Last updated on 2019-11-26
Columnist Dave Baumeister says we should take political parties out of county elections. He also contends that the politically damaged Aaron McGowan may have better chances than we think in the next Minnehaha County State’s Attorney election.
Greetings, Blogophiles!
Is there anyone else out there in the Blogosphere becoming extremely tired of political parties?
To give you a little info about me, I have been registered as an Independent for most of the past 20 years. For a few years during that time, I was registered as a Republican. Prior to that, I was registered as a Democrat for 23 years, so as you might imagine, being in a certain political party doesn’t have much meaning to me. My beliefs are my beliefs, and they are shaped by my family and friends, and how we all treat others.
Here is something to consider; those of you who think your political party is the greatest thing since sliced bread, you need to take a look at history.
The Democratic Party was the party that supported slavery and, later, Jim Crow laws. In contrast, Republican Teddy Roosevelt was one of the most anti-business/pro-worker presidents the country ever had. These philosophies are completely opposite today. (Although I don’t believe the Republicans today are pro-slavery or even racist, as a group, it is a pretty good bet that people who are racists also consider themselves Republicans.)
So now, let’s put party politics aside, shall we? As I have written before, the most important elections we have are for local offices and issues.
Two of the local governing bodies, school and city, exist as non-political positions. Why doesn’t the same hold true for county elections?
I could guess at reasons, but other than it might be a little more expensive to print extra non-partisan ballots, I really don’t know why anyone would feel a party designation is necessary for, say, a Register of Deeds.
Maybe, like the Capulets and the Montagues, the reason for their fighting has been forgotten over time, but they continue the feud because that is all they know. Like the way some people use religion, political parties can just give one group a reason to hate others.
So, I would like to see members from both political parties at our state legislature sponsoring a bill to make all elected county offices non-political.
Right now, if a person has all sorts of good ideas on how to make our counties better and wants to run for county office, and he or she didn’t want the label that goes with any particular political party, he or she would need about twice the signatures just to get on the ballot as people with bad or no ideas who are willing to stick a D or R after their names.
How can this be a good for anyone? How can this even be considered fair?
Maybe this year, the South Dakota Legislature can pass legislation that is not overturning previous referendums or legislation that won’t be overturned by the courts.
To make this work, I would like to ask my friends Republicans Sue Peterson and Jean Hunhoff and Democrat Ryan Cwach in the South Dakota House and Republican Art Rusch and Democrat Craig Kennedy in the State Senate to sponsor legislation to make all county elections non-partisan and to require the signatures for county election petitions be in line with city and school board petitions.
This should be legislation that everyone can get behind.
* * *
It seems the Minnehaha County State’s Attorney has a warped sense of humor (or a good sense of irony).
This week he sent out a memo – which he said could be released to the media (that’s me!) –saying he would be out of the office for a few days for knee replacement surgery, and to attend a law enforcement task force meeting in Pierre, but he would be back in the office full-time next Wednesday, Oct. 23.
Why is that funny, you ask? Remember what I wrote last week: that as an elected official, McGowan is only answerable to the electorate – not the county commission, the TV stations, newspapers – and certainly not the governor or attorney general.
When I think about it now, I believe SA McGowan is going to have a very easy time getting re-elected. South Dakotans love an underdog, and Governor Noem has done her best to make him that underdog. In fact, if I were McGowan’s campaign manager, I would want him to use the slogan, “THERE’S NO NEED TO FEAR! SA McGowan is Here!”
And to make fun of the chemical abuse angle, he could have campaign photos showing him taking a pill which he gets out of the secret compartment of his ring.
I could go on with this, but it is hard to type when I am laughing so hard!
Anyway, this Sioux Falls voter looks forward to seeing McGowan turn the tables on this situation. Maybe he needs another photo opp with “Sweet Polly” Kennecke….
grudznick did get a chuckle from that Simon Bar Sinister, who I felt had a misunderstood heart, and the Batty-Mans road-dog, Georgie.
Batty-Man is an insult and defamation to gay men, grudz. Surely you’ve been called that or you wouldn’t know the term. Knock it off, jerk. Goat-Goat-Goat Three at a time, on grudz’s dime.
I’m with you! Get rid of party’s in as many places as you can. The Gerrymandering R party won’t have it but it’s nice to day dream. If you can’t get it done at least get rid of the box that lets you vote the party line for all.
BTW, my political affiliation has been some what along the lines of your’s. Currently registered as a Democrat but lastly as a Republican so that I could try to pick the lesser of two evils in the primary’s. Independent for many years starting with Ross Perot.
If you got rid of party’s how would the dummies here vote. The only way they vote is to see if there is an R by the name. That’s it, you don’t have the R, you don’t get the vote. Ask voters about what the candidate stands for and they cannot give you an answer other than I vote for them because of the R.
If you got rid of the R or the D, voters would have to work, can’t have that.
I like Dave’s idea. The fewer political elections the better.
I think one of the reasons the parties like them is for recruiting purposes. County elections are where they look for possible statehouse and statewide candidates.
2016 Amendment V would have taken the party labels off every ballot and allowed South Dakotans to focus on electing the person rather than the party. It failed, but it had the lowest “No” percentage of any failed ballot measure that year.
Cory, I’d forgotten about that Amendment and it’s outcome. Seriously, that R and D are only for the low informed voter. The one that doesn’t have time to research any kinds of facts or past actions….you know, the typical Republican voter. As long as the brand name R is there, well then that’s how daddy voted and grandpa Zeb voted. The powers to be want to keep it that way as well, gerrymandering right in front of your eyeballs.
While Cory and I and George Washington all agree that political parties can be bad news, I think Amendment V was too confusing for most people. To accept that, they had to understand how elections would work under it, and that may have been a bridge too far. My proposal is just to keep things simple by taking the partisanship out of a place it isn’t needed. Two thirds of the government agencies that spend the majority of the local property taxes are non-partisan, so why does the third that actually does the collecting need to be political? It makes no sense. Some will try to spin it so it does, but that doesn’t mean there is any truth to what they say.
The one that galls me completely is the political selection of circuit court judges. How can it be that a judge is chosen because of party? Hard to distance yourself from party to the law when you clearly have a bias.