Massachusetts Needs More Republicans
By Anonymous - 9/17/08 - 12:45 am
Until Massachusetts becomes a battleground state - a state the presidential candidates must fight to win and win to get enough electoral votes - we are not likely to see them come to Massachusetts during crunch time. Regrettably, we are not the universal hub of national politics.
New Hampshire on the other hand is a battleground state in which John McCain currently has a 3% advantage over Barack Obama. Last Saturday, Obama held a rally in Manchester NH.
Who's been to a rally for a presidential candidate? What were your impressions?
A homemade sign at the rally.
More info about the rally here and here; video here; and photos here, here, and pet goat here.
Comments
Don't hold your breath
That's like saying, "Until I start crapping gold bars, I'm gonna have to keep working for a living."
Same result by a National Popular Vote
I don't think Massachusetts needs to be a "battleground" state. The current electoral college system, frankly, needs safe states and this has always been the case. What states are safe to what party has changed over time, and will change for Massachusetts, I imagine, but the state still serves an important function in the national race.
If we want candidates to come here, the better way to do it would be to push for a national popular vote. Then our votes WOULD matter because even if a candidate knew he would win the state, they would still have an incentive to campaign here knowing that every vote counts. Right now, winning Massachusetts 55-45 and 65-35 has no difference on the national campaign. With a national popular vote, it would matter and more attention would be paid to the current "solid blue" and "solid red" states.
Tinychusetts
Aww, so you have to drive an hour to get to NH to see candidates. Why can't it be more convenient?
Many "battleground states", like Colorado and Oregon, are larger than all of New England put together with most of NY thrown in. Sure, candidates visit your state ... you have to drive 300 miles to see them, but they visit your state!
Rally
I went to a Rally for John Kerry in 04. I had volunteered with the campaign on weekends canvassing in NH. The rally was three or four days before election day. It's hard to remember just how confident and hopeful we all were. It was right after the sox won the world series. The ownership group was there talking about how they believed in Kerry. The crowd kept chanting "three more days". I still have pictures in a frame with my "I'm working to win on election day" button on a wall, including the one the security guard took with my camera of me in my "Send Me" t-shirt to make sure my camera wasn't a bomb. I'm glad i participated even though we didn't win. The song "Beautiful Day" is a lot more poignant for me now because of it's associations with the election.
And on that note I'm going to sign up with my union to canvass for Obama.
That would be nice..
[dupe]
That would be nice..
If just to balance out the seemingly limitless number of people who vote for whoever john stewart tells them to!
Also, Massachusetts is a poster child for "too-big government"
Maybe we dont have more
Maybe we dont have more conservatives here because they dont feel welcome here. I believe you were the one making a huge fuss that at one point, in college, Mike Rush was a republican, like it was the plague or something.
from Science magazine
Although political views have been thought to arise largely from individuals' experiences, recent research suggests that they may have a biological basis. We present evidence that variations in political attitudes correlate with physiological traits.
In a group of 46 adult participants with strong political beliefs, individuals with measurably lower physical sensitivities to sudden noises and threatening visual images were more likely to support foreign aid, liberal immigration policies, pacifism, and gun control, whereas individuals displaying measurably higher physiological reactions to those same stimuli were more likely to favor defense spending, capital punishment, patriotism, and the Iraq War.
Thus, the degree to which individuals are physiologically responsive to threat appears to indicate the degree to which they advocate policies that protect the existing social structure from both external (outgroup) and internal (norm-violator) threats.