Preparing for Refugees

Now that the candidates have declared their willingness to run and the caucus meetings have been held, the respective parties are preparing for the process of culling the herd. For the most part, in Utah County the Democratic Party has one candidate for each of the offices in the 2010 election. The Republican Party has numerous intra-party contests.

It is interesting to me to watch the power struggle taking place in the Republican Party that has claimed "freedom", "choice", "liberty", "moral conscience", and "local control" as their watchwords in the legislature.

Republican candidates in Utah County are being asked to submit to a questionnaire and pledge. The pledge requires them to support only Republican party candidates. The questionnaire asks whether or not they oppose any part of the County Party Platform and whether or not they support or oppose the ethics initiative. This information will be made available to the delegates who meet at their County Convention next month.

I have had experience carrying the ethics initiative to my neighbors, many of whom are registered Republicans, and rarely do they oppose the initiative when it is explained to them. There is a lot of misinformation coming from members of the legislature and those who have heard that often resist the petition. If they voice their specific concerns, I can usually show the actual language of the initiative that answers their concerns and they sign the petition. The confusion caused by the misinformation sometimes causes the voters to back away from signing anything, worried that they are being fooled by one person or another. So the misinformation campaign does have an effect. But I don't think it is a big enough effect to carry support for the efforts of the Utah County to identify "ethics-niks" among their candidates for retribution.

The opposition of the Utah County Republican Party to a non-partisan citizens' initiative to promote ethical conduct by legislators and requirements of their candidates to follow lock-step the directions of a platform that is more defined and extreme than other Republican platforms in the state and nation may prove to be more restrictive than the voters want to allow their party -- even in Utah County.

The Democratic Party in Utah County may be seen as too conservative by the National Democratic leadership, and even the more progressives in our own capitol city, but the moderate platform and candidates will welcome the political moderates who are disowned by the radical republicans.

I encourage voters to study all candidates, and candidates to study all issues, and both to vote their conscience.