Minnesota’s 2010 Primary Election is now history. Let the analysis…and the wars…begin! And there will be wars.
The August 10 election had meaning; of course, everyone has the right…and tendency…to attach their own meaning to the results, and will. This includes me. For me, there are essentially three kinds of voters in political elections: those who vote FOR somebody; those whose vote is AGAINST someone they badly want defeated; and the third category: those who don’t vote at all. The third category has a whole smorgasbord of reasons for not voting, and is always the largest single bloc – an odd fact in this country that supposedly reveres its devotion to the practice of Democracy.
On Tuesday, a huge portion of the Minnesota electorate did not bother to vote, even with a long absentee voting “window” easily accessible. For whatever reason, they just didn’t care.
Here are some small contributions to this conversation:
First, the most recent 2010 Primary Election Results can be found here.
When I last looked at this site, about 10:30 a.m., August 11, here were the totals for Governor only, with virtually all votes counted and reported:
Independent:
Tom Horner received 11,315 votes, or 64% of the total cast for Independent candidates for Governor.
Republican:
Tom Emmer received 106,110 votes, or 82% of the total.
Democrat (DFL):
Margaret Anderson Kelliher received 174, 378 votes or 39.83% of the total.
Mark Dayton received 180,558 votes or 41.24% of the total.
Matt Entenza received 80,092 votes or 18.2% of the total.
These totals are, of course, meaningless without some context.
In the last high profile election in Minnesota, for United States Senator in 2008, the final vote total, after every conceivable vote was analyzed and recounted, showed this:
Al Franken received 1,212,629 votes
Norm Coleman received 1,212,317 votes
(Coleman-Franken final election results 2008 election can be found here.)
The only relevant “apples to apples” comparison I choose to note from the above data is the number of persons who actually voted in the 2010 Primary and voted for a DFL candidate, compared to the number who actually voted for the Democrat (DFL) candidate Al Franken in 2008.
Now will come the “spin” from all sides, the liars poker which passes for elections in the United States.
We will get what we deserve: a barrage of thinly disguised propaganda, presenting carefully crafted lies designed to pass as the truth.
We know what we’re getting from these “promises” and misleading messages.
It works.
In fact we demand it.
Which leads back to the title of this piece, “God is great, beer is good, and people are crazy“. As the singer probably said to the old man, “Ain’t that the truth.”
Caveat Emptor.