On the eve of Election Day, the National University System Institute for Policy Research (NUSIPR) projects a very low turnout rate in San Diego County. Using election data from the Registrar of Voters, NUSIPR evaluated the early ballots received for the June 3rd gubernatorial primary election.
Comments 17
The reason voter turnout will be so low tomorrow is that there is very little reason for most residents of San Diego County to vote:
The race for Governor is completely non-competitive.
There are no Senate races.
Unless you live CD-52, you don’t have a competitive Congressional contest.
There are no competitive Assembly or State Senate races.
Residents of City Council Districts 2 and 6 have barely competitive races to vote on while the rest of the city can’t even say that.
Let’s face it, the right to vote on Barrio Logan’s Community Plan or on a possibly competitive District Attorney’s race is simply not enough to get most voters to the polls.
Maybe if everyone lived in the Grossmont Hospital District…
Can they tell if there will be a smaller percentage of low information voters?
Author
The lower the turnout, the higher the percentage of low information voters, in most cases.
6/3/14 — Can’t believe we wrote that. We know what we meant to write: Low turnout means low information voters don’t vote. The percentage of high info voters increases.
The turnout will be low because so many of the districts have been gerrymandered into safe seats. There is no reason to get excited and get involved for the average person.
In San Diego county, 4 of the 5 Congressional seats are 60/40 or worse.
If you can create 4 districts that are 65/35, ( 2 on each side), then you can create 4 districts that are 52/48
“Reverse gerrymandering” is the only way to solve this mess and I support it.
John,
“If you can create 4 districts that are 65/35, ( 2 on each side), then you can create 4 districts that are 52/48.”
You really can’t. No matter how you draw the lines, East County is going to be very Republican and the South Bay is going to very Democrat.
Unless we force people to relocate based on their political leanings, there is no way you are going to create all 50-50 districts.
You would take part of East County and merge it with parts of South Bay.
Have you seen some of the ridiculous maps that were created with the current gerrymandered districts?
It can be done, not that hard
Another reason is that there has just been 2 big, emotional political events, the fight over “Filthy” Filner and the special mayor’s race between Kevin and David. People are emotionally burned out and want to get on with their lives
John,
If you did that throughout California, you would have 53 Congressional Districts that were 56% Democrat (including independents that lean Democrat) and 44% Republican (including independents that lean Republican). Every California representative would be a Democrat. Is that what you really want?
“Maybe if everyone lived in the Grossmont Hospital District…”
‘Like’
Author
“The lower the turnout, the higher the percentage of low information voters, in most cases.”
Can’t believe we wrote that. We know what we meant to write: Low turnout means low information voters don’t vote. The percentage of high info voters increases.
Hypocrisy
Hunter’s and Issa’s could be trimmed
As well as Vargas’s and Davis’s to
Create 5 competitive districts.
Some parts of the state would stay
clearly in the hands of the Dems, but we could
absolutely create a more competitive environment
than we have now.
Of the 53, 35+ could be made competitive as
opposed to the 5 we now have.
More competition would drive voter turnout
and force engagement and accountability.
Maybe the goal shouldn’t be more voter turn out, but should be more informed voter turnout?
Michael,
You missed the part about engagement and accountability.
Single seat, winner-take-all districts are the wrong way to go — you end up electing people whose primary duty is to “bring home the bacon” — grab all you can at the trough for your district, while logrolling votes for OTHER reps district bacon. Their stump speeches are primarily about what they’ve done for their district.
With even modest Gerrymandering, many voters know they will not be able to affect the outcome of their legislative race. An amazing number of this year’s CA legislative races are now single party races.
http://politicalvanguard.com/posts/what-you-need-to-know-for-tuesday-june-3-2014
Better to have proportional representation. If the Republicans get 40% of the statewide vote, they get 40% of the legislative seats. Put a threshold (commonly 5%) on getting a political party represented.
Such voting goes on in many other countries, and everyone’s vote counts. Much better voter turnout, and truer representation of public sentiment. Usually three to six political parties are represented in the legislature.
Moreover, the election is more about issues rather than just negative campaigning about individual candidates transgressions – real or imagined.
Richard,
I am not that familiar with the system you described, although I know it is common throughout Europe. One question: who decides which actual people get to be the representatives from each party?
HQ, normally each party holds an election/convention, ranking the representatives — best ones at the top. The more seats (greater percentage of the vote) the the party gets, the deeper into the list they go for their representatives.
Richard, maybe most voters realize the government and Media dictate the outcome. Government ,Corporatocracy, and the Caliphate have created the perfect form of Hedgemony. The likes of Soros,Kissinger, Murdoch will manage the dismanteling of the USA and our Freedom,giving us nothing but oppression.
With the comming of another Clinton, our only form of expression will be under government control. Our Freedoms are in a death spiral, as planned. But hay, you gents in the rostra are always welcome in Idaho.