2013 Issue

49 TAKING POLITICAL ACTION | continued on page 50 D. Population Stratification, Economics and Political Thought While raising the issue of “bookish” related to engineers, I cannot completely ignore one of the contentious topics of social stratification, a core concept in conserva- tive thought. In the past, stratification was determined by birthright. The modern American conservative view of happiness and social harmony is wonderfully described in “The Bell Curve” [14] in which intellectual abilities provide the ordering mechanism. The liberal tradition attempts to level these differences. Frankly, I do not want to pursue these arguments in this article, but I do feel compelled to raise the topic. III. ELECTION PROCESS A. Beginning Beginning candidacy for the Utah House of Representatives was easy. First, I volun- teered to run at the county convention. I did a brief verbal presentation prior to a vote of my district at the county convention. My candidacy was affirmed by voice vote at the state convention. I then filed the $14 fee and signed to file candidacy at the Davis County courthouse. Of course, I did not fully appreciate the subsequent process. B. Goals and Results I ran as aDemocrat inUtahHouseDistrict 20. This district is Bountiful (southern portion), North Salt Lake, West Bountiful and Woods Cross. This district has 21,558 registered vot- ers; of these voters 1,744 areDemocrats (8%) and 10,065 are Republicans (47%), leaving 45% with other affiliations [15]. In the face of this reality, I set four clear goals in running for office which I repeated to the Democrats at every opportunity: 1. Please my wife by running ( a road in the Chicago area is named after her great grandfather) 2. Use my candidacy as an opportunity to express an “engineering” viewpoint 3. Build a stronger opposition party (de- mocracy requires at least two parties) 4. If elected, become a proponent of engineering priorities – sustainable manufacturing The outcome is provided in Figure 4 from the Davis County Clerk’s website. The presidential campaigns were in the news and on television every night. The two campaigns spent a combined 1.6 bil- lion dollars. There was an LDS candidate. Therefore it is reasonable to assume that the Figure 5 - Scatter Diagram Davis County House Figure 4 - Davis County Clerk Data