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Sunday, Jan. 15, 2012 | 2 a.m.
Sun coverage
Daniel Walton, a 24-year-old prep chef, was a Democrat until last year, when he hit a breaking point with the ideological war between political parties.
Fred Lokken, a 55-year-old professor of political science, was a Republican until 2010, when his party nominated Sharron Angle for U.S. Senate. To him, it was a sign that the party had drifted too far right.
Walton, Lokken and thousands of others are part of a growing share of Nevada voters who have rejected the Democratic and Republican parties and registered without a party affiliation.
“Nonpartisan” — sometimes called “independent” in other states — voters have reached their highest share since 1985, which is as far back as available voter registration data goes.
As of last month, about 16 percent of active Nevada voters — 171,000 people — were nonpartisan, up from about 14 percent in 2000. In 1985, just 7 percent of Nevada voters were registered nonpartisan.
Including minor parties like the Independent American Party — an ultraconservative group that some confuse with independents — the share of voters unaffiliated with either of the two major parties rises to 22 percent of active Nevada voters.
Political observers from both parties acknowledge that harsher political discourse and polarization, nationally and in Nevada, have alienated voters.
“It’s not just here, you’re seeing it across the country,” said David Damore, professor of political science at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
“Politics has always been nasty, but the difference is it doesn’t stop — there’s constant campaigning. Both parties are appealing to their base. It’s why compromise is a dirty word.”
While some nonpartisan voters are moderates, not all are, Damore said. Many vote in either direction.
Democrats, who hold a 50,000-voter advantage statewide, believe the demographics of nonpartisan voters indicate they lean Democratic. In fact, Republicans need a strong showing among nonpartisans to win statewide races.
As a group, nonpartisans tend to be Hispanic and young. More live in a household with a Democrat than a Republican.
Zach Hudson, a spokesman for the party, said Democrats have pushed for “pragmatic solutions,” while Republicans tend toward “Tea Party extremism.”
Dan Hart, a Democratic political consultant, said it’s too early to know how independent voters will break this year. But, as usual, they will play a key role.
He said President Barack Obama appealed to them “masterfully four years ago, and I believe he converted some of them to Democratic registration. This year, I don’t think any of us feel the same enthusiasm. Obama has to draw a stark choice between himself and whoever the Republican nominee is.”
Ryan Erwin, a Nevada Republican consultant and early supporter of likely Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, noted polling in December that showed Romney edging Obama among the state’s nonpartisans. He said nonpartisan voters will reject Obama for failing to deliver on promises he made in 2008 to change the tenor of Washington.
“Voters were promised the moon, were delivered the bill, and never got the moon,” he said.
Damore said the parties have rigged the system with “closed primaries,” which allow only registered Democrats to pick a Democratic nominee and only Republicans to choose a Republican nominee. The 2011 Legislature cemented the closed-primary system with Assembly Bill 81, sponsored by Secretary of State Ross Miller. Miller said the bill clarified an ambiguous law.
Some states have open primaries, where voters can participate regardless of registration, and others allow nonpartisans to choose one party’s primary or the other. That, some Nevadans say, would result in candidates who are less beholden to the ideological base of the party and more willing to compromise.
Catana L. Barnes, founder of Independent Voters of Nevada, said her group wants open primaries.
“People want … to focus on candidates and issues rather than the ideology of a group,” she said.“They don’t want the system controlled by the ideology of Democrats or Republicans.”
She believes many voters join a party only so they can participate in primaries.
The last bill to open primaries to nonpartisan voters was in 1989. It was sponsored by then-freshman state Sen. Dina Titus, who is running for Congress in a heavily Democratic district. Titus now says she supports closed primaries.
I understand their frustration with "Party's" more interested in gaining and retaining power than in governing fairly, but to go "Independent" actually means losing the ability to have a say in who gets on the ballot. Rather than having to "declare" allegiance to one crooked "Party" or another, we should work to end partisan requirements altogether and have "open" primaries. We should not have to "declare" our political preferences to the government and its bureaucratic drones. It's none of their business which "Party" or candidate who we choose to back. Registering to vote is one thing. We have to be sure the voter is eligible but as to whom he or she prefers, that should be off limits.
The nationwide disguist with the incessant 2-party bickering and political gridlock makes a case for "open primaries."
Many, as myself, are left to ascribing to one of the two major political parties just so we have a "say" in the primaries, as Ms.Barnes pointed out, "She believes many voters join a party only so they can participate in primaries."
The current 2-party system and electoral college no longer serves us. We need to OPEN up the primaries, and be able to vote in candidates who truly REPRESENT us!
Blessings and Peace,
Star
It seems like a no brainer, yet I still get confused looks around town when people ask me if I'm D or R and I respond "neither, I vote the candidate not the party."
So it seems the majority still bow down and follow dogma rather than think for themselves.
"Political observers from both parties acknowledge that harsher political discourse and polarization, nationally and in Nevada, have alienated voters. . . . . "Voters were promised the moon, were delivered the bill, and never got the moon. . ."
Maybe the body politick is actually waking up to the fact neither the Rs nor the Ds are capable of governing us. And as disgusted by the campaign pandering to the religious hard right as I am.
Many thanx for turning us on to IVON!
"The nationwide disguist with the incessant 2-party bickering and political gridlock makes a case for "open primaries."
star -- actually that's how our republic was set up, to be different branches acting as checks and balances against the others. It's when government is marching in lockstep and expecting us to join it, parading and shouting slogans to the fuhrer, is when every good citizen should worry most. Democracy in action has always been raucous.
"So it seems the majority still bow down and follow dogma rather than think for themselves."
Kasidie -- excellent post!
So long as We the people act livestock we can not expect to be treated as anything else.
"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." -- Abraham Lincoln, first inaugural address, 1861
Correction: You can vote in any primary you want to. You only have to be registered to that party to do so - usually 30 days in advance of the primary. Once the primary is over you can switch back to nonpartisan or whatever.
And if you leave off your telephone number you won't get the robo calls.
All it takes is a call to your county clerk to get a change in voter registration form, a few stamps, and understanding that it's your right to belong to "neither".
Give it a try; I think you'll enjoy not being in somebody's back pocket by rejecting both the Ds and the Rs. Then you are tuely a FREE man (or woman or whatever).
Independent voters decide Presidential elections. Local and primary elections are mostly partisan.