Losing hold of our democracy?

The Miami Herald’s Beth Reinhard last week wrote a column titled  “Time to assess primary’s real winners, losers.” She gives an objective opinion of who were the winners and losers in last week’s primary races for governor, U.S. Senate, and other important political races in Florida.

There was one area where I must disagree with her. And in fact, she seems to state one thing and then says another in a following paragraph. She calls South Florida a loser because “Turnout was about 17 percent in Miami-Dade, under 15 percent in Broward and just over 16 percent in Palm Beach, among the worst showings in the state. Pathetic.”

Then two paragraphs down in the same column she says that democracy is a winner because “Primaries make candidates better.” Yes they do. They usually sharpen the candidate’s message, etc., I would add.

But I would ask Ms. Reinhard, who I don’t know and consider a good political reporter, how can democracy be winning when turnout in Miami during important elections – and these recent primaries were just that – yields a “high” of 17 percent in Miami-Dade County? Considering the thousands of eligible who are NOT registered, we’re basically saying that less than 10% of the eligible electorate decides who will lead us going forward.

As I asked in a recent column, “as voters, are we losing our hold on a democracy that seems headed to a less participatory system controlled by the power of money?”

Alvaro F. Fernandez