Where to Eat in Swing States, Early Primary States and More!

When I tell people I liked the food in Little Rock more than the food in Southern California, they are often surprised. Thinking about it, I can't really compare the two objectively because I had such excellent guides in Arkansas. Similarly, now that I'm in Minnesota (I'm exhausted just reading this. Someone hire me for good post-2020!) I'm on the hunt for neighborhood go-tos as well as places to eat as I travel about the state. And I thought, "Everyone should be as lucky as I was with my crew in Arkansas!" So, I've crowd sourced places to eat in early states, swing states and more. This will be an evolving list so please feel free to comment with your faves! Huge thank you to all my many friends both real and Internet for contributing.


Key:
Bold-I have personally eaten there, CAN CONFIRM.
Italics- Vegan or vegan-friendly. (Not exhaustive, these are just places I know for sure are vegan friendly)
"" Are comments for contributors
() Contain comments from yours truly

Early States:

Iowa
The Cafe, Ames
Downtown Deli, Ames
Fuzzy's Tacos, Ames
Great Plains Pizza, Ames
Hickory Park, Ames
The Spice, Ames
Whitney's Ice Cream, Bettendorf
La Tavola Italian, Burlington
Jay's Homestyle, Cedar Falls
Taste of India, Cedar Falls
Irish Democrat, Cedar Rapids
Cabin Coffee, Clear Lake
Rice House, Clear Lake
30 Hop, Coralville
La Vecina, Coralville
Monica's, Coralville
Scratch Bakery, Coralville
Vesta, Coralville
La Prairie French Bakery, Des Moines
Mars Cafe, Des Moines
St. Kilda, Des Moines
Zombie Burger, Des Moines
Dubuque Mining Company, Dubuque
Mario's, Dubuque (It is ALWAYS someone's birthday in there. They are constantly singing happy birthday)
Salsa's, Dubuque
Schera's, Elkader
Blackstone, Iowa City
Blue Bird Diner, Iowa City
Brix, Iowa City
The Cottage Bakery, Iowa City
Dumpling Darling, Iowa City and Des Moines
Goosetown Cafe, Iowa City
Hamburg Inn No. 2, Iowa City "For the pie shakes" (Famous popular stop for Presidential candidates because of the coffee bean poll)
Her Soup Kitchen, Iowa City
Java House, Iowa City
The Mill, Iowa City "Get the Nachos" (Also best option for day drinking)
Oasis, Iowa City (This came up from multiple sources and remembering how good it is,I almost jumped in the car.)
Pagliai’s, Iowa City (Guys seriously this is the best pizza I have ever had in the Midwest)
Pullman, Iowa City
La Regia, Iowa City
Short’s, Iowa City "Get the burger or black bean burger"
Stella's, Iowa City
Trumpet Blossom, Iowa City
The Vue, Iowa City
Rudy's Tacos, Waterloo

New Hampshire
The Friendly Toast, Bedford and Portsmouth (Had one near my college too! The stuffed french toast is the best brunch I've ever had)
Crust and Crumb, Concord
Dos Amigos, Concord
Margaritas, Concord, Exeter, Nashua, Portsmouth
Vibes, Concord
The Works, Concord and Portsmouth
The Bookery, Manchester
Cafe la Reine, Manchester
Gyro Spot, Manchester
The Puritan Backroom, Manchester
Noodz, Manchester
Portland Pie Company, Manchester
Red Arrow Diner, Manchester "Get the poutine!"
Hart's Turkey Farm Restaurant, Meredith
Parker’s Maple Barn, Mason
Ava Marie’s Chocolates, Peterborough
Bagel Mill,Peterborough
Fezziwigs, Portsmouth
Popover's, Portsmouth
Tuscan Market, Portsmouth
Kashmir, Salem
Tilt'n Diner, Tilton

Nevada
Lotus of Siam, Las Vegas
Habaneros, Las Vegas
Capriotti's, Las Vegas

South Carolina
Fruit Punch, Anderson "Get a bird dog. It’s a hot dog with chicken fingers, bacon, honey mustard and cheese"
Callie's Hot Little Biscuit, Charleston
Bowen's Island, Folly Beach
Pita House, Greenville

