[lbo-talk] Kerry's Tax Cut Makes Me Wanna Ralph

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

>I appreciate the recirculation.
>I'd like to note that in the beginning of the post I said I was 
>voting for Kerry, though that could change.
>
>mbs

The more you think about Kerry's program, the less likely it is for 
you to vote for him.  And thanks to the Democratic Party nomination 
process that was more frontloaded than ever, everyone will have 
months to think about it.  :-)

*****   2004 PRIMARY TURNOUT LOW
March 9, 2004

GROUPED PRIMARIES LOWER THAN INDIVIDUALS
BETTER SELECTION METHOD NEEDED
Curtis Gans

Contrary to some published reports and with the singular exception of 
the New Hampshire Democratic primary which set a new record high, 
Democratic turnout in the party's Presidential primaries through 
Super Tuesday was generally low - in the aggregate, the third lowest 
on record. . . .

In all, an estimated 14,500,000 eligible citizens or 7.2 percent of 
the national eligible electorate participated in the Presidential 
primaries through Super Tuesday. Only an estimated 10,300,000 
citizens or 5.1 percent of the 200,482,000 eligible Americans 
nationally participated in the selection of Sen. John Kerry as the 
Democratic nominee. (Estimations made necessary by more than one 
million still uncounted absentee ballots in California.)

A comparatively high turnout, greater than either 2000 or 1996 and 
perhaps equaling or exceeding the 58.1 percent turnout of 1992 is 
expected in November. But turnout is not expected to reach the 60 
percent plus levels of the 1960s. These are some of the highlights of 
a report issued today on Presidential primary turnout (and other 
issues) by the Committee for the Study of the American Electorate 
(CSAE), a non-partisan, non-profit research organization specializing 
in voter turnout issues.

Among the other highlights and lowlights of this report:

-- Democratic turnout (an estimated 10.3 million) constituted 11.4 
percent of the eligible electorate in the 20 states which held 
primaries through Super Tuesday, higher than the 9 percent which 
voted in the uncontested 1996 Presidential primaries and the 
virtually (after New Hampshire) uncontested primaries in 2000 in 
which 10.1 percent of the eligible electorate voted. But it was lower 
than the turnout for every other Presidential primary season in these 
states and more than 50 percent lower than the primary turnouts of 
1968 and 1972. . . .

Democratic turnout was a record in New Hampshire and a near record in 
the Iowa caucuses in part because of the enormous amount of time and 
money spent in those states, the latter (money) a record, because 
competing in those contests involved retail campaigning and 
mobilization and because Democrats (along with some independents and 
Republicans) are united in their distaste for President George W. 
Bush, had the time to comparison shop and were propelled to the polls 
by that animus.

That turnout fell off sharply after those contests was not 
surprising. The campaign moved immediately (within one week) to 
grouped contests (see below) which were underfunded (resources having 
been severely depleted by Iowa and New Hampshire), which had to be 
conducted through television ads and one-shot visits to get free 
media coverage, which minimized grassroots mobilization and in which 
candidates other than Sen. Kerry could compete in only a limited 
number of states. . . .

It is also not surprising that after a primary campaign in which 
voter involvement was limited to six weeks and which was conducted in 
only 20 of the 50 states and which was a brief wholesale campaign in 
most of them, in almost all polls, between 20 and 30 percent of 
Americans still do not know enough about either Sen. Kerry or Sen. 
John Edwards to determine whether they have a favorable or 
unfavorable opinion of either. But this truncated schedule, created 
by the Democratic Party, may come back to haunt it, as it gives the 
GOP five months to define Sen. Kerry before he has his optimum 
opportunity to present himself in the best light at the Democratic 
national convention.

What continues to be disturbing is the low level of voter turnout -- 
between 30 and 50 percent lower than turnouts in the 1960s and 70s. . 
. .

But whether the turnout increase is large or small, turnout this fall 
will not reach the mid-60 percent levels of the 1960s. There are two 
concrete indicators that demonstrate this: Contrary to public 
impression, the turnout for last year's California recall election 
was not, at 47.1 percent of the electorate, particularly high, 
despite the deep divisions in the state, the massive media coverage, 
the enormous amounts of money poured into it and the star quality of 
the elected governor. . . .

This [moving up their primaries to theoretically exert more influence 
on who would be the party's nominee] led to an ever-shortened 
campaign and an ever-greater grouping of primaries, which was further 
exacerbated this year, when, in the belief that it was in the 
Democratic Party's interest to end the primary season as early as 
possible, the party eliminated what had been a window of a few weeks 
between the Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary and allowed 
seven states to hold primaries and caucuses a week later.

The result has been lower turnout in the primaries which are grouped, 
due to campaigns run largely through television advertising with 
little personal contact and grassroots mobilization, often with 
diminished resources to conduct these campaigns, lesser information 
about the candidates and consequent progressively lower voter turnout 
when compared to primaries which are held individually. . . .

But by truncating the process, they [Democrats] lost the advantage 
they had in the daily coverage of criticism of the President and his 
policies, propelled themselves into a four-month dead period before 
the national conventions in which citizen interest will decline, the 
opposition will have the opportunity to define the nature of the race 
and the party will have to remobilize its supporters. . . .

<http://www.fairvote.org/turnout/pressrelease.htm>   *****
-- 
Yoshie

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