Tag Archives: Ranked Choice Voting

Nov 13 2018

The Maine Way

 

Bruce Poliquin has won reelection to Congress to represent CD 2 by 2,000 votes. In the realms of sanity and fairness, that would be the headline, but once again, forces from outside CD 2 have conspired to work against the wishes of the voters in this District. The cycle of southern liberal arrogance continues.

Ranked Choice Voting was created to insure that Republicans would never be elected again. Southern liberals have been constantly frustrated with the conservative vote in Northern Maine. The voting block leans right so, in the minds of the political elites, rural Maine doesn’t vote the “right” way. So, how do overcome the obvious intellectual deficits of northern hicks, those lovable, quaint, and post card worthy but not vote worthy backwoods Mainers?

So convinced of their intellectual superiority, liberals have simply awarded themselves extra votes. If the Democrats can’t win the first time, it just wasn’t fair, so they will add in the votes of their stealth democrat candidates, a.k.a. Independents. Extra votes, do-over votes, everybody-gets-a-win-as-long-as their not Republican votes, and Democrats can now say not only do they have 3 campaign dollars to every one Republican dollar, but also, 3 votes per Democrat voter to every one vote per Republican.

The voters of CD 2 voted against RCV by 20,000 votes but it narrowly passed because of its support in CD 1. So which District supports Ranked Choice voting? Certainly, not the Second Congressional District!

But the majority will of the voters for the First Congressional District (RCV)will now be used to circumvent the majority will of the voters of the Second Congressional District, who have given Bruce Poliquin the victory to represent them in Washington. The voters in CD 2 voted against do-over, twosies, and threesies votes, but CD 1 has overruled rural Maine and demanded we vote and vote again until we get it “right”. In other words, voting the Southern Maine Way is all we have Left.

-Andy Torbett

May 7 2018

Moody’s Blues

 

Once again the media and the political establishment have anointed who they think should be the candidates, explained to the voters why we should just except their established infallibility, and just embrace the inevitable by voting the way they indicate. So again, it’s the same old, same old. Two candidates, who the “powers that be” have foisted upon us, to which we are expected to except without question.

But I think not! For the Republicans, the establishment pick, Shawn Moody, has too many questions about too much duplicity, and not enough answers to assuage the doubts that surround him. The Republican Party does not do voters justice by anointing a candidate simply because the LePage political machine demands they do so.

Moody’s campaign from the onset has been based upon fallacy. It continues to brazenly spout these assertions and no one seems willing to challenge them. Let’s start now.

The Outsider: This claim seems more of the stuff of late night comic relief than a viable campaign strategy. Yes, the terminology is en vogue as of late but it is hard to substantiate when you are shouting it from inside the bowels of the LePage political power structure. Yes, the shuffle heard ’round the State was the movement of all the Governor’s soldiers moving their camp to under the Moody flag.

Not a politician: Again, do they speak in jest? How does a man run an Independent race for Governor, become a political appointee, and surround himself with all the Governor’s horses and all the Governor’s Ladies and Gents and not be a politician? The Moody campaign seems to enjoy playing fast and loose with facts.

The only one who has worked in the private sector: Now we are approaching sit-com level humor. Everyone of Moody’s opponents has worked in or run a private sector business. I find it unsettling that a man who wants to be Governor has such a narrow view of what is a valid profession in the private sector.

Mike Thibodeau, who has left the race, ran a very successful construction business and still owns a private sector business that manufactures snow shovels. Ken Fredette has a successful law office. Garrett Mason worked in the family construction business as a boy and then worked as an administrator for a professional sports team. Mary Mayhew has also worked in administration.

If only Shawn Moody had been given a few more opponents, he could have disparaged the entirety of the private sector profession save for Auto-body Technicians. Poorly thought out and thin on facts, Moody’s campaign song, constantly chirped and parroted, may in the end have him singing the Blues. With such a questionable foundation for a campaign, one has to wonder of the validity of the platform.

Conservatism?: Really? This is hard to swallow when the man spent an entire election railing against the tenets of conservatism. Seven years as a political appointee in the LePage administration and he never spoke out once of his embrace of conservative principles until right before announcing his conversion to a Republican and run for Governor? The people are right to question the convenience of Moody’s “Road to Damascus” moment on the eve of his new “NotapoliticianOutsider” campaign.

Traditional Family Values: This is to be expected. Every Republican candidate has a “Come to Jesus” moment in spring/early summer, when they realize they have to get elected. The question is, Who has a consistent record on those issues? Moody is murky at best and needs to speak with clarity on this and other issues.

For instance, the Ranked Choice Voting issue. Rumor has it that Shawn Moody has been in support of RCV until recently when political expediency dictated he switch. What is Shawn Moody’s stance on this issue? He needs to clarify.

And what of Medicaid expansion? Again, rumor has it that Mr. Moody has been in favor of expansion, while his new found Republican colleagues have been staunchly fighting the growth of this bureaucracy. Mr. Moody needs to set the record straight on these issues.

Shawn Moody has difficulty being a straight shooter when he has to keep dodging his political past. If Mr. Moody gets the Blues, it’s because he plays a song that has no soul. His rhythm strikes a chord of deceit and we’ve all heard this song before.