While the mantra before the Feb. 9 caucus was "the primary doesn't count", that doesn't mean you shouldn't vote in it. It still may count for something.
First of all, depending on where you live in Washington, the February 19th election may actually have other things on the ballot besides the presidential nomination. For example, my city has an important measure on the ballot relating to changing the city's form of government. In other areas there are school levies, fire district bonds, etc.
But the other reason to vote in the February 19th election is this: to reaffirm -- or counterweigh -- the outcome of the Feb. 9 caucus.
It started with a rumorstarted in the SeattlePolitics LiveJournal community, and elsewhere:
I have it from reliable sources that the Washington State Superdelegates are going to cast their votes based on the Primary's result (not the caucus)...so make sure you [vote in it].
While this rumor was soundly dismissed, the theory has circulated that while there may not be that sort of agreement, a Clinton primary win, thought it would provide zero real delegates, would give Washington superdelgates an excuse to support establishment-favorite Clinton, without appearing to oppose the will of their state.
Since the Feb. 9-10 caucuses, Clinton has been steadily dissing the caucus system, declaring it to be "undemocratic". (No word on how she feels about the democraticness of superdelegates, of which she has many in her pocket, however.) She goes on to deride caucuses as the playground of "activists" -- a term we haven't heard used as a dirty word since Bill O'Reilly used it to diss liberal judges.
So it turns out that, in the wake of the caucus, Hillary's double-standard and sour-grapes rhetoric on party democraticness, and her diss of progressive "activists", that the pro-establishment centrists backing her candidacy, are actively pushing Clinton supporters to vote on Feb. 19. From Seattle weekly The Stranger:
I asked [Linda Mitchell, president of the National Women’s Political Caucus of Washington] if she’d been hearing about Clinton people encouraging Washingtonians to vote in the primary, even though the primary won’t be used to apportion any Democratic delegates. Mitchell replied:
"Am I hearing it? I’m feeding it. As the president of the Women’s Political Caucus, and as a supporter of Hillary Clinton, I think that the caucuses are not very representative of the voting public and I’m hoping that the primary does show greater support for Hillary Clinton."
Obama, a man of substance over image, had a great GOTV effort in Washington for the caucus (where it really counts). It would behoove Obama supporters to seal the deal and support their candidate, even if only symbolically, in the Feb. 19 primary as well.