On Tuesday, May 17, 2022, Oregon voters voted in a primary election. This included contests for the gubernatorial nomination for both parties. Although somewhat underwhelming, I still found the contests to be interesting and important.

Oregon has not had a Republican governor since 1987, when Neil Goldschmitt took office. Although not all of the five governors since then won by wide margins, and although not all of them were particularly progressive Democrats, the Oregon governorship is probably the safest statehouse for the Democratic Party in the United States. Despite current issues, such as homelessness and the high cost of living have caused consternation among the electorate, including progressive and moderate Democrats, the very good chances are that whoever wins the Democratic nomination for governor will win the election. The two front runners were Tina Kotek, the Speaker of the House for the Oregon legislature, and Tobias Reed, the State Treasurer, both of them with establishment backing from unions and liberal advocacy groups. The election was basically between them.

But there were a dozen other candidates, and I did my due diligence, reading my voter's pamphlet and looking at their position statements. One of them caught my eye: a Medical Doctor in Medford, whose candidacy was based around fighting climate change. He also had YouTube ads. Some of his proposals were a bit too specific: in both his YouTube videos and his voter's pamphlet statement, he specifically mentions electric leaf-blowers. Which is a nice practical suggestion, but given the host of problems Oregon faces, it seems too specific. I ended up voting for Dr. Julian Bell anyway, because I did want to make a statement that climate change is an important issue.

As of right now, most of the vote is in, and the winner is Tina Kotek, with a 56-34 lead over Tobias Reed. The other dozen candidates make up about 10% of the vote, with the candidate I voted for getting only 0.8% of the vote. None of them got more than 2%. Even in a year when the primary electorate was dissatisfied, primary voters overwhelmingly went for two "safe" options. Presumably, Kotek will be elected governor, and then she might be able to deal with Oregon's immediate problems, and then she might be able to fix long term problems, such as how climate change is damaging Oregon.

The cental conflict is that the candidates were either too bland--- offering generalisms about education and healthcare, or too specific, focusing on one single issue out of context. And so, in this race, like in so many others, there doesn't seem to be any "new ideas" that offer a comprehensive, well thought-out program that offers real solutions.

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