Ten days ago I voted early in downtown Tampa. But as I made my way to the elevator in the County Center, I realized my ballot didn't contain a couple of local races that I've been paying particular attention to, such as Attorney General and the HD 61 race that has become quite intense. Come to think of it, I didn't get to choose between Charlie Crist or Nan Rich for governor.
After going back inside the rooms delegated for early voting, a poll worker found my "receipt" and informed me that I was listed as NPA — Non Party Affiliated, or independent. That's generally the way to go, I feel these days — except in contested primary elections.
You see, Florida has a closed primary system, meaning voters may vote only for candidates of the party with which they are registered. In an open primary, all registered voters can vote for any candidate, regardless of their political affiliation or lack thereof. We're one of only 11 states that have this form of voting.
Back when I lived in California , I remember how a closed primary system really upset some folks back in 2000. Lots of Democrats who were bored with supporting Al Gore as their standard bearer wanted to be able to participate in the GOP presidential primary that spring, coming right after John McCain stunned George W. Bush by attaining a 19 percentage-point lead in the polls.
Of course, this was when McCain was adored by liberals. In any event, Democrats wanted to vote for McCain against Bush in the Cali Primary, but of course they couldn't, since the state had a closed primary system. (Since then, the Golden State has moved to a top-two primary system — that's where all candidates, regardless of party affiliation, are listed on one ballot. Voters choose their favorite candidate, and the top two vote-getters become the candidates in the general election.)
Times have changed since then. The big deal about having a closed primary system in 2014 in Florida is that more and more voters don't want to be registered as a Democrat or Republican — but by claiming their independence, they're effectively disenfranchised from voting today. There are 2.7 million Floridians registered as NPA who can't weigh in all types of races today.
Early voting has been pretty lackluster, and the overall turnout could end up being lower than 20 percent. Before you bemoan how horrible that is for our democracy, realize that our closed primary system has essentially told millions of Floridians that we really don't want you to vote — unless you're totally fired up for voting for school board and judges.
In today's election news...
Charlie Crist made five different stops in some of the biggest media markets in Florida yesterday. In Tampa he dismissed the analysis by some Republican political consultants that he HAS to get 80 percent of the vote against Nan Rich tonight or else he's damaged goods going into November. Or something like that.
The interesting thing about the Ice Bucket Challenge is who you choose to "nominate" to carry the chain on. Who says they have to be friends? Yesterday Equality Florida's Nadine Smith challenged three well known critics of same-sex marriage — John Stemberger, Mathew Staver and state Representative Dennis Baxley — to douse their heads with ice-cold water for charity.
An ambitious plan to attempt to reduce violence in Hillsborough County was unveiled yesterday by the Violence Prevention Collaborative (VPC), a group formed last year by County Commissioner Kevin Beckner.
And supporters of that high-speed ferry projected proposed by Ed Turanchik last year need not get depressed that the plan is endangered now that there's an environmental issue with one of the properties crucial to the ferry plan actually happening. At least that's what Turanchik told CL the other day. (We'll have a response from Audubon Florida later today on the site).
