Democracy for Vancouver

As the Columbian wrote yesterday, Martin Hash removed himself from the Democratic primary race for the 17th Legislative District State Senator position currently held by Don Benton.

It is unfortunate that the “top two” primary system sidetracked his candidacy and thereby diminished the democratic process. This is certainly not how democracy is supposed to work. Were it not for that system, the voters in the 17th LD presumably would have had a chance to pick who they wanted to run against Benton. Instead Democratic Party insiders were told THEY must, in essence, pick the candidate by nominating either Hash or Carrier.

It was clear from attending the last 17th LD meeting that the consensus was the PCOs did not want to choose either and wanted the primary process to decide who should run against Benton. In addition the state party rules for nominating were clearly in violation of the 17th Dems bylaws against endorsing a candidate before the primary.

Instead of stoking the crisis caused by these changes in the elective process, Hash gracefully exited the race. As a PCO of the 17th and a supporter of David Carrier, this author is most grateful to Martin Hash for avoiding what possibly could have been a destructive process that might have reduced the number of voters willing to vote for the Democrat in the race against Benton.

But this still sucks. It sucks for Hash and it sucks for the voters.

No matter what you think of Hillary’s inability to call it quits in the race for the Democratic nomination, it APPEARS the voters ARE going to be the ones that decide who runs against the warmonger in the general election. The same can no longer be said for the Benton-Carrier race. Martin Hash is not the loser here. The voters are.

PS: Martin Hash has a link to David Carrier’s website on his own campaign site. He deserves much credit for dealing with the reality of a messed up situation.