Voter Dynamics

[Martin Hash]

Politics is fascinating. I have 2 years of intimate exposure to it as a candidate and, importantly, I used that time as a scientist would, examining the dynamics and requirements of getting elected. I think most people have preconceptions about how politics works; of course, we get those ideas from our schooling, parents, and peers. I can only speak as to my own thoughts, but I wondered why our elected officials seemed of such poor quality (as compared to high-end private industry), and why Special Interests appeared to control the system. “Why?” I wondered, “don’t wise, qualified candidates run?” Aren’t our elected representatives, especially the ones that claim to be “for The People,” supposed to put the best interests of The People first? And how can unqualified politicians know what the best interests of The People are?

I jumped into the middle of the fray to find out for myself. I ran my campaigns to extract the most viable data as to what was and was not the truth about getting elected. Well… Politics IS controlled by Special Interests, and statically speaking, there are no “independent” voters – everyone has a special interest. Special Interests are all about selfishness. It’s what they/we want – damn the consequences, and when they/we get control of the system, the system is going to benefit them/us first and foremost. This is what politics is about. I suppose there are politicians that can transcend these selfish manifestations, and I aspire to become one, but that would be after I get the opportunity to demonstrate my competence.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, it is not the money that Special Interests bring to the table – it’s the VOTES! Here is the precedence of votes received:
1) The number of registered voters in your party.
2) The political tide.
3) The number of your Special Interest voters.
4) Your qualifications.

The next time I run for office, I WILL become beholden to Special Interests so that I can win, and because I am loyal and a person of integrity, I WILL do what my Special Interests want me to do because I told them I would. Now, combining my desire to do my small part to build a better society with my desire to do what is right, the question becomes: Which Special Interests am I willing to kowtow to?


Note: As ridiculous as it seems, you can almost totally ignore those people who don’t vote. Non-voters are the Non-Special Interests.


My conclusions are based on the following analysis:
Most scientific experiments require a Control - in this case there was a second legislative seat in my district. The Control had one Republican (unknown and unqualified) and one Democrat (a reasonably qualified incumbent who voted party lines but was a fiscal conservative). The final Primary vote for the control was 56% for the Republican and 44% for the Democrat. Since there was almost equal party voter registration, obviously there was a strong Republican tide in this particular election since the Democrat was a competent incumbent.

The candidate field for my legislative seat had no incumbent, so votes could only be attributed to party loyalty, political tide, Special Interests, or qualifications. The Primary results had almost the same number of total votes (as would be expected in the same district), with amazing similar outcomes to the Control: 57% for the Republican (experienced candidate but unqualified), and 31% for the Democratic Party nominee (unknown and unqualified), and 12% for me (politically unknown and qualified – as recognized by the unbiased editorial staff of the local newspaper). Importantly, I also ran as a Democrat, making the similarity of the results stunning in their import. What these numbers say is that qualifications are inconsequential compared to party affiliation and political tide, and only a third of the impact as Special Interest votes.