Don't Cry For Me Rosalind Kurita
The Tennessee blogosphere is up in arms over the Democratic Party’s coup d'é tat against Rosalind Kurita. It’s bare-knuckled, backroom politics at its worst, according to liberals and conservatives alike. Many are denouncing the party as anti-woman. Here’s state GOP chair Robin Smith in one of her regular fits of fake outrage:
“Removing Tennessee’s highest elected Democratic woman from a race that she won, kicking to the curb the supporters of Hillary Clinton, and rabidly attacking Sarah Palin are stunning tactics from a party that depends so heavily on the demographic of women voters and claims to be the party of ‘women’s ‘rights’.”
I’m not sure how Sarah Palin was wounded here, but whatever. All the criticism misses the point. What the party did wasn’t anti-democratic. Rather, this is how democracy is supposed to work. Kurita got exactly what she deserved, and she doesn’t get off the hook because she’s a woman.
It’s not that the senator voted against John Wilder for speaker. Wilder was part of the Democrats’ problem. With his alliance with Republicans, he held power for power’s sake. He never tried to advance Democratic Party policies. He opposed most of them, in fact. So Kurita could have voted to oust Wilder to elevate a real Democrat to the speakership. Senate Democrats should have banded together and done that many years ago.
But Kurita voted against Wilder and gave Senate control to the Republicans. To a Democrat, that has to be unforgivable. The only way for Democrats to push their policies through the legislature is to impose party discipline. In the Senate especially, that’s been a foreign concept. That’s why every year the House passes Democratic initiatives only to see them fail in the Senate. Kurita’s ouster sends the message that Democrats finally might be serious about getting something done in state government.
Update: Kurita is an official write-in candidate. That's great. She should have run as an independent or a Republican in the first place. Now, all you people who feel disenfranchised can strike a blow for democracy. Knock yourselves out. Go to the polls and write in the name of Tennessee's Leiberwoman.
Update II: David Davis agrees with me. That settles it.
Comments
That's all peaches and cream and shit, if we lived in a Democratic state. We do not. We live in a state that leans to the right, and many of the elected Democrats are able to keep their seats by showing their independence. This decision undercuts them.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 09:54:14 AMThat's a defeatist attitude for Democrats, Sean. If they can't act like Democrats, why should anyone care if they keep their seats? What's the point? Democratic initiatives favoring health care coverage, working people, etc. are defensible with voters all over the state.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 10:22:30 AMMy argument is that we should have had registration by party all along, and the TDP has fought that, to my knowledge. I do agree with your argument that Democrats should act like Democrats, but this is an ex post facto act, and I'm still not thrilled.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 10:25:51 AMIt's a party primary. Party members get to pick the nominee, period. Republicans don't have a say. If the party thinks too many Republicans voted, then the party can void the results. It's like an Elk's Lodge election.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 10:40:29 AMI'm going to respectfully disagree. It's a party primary, but I expect my vote to count. The state party establishment just told thousands of people that their votes DON'T count.
I'm a life-long Tennessean and I've always been proud of our open primary system. To me, it speaks to the "best-man-for-the-job" school of thought. I understand that it lets the system be open to a bit of gaming, and I can believe that may have happened in the Kurita-Barnes race. However, since the Rs aren't even running a candidate in November, Republicans' only chance to make a difference in this race was to vote in the primary. If that seat is important enough to them, then they should have that opportunity. BTW any R voting in the D primary gives up their chance to vote in any R primary that day. So it is a conscious choice on the primary level.
I don't always agree with Kurita, but the polls tell me she won the race. I think this is a disservice to all Tennesseans, but most especially to the voters who elected her, fair and square as far as I can tell. Have there actually been any substantiated case of voter fraud in the Senate-22 race??
Posted 09/15/2008 at 10:51:48 AMIf they can't act like Democrats, why should anyone care if they keep their seats?
