District 54 Special Election Results

There was a special election in east Arkansas for state house district 54. The man originally elected to the office (Fred Smith) resigned after a felony conviction (which he is appealing) and questions about whether or not he actually lived in the state. The winner of last nights election, Democrat Hudson Hallum, is under investigation over questions about the way his campaign handled absentee ballots in the primary election in which Hallum narrowly lost to his opponent in regular balloting, but triumphed on the basis of an overwhelming margin in absentee ballots.

Hallum got 51% of the vote. The reason he won such a narrow majority in the heavily Democratic district is because there was an independent in the race, D'James Rogers, who received about 28% of the vote. Republican John Geelan had a bit over 21%. Less than 2000 votes were cast.

I could make some more points about how independents can do better than the "hated" party in many areas of the state. I could go on about the need for instant runoff voting, or some other method to make sure that people don't have to live with representatives who fail to get majority support. But I don't want to do that here.

To me the real story here is the population. What a mess of corruption, and most of them don't even consider the idea of rejecting the corrupt Democrat representation that has brought them this low. Go to their communities, they are dying. They are poor. They are miserable. Yet they continue to "dance with who brung them" even when where they have been brought to is a place of despair. If it was you or me, don't you think we'd try something different? Apparently, folks who want something better for themselves are simply leaving. The population of the district has declined, even while Republican areas of the state have grown and prospered.