is not very well designed to produce that result.
We love to valorize democracy in this country. But if this is what is meant by ‘democracy’ then something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Washington has two separate initiatives to privatize liquor stores. No one is clear on what the difference is between them, but there is a difference such that no one is sure what will happen if they both pass.