I readily accept Karlo Silbiger’s “guesstimation” on the percentage of bullet votes received by Nancy Goldberg in our last School Board election as being about 33 percent. He certainly has much more experience in analyzing election results than I do.
That would mean, of the 2200-plus votes Ms. Goldberg received, he thinks that about 700 of them were bulleted. We know there were about 1,200 bulleted ballots cast in this election. In doing the math, 700 divided by 1,200 equals 58.3 percent. That equates to almost six out of every ten bulleted votes were cast for Nancy Goldberg. Over half.
Wow, an Amazing Statistic
Just looking at this extraordinary number, one could believe that there was an effort to take advantage of Culver City’s low voter turnout in an off-year election, by magnifying the worth of each vote cast, and, in this case, each vote not cast.
It also suggests that there was some concerted effort taken by some of her supporters to assure Ms. Goldberg’s election to the Board.
Dirty Tricks?
Was it meant as some political dirty trick? I don’t think so. Most politicos in Culver City, including me, had Scott Zeidman already safely back on the School Board. They felt the real battle was going to be between Laura Chardiet and Nancy Goldberg for the remaining seat on the Board.
Having a Fool as a Client
Not that Scott Zeidman ran the perfect campaign. He didn’t. He made mistakes. Scott didn’t distance himself enough from the outlandish, boorish behavior of his fellow Board member Steve Gourley. He also ran his own campaign; this strategy brings to mind a twist on a lawyerly saying: He who hires himself as his own campaign manager, has a fool as a client.
Overzealous Supporters
The overzealous actions of some voters went well beyond that of the normal voting patterns of past elections, and thereby skewed the election results, causing unintended consequences for another candidate.
“What it is… ain’t exactly clear.”
Something happened in this last election cycle: Something out of the ordinary. We may never completely understand its full impact on our community.
If one-third of Nancy Goldberg’s votes were bulleted, then that means she got over one out of every two bullet votes cast.
Somewhere Over the Rainbow
We are being asked by her supporters to believe that this was some kind of spontaneous home-grown, grass-roots, mass-outpouring of community support for a beloved teacher or that it was just a one-time, odd election anomaly brought on by inexperienced, first-time voters who didn't know better.
Careful What You Wish for
This is somewhat akin to asking ourselves to wear Dorothy's ruby slippers in the dream-like world of “The Wizard of Oz” as she is being asked by a man behind the curtain to disregard the very same man behind the curtain who seems to be pulling all the strings and moving all those levers.
It seems as apparent to me as it did to Dorothy that what you see is not necessarily what you get, that there still is a stark reality to be found even in the fantasy world of politics.
Conclusion: There was a lot more going on behind the scenes in our latest election than what we are being led to believe.
Mr. Laase may be contacted at GMLaase@aol.com
