William T Goodall wrote:
>
> On Friday, September 5, 2003, at 11:39 pm, Horn, John wrote:
>
> >> From: Julia Thompson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >>
> >> OK, my understanding is that voter registration rolls are public
> >> information. Is party affiliation part of the public record
> >> on those?
> >> If so, checking that as a back-up might help. (Didn't read
> >> the article
> >> to see anything about methodology, just a thought off the top of
> > my
> >> head.)
> >
> > Don't forget that there are states like Missouri where you don't
> > have to declare your party affiliation. You just walk in during the
> > primaries and request a Republican, Democratic, or whatever ballot.
> > Freaked me out when I first got here.
>
> Freaks me out that anyone anywhere has to declare a 'party
> affiliation'. [1]
>
> Isn't that counter to the whole secret ballot democracy thing?
>
> [1] Outside the former USSR anyway...
It's for voting in primaries. You can't vote in the primary for more
than one party, they keep records of what primary you vote in. You can
switch parties for that at any time, although I'm sure switching is
easier in some states than in others. You can also darn well give
campaign contributions to anyone you want to, as well. In Texas, they
keep a record of how you voted in a primary for at least a few weeks so
that if one party needs to do a runoff, you don't get to participate in
*that* if you voted in another party's primary.
Me, I'm not entirely happy with the agenda of any particular party, but
where I am, chances are that most of the local offices will be filled by
Republicans, so if I want much of a say in who is representing me, I
vote in the Republican primary. I've voted against some
worse-of-two-evil types that way, and ended up with the lesser of two
evils on some of those occasions. In the general election, I'll
research the candidates for each office and make my call there. (In the
2002 election, I voted for members of 4 different parties, and wrote
someone in for one position where *none* of the candidates impressed me
in the least.)
Julia
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