Hey, We're Still Having Elections? SWEET!
Nice Time!
Take that, all of you cynical Cyrils and malcontent Marcies who grumbled after Trump/vote suppression won in November of ‘24 that we’d never have another election! We have still been having them, and we still do, and Democrats have been winning them. Which is why Republicans have been frantically vote-suppressing as hard as they can!
For instance, in Minnesota on Sept. 16, the seat of assassinated state Representative Melissa Hortman was won by one Xiongpao “Xp” Lee, a member of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party (one of two state Democratic Party affiliates with a different name from that of the national party). Lee was born in a refugee camp in Thailand, after his Hmong family was displaced from Laos during the Vietnam war. Then they moved to Fresno, and Lee moved to Minnesota after college. Where he proceeded to become Republicans’ worst nightmare, a community organizer.
My brain thought that was Laura Dern in “Citizen Ruth” up there for a half a second.
Anyway, Lee founded the Hmong American Census Network to make sure the population got counted, and then he worked for the Minnesota Department of Health as a community coordinator during the COVID-19 pandemic. Then he ran for Brooklyn Park City Council and won, and now he is the representative of District 34B after winning 61 percent of the vote, keeping the Minnesota House tied 67-67. Lee has a new baby, is adorable.
Nrog koj zoo siab means congratulations in Hmong!
Now down towards the border, almost Mexico way, where yesterday progressive Democrat Adelita Grijalva won Tuesday’s special election for Arizona’s Seventh Congressional District seat to complete the next 15 months of the term of her late father Raúl, which has been vacant since he died during cancer treatment in March. This narrows Republicans’ majority to 219-214, and is bad news for the coverup of the Epstein Files! Among other things, of course.
Grijalva is a former Pima County supervisor and Tucson School Board member, and she’s vowed to carry on her former-activist father’s progressive policies. She was endorsed by Bernie and AOC, and Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Maxwell Frost of Florida has announced that she’ll be joining their club of House and Senate RADICAL LEFT DEMOCRATS.
Here’s a quote: “At 54, Grijalva will be younger than more than half of her congressional colleagues.” Now don’t we all feel like little spring chickens!
This leaves two more vacancies in the House: Texas’s 18th Congressional District will be up for grabs after November 4 after Democratic Rep. Sylvester Turner died this year. It includes Houston and has generally been considered deep-blue, but who knows what it will be after Texas passed those gerrydoodled oughta-be-illegal redistricting maps. You remember all of that.
And then there’s a primary coming up for Tennessee’s deep-red Seventh District, which Mark Green, Republican, won by more than 20 points. But then he resigned in June to work for a Florida lobbyist and get some sweet private-sector money. That primary will be on October 7, and early voting has already begun. Republican frontrunners in a close four-way right now are some peaches: Cody Barrett, a John Birch Society combover who’s real mad about red flag laws trying to keep guns away from would-be school shooters; state Rep. Gino Bulso, who wants to ban Pride flags and make schoolchildren watch pro-life fetal development videos … you get the idea.
One bummer, though, in the (officially nonpartisan) runoff election yesterday for mayor of Mobile, Alabama, Democrat Barbara Drummond was very narrowly defeated by Republican Spiro Cheriogotis.
But, even in places where Democrats have lost, the needle is moving! For instance, in April, Democratic candidate Gay Valimont in Florida’s First Congressional District moved her district 17 points from November in the special election to replace creeper Rep. Matt Gaetz. And Joshua Weil improved the margin in Florida’s Sixth Congressional District by 19 points. Quite something!
And in March Democrats flipped a state senate seat in Pennsylvania that they had never, ever won. Ever! And then there’s that Wisconsin Supreme Court seat that Elon Musk tried, and failed, to buy.
PREVIOUSLY!
So, Tennessee Democrats may have an uphill climb, but also maybe not an impossible one. They’ve got some quality candidates: state Reps. Bo Mitchell, Vincent Dixie, and Aftyn Behn. They’re hitting hard with AFFORDABILITY. Have some ads!
And Bo Mitchell:
Who would you pick?
And then get out there and early-vote if you’re in Tennessee! Bring us some more good news! We need it!
[NBC / Tennessee Lookout ]
Good news is good.
OT - interesting discussion with the therapist today. We discussed my trip back to Sheffield for the funeral and my clash with my sister over her support of fascism. I told him that I feel like I can't just leave views like hers unchallenged, despite Mr Cakes best attempts to prevent me from breaking ties with another family member, as I can see these formerly extreme views becoming acceptable mainstream policy the more they go unchallenged, which in turn pushes the extremists to become more extreme in order to generate the rage they thrive on. He didn't know that the idea of euthanasia the homeless had been spoken aloud on US TV and seemed shocked.
We ended up in a philosophical discussion about freedom and responsibility. He said it's a complicated subject, I disagreed and said I find it incredibly simple: your freedom ends at the point it affects someone else's freedom, and, to quote Sir Pterry, evil begins when you begin to treat people as things.
I repeat my plea.
The only way we get even a *semblance* of a check on this maladministration (and Taney Court 2.0) is a Democratic impeachment+removal-sized majority. And even then we have to be prepared for the massive deference in the legal and political systems for the unreconstructed (including unlimited appeals and do-overs for the pricktator and his allies).
SO I am not even saying send money. There are only the actions that need being done.
Make sure, NOW, that you are registered. If you are in a suppression area, use the time NOW to navigate the barriers so you are not scrambling for Election Day. If it's too late for 2025, get yourself set up for 2026 at least.
The only action you need is to vote, and if you get the Democrats in overwhelming numbers only then can you make the change. It truly matters who is in office. It truly matters who chairs the committees. All of this matters.
We know what to do. Mount up.