Voters do bridge rural-urban divide . . . . occasionally

“Baker County votes don’t matter — Portland decides every election.”

This lament is one we hear often.

And it’s not without merit.

Consider, for instance, that President-elect Barack Obama received 57 percent of the votes cast in Oregon, and John McCain 41 percent.

Obama did exceptionally well in Multnomah County, Oregon’s most populous, where he got 77 percent of the votes to McCain’s 21 percent.

Yet in Baker County Obama polled just 32 percent to McCain’s 64 percent.

The returns are similarly reversed in the U.S. Senate race.

Democrat Jeff Merkley unseated Republican Gordon Smith, 49 percent to 46 percent; Merkley, like Obama, won handily in Multnomah County, 69 percent to 27 percent.

But Smith dominated in Baker County, taking 66 percent of the votes to Merkley’s 26 percent.

In other statewide races, Democratic candidates were elected as Secretary of State (Kate Brown) and Treasurer (Ben Westlund). Baker County voters, though, went for the Republican in both campaigns, and by significant margins.

So far, then, the case for secession seems pretty sound.

But the political divide might not be as insurmountable as the results from those races suggest.

Among the 12 statewide measures on the ballot, Baker County voters agreed with their fellow Oregonians on seven.

Here’s a few examples from prominent measures:

Measure 65 would have replaced Oregon’s party-affiliated primary system with one in which all candidates would compete, and the top two, regardless of their party, would advance to the general election.

Oregon voters soundly rejected Measure 65, by a margin of 66 percent to 34 percent.

Baker County voters reacted in similar fashion, defeating Measure 65 by 71 percent to 29 percent. So did Multnomah County voters, who turned down Measure 65 by 61 percent to 39 percent.

Measure 62 would have allocated 15 percent of Oregon Lottery revenue to a public safety fund.

Oregonians overall opposed Measure 62 — 61 percent to 39 percent.

So did Baker County, where 58 percent of voters were against the measure. Multnomah County voters were even more adamant in their opposition to Measure 62, rejecting it 72 percent to 28 percent.

Measure 59, which would have allowed Oregonians to deduct all of their federal income taxes on their state tax returns, was defeated statewide (64 percent to 36 percent), and in both Baker County (57 percent to 43 percent) and Multnomah County (75 percent to 25 percent).

Baker County voters aren’t, of course, in lockstep with their urban counterparts on every issue.

Measure 58, for instance, which would have prohibited students in public schools from being taught in a language other than English for more than two years, failed, 56 percent to 44 percent statewide, and 71 percent to 29 percent in Multnomah County.

Baker County voters, however, liked the measure, endorsing it by a margin of 55 percent to 45 percent.

Baker County voters also think homeowners ought to be able to do a certain amount of work on their properties without buying a building permit.

Measure 63 passed by 62 percent to 38 percent here, but it failed statewide, 54 percent to 46 percent. Multnomah County voters were even less fond of the measure, defeating it 69 percent to 31 percent.

The bottom line here, of course, is that so long as Baker County’s population is less than half a percent of Oregon’s, and about 2 percent of Multnomah County’s (this is a good thing, so far as we’re concerned), we will inevitably be overruled, as it were, in certain elections.

But by no means every time, as Tuesday’s results prove.

Fact is, none of us will ever know for sure which way it will go until the votes are counted. But one thing is sure: The only vote that truly doesn’t matter is the one that’s never cast.