As someone who votes in each election, I’m glad to hear that Secretary of State Trey Grayson talking about a rotating primary for the presidential election. By the time Kentucky’s votes are tallied in May, the respective nominees for each party will already be decided.

There’s no reason why a state’s vote, no matter the state, should be inconsequential to the voting process. Iowa’s turnout for last week’s caucus was record setting, according to news outlets, but for states like Kentucky there’s no reason for voter turnout to be high for the primary election. Why vote once the race is already decided?

Locally, we now know who will be hitting the campaign trail for a special election on February 5th to replace Lt. Governor Mongiardo’s old Senate seat, and it seems like deja vu all over again. State representative Brandon Smith and Scott Alexander have earned their party’s nomination, and now it’s in the voters’ hands to decide who will represent this senatorial district in the General Assembly.

But another interesting race this year will be for the local representative’s seat. Smith, who currently holds that seat in Frankfort, may no longer be the district’s representative after this year whether he wins the Senate race or not, so it is interesting to wonder as to who may be considering a run for the House in 2008. Candidates have until the end of this month to file with the secretary of state’s office to run for that seat. Smith hasn’t indicated to me one way or the other whether he will still want to hold on to his seat in the House if he goes on to lose the election for Senate.

There are a few names that I have heard floating around, but none have filed as of yet and none have expressed any interest to me personally. Perhaps they were waiting to see how the nomination process unfolded for the Senate race first, and perhaps they are not interested after all.

But back to the Senate race. For one, I am very interested in following this race. For anyone who followed the last race between Brandon and Scott for the House seat in 2006, it was for a time a hotly contested race with a negative ad or two. But that was 2006, and from what I can gather Brandon seems magnanimous to the memories of that race, and is looking forward to the next month of campaigning. And for what I can tell Scott is looking forward as well.

Politics are funny sometimes, as is the way these races seem to shape up. Although voter turnout is quite likely to be very low for this special election, it should be noted that this election is going to be one of the most important for Perry County in some time. With Governor Beshear announcing budget reductions and a lone legislator representing the county during the first session of the General Assembly, the county is going to be in a fight for tax dollars to fund projects. Every other county will want these dollars as well, and apparently with less dollars to go around for this year’s budget, it could be a bleak session. I only hope that Brandon Smith is able to get some funding for the area and Lt. Governor Mongiardo can stick his neck out a bit and fight for some funding for the region as well.