Alaska democracy hypocracy - believing in voters & votes

zac love

Well-known member
so I don't know if anyone else has been following the Miller / Murkowski election up in Alaska, but from the little I've read in the mass media, it seems like down here from my perspective in the lower 48, Mr. Miller doesn't believe in the whole aspect of democracy where people get to vote for their government officials.

I totally feel like Murkowski has some "sore loser" in her, but it doesn't bug me when someone looses a primary & doesn't exit the race. (Hell, Illinois had one of those in the Governor's race this season)

What bugs me is a candidate's camp flooding a list of write-in candidates with the sole intention to make it difficult for voters to find the candidate they want to vote for.

It also bugs me that a candidate wants to strip a vote away from an American citizen if they didn't dot each & every one of their "i"s.

To me this seems to be very hypocritical, undemocratic, unethical & a 100% pure example of political elitism.


anyone else?
 
I totally feel like Murkowski has some "sore loser" in her, but it doesn't bug me when someone looses a primary & doesn't exit the race. (Hell, Illinois had one of those in the Governor's race this season)
Illinois has a sore loser law. If you lose in the primary you can't run as an independent in the general election.

Scott Lee Cohen won the primary for Lt Governor in Illinois. He was then strong armed out of the race by the Illinois Democratic Party. He then ran a sour grapes campaign for governor out of spite. Because he won the primary election he was not subject to the sore loser law.

Ironically, he spent $6,000,000 of his own cash in the campaign to screw the Democrats but the votes he got ended up hurting the republican candidate and helped the democrats win a very tight election.
 

Chugach3DGuy

Well-known member
so I don't know if anyone else has been following the Miller / Murkowski election up in Alaska, but from the little I've read in the mass media, it seems like down here from my perspective in the lower 48, Mr. Miller doesn't believe in the whole aspect of democracy where people get to vote for their government officials.
Yup, that's pretty much what I think on the matter too. Joe Miller is all about Joe Miller. Looking at all the things that happened from the moment he won the primary all the way up to his current wrench-throwing capers (including the situation where his hired goons illegally detained a reporter for trying to ask him questions), I'm still amazed that he continues to have as large of a following as he does.

The sad part is how mean and vicious people have gotten over this whole thing. People don't understand that just because you disagree over something doesn't mean you're instantly 100% for the other side in extreme. I do think supporters of all three candidates have fed into this viciousness.

I totally feel like Murkowski has some "sore loser" in her, but it doesn't bug me when someone looses a primary & doesn't exit the race.
I'm not a die-hard Murkowski fan, but I am really glad that she decided to stay in the race. Personally, I'm hoping that deep down she knew that if Miller won, it would mean bad news for all of us. I also think that as the race to election day went on, more people started catching on to Joe Miller's underlying values and personality and saw him for what he really is.

What bugs me is a candidate's camp flooding a list of write-in candidates with the sole intention to make it difficult for voters to find the candidate they want to vote for.
Joe Miller's campaign slogan should have been "Do as I say-not as I do". Also, a week or two before the election a Pro-Miller radio talk show host aired a caller who offered the idea of people registering themselves as write-in candidates to take away votes from Murkowski and also to make the process of counting the ballots that much more time consuming. Over the next 24 hours, the office that handles candidate registration was swamped with calls and walk-ins, which led to the radio show host being suspended from airing his next show, just days before the election.

It also bugs me that a candidate wants to strip a vote away from an American citizen if they didn't dot each & every one of their "i"s.
I think he's being a jerk about it, but if you're smart enough to get yourself to a voting booth, you're probably also smart enough to write down the proper spelling on a piece of paper and stuff it in your pocket before you get there. I see no reason why blatant misspellings shouldn't be booted, but I will agree that some of the ballots Miller has contested just make him look like an even bigger jerk. At this point in time, it looks like he's only trying to throw wrenches into the works as a way to kick and stomp and whine about how HE was supposed to win and how the voters of Alaska clearly didn't do it right.

To me this seems to be very hypocritical, undemocratic, unethical & a 100% pure example of political elitism.
It is definitely all of those things. For a candidate to rail against the very system and programs that he himself has benefited from is hypocritical enough, but to try and hide from the facts on top of it is a big insult to me and a slap in the face to the very people he expects to vote for him.
 

svp

Well-known member
zaclove,

While I agree with everything you said, there is an issue of fairness and equality in this process. As I understand it, Alaska law says that a write-in candidate's name must be spelled correctly for that vote to count. Normally, I'd side with Alaska election officials when they say they're considering voter intent with regards to spelling. However, in a recent previous election in Alaska (don't remember which one) the law was applied as written and voter intent was not permitted to be considered which could have altered the outcome of that election. So the question is, why are the rules different for Murkowski than any other person on the ballot??? If the state wants to go by voter intent so everyones vote counts, I'll support that but the law has to be applied equally in every election and that's just not the case in Alaska.

I definitely think Murkowski is the person Alaskans decided they wanted as their Senator. However, I think Miller should keep his lawsuits going because the state of Alaska should not be let off the hook for playing favorites with election law.
 
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