NJ Primary Election
Today, New Jersey holds it’s annual primary election.
NJ’s primary is one of the latest (if not THE latest) in the whole primary season. As such, it’s worthless for the purpose of choosing a Presidential candidate.
Turnout tends to be low, because it’s meaningless. Something like 1/2 of NJ voters are registered as independents, so they can’t vote at all in the primary. Even for Democrats and Republicans, there are very few contested races.
This year, the Republicans have ZERO contested races. You just walk into the booth, push all the buttons (we’re on digital voting machines now), hit the red button and walk out. It takes longer to get signed in by the old ladies than it does to actually vote.
For the Democrats, only the US President race is contested. The choices are:
John Kerry – a man who seems to change his mind a lot
Lyndon LaRouche – a man in prison (or at least he used to be – I’ve lost track)
Dennis Kucinich – a man who looks like a space alien (and is so far from center that he might as well be one)
some other guy whose name I’ve never heard of and can’t remember.
Some choice, eh?
The polls open at 6am. My wife usually votes about 7:30am and I follow her at 7:45am on the way to work. In hotly contested races, there are often 30 or 40 people ahead of us.
Today, I was Democrat number 001. Republican 001 was the only one torn off of that book, so I suspect it was my wife. The old ladies got to sit around from 6am until 7:30am before ANYBODY showed up.
What a waste.
Polls are open until 9pm, if you want to bother.
Protected Gay Speech? In School?
Rosemary (Queen of All Evil) has a new blog. Stop by and say hi.
She lists a story where a high school student is in trouble. He is running for some post in his school elections, using his gay sexual orientation as his slogan.
His posters read: “Gay Guys Know Everything!” and “Queer Guy for Hunt High.”
The school removed the posters, and Jared contacted the ACLU. The ACLU has sent a letter on his behalf to the school.
Normally, I’m a strong supporter of gay rights. However, in this case, I think the school is right. The school has a duty to prevent discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, disability, etc.
How would you react to these slogans?
“Once you vote Black, you never go back”
“It’s time a Girl wore the pants at this school”
“Vote Japanese, or face my samurai sword”
I don’t see those slogans flying either. Schools do have a limited ability to restrict speech for the preservation of order.
(Yeah, my position on this one surprised me too.)
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