Great, so we should kick out Charlotte Burks and all the other religious fundies that I can't stand. Then we'll have a great Democratic minority we can all be proud of.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 10:53:57 AMDr. Cracker, your diagnosis is correct but there's a bit of a problem with your prescription. If we had party registration for primaries, turnout would be even worse than it is now.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 11:02:47 AMLaura, in this case Republicans picked the Democratic nominee. How can Democrats allow that? Kurita gets her fancy new office and her speaker pro tempore title. She's smiling like a cheshire cat, and she has Republicans to thank for it all. If you want to exercise your constitutional rights, vote in the general election. Otherwise, you're just another member of the elk's club.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 11:33:59 AMI'm a life-long Tennessean and I've always been proud of our open primary system.
Well, I'm not a lifelong Tennessean nor am I proud of our open primary system. It's begging for fraud. I've volunteered for the Democratic Party for the past three elections and I can't tell you how many times I've called or knocked on someone's door and had them tell me, "we're Republicans! I have no idea how my name, address and phone number got on your call list/walk list! honest!" Well, moron, you got on my list because you voted as a Democrat in the primary. That's how these lists are generated.
Far too many people think it's "cute" to undercut the opposition and try to vote for the weakest candidate, especially in elections where your candidate is an incumbent (as happened in 2004 with Bush/Cheney).
People should declare a party when they register and be done with it. It would just be easier all the way around.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 01:19:11 PMMr. Woods, it would seem to me that your agreement with the undemocratic actions against the will of the voters to strip them of their votes is only serving to encourage voter apathy. The Tennessee Democratic Party as well as you are only reiterating the commonly held belief that one's vote doesn't really count.
Have we all forgotten how hundreds of ballots where "Gore" was clearly written were tossed aside in Florida in 2000 when it was determined they didn't show the "clear intent" of the voter?
Come on! Throwing out the will of the majority because the powers that be don't agree with the decision of the people is shameful. If this is what it means to be a Democrat, then I will happily be declaring my independence this year.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 02:35:07 PM@Woods and Southern Beale: It may BE about the party, but it shouldn't be. Those who put partisanship above what's best for the state aren't the people I want in office. Call me an idealist if you want, but I still believe there are a lot of people out there who want to serve -- not to serve as a member of a party, but to serve the citizens of this state. I'm definitely aligned with a particular party, but the highest calling shouldn't be your allegiance to the GOP or the Dems. It ought to be to the citizens.
Republicans voting in a Democratic primary, in an open-primary state, isn't fraud. It's democracy. It's not fraudulent even if every single vote Kurita got came from the GOP. Which I'm sure it didn't. In TN, I would suspect our official party membership count is pretty low, and I'm curious how you'd go about proving that her votes did come from people who are Republicans. In Tennessee, the more practical definition is not "people who are card-carrying members of the GOP" but instead, "people who tend to vote Republican." And there is NOTHING in any election law here that prohibits any registered voter from voting in any primary they choose. So again, I fail to see how one could ever prove malice in this case.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 02:41:14 PMI hope we DO get party registration out of this, if for no other reason than my belief that Republican voters are more willing to cross over than Democratic voters.
I support the ExecComm's decision and note that write-in voting is extra trouble for the voter and very unlikely to produce a winner against the eventual Democratic nominee.
Posted 09/15/2008 at 03:04:14 PMHere's the thing. It wasn't independence. She didn't vote for Ramsey for no reason. She sought out a deal, she got a deal and that's that. She came through, and she was rewarded for her services. That's not independence, its prostitution.
Bye Ros...
Posted 09/15/2008 at 09:56:53 PMThank you, Heidi. That's what I was trying to say.
Posted 09/16/2008 at 08:50:45 AMDoes anyone's memory go back farther? When she tried to be in the Democratic leadership of the Senate and the good ole boys wouldn't let her in? They didn't want a smart progressive, independent woman in office. When they completely shut her out is when she sought out the deal. If you're not at the table, you don't have a vote regardless of how you will vote. She just refused to be told how to vote on every issue.
Posted 09/16/2008 at 10:24:41 AM