Writing Over the Years

Alexa, Zach, Samantha, and Alison
From approx 1987 to the present

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

LTE published Butler Eagle 4-21-2010

Return power to the people

Most people in the country are registered Democrats or Republicans, but what has this meant? Probably not more than holding a political philosophy and pushing a lever to vote every four years.
And yet the parties have extraordinary power, and that power begins in the county committees at the grass-roots level.
In Pennsylvania, in the Republican Party, every voting precinct in a county elects two people to seats on the Republican County Committee. The problem is that this level of government is virtually invisible.
Can people name one of the committee people representing them in their voting precinct? Probably not.
And it is highly likely that no one is representing them.
In Armstrong County, there are 74 precincts; however, in the election on May 18, when committee people will be elected to four-year terms, only 22 of the precincts have even one person running. Fifty-two precincts will have no representation.
From the county committee, representatives are chosen for the Republican State Committee, and from the state committee representatives are chosen for the Republican National Committee. These committees have enormous power, and when it becomes concentrated in such a few people who might be entrenched in the system, the influence of big money, special interests and control of the ballots, endorsements and campaign money has huge potential for abuse.
I am told all of this is true for both parties across the entire nation.
Voters can change this on May 18. First, they should go to their voter registration office and find out if anyone is running in their precinct.
Second, if no one is running, it is not too late. Anyone can run as a write-in candidate. Only 10 people need to write in one's name (uniformly) on the ballot.
Additional information is available by googling the National Precincts Movement and, in Pennsylvania, the PA Precinct Activists.
This is the key to returning power to the people at the grass-roots level.

Alison Weber
South Buffalo Township
Armstrong County