SAVING ELECTIONS FROM FRINGIES AND FANATICS

The Republicans have no one to blame but themselves for their stinging electoral setbacks on Tuesday, and it’s neither honorable nor conservative to explain our own failures by criticizing the folly of others. Nevertheless, some of the high profile disasters suffered by the GOP once again illustrate the consistently insane and destructive role of fringe parties in American politics.

At the conclusion of a long night of counting, control of the US Senate (and through the Senate, potential control of the Supreme Court for decades to come) came down to two cliffhanger races in Virginia and Montana. In both contests, the Democrats appeared to prevail, giving them the barest of majorities in the Senate (and dominance of the all important Judiciary Committee). And in both states, third part eccentrics played a decisive role in the final outcome.

In Virginia, Democrat Jim Webb appeared to beat Republican Incumbent George Allen by a tiny margin of less than 7.000 votes. Meanwhile, 26,000 votes went to the “Common Sense Conservative” candidate of the mighty Grass Roots Party, who identified herself as Gail “For Rail” Parker. If two-out-of-three of the votes that went to this devoutly Christian, retired Air Force Officer (whose big issue was building more train lines) would otherwise have gone to George Allen, then her utterly meaningless candidacy handed control of the Senate to Harry Reid, Charles Schumer, and Barbara Boxer.

Montana provides an even more alarming example. Democratic John Tester beat the Republican incumbent Conrad Burns by a margin of less than 3,000 votes. At the same time, Libertarian standard bearer Stan Jones drew 10,324 votes. In general, Libertarians draw more than two-thirds of their votes directly from Republicans. Once again, the Stan Jones juggernaut (which earned an anemic 2.6% of the total vote) drew more than enough support to change the course of history for the worse.

The amazing revelation for the 10,324 suckers who voted for Mr. Jones is that they cast ballots for an individual so dazed and confused that he couldn’t even recall the office for which he was a candidate. On the day after the election, a visit to the “Stan Jones for Senate” website featured the headline: STAN JONES- LIBERTARIAN FOR U.S. SENATE. Immediately below that headline appeared a statement from the candidate that began as follows: “For many years I have recognized that something is vitally wrong with our government. We seem to vote for people who promise to improve things. But regardless of who we vote for we get the same thing- more government and higher taxes. I’m running for Governor to drastically reduce state government.”

Actually, Stan, you weren’t running for Governor – you were running for U.S. Senator. The headline less than two inches above your statement says so.

Nevertheless, later in his manifesto the honorable Mr. Jones declares: “I won’t hesitate to issue blanket pardons when the legislature passes unnecessary laws over my veto or fails to repeal bad laws.” Actually, Senators don’t get to veto anything, or pardon anybody. Elsewhere on his website, Stan Jones brags about his “study of the constitution.” Maybe further study will help clarify the different roles of U.S. Senator and governor of Montana.

But then again, when you’ve got no chance of winning anything, who really cares about the difference between executive and legislative, Senator and Governor?

For those who protest that Stan Jones inadvertently re-cycled some previous statement of candidacy from some previous (and doubtless pathetic) gubernatorial race, I’ll concede that’s probably true. But his failure even to proofread his own letter “To The People of Montana” declaring his candidacy, and to adjust its language for his current campaign, demonstrates just how little effort or thought or care he actually put into his race for the Senate. He simply didn’t take his campaign seriously enough to specify the right office in his statement of candidacy. And yet 10,324 duped voters took him seriously enough to use their precious, sacred franchise to mark their ballots for a lazy, sloppy lunatic.

Any time some fringe party gets a line on the ballot it will draw votes – which is why the system must be changed to make it far more difficult for eccentric parties to win a place on general election ballots. Primaries are different, of course. The primary is the first round in the process and anyone can and should run, with wide open access to the ballot. Let any loon-dog party get a shot at the primary voters, but then limit a place on the general election ballot to those parties that made at least some vaguely respectable showing by drawing some serious level of support (say, 5%) among primary voters. That means the Ross Perots and Jesse Venturas and even Kinky Friedmans (and Joe Liebermans) would still earn their names on November ballots, but that the Gail “For Rail” Parkers and Stan Joneses would not.

Some activists complain that we already make it too hard for third and fourth and ninth party candidates, but actually the current system discriminates against the major party contenders. As a Republican or Democrat, you can only earn a spot in the general election by first generating substantial support (enough to beat your opponents) in the primary. That means that some candidates who win tens of thousands, even hundreds of thousands of votes will still lose in the primaries and fail to appear on November ballots. If you’re running as a Losertarian, however, or a representative of the Green weenies, or the Constipation Party, you’ll seldom face primary opposition (what sort of crazed narcissist actually wants such embarrassing nominations?) so you can qualify for the general election with a dozen primary votes or less. You get to play in the general election without going through one of the toughest ordeals of the election process. Why should we make it harder for a Republican or Democrat to qualify for the November sweepstakes than it is for weirdo fringies with zero chance of victory?

In two formerly Republican Congressional districts in Texas and Florida, the GOP candidates couldn’t get their names on the final ballot, despite massive support (they both nearly won, after replacing disgraced former Congressmen Tom Delay and Mark Foley. Meanwhile, kooks and crazies with a few dozen supporters got their names into the general election, and didn’t have to ask their supporters for write-in support.

Democracy needs to remain open and free-wheeling, allowing for the possibility of some oddball or idealist to come out of nowhere to shake up the status quo. The way to maintain that openness is to make primary access easy. But a place in the general election is a different matter, and it ought to be earned: you don’t make it to the finals in any sport unless you’ve done well enough in the first qualifying round.

The egomaniacs who get their jollies by running oddball campaigns for high office have a right to their dreams and their obsessions, but the rest of us have a right to a sane political selection process that’s free (in its final, all important stages) from distortion, distraction and destruction by self-indulgent fools with no real support.