Palin loses in special election for U.S. House seat
Did Alaska’s decision to use the ranked choice election system show us the way we can recover out of our national polarization death spiral? In a special election, that resulted from the passing of Republican Rep. Don Young in March, Alaskans chose a fairly moderate Democrat with a congenial nature and track record of reaching across the aisle. She defeated a field of Democrats and Republicans besting 2nd place finisher Sarah Palin 51.5% to 48.5%. Alaskans decided, through a voter initiative in 2020, to switch to the ranked choice election system which begins with an open primary and has voters rank their preferred candidates from 1 to 4. It can be a bit difficult to grasp, as I am still trying to fully, but if more widely adopted could prove to be the solution that saves us all.
The premise is brilliant in that it results in the moderate majority being able to more strongly influence the type of candidates who will be most viable and who ultimately can win. Contrast that with closed primaries which dominate and amplify more power to the extreme voices. It’s become pretty clear to most of us, at least those of us still occupying some vestige of the sane middle ground, that the status quo of our national politics is broken. And what is mostly to blame is our divisive two-party system, specifically the closed primary system. That is the root of the problem. Then you add in social media and cable news on top and the whole thing is about to topple over.
The current status quo results in extreme candidates echoing radical positions to their bases in order to get through the primaries. We can all see it right before our eyes, we’re watching it in real time, we all know it’s broken and certainly not doing anything to bolster a spirit of civility and national unity. Extremism dominates, especially on the Republican side There has arisen, in most races, a de-facto Trump purity test where saying the craziest thing possible and being the loudest conspiracy-driven and election-denying person in the room usually wins you the primary.
On the Democratic side, one could argue, and I believe citing the candidate field itself to back up the claim, that they are putting up substantially more moderate contestants. That is by the metric of the big 70% issues that most all of us would agree upon like: a women’s right to choose and gun safety and defending democracy and voter’s rights. No one is winning major Democratic primary races by pushing “defund the police” and “tax everyone at a 90% rate” or “ban all gun sales and confiscate the rest”. That just won’t work with most voters. The majority of Democratic primary races are resulting in the moderate candidate winning while it seems pretty apparent that the Republican primary races are, on balance, yielding more extreme Trump-like candidates to compete in the general election. That’s not to say that the ranked choice system wouldn’t also help the D side, because I believe it would.
Let’s fix this! One way or the other we must figure out a system throughout the country that begins to give more voice to center right, center left, and independent voters, which together, I believe, constitutes the majority of Americans. Quit making us have to choose extremist candidates because we hate the other side so much. Give us better candidates who are interested in representing all of us and not just one party’s political base at the expense of the other.
The open primary – ranked choice system could till the soil and lay the groundwork for a new crop of public officials who are more motivated towards cooperation and coalition-building and less by culture wars and fear-mongering for votes. This is the direction we must begin to move in via state legislative action, voter amendments and any other practical means. We all need to learn more about this viable alternative and spread the word. We have to get to a better place. Alaska may have just shown us the way.