The Postmodernist

An Op-Ed piece published in the New York Times in March lays out an intriguing plan for election reform: Phil Keisling advocates abolishing party primaries. As an independent voter, I, myself, consider this a step in the right direction. Tomorrow, May 18, Kentucky will hold it’s primary elections, and I still can’t vote in any of them.

There are a slew of candidates up for Mayor of Louisville, most of which are Democrats. Although, by reading content published on their websites alone, you’d almost never guess. I knew Jim King is running as a Democrat thanks to his hateful direct mailings attacking Greg Fischer for donating to some Republican politicians. I pegged Fischer for a Republican because of this, until I looked at the list of mayoral candidates on Wikipedia.

Nor did I realize Tyler Allen was a Dem until glancing at the list either. For Democrat candidates, they sure don’t seem too keen on talking about their party affiliation on their campaign websites. This serves to underline my point…

The Party no longer matters to the mainstream. Keisling provides abysmal statistics to prove this very fact. Primary election voter turn-outs are incredibly low. The fact that Texans can celebrate a new state record of 16.5 percent turn-out becomes only more ludicrous when you realize it’s the state’s high. And 5 percent in New York? This is what decides our elections, folks.

Primary elections only serve partisan politics. So why are we still pushing primaries in a country whose citizens are frustrated at the notoriously deficient partisanship politics they produce?

I’d personally rather see Tyler Allen on the ballot than Greg Fischer, but if Fischer wins in the primary, it won’t matter. As an independent voter, next to none care what I think until November. A campaign volunteer stopped by the house the other day to speak to my other half only because he’s a registered Democrat. And all the direct mail sent to the house is addressed to him as well. I’ve received nothing, because in the world of party primaries, independent voters don’t matter.