Turnout, turnout, turnout.

[pinto]

After voter registration, it's always been the obvious key to winning elections.

CA House District 50 (Busby v Bilbray) came close to handing Dems a House seat in an overwhelmingly Repub District. It was doable. But turnout was somewhere around 30% of all registered voters.

That same turnout was recorded statewide in CA.

While voter participation in primaries is notoriously low, the CA 50 race was an election - Bilbray will hold the seat until the November general election - and the Democratic primary race for Governor determined our electoral answer to Arnold, the action at the polls was disappointing.

One of the dangers of low voter participation, especially here in CA, is that elections get determined by single issue voters - even when they represent a minority of the electorate. That's not a good recipe for representative government, imo.

I am unabashedly an advocate for the role of government in the "social contract". And I am also unabashedly an advocate for our responsibility to that contract.

Is voter apathy the end of the world? Probably not.

But, does it matter? I say yes.

We need to vote. And encourage others to vote. A constitutional democracy depends on it.