Choice is always good.
You wouldn't want to go to the grocery store and find only one brand of peanut butter. You want to be able to have a variety of tastes and to be able to comparison shop for price or other factors. And since we all have different filters for our choice, not everyone will walk away with the same brand.
No one wants to walk down the aisle and only see GENERIC Peanut Butter, GENERIC Lima Beans, GENERIC Corn Flakes, and on and on. It would be like shopping in the old Soviet Union.
Speaking of the Soviet Union, and other autocratic countries (including the new Soviet Union, known as Russia), their lack of diversity is not limited to their consumer markets. It's also seen on their ballots. There is only one viable option. Either there is no choice on the ballot, or opposition is just for show.
I can't imagine living like that. I like having choices in the stores. And I love having choices on the ballot.
Unfortunately, ballot choice has not existed in my adopted home state of Georgia. For decades, the Democratic Party dominated across the state. The opposition was paltry and uncompetitive, and often Democratic candidates would run in November unopposed, with the Republicans unable to mount even a token opponent.
But this did not last forever. In recent years, the Republican Party has taken a chokehold on Georgia politics. The great switch, primarily provoked by the national Democratic Party's stance on civil rights, and then egged on by religious leaders of the conservative right, so much so, that by the early 2000s, the Democratic Party had been reduced to minority status, only able to hold sway in a small number of districts.
In my own neck of the Georgia woods, there would be very few Democrats appearing on the ballot. Everyone around me seemed to accept that the real election was the primary, and were completely undisturbed by the Soviet-style ballot in the Fall.
But not me. It bothered the bejeezus out of me. I grew up in an area of Michigan that had very competitive elections. Sometimes the Republican won, sometimes the Democrat. No one could win by only appealing to party. Splitting ballots was more common than not. And those who were elected, if they refused to compromise and get stuff done, their jobs were in peril.
Not so today. And this is true in many parts of the country. Districts have been gerrymandered to be uncompetitive, to protect one party or the other. The reason Republicans have dominated so much the last decade has as much to do with their surge election in 2010 as anything else, when they captured an enormous number of state legislatures. This enabled them to control how districts were formed coming out of the 2010 census, and shape them to favor Republicans for the next decade.
In 2020 this could flip if the Democrats have a wave election. And that would be just as wrong. Elections districts should be determined by geography and population, not by granting one party or the other dominance.
But all is not doom and gloom in Georgia. The Democrats have mounted competitive candidates this year, at both the state and local level. And many of them are real choices, not just faint echoes of the other party. Will this improve the percentage of the vote the Democrats get? I don't know. But at least Georgians get to hear a real choice for once.
Even locally, our ballot is slightly more competitive. We have a real go-getter, a really vibrant choice, in our Congressional race, with the introduction of an effective, articulate Democratic candidate. The incumbent Republican Congressman, Buddy Carter, is not going to be able to sleepwalk his way to victory. He's going to have explain himself and defend the decisions he has made, and that is as it should be.
And the race for State House Representative is actually a two-party race for the first time since I can remember. The last time I recall was in 2002 when the Democrat actually won. And then immediately after winning, announced his switch to the Republican Party.
Things are not ideal yet. There are still many local races, including every county race, where there is no November opposition. Much of the ballot is still Soviet style.
But it is getting better. And that, I think, is to the benefit to us all. Choice makes democracy stronger. Choice makes democracy real.
Face it. Choosy voters choose choice! Works for peanut butter, really works for democracy.
This year, spread the choice. Shop around. We'll all be better off for it.
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