Vote today!

[cos]

Today is the special election to choose Somerville's new State Representative. Polls are open until 8pm.

The district covers the middle half of Somerville, from roughly Union Square to about a couple of blocks past Davis Square (towards Tufts). Check your address at WhereDoIVoteMA.com to see if you're in the district (scroll down and see if your "Rep in General Court" is "VACANT")

The candidates are Denise Provost and Elizabeth Moroney. Although both are good, and have similar positions on most issues, I think it's extremely important for the Massachusetts progressive movement, and much better for Somerville, for Denise Provost to be elected today. See my long post from yesterday about why I think so.

I've heard from a lot of people that Denise Provost is a shoe-in and will win. Don't be complacent! This is a special election, so the overwhelming majority of voters will not vote, and it will be decided by the small handful who do. Yes, a large majority of Somerville voters prefer Denise Provost, and yes, she should win this election easily, and would win it easily if enough people voted. But that doesn't mean she necessarily will win, if only 1 out of 10 people vote. Anything could happen.
[Edit: Remember, Carl Sciortino got elected on a margin of only 93 votes in 2004! And that was a regular state primary, when a lot more people vote. And while you're at it remembering that, don't forget that Denise Provost supported Carl and Elizabeth Moroney supported Vinnie Ciampa.]

Whether you live in the district or not, if you care about Somerville and about Davis Square, today is the day to volunteer for your candidate and help get out the vote. The candidate that does a better job getting her voters to the polls today will be elected, and that means your candidate needs your help.

Hope to see some of you at the Provost campaign office today (it's next door to Diesel, on the 3rd floor).

Comments

[turil.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. I, as a registered Green, wonder if I could have voted today, since the Green-Rainbow partry didn't get enough votes in the Presidential election last time (too many panicked and voted for Kerry, I guess). I'll have to investigate this further...

party registration

[cos]

Although the Greens lost official ballot status after 2004, I believe that if you were already registered Green and haven't updated, you are still registered Green and cannot vote in any primaries (since without ballot status, Greens can't hold a primary).

If you live in Somerville, you might want to take into consideration the fact that all of the most important election decisions that send real progressives to the state house (Pat Jehlen, Carl Sciortino, Denise Provost) happen in Democratic primaries, and if you want to be a part of that, you may want to register in a way that lets you vote in those elections. The strongest, best progressive candidates around here mostly seem to run as Democrats, not Greens.

P.S. If you register unenrolled, you can vote in any primary. However, if you care about the statewide offices, such as governor and secretary of state, the Democratic caucuses and state convention are very important, and you need to be a registered Democrat to participate in those.

Re: party registration

[turil.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the info. I'm not planning on changing my party affiliation, though. I've been registering Green since I could first vote (nearly 20 years, now, damn I'm getting old), and I'm quite happy with the party platform (if not the seeming lack of organizational capabilities...). It's too bad that the Democrats don't endorse Green party platforms and/or promote a more inclusive electoral system.

Some of the Somerville Democrats do definitely represent my values quite well, and I certainly do vote for the ones I like when the opportunity arises. And I was afraid that I might have missed an opportunity. But, you are right. It wasn't an option for me, and that's cool.

Re: party registration

[cos]

I, too, like the Green 10 key values (I can't say what the Green "platform" is because there are many Green parties and many versions of it), and I was a Green through the late 90s and until about 2003.

I think there's a lot of blindness about, and prejudice towards, Democrats, among Greens. I've come to think that the Green party is about elevating the ideals of building a third party, and of being cynical about Democrats, far above and beyond any of the things the Green party says they actually want to accomplish - support for the poor, environmental protection, election reform, peace and conflict resolution, embracing diversity, universal health care, good public education, and so on. Sure, there are many Democrats one can be cynical about. But there are also many Democrats who do far more to put these Green ideals into actual practice than the Green party has been able to - and they need us!.

You want a more inclusive electoral system? Denise Provost, in PDS questionnaire, when we asked her about election issues, responded with a paragraph about why we need instant runoff voting. On her own initiative. She's a Democrat. John Bonifaz is running for secretary of state as a Democrat. He founded the National Voting Rights Institute; he sued Massachusetts over failing to fund the clean elections law in 2002 and won, forcing the state to fund several candidates; he was lead counsel for the Cobb-Badnarik Ohio recount cases. If he wins, he'll be the person who administers elections for the state of Massachusetts. His platform is our wish list: election day registration, no-fault early voting, multilingual access, paper ballots, count every vote, instant runoff voting, fusion voting, support for a constitutional amendment guaranteeing the right to vote, and so on.

Carl Sciortino won by 93 votes.
Tim Schofield lost by 64 votes.

John Bonifaz needs your vote in the 2006 Democratic primary.
Being registered as a Green, today in Massachusetts in 2006, is IMO a cop-out. You're denying yourself the ability to achieve what you claim to want to achieve, now that it's within reach.