Who Is This Party For Anyway?

California's 52nd Congressional District has been having a real party in the weeks leading up to Election Day. The mud-slinging, trash talking, accusatory race has been covered in the broadest of scopes, from burglary and masturbation, to the actual issues of marriage equality and healthcareⁱ. For the first time in a while, people in the district may actually pay attention to the issues a race because parties won't be the most obvious indicator on how a candidate stands on issues. Former City Councilman Carl DeMaio may be a Republican, but he stands pretty liberal on issues such as marriage equality, abortion, and social security. This means that looking strictly at a candidates party labels in this race may not be as revealing as most constituents are used to. In the most recent gallup poll, issues of dissatisfaction with the current government and healthcare accessibility seem to be the two most important things to voters outside of the economyⁱⁱ. To determine how to vote, Californians should probably pay attention to be what is being said on the issues that pertain to their lives.

Normally political parties help people decide where to place their vote. They tell people how a candidate will stand on things such as the economy, government spending, social issues, and foreign involvement. People rely on these labels to identify which candidate would most support their core ideals and how their vote ultimately results in having their beliefs implemented in law and government. They allow voters to stay relatively sure that they will be accurately represented, even if they don't necessarily know a great deal about a given candidate. Though this may actually encourage some level of laziness in voters, for the most part it allows for accurate representation in our two party system. If we lived in a nation that operated under a multiparty system that rewarded seats proportional to the votes, we may have a higher turnout, but ultimately may also have a less efficient and responsive government. Parties are important to the central functionality of American government.

In the congressional race in California, it seems that parties will help people namely determine an economic stance for each candidate. It seems that taxation and government spending will be the name difference between DeMaio and the freshman Democratic Representative Scott Peters. Seeing that most voters who vote on economic policy vote based on party lines, the key deciding factor in this race will most likely be social issues. Access to affordable healthcare is something both candidates have been campaigning hard on, pushing the issue from the lens of government involvement and who should be responsible for the decision making in coverage. With many citizens dissatisfied with the current state of healthcare and the job government has done, it seems that this may ultimately benefit DeMaio. The identification of the current healthcare system with the Democratic party may ultimately prove harmful to Peters' campaign. People who view the Affordable Care Act as a negative program will attribute it to the Democrat's pull in congress, and thus vote for the candidate who will fight most to put power back in the hands of his constituents.

Ultimately this race is unique in its party affiliations. Peters' speaks out about how the current government is doing a poor job on key issues, though most of the members from his party supported the legislation that lead to where we stand. DeMaio is one of the least traditional and most socially liberal Republicans in the country, which leads to members from his own party speaking out against him. His identification as a Republican and socially liberal ideals may cause him to have a hard time gaining the bipartisan support he is pursuing on issues such as Medicare. The party lines in the 52nd Congressional District of California are confusing, and in this close race its the informed voter that will probably have the greatest impact.

i Parkinson, John. "A Brief History of the Craziest Congressional Campaign of the Year". ABC News. October 23, 2014. http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/history-craziest-congressional-campaign-year/story?id=26403516

ii Gallup. "Most Important Problem" October 2014. http://www.gallup.com/poll/1675/most-important-problem.aspx