low turnout: what does it mean?

Early voting turnout as of Thursday in heavily Republican Williamson County was only 2.2% of registered voters. 

In Davidson County the result was a slightly better 3.7%.  However, what has struck me as surprising about Davidson County’s results is that more than twice as many people have voted in the Democratic primary, where the Governor, Senator, and Congressional races are practically unopposed, than in the Republican primary (9,018 v. 4,363).

What does it mean? 

Are Republicans turned off by a negative U.S. Senate Republican primary race where charges and countercharges are the chosen currency instead of issues? 

Are Republicans angry at a Republican Congress that has spent money like out-of-control drunken sailors?  (And to be fair to my Navy friends, sailors, when they’re drinking, at least are spending their own money.) 

Are Republicans mad at a Republican President who, nearly five years into a war on terrorism, hasn’t gotten around to doing anything about securing our nation’s borders? 

Are Republicans exasperated at a Republican President who has happily signed frivolous multi-billion dollar spending bills like the massive transportation pork bill, but just now has finally decided to use his veto pen for the first time on a small funding bill for stem cell research?

Or are Republicans stupefied by a national Republican leadership that in the midst of an ongoing war in the Middle East, rising national debt, rising energy prices, rising medical costs, and a looming Social Security collapse, has decided that the best thing to do was to try to pass two doomed constitutional amendments to ban flag burning and gay marriage?

I think all of the above.

If this low turnout is indicative of things to come in November, I’d sure hate to be a Republican candidate in a down-ticket race.

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