RALEIGH – As candidates, political professionals, and pundits pored over the primary-election returns Wednesday, they surely noticed several intriguing trends. More about them in a moment. First, though, please let me rain on a traditional journalistic parade.

The statewide turnout for Tuesday’s primary election was just shy of 900,000 voters, or about 14 percent of North Carolina’s registered voters. Was this some kind of catastrophe for self-government in the Tar Heel State? Did it constitute evidence of public disaffection with politics? Did it constitute a lack of evidence of public disaffection with politics, since so few showed up at the polls to vote the rascals out?

No, no, and no. The 2010 primary turnout was about average for a May primary in a nonpresidential year. In 2006, when Democrats were building momentum towards a banner year of electoral gains, the May primary attracted about 650,000 voters, or 12 percent turnout. In 1994, when Republicans were building momentum towards a banner year of electoral gains, the May primary attracted about 430,000 voters, or 13 percent turnout.

Since 1990, such primaries have average about 15 percent turnout. So just relax – the 14 percent figure is just about the least-newsworthy finding from Tuesday’s balloting.

Plenty of other results were worthy of real news interest, however.

For one thing, there will be a June 22 runoff in several of North Carolina’s most-watched political contests this year – the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate, the Republican nomination for U.S. House in the 8th and 13th districts, and the GOP nomination in WNC’s 47th state senate district, which has been one of the most competitive legislative seats in the state.

Runoffs typically post far lower turnout than May primaries. Expect only a trickle of voters to head to the polls next month, mostly hard-core partisans to whom expensive media campaigns are irrelevant. This gives candidates with strong name ID and weak bank balances a better-than-average chance. That bodes well for Elaine Marshall in the Senate race and Harold Johnson in the 8th District, for example. Of course, with the electorate for runoffs so tiny, there’s always the possibility of some bizarre results.

For another thing, it was notable how many state legislators had trouble maintaining or restarting their political careers on Tuesday. Five incumbent representatives lost their primaries: Democrats Nick Mackey of Charlotte, Earl Jones of Greensboro, Ronnie Sutton of Robeson County, and Bruce Goforth of Buncombe County, plus Republican Pearl Burris-Floyd of Gaston County. Former Rep. Mary McAllister of Fayetteville, former House Co-Speaker Richard Morgan of Moore County, and former Sen. Fern Shubert of Union County all staged failed bids to return to the General Assembly. And outgoing Sen. Julia Boseman of New Hanover fell far short in her bid for a district-court seat on the coast.

Of course, part of Boseman’s problem was probably some voter fatigue with the lengthy political and legal controversies surrounding her. Something similar may well have happened in the district attorney’s race in Brunswick, Columbus, and Bladen counties. Longtime Democratic DA Rex Gore gotten beaten in his primary, most likely because the public came to associate him with a political ally, state Sen. R.C. Soles, who is retiring with a recently minted conviction for assault and credible allegations of sexual and financial misconduct.

Finally, as Public Policy Polling’s Tom Jensen astutely observed, the real news in the turnout numbers yesterday wasn’t the sheer total, which was unsurprising, but its composition. Republican voters were overrepresented in the Tuesday electorate, even though the Democrats had the competitive U.S. Senate race and many GOP-leaning voters had no compelling congressional race in their districts.

Not a particularly good sign for the Dems. But November remains quite a ways off.

Hood is president of the John Locke Foundation.