Swing States and other states in which contributors have worked

Arizona
Horsemen Lodge, Flagstaff
America's Taco Shop, Phoenix

Arkansas
Doe's Eat Place, Little Rock (BEST tamales)
Lost Forty Brewery, Little Rock
Sims BBQ, Little Rock
Slim Chickens, Little Rock
Three Fold, Little Rock

California
Georgia's, Anaheim (In the Anaheim packing district. Get the spicy chicken sandwich)
Grow, Anaheim (Get an iced lavender latte and the avocado toast)
Mendocino Farms, Multiple locations (Everything is delicious but I am partial to the chicken caesar salad)
Cafe Moulin, Laguna Beach "Get the French hotdog, only available at the Laguna Beach location and only in the summer"
Two Saucy Broads, Fullerton (Best pizza in Orange County)
Christaki's, Tustin (Sit down place. Best gyro in the area)

Colorado
La Caretta, Colorado Springs
Poor Richard's, Denver
Charlie Brown's, Denver
City O City, Denver
Denver Beer Company, Denver
Denver Biscuit Company, Denver
Lechuga's, Denver
Pablo's Coffee, Denver
Rosenberg's Bagels, Denver
Sam's #3, Denver
Santiago's, Denver
Sassafras, Denver
Vital Root, Denver
Watercourse, Denver

Delaware
Capriotti's, Multiple locations

Florida
Publix, Multiple locations (Yes, the grocery store. I left this in because people are obsessed with their subs)
Four Rivers Smokehouse, Multiple locations
Satchel's Pizza, Gainesville
Basilic Vietnamese Grill, Lauderdale-by-the-Sea
Alter, Miami
The Big Pink, Miami
Garcia's, Miami
Monty's, Miami "For Happy Hour"
Prime Fish, Miami Beach "Bottomless brunch"
Kadence Sushi, Orlando
Carmine's, Palm Beach Garden
Columbia Restaurant, St.Petersburg and Tampa
Wright's Gourmet House, Tampa


Michigan
Zingerman's, Ann Arbor (Have not eaten there but have gotten a gift basket from them and made their mushroom soup recipe)
Anchor Bar, Detroit
Slow's BBQ, Detroit

Minnesota
Matt's, Minneapolis "for the Juicy Loosy"
Mucci's, Minneapolis (favorite rec I've received so far in MN. The bucatini, focaccia and tiramisu are especially delicious)
Safari Express, Minneapolis "For the camel burger"
Canadian Honker, Rochester
Lifestooshort, Rochester
Nupa, Rochester
Hunan Garden, Rochester
Bloedows Bakery, Winona

Missouri
Gates, Kansas City, "burnt ends, plus they have the best sauce"
Jack Stack, Kansas City "cheesy corn bake"
Joe's, Kansas City "burnt ends, pulled pork, fries"
Q39, Kansas City "pork ribs"

North Carolina
Fiction Kitchen, Raleigh
Happy & Hale, Raleigh
Rise, Raleigh (I'm obsessed with their creme brulee donut and I don't even like donuts. Also their biscuits are baking goals)


Ohio
Melt, Multiple Cities
Swenson's, Akron "LeBron took Amy Schumer and co to Swensons, so it's good enough for me!"
Campus Pollyeyes, Bowling Green
Yours Truly, Chagrin Falls "the Killit Skillet is the best hangover food on the planet"
Side Quest, Cleveland
Slyman's, Cleveland
Sweet Moses, Cleveland
West Side Market and Greenhouse Tavern, Cleveland
Jeni’s Ice Cream, Columbus
Katzinger's Delicatessen, Columbus
Little Palace, Columbus
North Market, Columbus
Old Skool, Columbus
Schmidt's Sausage Haus, Columbus
Tony Packos, Toledo

Pennsylvania
Bird in Hand Farmer's Market, Bird in Hand
Hibernian Cafe, Drexel Hill
Klein Farms, Easton
Tomato Pie Cafe, Harrisburg
Cocina Mexicana, Lancaster
Prince Street Cafe, Lancaster
Sprout, Lancaster
The Vandal, Lawrenceville
Dim Sum by Jane G, Philadelphia
Han Dynasty, Philadelphia (MaPo Tofu and the DanDan Noodles are both excellent)
Jim's Steaks South Street, Philadelphia
South Philly Barbacoa, Philadelphia
Tony Luke's Sandwich Shop, Philadelphia
Jimmie John's, West Chester "Not the sandwich place!"

