By BECKY HAND
Community editor

Records were broken in Whitley County during Tuesday’s primary election, at least when the last 20 years are considered, according to Jennifer Baxter at the Whitley County Clerk’s office.
Twenty years ago George Bush Sr.’s Republican opponents had dropped out, while Michael Dukakis had Jesse Jackson still in the running when time came for the electoral votes to be cast at the Democrat convention. Similar to this year’s tenacity of the two Democrat hopefuls.
That year, 1988. in the open primary (no incumbents), Whitley County voter turnout was 34 percent. At the general election, Dukakis and Bush ran with the Libertarian Ron Paul opposing them, and voter turnout was 78 percent, the highest result for a general election in Whitley county in the last 20 years.
In 1992, George Bush Sr. ran for re-election against William Clinton, and H. Ross Perot was a third-party candidate,  running as an independent.
Again voter turnout was the highest in the last two decades — until now — at 38 percent during the primaries. The 1992 general election was also high with 77 percent of registered voters making it to the polls.
This year, with three people still in the running, John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, a 20-year record was set — 42.56 percent of the county’s registered voters cast their votes. Nearly 10 percent of those votes had been cast by absentee ballot.  
Baxter predicts a record turnout in the November general election, if the past is any indication.
Whitley’s turnout by precinct has Thorncreek South at the top with 50.05 percent, and Smith Northeast at the bottom with 33.87 percent.
In comparison, the 2004 elections had 20.5 percent in the primaries and 68.4 percent in the general election in Whitley County. That year John Kerry and George W. Bush were the only remaining candidates in their respective parties, with Kerry’s opponents all dropping out by early March.
In 1988, George H.W. Bush won against a divided Democrat party. In 1992, Bill Clinton beat incumbent Bush while Perot  stirred things up.
The year 1996 had Clinton winning over Dole, with Perot still in the picture, and 2000 pitted Bush the younger against Al Gore, with Ralph Nader and Pat Buchanan as hangers-on.
In 2004, Bush and Kerry ran almost alone with Nader picking up a few votes, but not making much of a ripple. What will 2008 bring? Will Clinton and Obama keep at it until the convention in August in Denver? And what effect will that have on the outcome?
Whatever happens, more people than ever will probably get out and vote. And as Martha Stewart would say, “It’s a good thing.”