A few takeaways from Tuesday tells me a couple of things. First, I'm glad I was wrong on my 20 percent or below voter turnout prediction. We had a whopping 33.01 percent of voters in Alabama go to the polls and 28.16 percent of Escambia County residents.
You know I'm being sarcastic because it's still hard for me to rejoice and wave a victory flag with well more than half the registered voters in this state and in this county who don't vote. They apparently don't care about taxes, health care, illegal immigrants, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, gun issues, abortion, or what they pay at the grocery store or pay for gasoline and electricity. They don't care about roads that need that need to be paved and potholes that need to be fixed.
Maybe Bernie Sanders is on to something. The people want the minority to dictate what the majority does. Maybe Hitler, Castro and Stalin were on to something. If the people don't care about their lot in life, we'll dictate it for them and run every aspect of their daily lives – down to the price of bread.
While 33.01 percent and 28.16 percent were higher than I expected, it's still pitiful.
Those in Alabama who did vote spoke loud and clear Tuesday on whether or not they wanted to continue electing members to the state school board or having them appointed by the governor and then approved by the Senate.
More than 75 percent of the voters in Alabama and more than 80 percent of the voters in Escambia County voted 'No' on the amendment. I was in that group.
My reasoning was that I didn't want to take the right away from the voters, but then again the majority of voters don't care.
Over the next few weeks, spin doctors and so-called political experts will dissect that vote and try to tell us why we said no. It could be they didn't trust the governor and Senate to make the right choices. I'm not saying the current governor and Senate because those names will change but the law will still be on the books.
We may find out that the people voted no for the same reason I voted no – it didn't pass the smell test and they wanted to have a say on who sits at that table.
I think another dream I had went up in smoke Tuesday (and Wednesday morning) when Joe Biden slapped Bernie Sanders in the face and turned the crowded Democratic presidential field into a two-horse race. I was hoping for a brokered convention with no candidate having enough delegates to win the nomination on the first ballot. TV ratings for the Democratic National Convention would go through the roof. It would be must-see TV whether you were a Democrat or a Republican.
Biden's victory and Mike Bloomberg's decision to drop out of the race Wednesday morning and endorse Biden, which I'm sure will come with a substantial campaign contribution, virtually kills any chance of a brokered convention.
There were 14 Democratic presidential candidates on Alabama's ballot Tuesday and they are dropping like flies. Elizabeth Warren will be the next to hang it up and it will become the Joe and Bernie show and I know Bernie is 'feeling the burn'.
The big loser Tuesday was probably Hillary Clinton. I've had this feeling in my gut for some time now that if the Democrats went into a brokered convention she'd try to ride in on a white horse to save the party on the second or third convention ballot and try to win the nomination.
My gut started telling me that when I watched as Hillary coincidently took her book-signing to places like Iowa, New Hampshire and many of the states who had primaries Tuesday. She's been crisscrossing the country more than the candidates, drawing big crowds and hasn't had to spend a dime on advertising. I think her horse just came up lame. Now she can easily say that was never in her plans.
There were really no other surprises to me Tuesday. Most of the people I voted for either won or are in a runoff.
Bradley Byrne didn't surprise me Tuesday, but the way his campaign for the U.S. Senate has gone has been a surprise. I really thought in the beginning he was the man to beat. By Tuesday, I felt confident he would finish third.
Some very key races will be on the March 31 runoff ballot, like the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House. Hopefully more people will turn out and have a say in what they want for their community, their state and their nation.