Virginia
Bodos Bagels, Charlottesville
Okra's, Manasaas (My husband's favorite)

Wisconsin
The Vegetarian, St. Croix Falls
Dotty Dumpling's Dowry, Madison
Graze, Madison
Ian's Pizza, Madison
Monty's Blue Plate Diner, Madison
The Old Fashioned, Madison (the CHEESE CURDS you guys)
Pel'meni, Madison
Weary Traveler, Madison
Tornado Room, Madison
Sobelmans’s, Milwaukee "for burgers and Bloody Marys"
Lakefront Brewery, Milwaukee "for Friday Fish Fry"
Kopp’s, Milwaukee "for frozen custard and burgers"


This list is far from exhaustive even within my own brain so please get at me with your suggestions! And/or comment below if you are looking for a place to eat in your turf. Maybe someone has been there before!

California's Top Two Primary Is Bad and Should Be Abolished

I'm back, babies! Well, back because I lost a primary. But that's okay. I have actually never felt so okay after losing an election first because I am so incredibly proud of the job that we did and second because I was prepared for the possibility of going right into the general election so I'm still raring to go to take back the house and take on actual Republicans (I hate primaries.)

Anyway I have been itching to write a post about the top-two primary system for a while but for obvious reasons was holding back until I was not currently at its mercy. For those of you who have not been following the political pants-peeing Twitterverse the top two "jungle" primary means that the top two vote-getters, regardless of political party, advance to the general election.

At first glance, a jungle primary seems appealing if you do not go in for the two party system. The problem is that we currently live in a dangerous political reality and not a cloud made of unicorns. It may also seems appealing if you live in a solidly red or solidly blue district where you would like to have an actual choice in the general election. Again, that would be fine if there weren't several swing districts in California that could determine the fate of the house and therefore of whether many Americans have things like visas for their family and healthcare.

Take a district like mine which has an EVEN Cook PVI. When incumbent Ed Royce was running for re-election, no problem. He would easily get the bulk of the Republican vote and advance to the general election with the top Democratic vote-getter. But when Royce announced his retirement, all hell broke loose. We had 21 candidates and 17 who ultimately filed, but let's say for the sake of simplicity there are 6 viable Democratic candidates (Bert, Ernie, Grover, Elmo, Big Bird, and Cookie Monster) and 3 Republicans (Reptar*, Rodger Klotz and Mr. Bone).

We could end up with a result like this:

Klotz-16%
Reptar-15%
Big Bird-14%
Cookie Monster-13%
Ernie-12%
Grover-11%
Mr.Bone- 9%
Elmo-8%
Bert-2%

Klotz and Reptar, both Republicans, would advance to the general election even though 60% of the electorate voted for Democrats.

How primaries should work in general is a topic of contentious debate. Should they be closed (meaning you have to be a registered Dem to vote in the Democratic primary) or should they be open (meaning anyone can vote in any party primary, thus expanding participation) or somewhere in between? But whether you argue for the former or the later this accomplishes neither goal. A top-two primary robs the Democratic electorate of choosing their nominee and weakens the power of the Democratic party. Neither does it enfranchise the broader electorate. In the example above, most voters preferred a Democrat but will now be stuck with the choice of two Republicans as their representative.

An ancillary problem is that this system favors Republicans, who are more consistent primary voters. I can't tell you how many Dem or Dem-leaning Decline to State voters I spoke with were not planning on voting the primary because they figured they would just support the Democratic nominee in the general election, not realizing if they didn't vote now they might not have that option. (This part is ultimately a problem of both turnout and voter education but I felt it was worth mentioning here.) Dedicated Democratic voters had the opposite problem of being forced to choose not their preferred candidate, nor even the candidate who they felt had the best chance of winning a general election, but the candidate who was best positioned to make it into the general election, not always the same person.

Furthermore, the jungle primary leads to poor distribution of resources. Because there is no true Democratic primary, the California Democratic Party (CDP) engages in a series of caucuses for their nomination process. The rules and especially list of participants in these caucuses are (despite the best efforts of many dedicated people on the CDP staff) byzantine and amorphous respectively, much to the frustration of anyone who has managed a primary campaign in the state. The caucus- goers are local Democratic party delegates and their alternates which means that an extremely disproportionate amount of a candidate's time in the early and even mid months of a primary is spent talking to 30 to 60 voters who may or may not represent the will of the actual electorate. It is a questionable process to say the least but it is also the only way for the state party infrastructure to exercise its power in a top-two primary system.

