Iran's Elections

I wonder if it surprises most Americans that Iranians today are going to the polls to take part in their regularly scheduled Presidential election.

The Bush Administration has levelled a number of very fair criticisms against Iran's decidedly malformed democratic process, but it's also fair to say that Iran has been one of the most democratic countries in the middle east for some time.

In light of the good critique being issued by our own government, I hereby offer Simianbrain readers another opportunity to call me a traitor by examining one of the arguments in the face of our own democracy, such as it is.

Thousands of candidates (including all women candidates, by the way) were barred from running by a supreme council of clerics.

In the United States, our federal government currently includes 537 elected offices; 435 in the House of Representatives, 100 Senators, a President and a Vice-President (who are elected together).

Of those who hold these offices, there are exactly two members who are not part of the major political parties: Bernie Sanders of Vermont in the House and Jim Jeffords of Vermont in the Senate. Jeffords left the Republican party in 2001, and will be retiring in 2006. Sanders is likely to replace him in the Senate, but an indepedent is not especially likely to replace Sanders in the House.

Are you following along? How many thousands of candidates are excluded in the United States every election cycle because they are not part of the established party system?

Individuals can still run as independents, sure, but there are a variety of obstacles in election law (which varies by state) that state parties are in part designed to mitigate. There are petitions that have to be signed, fees (often running into the thousands of dollars) that have to be paid, and substantial costs related to actually campaigning once you're on the ballot.

I know, those on the right will say I'm trying to compare us to Iran. Get over yourselves. While we're taking this opportunity to critique other nations' democracies, let's spend some time looking at our own. Have the two parties conspired to create intentionally cumbersome ballot access requirements for potential candidates? Have they sealed up the process so that only their own picks have a decent shot at winning? Have they gerrymandered congressional districts to ensure that competitive races can't happen? Yes to all of the above. Are we Iran? No, but could we, as voters, demand better from our leaders and for our democracy? Yes we could, and we should.