On the most basic level, the answer should be obvious. It is how people in the United States are given choices, are given the chance to express their opinions about who should represent them.

Yet, this evening over dinner, I was struck by another aspect of why primaries are so important. I am visiting with friends in Washington DC who I met through Gov. Dean’s 2004 Democratic Primary campaign. I have made friends through the primaries. I have learned through them.

I am in Washington for the New Organizing Institute training. This is a group of around forty people who have become excited about being involved in politics. I don’t know how many of them became involved because of the 2004 election but I know that there are people who were involved in the campaigns of Gov. Dean and General Clark.

Even as I met people who have been involved in politics for decades, they often talk back to the first primaries they were involved with, people who came clean with Gene (McCarthy), or who supported Bobby Kennedy.

Primaries excite us. They drive us. They are important not only because they provide us choice, but because they provide us motivation to become more involved in our society.

I am proud to be working in two primaries right now and I hope that these and other primaries will help build a strong democracy in our country.