But it gets even more convoluted. Unlike the Minnesota caucuses, which are a whole other kettle of lutefisk, voting is not open to the general public and candidates and stakeholders do not as a rule abide by the endorsement** although state and local party leaders argue that they should. To wit, in California's 48th District the CDP endorsed Hans Kierstead and the DCCC endorsed Harley Rouda. As of writing, that race remains too close to call.

Speaking of the DCCC, the other massive waste of resources caused by the top-two primary system is the DCCC's involvement. Wounds are still fresh, but although I vehemently disagreed with and at at times felt personally victimized by the DCCC's choice to get involved in my race, I still totally get why they did it. In general, I am of the opinion that rather than invest in altering the outcome of Democratic primaries, the party should spend that money figuring out how to win general elections. However, in the case of California's top-two primary system the DCCC has not just a right, but an obligation, to ensure that at least one Democrat makes it to the general election. The result, however ham-fisted, is millions of institutional dollars spent necessarily meddling in primaries when that money could, should, and mostly likely was intended by donors to be spent fighting Republicans. One can only imagine the ill-will and distrust generated between national and local parties thanks to the jungle primary system.

So what to do? If one believes that the impetus for California's top-two primary system is to create greater choice for voters in deep red or blue districts (and not, as has been suggested to me, to create greater opportunities for lobbyists) then my suggestion is instant runoff primary voting. Under such a system, Californians would have the opportunity to express their preferences among their party's candidates without causing a general election shutout, except in cases where the majority of the electorate really did skew heavily red or blue. It's a system that, like all other electoral systems, could be gamed but would still be a marked improvement. Ranked choice voting has the added benefit of discouraging intra-party negative campaigning since you still want your opponents' supporters to put you second, but more on that another time.

There you have it. This was almost as exhausting to write as it was to live through, but I hope not so to read. What other topics do you want to see? I've got loads of opinions and a moderate amount of free time and it's great to be blogging again.


Campaign Love and Mine,

Nancy













*Yes I know Reptar was from Rugrats and the other two were from Doug. Don't @ me, bro.
** I see you, Tim Walz.

Ten More Votes! A Firm Of One's Own with Eric Hogensen

One of the things I love the most about our community is that you have people wherever you go. To wit, I am in Los Angeles looking for my next adventure and the consultants and operatives of the West Coast (and yes, the GC culture is a huge thing here, another post on that later) have been nothing but generous with their time. I sat down with Eric Hogensen of HSG campaigns to learn more about his business AND his exciting new project, Ten More Votes!

Who are you? Tell us a little about yourself and your career trajectory.

I was born in Chicago and raised around Madison, Wisconsin. My mother is Mexican and father is Jewish. I was raised in a fairly political household by left-wing radical artists and got a Poli Sci degree but I didn’t work on my first campaign until after college. I started as a Field Organizer in WA-03 (Olympia) in the summer of 2000, literally fell in love with campaigns on that race and I've been doing it ever since. I came up through field, did a Kentucky Governor’s race, a Presidential cycle for Clark in South Carolina and a Congressional race in Vegas. Along the way I did a little bit of everything from press to finance to managing.

What do you love about campaigns?

I think of campaigns like a mosquito zapper. One pops up and all these people from all over suddenly flock to it. I’m definitely a people person so I love that feeling of camaraderie and teamwork. There’s nothing like that pace and that energy. I especially love managing because you are in the middle of everything, you move things forward, you influence the candidate, there’s no part of the race you don’t touch. But it takes so much out of you.

When did you start your own firm and why?

I believe you only have two or three races in you to manage and really do it well. I won my congressional race in ‘06 started my firm in ’07. I got some good staff that I trusted and rented a couple rooms above a soccer bar in Milwaukee, focused on mail and digital. Once it got going, I moved things out to CA because I love it here. The weather is great and my wife is from SC and so she missed warm weather. 

What surprised you about starting your own firm?

The thing I was least prepared for is that once you're a consultant all your relationships with other consultants change. As a manager, they’re helping you get jobs and you are helping them by staffing their races. As a fellow it’s just different. Even if you’re not in direct competition maybe they’re on a race with someone with whom you are. Also the reality of constantly selling/finding clients. The impact and the beast of that is intense.

