A brief political note

[redbird]

My congressional district has a Democratic primary next month (other parties may also have primaries; I haven't checked). This is what used to be the Harlem district, once represented by Adam Clayton Powell Jr., and since 1970 by Charlie Rangel.

I think Rangel has just convinced me to vote for Adriano Espaillat. Not because of anything he said for or against Espaillat: because today's Rangel flier throws God into the equation (as part of saying "hey, look, Korean War veteran").


If Espaillat is elected, he will be the first member of Congress of Dominican ancestry (a quick look at his own website and Wikipedia doesn't tell me whether he was born in the U.S. or the D.R.). That's going to be a factor in the primary, but will be balanced against Rangel's strong roots in the African-American community; however, after the latest redistricting, the district is majority-Latino, and a lot of those are Dominican. As far as I can tell, I don't have any preference on those grounds: either is fine with me.

Rangel had worked his slow way up the seniority ladder in Congress to be chair of the Ways and Means Committee for a bit, and then ranking minority member: and then there was a complicated mess involving corruption charges and misuse/hoarding of rent controlled apartments. As part of settling that, he gave up his seniority. Given how Congress works, if I have the choice of two equally good (or equally bad) candidates, but one would be chair of a committee that is important in handling appropriations, and the other wouldn't, it benefits me to vote for the committee chair, because it'll mean more useful stuff for the district. (I might not benefit directly, but it would be good for my neighborhood.)

Just to complicate everyone's lives, this is one of three primary elections this year. The presidential primary was in April. The primary for the state legislature will be on Thursday September 13, for added confusion since primaries are traditionally held on Tuesdays; apparently the head of the firefighter's union asked that it not be on September 11, despite the fact that September 11, 2001, being a primary day saved lives, because some people stopped to vote before work that morning and weren't there when the planes hit the World Trade Center. A September primary wouldn't leave enough time between counting the votes and Election Day to satisfy current federal law. This is mostly being talked about in terms of not disenfranchising people in the military, but it also affects civilians living abroad, of course (hi, Mom!). No, I don't know why the federal law doesn't affect elections for the state legislature (or mayor, next year, or any other state or local office). Some interpretation of federalism?

Comments

[bibliofile]

These nuts and bolts of elections interest me, so thanks for posting all of it.

I too don't know about the timing thing, either. I just know that during the last presidential election we had four weeks for sending & receiving absentee ballots. This year, we have two. It's not an improvement, AFAICT. (I may do some digging about this; the answer may be in some of my election worker materials.)

[adrian_turtle]

I think Rangel has just convinced me to vote for Adriano Espaillat. Not because of anything he said for or against Espaillat: because today's Rangel flier throws God into the equation (as part of saying "hey, look, Korean War veteran").

What did he say that was so objectionable? I see a big difference between a politician saying he believes God helped him survive a dangerous situation (or saying he is active in his church, for that matter), and saying he wants to do God's work in government. You might have different boundaries for what's acceptable, of course.

[redbird]

It reads to me as saying "vote for me because I believe in God," which implies "believers are better than nonbelievers." As an atheist, I resent this, and all I can do is take my vote away. This is in a context/society that is overwhelmingly pro-religion, in which religious people are if anything over-represented. ("Pro-religion" in the sense that there are people who think and say that believing in anything is better than being an atheist or agnostic, not just support for specific religions.)

I don't think he's actually saying "God likes me better than the other candidates," at least, which puts him ahead of some.

(If he said he was active in his church, I'd want to know what he did there: teaching Sunday school is at best neutral, running a food bank is a positive thing that helps people regardless of what they believe.)

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

Rangel proposed reintroducing the draft (http://www.house.gov/list/press/ny15_rangel/CBRStatementonDraft02142006.html). Even though he didn't expect it to pass, I don't think that was something for a member of Congress to play around with.