Opinion: Paradigm Shift? Not Yet.
The idea was that the Neighborhood Associations would become such an educational and networking force that big money campaigns would be a thing of the past. Well, it would seem that at least in El Paso, that is not the case.
Perhaps it is not altogether false. It is very likely that there was an influence but it is hard to pin point it. The turn-out for District # 1 was about 14% of the registered voters. Maybe we need to work on our democracy and leave other countries alone for a while.
Also, there was a consistent spread of the vote amongst the four candidates in all of the major areas of District # 1. Well, the good thing is that Neighborhood Associations did not try to influence the vote.
What they were supposed to do according to this theory, was to better inform the residents and to empower more voters to get to the polls. In that sense it looks like it failed.
Another point of view, is that the big money campaign (Austin) won the most votes, and the least or non-funded campaign (Schecter) had the least. So that is nothing new. And to be sure, this idea and the groups are so new that many didn’t believe that Schecter was likely to win without a funded campaign and perhaps that is why he only garnered 7%.
But, perhaps, we saw a hint of that new paradigm in the District # 8 race. Without a complete break-down of the # 8 election, it would seem that Cobos out spent O’Rourke and yet O’Rourke won by a landslide. Maybe when the choice is clear as it is in the # 1 Runoff voters will step up to the plate.
So for now, it may be that it is old politics as usual. Big money buys elections. Or is this election going to be different?
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Editor, Upper Valley Beacon
Copyright © 2004-2005 Valley Publishing Company: All Rights Reserved.
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