Tell us about Ten More Votes.

Ten More Votes is a mobile voter contact campaign app for Democratic campaigns that volunteers and supporters can use to easily call, text and canvass for the campaign. No other platform allows you to do all three and its ease of use, in my opinion, is second to none. 

How did this come about?

My friend Kelly (who is a tech person) and I were talking. He was building apps and doing some freelance projects and we decided to do a project together.  It did come out of what I perceive to be a gap in campaign technology. There are solutions out there but I don't think they are as simple as they can be and for me this filled that gap.

How have you seen this kind of technology change over the course of your career?

I've by seen it go from nothing in 2000 -basically we were just chatting with each other on AIM-- to now where smart campaigns spend a significant part of their budget and devote staff to digital. So literally from 0 to like 50% when you consider how much tech is a part of everything. The key becomes how do you integrate everything; how do you curate what’s out there? You don't want to get distracted by shiny objects. At the same time there are fundamentals that don't have anything to do with digital: management, messaging, good candidates that won't ever change. 

If people want to learn more about how 10 more votes works how can they find out?

You can use this link to sign up for a demo. CampaignSick readers get 10% off their first two months of using the app!

What else do you want people to know about Ten More Votes?

We used to talk about this like a FUBU product, for us by us. Lot's of people come from the tech world and want to tell us how to improve things, knowing nothing about the process. I built this with us in mind. I'm a campaign person; I'm not an angel investor or a tech bro. Basically I love your readers and and I want their feedback because that's who we build this for.

What do you wish you had known earlier in your career?

Be more mindful of how you treat people. When you are young and passionate you get caught up in the moment and you lose sight of how the things you say affect people. I never lacked confidence, I can tell you that, but there's a way to be confident without being cocky. People will remember how you treat them long after you've forgotten what you said.

Breaking News: There Is Too Much Money In Politics

According to common sense and this Demos report.

This is another case where I don't have much to add but I wanted to share the facts and figures presented because they are startling.

Candidates for the U.S. Senate must raise an average of $3,300 every day for six years to match the contributions collected by median 2014 winner; House candidates must raise $1,800 every day of their two-year cycle.
Relying exclusively on small donors, Senate candidates would have to secure at least 17 contributions every day and House candidates at least nine in order to keep up.

In 25 targeted 2014 congressional races, successful candidates and their closest competitors received more than 86 percent of the funds they raised from individuals in contributions totaling $200 or more.
Only two of 50 candidates in these competitive races raised less than 70 percent of their individual funds from large donors, while seven relied on big donors for more than 95 percent of their individual contributions.

This big money system filters out qualified, credible candidates who lack access to large donors. Four of these candidates are profiled in the pages below.
Kelly Westlund, lost WI-7 general election: “The current system makes sure that from start to finish our political process is dominated by the people with the most money…it’s no wonder that there is no voice for working class people in Congress.”

Rev. Michael Walrond, lost NY-13 Democratic primary: “You find out very quickly this is not about who has the best ideas; this is about who has the most money.”
David A. Smith, lost FL-7 Republican primary: “It’s very difficult for a first-time candidate, unless you’re personally prepared to write a big check to break into it.”

Amanda Renteria, lost CA-21 general election: “Given my network, where I come from, where I’m running, I expected that I wasn’t going to have huge donors. You have to ask folks for help that have been in your network and that understand where you’re running and why it’s important. That for me ended up being a small donor base.”

A federal program matching small contributions with limited public funds would have helped the profiled candidates compete more effectively against their big money-backed opponents by substantially narrowing the fundraising gap. One candidate would have raised significantly more money than her opponent if a matching fund program were available. The other three candidates would have narrowed the fundraising gap by an average of more than 40 percentage points. More importantly, they would have had significantly more resources to get their messages out and hit the minimum threshold for running a competitive campaign. And, they would have been able to do so raising two or three small contributions each day as opposed to the nine or more they currently need to keep up.

Turnout Got Low, Low, Low, Low

I'm just catching up on some light reading and I came across and an article from Yahoo news that does a really good job of outlining just how miserable turnout was in the 2014 elections.

Voter turnout in last week's midterm elections was terrible. How terrible? Just 36.3 percent of eligible voters cast votes — the worst turnout in 72 years, the New York Times reports. Only the 1942 election (33.9 percent) had a lower rate of voter turnout.

