Lack of Competition From Republicans Hurting California Democrats

Commentary The Super Bowl is coming up. Two teams will go head-to-head for the Vince Lombardi Trophy. They’ve competed against the best and are getting ready for one final competition against each other to decide who stands on top. Contrast that with California’s statewide political races: Democrats win automatically. Republicans are lucky if they can get 40 percent of the vote for U.S. senator, governor, or the other statewide positions. Two times recently, in 2016 and 2018 for U.S. senator, both finalists in the general election were Democrats with nearly identical views. This year, the only statewide race, except for the presidency, is for U.S. senator. The two finalists will be decided in the March 5 primary election. Because of the undemocratic Top Two system, the contest is among those of any party, or no party, a system that produced the lack of choice in 2016 and 2018. This time, that seems unlikely to happen, as the polls are showing the victors probably will be Democrat Rep. Adam Schiff and former Los Angeles Dodgers baseball star Steve Garvey, a Republican....