Nick Jimenez

Sunday, February 20, 2000

Why do we endorse candidates?

Today we begin publishing the endorsements of the Caller-Times Editorial Board in the March 14 primaries. The endorsements are our recommendations to the voters. We take those endorsements seriously and those endorsements come after research into the issues and talking to the candidates.
   We hope the voters consider our recommendations, but the endorsements also have another purpose. They are our contribution to making participatory democracy work.
   The continuing drop in voter turnout has to be one of the most disturbing trends in the country's recent history. A lot of reasons have been offered: too many elections, disconnection with the government, the thought that one's vote doesn't count.
   If you think your vote doesn't count, ask the voters in the Gregory-Portland school district. A Gregory-Portland bond issue passed last Saturday by the margin of 39 votes. Students who attend the new school to be built with those bonds can thank the 39 voters who took time out on a Saturday to cast their ballot.
   We have made voter registration about as easy as we can make it, short of sticking a registration card in your hand in your easy chair while you are fumbling for the remote. Voting itself is getting easier. Early voting, which begins Feb. 28, gives citizens more time to make a choice. Mobile voting during the early voting period will bring the ballot to a mall or other public place near you. In time, I think, we will have Internet voting, although the recent vandalism of Web sites does give me pause.
   What we haven't solved is getting the huge mass of eligible voters to simply make the decision to vote. The endorsements are our way of sparking interest and bringing information to the readers.
   There are newspapers that don't endorse. The way I look at it, the newspaper is part of the political process. That's why we, the press, that is, get into the First Amendment. If the voter has to make a choice, then the newspaper has to make a choice, too.
   I think newspaper endorsements offer the readers a source of information that is special. Voters will get bombarded over the next few weeks by candidates' campaign ads, billboards, special-interest endorsements and other persuasions on who they ought to vote for. Our endorsements, however, are offered with no other motive than to recommend to the voters the best candidates in the respective races.
   We have been interviewing candidates for weeks. We talk to them about their candidacies, their backgrounds and the issues in their race. It's the kind of examination that voters would undoubtedly make if they had the time, the resources and the opportunity to sit down with the candidates.
   I enjoy the meetings with candidates. And despite trepidation by some of them who expect a "grilling," I expect that most candidates enjoy the meetings, too. They get to talk about their favorite subject and they have an interested audience that asks questions.
   Then the members of the Editorial Board - the people whose names you see at the top of the editorial column on the opposite page - make a choice.
   Except for justice of the peace, constable and party offices, we make an endorsement in every contested race in both primaries. Endorsements are a tradition we are of proud of. I believe that it is part of our job, this watering of the tree of democracy.
   The readers, of course, will make their own choice. We hope the endorsements are considered when they are making those choices. But even when the voter makes a choice different than ours, the endorsement should provoke the thinking that leads to a reasoned decision.
   Voting is a right that has been bought at dear expense. This newspaper takes it seriously. We hope the citizens continue to hold it just as dearly.
   (Nick Jimenez can be reached by phone at 886-3787 or by e-mail at jimenezn@caller.com.)
  

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