Here's a quick breakdown, based on preliminary estimates of voting data from the United States Elections Project:

• Less than half of the eligible voters in 43 states cast votes.

• The seven that saw more than half: Maine, Wisconsin, Alaska, Colorado, Oregon, Minnesota and Iowa.

• No state cracked 60 percent.

• Maine, at 59.3 percent, had the highest voter turnout percentage-wise in the country.

• Indiana, at 28 percent, had the lowest.

• In California, Texas and New York — the three largest states in terms of population — less than a third of eligible voters voted.

• New York, at 28.8 percent, had the fourth lowest turnout rate in the country.

I don't have anything particularly insightful to add, but I wanted to share it with you all and also keep it here archived so that we have easy access to these statistics later. We have to do better.

Carl DeMaio is a Human Garbage Slug Who Should Drown In His Own Diarrhea

From San Diego City Beat

"Congressional candidate Carl DeMaio wants voters to know that he's down with the whole women's rights thing: access to birth control, equal pay, etc. But, behind the scenes, if you're a woman he disagrees with, you could be the subject of ridicule.

On Jan. 22, DeMaio sent an email to two members of his staff, campaign spokesperson Dave McCulloch and then-policy director Todd Bosnich (Bosnich has accused DeMaio of sexually harassing him and trying to buy his silence). The email's subject line is "Kate Lyon" and includes a photo of an overweight woman wearing a bra and eating what looks to be a Twinkie. (The woman in the photo is not Lyon.) Based on the email's metadata, it appears to be authentic.

Kate Lyon is the deputy campaign manager for Scott Peters, the 52nd District congressional representative whom DeMaio's challenging in the upcoming election. Earlier in the day on Jan. 22, she's responded to a tweet from McCulloch and was critical of a new DeMaio TV ad that compared Congress to Lindsey Lohan and cockroaches. "U thought ur boss's cockroach ad was representative of new type of [Republican], someone trying to change Washington? Typical," Lyon tweeted at McCulloch.

We checked with Lyon and the Peters campaign before publishing this. Spokesperson Alex Roth provided a statement:

"Kate Lyon is one of the most experienced and respected members of our staff. She previously worked as an attorney, and for NARAL Pro-Choice America and Planned Parenthood. It is disgusting and despicable that this champion for women’s rights, or any woman, would be demeaned this way. I wish I could say it is shocking, but coming from Carl DeMaio, nothing is shocking.""

I can barely type about this because it is so putrid. I sat stunned at my desk for a full 2 minutes with full on rage about this. On what front am I most offended? As a campaign staffer? As a woman? As a person who has struggled with their weight? I DON'T EVEN FUCKING KNOW.

As one commentor on this article observes, "DeMaio presumes fat female bodies are a punchline rather than recognize the proud, lived experience of many who live with dignity in a world that would demean them." Not to mention how completely classless it is to go after campaign staff. Not to mention the long history of sexualizing women in politics in order to take their power away. I won't republish the picture because who knows if it was even put on the Internet consensually (certainly not for this purpose) but it is easy enough to find. Carl DeMaio is disgusting in a lot of ways, but for me this takes the cake.

Today In Voter Suppression: California Same Day Voter Registration Delayed Until 2016

The Voting News has the release here, but basically from what I can gather, Secretary of State, Debra Brown says the state won't be meet the legal standards it set for itself in time to implement same day registration by 2014, which (again from what I can tell) the Secretary of State was responsible for:

"The law was expected to take effect in 2014. However, to be operative for the 2014 general election, the Secretary of State needed to complete its HAVA compliance by December 31, 2013. Last month, Bowen took to Twitter to explain why the state won’t be adopting California’s landmark same-day voter registration law anytime soon. 'That law (CA Elections Code section 2170) will likely take effect in 2016 or later,' Bowen tweeted on Jan. 13."

So you know, there's that.

Sexist, Horrible Hillary Buttons

Because it's a day that ends in Y, something terrible and sexist happened in the news. See the above buttons at the California Republican Convention. The "joke" is not in any way new, but my outrage is renewed because SERIOUSLY WHAT YEAR IS IT? What does a woman have to accomplish before she is no longer reduced to a (literal) piece of meat? Salon.com has the story. On the bright side, I had a dream that Hillary told me she was going to run last night. Let's hope this is all they've got.

