For Gonzalez, some warning signs
They've pretty much finished counting the ballots here in Multnomah County from Tuesday's elections. The voters showed common sense in the county district attorney's race and in the contest for Congress in inner and east Portland, but the outcomes in the Multnomah County commission races were disappointing. The establishment candidates came in first in the three races out of four that were interesting. In one of those races, a viable change agent, Jessie Burke, didn't even make the runoff.
Portland city government wasn't on the ballot, except for the infernal city gas tax, which won renewal handily. But in November, the new, improved City Council will occupy the center ring in the local political circus. Every Portlander will be voting for the mayor and three City Council members from a newly drawn district. In all, there will be 12 new council members to go with the mayor. A goofball, untested version of "rank choice voting" will be used to see who gets the seats, and the mayor's job. At least a couple of the precious children who drew up this lame system are running for the very offices they created.
If I were Rene Gonzalez, the only sensible chioice for mayor, I'd be pretty worried after what I saw this week. The Democratic Party machine showed its strength in the county races, which are supposed to be nonpartisan, and it will be back in even greater force in November, when Orange Caligula will be running for national dictator. Gonzalez's main opponents, Carmen Rubio and Mingus Mapps, may cancel themselves out as first choices, but under "rank choice," they could get a second shot at Gonzalez, and maybe a third as well, as the elections folks recheck ballots over and over to compile the voters' rankings.
Gonzalez had better hope he comes across as the first-round winner, because I doubt he'll be very many people's second choice. Mapps voters will probably have Rubio at no. 2, and vice versa. Even in a third go-'round, I don't see Gonzo picking up too many votes. For a lot of voters, he'll be ranked either first or last.
We moderates can hope that Gonzalez performs like the new D.A., Nathan Vasquez, did this week, but in a three-way battle, he could wind up like Burke instead, giving a concession speech, after the "rank choice" machinations are finished.
Always considered myself a moderate. Of course if I asserted that in zip code 97214, I’d be ridiculed.
ReplyDeleteNorman? Vasquez?
ReplyDeleteYou got auto-correct on, buddy?
I thought I was the typo king (in the way Homer Simpson is the Internet King?).
Much as I find Gonzales utterly distasteful and don’t feel *all that* strongly about rank choice/re-arranging the deck chairs on the titanic, 12 more council members from the non-profit industrial complex & PSU patronage-machine+ their consultants in a place full of pet projects where the voters are none-too-bright nor strategic…
…Yikes!
Given my ballot, submitted at 10pm Election Day, got counted (and, why not/it got submitted postmarked the day-of & got there, what’s the problem?) & I was mostly curious in a sort of scientific way how strategic and republican & down to the wire I could be about it?), ranked choice sounds like it’ll be ‘interesting’ in this town, to say the least?
Disappointing on Burke & the cool 380mil zoo bond we don’t even need (god god!…I thought it’d at least be close?).l, and, in my case, disappointing to boot Schmidt from a structural point of view imo (not the popular point of view here).
No chance on the gas tax when the tax should just be on new tires universally federally progressively (and partly similar at each state above and beyond that/‘pay to play’ luxury/minimally regressive sales tax, basically ) weight & luxury SUV sized classification collected up front and proving you have off-street parking like Japan does it to own a car & get rid of car dealerships & smash their pure middle-man economic position that only exists because of extreme economic inefficiency and 100-year established well organized cancerous political lobby for the most part?
Charge bridge tolls between Hayden & govt island & rest of oregon for >3trips/month (I should be able to go to Vancouver for free the lousy <3 times/month I want or need to) & have some dedicated carpool & commute lanes with some surge pricing to gouge the Clark residents / keep them from clogging up & wearing out all our roads excessively & wasting fuel to buy a pack of cigs or something ridiculous like they do?
That’s my counter offer (queue my cousin Vinny), being unable to live in some glorious utopia where it’s more like the video game Grand Theft auto 5 where we car Jack all the affluent suburbanites, the cops never show up should they dare even pass thru/around the city & send them to the gulag thereafter to work it off (at best?)?
You Portland normal folks seem screwed, electorally speaking.
ReplyDeleteJessie Burke never got a real campaign going beyond her initial schtick (people don’t get what’s going on down here). Vasquez did.
ReplyDeleteVasquez was in a two-way race running against an incompetent incumbent. In a three-way contest for an open seat, it was a lot harder, and Burke wasn't up to it against an old pro like Adams and a darling of the homeless industrial complex. Gonzalez is in a three-way race for an open seat, and one of his opponents is Carmen Rubio. He'd better bust tail all summer, and run smart as hell.
DeleteNo love lost for Gonzales here, but I can’t say I think you’re analysis is incorrect/can’t find fault here, &, idk if in shitty times I even mind if Gonzales wins if we chart *some* course thru the mess, but at the end of that, everyone hates Gonzales and as Hunter S. Thompson said of Nixon, ‘maybe we fire him thru a storm sewer drain when we’re done with him as an appropriate & fitting end (paraphrasing)?’
DeleteYour analysis*
DeleteNo love lost for Gonzales, but if it takes a transplant ‘wolf in sheps clothing’ suburbanite creep/plant that resides in Eastmoreland & takes $ from the cop union to drag us kicking and screaming toward *some* kind of solution snd order because the rest of us can’t get organized /get our shit together, attract some talent and resources and spend les time daydreaming and figure out who our class enemies are / what amount disorder, chaos, bad publicity, & taxation without services is unacceptable, so fucking be it? / better get on with it!
ReplyDeleteYeah, the proportional ranked choice voting method has only is “untested” if “in use since 1948” is untested (Cambridge, Mass.) — https://voterchoicema.org/how/
ReplyDeletePortland had it in 1913. Of course, we came to our senses and ditched it 20 years later... but that said, the new Portlandia form of ranked choice is unique because it elects three candidates, not one.
DeleteNot that Cambridge, Mass., counts as a real city, but even there, I don't think they have "single transferable vote" or whatever the Portland foolishness is called. It's all a setup to get marginal people like Hardesty, Rubio, and Vega Pederson elected. Portland voters are dumb enough as it is.
DeleteGonzo is toast. If you’re gonna win in proggy PDX and not toe the woke line, you best be likable and he is not, by any stretch. Abandon all hope on this guy.
ReplyDeleteMapps somehow gaining traction is probably the best option we will realistically have.