Category Candidates

Dec 2 2018

When a Plan Comes Together

 

Political irony is on full display in Maine. The staple of many a politician, hypocrisy has now been foisted upon the voting process. Ranked Choice Voting, toddling mere months into it’s infancy, was found unconstitutional by the State Supreme Court for use in State elections, has now mired the state into the muck of necessary legal challenges into its Federal constitutionality, and media punditry has circled the wagons around their collective talking point that challenging RCV at the Federal level erodes the peoples’ confidence in the “institution” of voting, seemingly oblivious to the millions of dollars, and years of political spin, spent on ads, campaign mailings, and signature drives, all in a effort to erode the voters’ confidence in Maine’s already constitutionally established voting system.

Here, the time proven political ploy of accusing your opponent of the very thing to which you are guilty is so stark it cannot be veiled. Could it be that the so-called “erosion” of voter confidence is not the result of inevitable legal challenges by a candidate, but a collective “aha” moment as Maine voters began to pull the propaganda veil away to reveal yet another political con game?

Ranked Choice Voting was passed by peoples’ referendum, a process which has been criticized roundly from all sides of the political spectrum. Because the process does not require signatures to be gathered proportionally by each county, the process becomes a people’s referendum of the most populated areas not the whole of Maine. Why plod along the byways and dusty ways of Piscataquis County, when you can gather all the signatures you need in Portland?

It stands to reason, at it’s inception, from the Referendum process on, Ranked Choice Voting was the will of the voters in the 1st Congressional District. The 2nd Congressional District would not have been fertile ground for signature gathering towards an perceived anti-LePage referendum. It was the 2nd District whose votes swung LePage over the top to victory, and that was reflected when CD2 voted down the referendum by 20,000 votes.

Still, CD1 votes won the day. RCV was immediately challenged in court and ruled unconstitutional. The ruling could only apply to the state constitution; therefore, state elections remained one vote for one person, while Federal elections remained in limbo until they could be challenged at the Federal level.

It was no surprise that the only Congressional District that RCV would effect would be CD2. CD1 would not, and for that matter, will never face an RCV challenge, as it is rumored that Cumberland County is a gated county that requires proof of registration with the Democrat Party before residency. It should be noted that this writer has yet to confirm the veracity of said rumor.

Sarcasm and cynicism aside, at every step in its brief infantile history, Ranked Choice has been the majority wish of one political demographic, CD1. Unfortunately, CD2 is bearing the repercussions of that wish. Ironically, without legal intervention, CD1 now enjoys two Representatives for the will of its voters and CD2 has none.

-Andy Torbett

Nov 27 2018

Impossible RCV

IMPOSSIBLE RCV: SoS claims Golden gains
604 votes from less than 562 ballots?
The numbers just don’t add up
AUGUSTA – The latest explanation from the Democrat Secretary of State about “newly found” ballots, just discovered on the eve of the 2nd Congressional District recount deadline, does not seem to add up.
The SoS claims approximately 600 new Ranked-Choice Voting votes have appeared for Jared Golden, stating they were gained from newly found ballots cast by people using a special machine only for voters with disabilities in six towns.
We now have the list of towns these ballots were from:
Monroe, Blue Hill, Otis, Van Buren, Mars Hill and part of Brewer.
Using the Bangor Daily News election results, we can see at most that there were only 562 votes cast for Tiffany Bond and Will Hoar in those municipalities if you include ALL of Brewer’s votes, not just part.
Monroe
Bond: 35
Hoar: 8
Blue Hill
Bond: 70
Hoar: 35
Otis:
Bond: 14
Hoar: 10
Van Buren
Bond: 42
Hoar: 18
Mars Hill
Bond: 31
Hoar: 9
Brewer (Entire City totals, not just the “part” that Sec. of State is dealing with)
Bond: 199
Hoar: 91
Forget about the fact that we already witnessed a ranked-choice retabulation that showed us that about 35% of Bond and Hoar voters didn’t rank Golden or Poliquin at all.
Forget about the fact that we already witnessed a ranked-choice re-tabulation that showed Congressman Bruce Poliquin picking up some votes from Bond and Hoar voters.
Forget all that and ask yourself, how could 562 Bond and Hoar “First Choice” ballots turn into 604 votes for Golden?
This process is broken. We still do not have the full story.
Assuming the same rates we saw in the official, publicly transparent RCV retabulation, one could estimate that about 2,400 new ballots would be required to see Jared Golden gain 600 more votes.
And now we are told that some number of ballots less than 562 have given Jared Golden 604 more votes.
Nov 27 2018

