out election rules and how to use them. It looks like Governor Plenty knows what I was talking about. [Of course, knowing the rules is something we expect from our elected leaders, even if they are only plurality elected.] He has called the special election to fill the Northfield-area senate vacancy on January 3. DFL people are crying “foul:” because in a constituency so filled with students that he called the election so soon for two days after a major holiday and while many students won’t be around.
While I wonder whether any student who does not plan to either be in the district on January 3rd or has the ambition to obtain a proper absentee ballot should really be claiming residency in the district, I do think there are other reasons to regard the choice of date cynically.
Conventional wisdom says that Republicans do better than DFLers in special elections and when voter turnout is low. [Cf. A Note on Voter Turnout, 11/6/07] First off, the date is on a THURDAY. Americans are used to elections on Tuesdays. Choosing another date seems almost un-American. We often talk about how we should move our elections to weekends, but in 
of Congresspeople,
Tuesday, January 1 is a legal holiday and probably not a good day for an election. It might not even be legal. Rather than wait for January 8 which would be a Tuesday, Plenty chose January 3. It’s not a weekend and it is not a Tuesday.
Make your own inferences.
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3 comments:
I deleted a post because it contained racially offensive language and a lot of words in a language or code that I did not comprehend. I then deleted my own post explaining why I had deleted the first post because I had not learned how to use this software right and made the post too confusing.
Let me just say that all are welcome to post. I really would prefer that an identity, real or assumed, be demonstrated in the signature, but as long as posts show relevance and proper etiquette, I won't take them off.
Ray
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