[FRIAM] The 2020 NM Primary

[Steve Smith]

> https://healthyelections.org/state-updates/new-mexico
>
> I have no insight or investment. It's really just spam, I guess.

I am registered "Declines To Report" so am not invited to vote in either
primary and am unclear if I am part of the remaining 58% of "eligible
voters" who did not vote in the primary?  I think NM has a modest
contingent of "independent/DTR" voters.   It is interesting to me to see
the smallest counties having the highest turnouts (Catron and  Mora)
with the former being decidedly Conservative and I presume the latter as
well.  Does this reflect a strong turnout/show-of-support for Trump?  I
*do* think so.   The highish turnout in Santa Fe Country might well
reflect a similar commitment by the "Liberal Elite" to shut Trump down.

I am not sure of Los Alamos' persuasion, I know there was always a
strong "hawkish" posture for obvious reasons such as one's bread being
buttered by strong support for the military-industrial... though many of
the folks I worked with were *also* Liberal-Elites by other measures...
well (over?) educated, a deep/long engagement in academia, often very
broad/worldly experience and interests...  

Mary DID participate, ordered an absentee ballot but missed the mailing
window AND the early voting window.  When I took her to the "early
voting" location I normally use, they were not open and no notice of
where regular voting was to occur, so I tried another one that was once
stood up, and was stymied as the last possibility I knew of was on San
Ildefonso Pueblo property which is COVID closed to outsiders.   We
finally went to the main county location which was happily accepting
mail-in-ballots delivered by hand, so all was good, but someone with
less motivation or resources might have failed to  vote through only the
slightest of errors of their own.   We looked it up afterwards and it
was patently NOT obvious where she should/would have voted this primary.

I'm going the mail-in route, she is going the early in-person this 
final, partly just to get some parallax on how well they work.  NM is
far from a difficult state to vote in, and also not one in play for any
significant seat.

I'm concentrating on engaging as meaningfully as I can, those I know
well enough (in Swing States) that I *might* be able to persuade them to
at least sit this one out, if not vote *against* the mistake they made 4
years ago.  

I'm intrinsically distrusting of *all* politicians and the
processes/institutions they represent or maintain, but this debacle of a
Executive/Senate either needs to be shut down and repairs started or the
Long Slide into some abyss (Apocalyptic Efflorescence or otherwise)
seems inevitable.   Maybe Dave and Marcus' fatalism is as good as it
gets, and maybe come November I'll join that chorus, but for now, I'm
not there yet.   If Biden wins and the Senate flips, I'll call that "a
good start" and try to figure out (surely differently than many) what
the next arc of our sociopolitical path might be if we want a healthy
society.

mumble,

 - Steve