The Latest RCV Farce

A press release from the Maine Republican Party

On eve of recount, Maine SoS Matt Dunlap “finds” more ballots
Augusta – On the eve of the recount deadline for Maine’s Second Congressional District, Maine Sec. of State Matt Dunlap has told a Maine newspaper that his office has suddenly “found” more votes, adding to Jared Golden’s round 2 lead by about 600 additional votes.
“Trust in this system is shaken from start to finish, and now we are told that Secretary of State Dunlap simply ‘found’ more votes and added them to the totals to expand Jared Golden’s lead, but that he didn’t bother telling anyone until this recount deadline was upon us,” said Jason Savage, executive director of the Maine GOP.
“This addition to the vote count appears to us to have been done under the cover of darkness with no notification of any of the processes that were taking place and no public observers.”
Not only is the public denied the ability to review the algorithm that powers the RCV software, but now the vote total changes when nobody is looking. So much for the RCV process being transparent to the public.
“This is all the more reason for the recount and lawsuit. Nobody should be able to just add to vote totals under the cover of darkness without proper notification and transparency measures. Those results are sacred. They should not be treated like a seventh grade homework assignment,” concluded Mr. Savage.
Nov 2 2018

My Vote for Bruce Poliquin, My Vote for 2A, My Vote for Liberty

 

They want it bad. Oh, they really do. They’re convinced there is going to be a blue wave.

What remains to be seen is the response from the voters. For us in the 2nd District, the question will be whether we fall back into patterns of old of allowing liberal false narratives and skewed polling data to intimidate us or remain vigilant to defend the ground we have retaken. The choice is ours.

As for me, in the 2nd District, I choose Bruce Poliquin. To be truthful, I am surprised that the race is considered close. You would have thought we would have learned our lessons by now.

The first being the lesson we all learned in the Q3 battle. The truth that the rural voters banded together to turn back the assault against our 2A rights from Micheal Bloomberg and the alliance of southern Maine liberal interests groups. But united as one we stood and won a decisive victory.

So why divided now? The contrast is the same. Jared Golden is allied with the special interests that attacked our Natural Born Rights incessantly.

From tossing rifles on the ground to refusing to shake Poliquin’s hand after he had particularly bad debate performance, he seems more a tantrum throwing brat than self-described veteran who wants to be a leader. One that struggles with the truth it would seem, as everyone from Governor LePage to the Wall Street Journal have called Golden out on his blatant lies concerning Poliquin’s votes on healthcare. In this election more than ever, playing loose with the facts is a prerequisite to running for office in the Democrat Party. Such stark mischaracterizations, you would think, will not pass the scrutiny of the voters of the 2nd District, so noted for their adherence to common sense, but, stranger things have happened, like a guy throwing a rifle on the ground and still considered to have the intellectual and common sense fortitude to represent the 2nd District.

Bruce Poliquin has worked tirelessly for Maine. From the moment he has taken office, he has been relentless in defense of our great state. I’ve known Bruce to be straightforward and honest with me, never afraid to take my call, even when he knew he might not like what I had to say.

The complete and utter lies that have been launched against Bruce are reprehensible. We of rural Maine cannot reward Golden’s not-so-golden behavior. The best way to take the bad behaving Democrats to the woodshed is at the ballot box.

To be straight, this is not the time for disunity. The task is not complete. The President needs our support like never before and he needs that support to be unwavering because the DC swamp is relentless in their attacks against him.

Poliquin will give the President the support he needs. I’m asking all the Conservatives of the 2nd District to stand united once again for Freedom against leftist attacks. Send Bruce back to Washington!! He has my vote and I hope he will have yours.