"Count My Vote" Distances Election System from Voters

Utah is embroiled in contention over its elections. Our caucus system to select election candidates is under attack from the Count My Vote (CMV) initiative. Under former governor Mike Leavitt, CMV intends to take over Utah elections, end our neighborhood participation, and dump Utah into political primaries -- the big money, battle-to-the-booth brawls that mimic national elections. CMV splays slogans, platitudes, and catch phrases across the media, but what they are not giving us is a straight story. They want us to abandon self-government for the power, prestige, and patronage behind this initiative. A compromise has emerged to head off the takeover. The Utah Senate backed the compromise, and the caucus system, in last Thursday's near-unanimous 26 to 2 vote to keep Senate Bill 54, the compromise, alive in the legislative process.

The underlying problem in this tug-of-war is poor participation in elections, both state and national. Voter participation is down in Utah, and nationwide. "Why" is up for grabs: too many distractions, increased apathy, less personal responsibility for freedom, increased "government-gimme," despair? It's hard to say.

The national elections give a snapshot of the problem. Utah performed poorly in 2012. Eighty percent of registered voters cast ballots, but half a million unaffiliated voters bailed, for an overall total of 57 percent, according to the Salt Lake Tribune. Utah is among the bottom 10 states for national voter turnout, and Count My Vote proponents blame the caucus system. They promise to involve more people in the selection process and increase voter turnout. While everyone wants that, several state senators say there is nothing in Count My Vote to produce those benefits.
Many states, such as California and Connecticut, previously had caucus-type procedures and now mourn their abandonment. States that switched to primaries got less voter involvement, not more, according to Curt Bramble, sponsor of SB 54.
Why do Utahns slouch at the polls? With our one main party, too many complacently believe that a Republican is a Republican is a Republican -- all vanilla. Not so. Republicans rival the BYU Creamery for flavors: liberal, conservative, libertarian, constitutional, progressive, moderate and uninvolved, for starters. The opposite ends of the Republican Party vary as much as baseball and ballet, Ferraris and Jeeps. You cannot be just a Republican. You may disagree vehemently with the flavor of the Republican running; chocolate is not strawberry, you know. You get involved with politics in Utah for the same reason you make yourself part of any trip to the Creamery: to be sure you get the flavor you want.
Count My Vote rankles the informed. Supporters collecting petition signatures to put Count My Vote on the 2014 ballot are backed with big bucks -- thus the sardonic title Buy My Vote -- and the average Joe drinking the poisoned Kool-Aid doesn't "get" the issue. Signatures piled onto CMV petitions at a recent gun show in St. George, as those uninformed on the issue and seduced by the two-second spiel to "make their vote count," mindlessly gripped the pen and signed on the dotted line.
When questioned, few understood the initiative, but signed anyway: "Hey, it's a Republican thing! Can't be bad, right?" Those abreast of the issue ground their teeth and remembered anew why we must understand our governing system to make wise choices.
Voters must also have accurate information to choose wisely, and they aren't getting it from Count My Vote. Not only is there no evidence that a switch to primaries will produce greater voter involvement, but the current caucus system does not deny people a voice, as CMV advocates claim, it gives them one. We have some obvious deception here, and Count My Vote is not playing a fair ball game.
The mood in the Senate chambers for last Thursday's hearing on SB 54 was overwhelmingly positive, as the vote totals showed. Utah's leaders obviously recognize the value of the caucus system and want to keep it. That's a clear message to us to do the same.