Same Day Registration in California!

Starting in 2014. Read about it here.

Enfranchished doesn't always mean empowered.

A California poll shows that voters are increasingly less informed.

I will let you in on a little secret. Anyone who has ever worked on a campaign for an extended period of time has secretly and fleetingly wished there existed some kind of intelligence/information test for voting. Of course we would never advocate for such a test because of the obvious non-democratic and somewhat Jim Crow-y implications, but the temptation is there.

It is infuriating to sit with cold hard facts about a candidate's voting record and espoused principles while over the phone a voter tells you s/he is voting against your candidate and her/his own self interest, because "I just don't get a good feeling about him."

In defense of the uneducated voter, there is so much information out there, that it is difficult to know what to believe. Even the most politically active among us have one or two issues we use as a litmus test because you can't agree with your candidate on everything. Even after your candidate has been elected and served, it is impossible to know what might have been otherwise. And there have been times when a voter's gut reaction has turned out to be somewhat prescient. (I'm still kicking myself over John Edwards). In the end, it is about who you want answering the red phone.

Still, to me, this article highlights the fact that enfranchisement is not enough. As my hero, Teddy Roosevelt, once said "A vote is like a rifle; its usefulness depends upon the character of the user." When I advocate for your right to vote, I am also advocating for your right to use your vote like an idiot. That's part of what democracy is. That's why we can't stop with voter registration and access. An ill informed vote has little power behind it. As the article points out,

"It's almost as if a quarter of the electorate is really not there for most of the elections...The leadership tends to follow the whims of this smaller and smaller segment who are indeed following what's going on. But that segment may not be reflective of the whole. That has a bearing on politics."

True empowerment is about having the tools to make an informed decision and the confidence that your decisions will make a difference. This comes from government accountability, community activism and yes, some initiative on the part of the voter. In an age where voters get their information increasingly from niche websites and social media, we have to reconsider how we reach out to them. We have to find a way of communicating that voting is not just about the act itself but the weight you put behind it. The more engaged you are, the more your vote matters. Knowledge, as they say, is power.

Articles like this make me both hopeful and intimidated. On the one hand, there is so much potential to be harnessed. On the other, it highlights the age old dilemma: to empower more voters elected officials need to take them seriously, for elected officials to take them seriously, voters need to be empowered.

You guys, this stuff is hard! But as Theodore Roosevelt also said "It is only through labor and painful effort, by grim energy and resolute courage, that we move on to better things."

Peace, Love, and Presidents,
Nancy

The Most Sexist Campaign Ad I've Ever Seen*

*also it's pretty racist.

Yes, this ad is real. Someone thought that was a good idea. It is so unbelievably offensive that I feel that aspect needs no explanation. Also, it looks like it was made by twelve year old boys, possibly to get back at a teacher or some girl who wouldn't make out with them.

Here is an article about it. (FYI: What the article doesn't make clear is that the FEC complaint is unrelated to the content of the ad, but has to do with the PAC's association with Hahn's opponent's campaign.) The article includes the following quote from NOW President Terry O'Neill:

The GOP can't simply shrug its shoulders and claim ignorance about this ad. The party now has a woman running for president and another high-profile woman who may also jump into the race. In the past couple years, conservatives have received a crash course in what it's like to have gender stereotypes and sexist slurs directed at women on their side of the aisle.

Obviously I agree with O'Neill's denunciation of the content of this ad, but I don't think the Republican party is going to stop being sexist simply because Republican women are running for office. Michelle Bachmann and Sarah Palin are anti-choice, anti-sex education, anti-equal pay for women and anti-rape victim support. Having a cello doesn't make you a cellist, and having a vagina doesn't make you a feminist.

On the other hand, according to her website:

Janice strongly supports advancing the rights of women. She believes in providing women a quality education, fair pay, and equal employment opportunities. Janice supports a woman’s right to choose and will fight to ensure that women of all ages and backgrounds are provided the tools they need to succeed in today’s society – whether in the job market or at home raising children and caring for their family.

Can you imagine being the candidate and her staff seeing this ad for the first time? Ironically, but not surprisingly, the ad is actually galvanizing support for Hahn. Maybe you would like to donate to an actual feminist candidate?

Okay, I do need to say it, just in case. This ad's portrayal of women in politics is completely unacceptable.