Friday, August 8, 2008

Ten Reasons for Alaska Progressives to Be Optimistic This August

1) -- Ted Stevens' trial will be a spotlight of national news in the weeks leading up to the National Election, depressing the GOP base and GOP crossover in Alaska - and nationwide.

2) -- Barack Obama will almost have to come to Alaska during the trial to highlight the differences between his Senatorial mission and that of Stevens. And that other old dude - not as old as Stevens - but the "white-haired, really old dude..."

3) -- Next to Don Young, Sean Parnell looks very, very clueless. Every chance potential August independent voters see them side by side, they'll want to know more about Diane Benson and Ethan Berkowitz.

4) -- Our Democratic Party AK-At-Large U.S. House seat candidates are both getting national attention. Let's hope the race stays positive.

5) -- Next to Don Young, Sean Parnell, while posing as a fiscal conservative, is a member of the highest-spending GOP gubernatorial administration in the USA. The Saradise base he has launched from, with help from the Club for Growth, has too much cognitive dissonance to become a message that really works with voters - no matter how much money they throw at it.

6) -- All these young Obama campaign workers are working their butts off from early morning until almost midnight, organizing this state from the center and left like it has never been organized before. The spillover into state-level politics is an added benefit from the Obama campaign's heavy presence here.

7) -- Next to Diane Benson and Ethan Berkowitz, Sean Parnell is a pasteboard suit, stumbling over on some answers when he knows he can't tell the truth, or giving stupid, uninformed ones, when he thinks he can bullshit people or stall out the clock. Parnell, to re-use a term used here before, is fucking clueless on many issues important to Alaskans.

8) -- Democratic Party candidates for Alaska House and Senate are also working harder than in years. There are several examples, but my favorite is Valdez resident Nancy Lethcoe and her battle to unseat the powerful John Harris. Nancy is a U.S. Summer Olympics champion, and two-time world record-holder - the butterfly - so I'm happy to begin writing about her on 8-8-08, the start of the 2008 Games. More to come soon on Nancy Lethcoe, and other Alaska Legislature candidates.

9) -- Did I mention Sean Parnell? What really goes on in that light (as in "airhead") governor's office? How much to the stories of illegal cooperation between his Juneau state-paid staff and his campaign office is going to start coming out? If the truth emerges, his conduct may make Troopergate look like kids' play.

10) -- The best reason to work our butts off - it gets Katie Hurley to smile so beautifully!

image -- Katie Hurley at the Palmer Obama office opening

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Did you see Sean's ad? He has a picture of him and S'Palin posing and mentions their "team." Is this for people who hate him but like Sarah so he is trying to say that he won't be doing anything and that she will be?

Anonymous said...

I agree, the lefties have a shot at gaining some ground this fall.

It isn't because they are great stuff. It's because the R's shot themselves in the foot.

Enjoy the time in the sun...it will be short.

Anonymous said...

Phil, kind of off topic, but do you know anything about an alleged Ivan Moore poll referenced in the Anchorage Press recently?

"Then again, a recent poll by Ivan Moore Research suggests that there are plenty of voters who haven’t made up their minds.

In the Democratic primary, 15.9% of the respondents were undecided; Berkowitz scored 54% while Benson had 25.2% (Don Wright of the Alaska Independence Party was included, and got 4.9% support). Among Republican voters, 10.1% were undecided, while Young was up top with 46%, Parnell fairly close behind at 38.3%, and LeDoux with 5.6%."

Do you think this was an unbiased sample? Did he sample outside of Anchorage? I just find it rather difficult to believe that Ethan is really polling this far ahead of Diane.

And then again Ivan Moore has been wrong many times before.

Philip Munger said...

Linda - A few days before the Press article, Brendan Joel Kelly commented at PA that he'd be publishing a new poll the following Thursday. That's the info in the Press, I guess. I know nothing else about it.

Anonymous said...

The poll was a random sample of likely primary voters drawn statewide, distributed to reflect statewide primary voter turnout.

Anonymous said...

I'd like to know why nobody ever polls me. I've been voting in primaries here for as long as I can remember. Maybe they've got a list of the dirty hippie commie pinkos and don't bother calling us.

And since I've been using my real name, I'm probably really on their list now, if I wasn't before.

Maia said...

If they do have such a list, it can't be complete -- my parents are known dirty hippie commie pinkos (AND members of the AFL-CIO) and they get polled all the time.

Anonymous said...

I just don't understand. I feel so slighted. :(

Oh, well, at least my vote counts like everybody else's -- or maybe it doesn't. At this point, not only do I not trust polls, but I don't really trust election results either. The next three months should be pretty interesting.

Anonymous said...

The funniest thing about this blog entry is how much it's going to suck to be a dried up old hippy hack like all of you idiots after Parnell wins.

You forgot reason #11: good growing season, so all of you hippy fuckers can just get high for the next twenty years of Parnell in Congress.