by Jonathan Rich in Uncategorized
Posted on September 17, 2008 at 12:26 am
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At 7:30 this evening I was out knocking on doors in Medford, although at that point I had to stop under street lights to read the list of Sciortino supporters that I was supposed to be encouraging to get to the polls. At one of my last doors, I was grateful to hear a woman tell me that she had just voted. That’s great, I said, I think it may be a tight race. Her eyebrows went up and she shrugged. “I don’t know,” she said, “everyone I’ve talked to is voting for Carl. I think it’s going to be a landslide.”
I don’t know if Carl’s victory tonight qualifies as a landslide, but later in the evening I was given an unofficial tally for the precinct I’d been working in, and Carl had gotten almost 60% of the vote with 216 write-in ballots cast for him, against 153 for his opponent, Bob Trane.
It’s a credit to Carl’s large and dedicated campaign staff that very few write-in votes were disqualified for mistakes. If you were around town today you couldn’t miss the sticker crew, wearing fluorescent green tee shirts and carrying blue and white balloons.
I strolled over to the Sciortino event at Sabur this evening around 9:45, hoping I wouldn’t have to stay up too late to hear the results. Oops! As it turned out I got there over an hour after Bob Trane made what everyone told me was a very gracious call to Carl to concede the race. It wasn’t a raucous crowd, but there were a lot of people looking very, very happy. A lot of them are probably still there as I write this.
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another volunteer’s experience:
Like vultures circling a fresh sky burial, DPW trucks and other trucks with Trane (and Curtatone) stickers circled round and round Somerville Wards 4 and 7, and Medford Wards 4,5,7 and 8 today. Who were those people who were so busy snapping and sending cell phone pictures to their friends, and phoning in false “obstruction of traffic” reports to the police stations? Folks holding Trane signs were clearly heard making phone calls to complain that Representative Sciortino’s campaign workers were blocking traffic as they handed out stickers for his write-in campaign- even though they were sharing the same sidewalk real estate.
Several people requested stickers for Representative Sciortino’s write-in vote, but were extremely nervous. “I’m friends with Bob, but I just don’t think this is the job for him,” said one, who took a sticker, placed it on his finger, put that hand into his pocket, looked right and left, and scurried into the voting booths.
Others said they were not going to get involved in this election, because, even though “Carl Sciortino is the smarter one,” they didn’t want to be seen doing any activities around the polls.
For no apparent reason at all, folks in trucks would pull into streets within feet of Sciortino workers, block curbcuts, get out, lean against the truck, fold their arms across their chests, and talk for up to a half hour at a time- then, simply get back into the truck and drive away.
For two campaign workers, it was noticeable that, in a span of six hours, the local liquor store on the corner got a stream of business that trumped the polling station across the street by almost two to one.
Over 400 “ordinary citizens” volunteered, in the last 3 months of a summer’s Primary season, to walk the districts, knock on doors, listen to residents, hand out stickers, and hold signs to ensure the reelection of a leader in civil rights, transportation equity, consumer trust, educational reform, and simple decency. Representative Carl Sciortino, 34th Middlesex, who was forced to run a write-in campaign, will continue his good work on the hill for another two years.
It seems that grassroots community organizing has shown its strengths this September’s day.
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Wait, let me be clear on this: you mean Somerville DPW trucks were circling in Medford?
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No one is going to beat a “progressive” in this area in a DEMOCRATIC primary. I have no idea why Bob did not run as an Independent or Republican. He would have gotten on the ballot easily and have those votes – and then campaigned to win over moderate democrats in the general election. I told him that, but he thought there were enough moderate democrats left to win. Nope.
I wonder if I dress in a skirt and red pumps – if Carl will FINALLY meet with me and other residents and business owners of the 34th? He seems to be pulling for transvestie community heavily and they seem to be the onyl ones who can get an audience with the prince. Hey… when in Rome!
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[For those just checking in on the conversation, I believe Carl had offered to meet with "Imux" at his office hours in Teele Square, but "Imux" took umbrage that Carl didn't show up at his door with an offering of beer. As far as I can tell, "Imux" is the one playing the little prince in this story.]
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Jonathan, my understanding is that Carl no longer goes to Soliel Cafe (new owner) – and I have no idea where he holds “office hours” now. He never got back to me.
Also, did he really need to make a point that he intends to concentrate on the GLBT community? That it will be one of his highest priorities. Aren’t there other priorities that rank a bit higher? Come on, how th-illy of him!
And… more importantly – why are you against beer?!? ;>)
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I wrote this at 2:30 am after election day…..
I have been awake for two days pretty much and right now I’m not sure if I can go to sleep because I have such a huge adrenaline rush. My body is aching all over because I have been on my feet since 5 am. I wear a pedometer and today I walked over 5 miles. Where? In a parking lot at the Medford 7-1 polling place for 13 hours coordinating my volunteers and speaking to every voter to make sure they knew how to vote for Carl Sciortino. All day long was amazing.
I had been canvassing this precinct for quite a while and I pretty much know every voter’s house and what their pet dogs names are. Most people I spoke to had read about the race, read our literature and knew they wanted to vote for Carl because he has brought so much to our district. Hardly anyone seemed phased by the stickers. People were turned off by the negative campaign literature of Bob Trane and wondered why he didn’t really give them any good reason to vote for him and was only attacking Carl for catering to “Special Interests”. You know like Teachers, Nurses and Health Care workers, Social Workers. When I talked to people I said, I don’t know about you but that seems to be the people who help people like me, that is me. And they agreed.
Today my precinct further amazed me as I saw voter after voter arriving at the polling place holding tight to their stickers. Stopping while we made sure they knew how to use them. Some people got inside and realized they didn’t have their sticker and came all the way back out to us to get one. I spoke to a number of people who proudly told me that they were a new citizen and this would be their first vote. Immigrant parents brought their (adult) children with them to help them vote because they were concerned that they wouldn’t understand the ballot. They wanted to vote and they wanted to make sure their vote counted.
Everything wasn’t rosy all day. A guy working for the Trane campaign walked around yelling “have a good trip back to Connecticut and New York”….because of course they claim that no one working in our campaign actually lives in the district and that we bring in people for our “machine” from all over the country. “I live in Somerville Ward 7 Precinct 3″ I told him. “yeah right, no you don’t.” At the same time there was a photographer walking around taking photos of us. He told me “I’m with the press taking photos for the paper.” “What paper are you with?” I ask. “The Somerville News.” Funny thing……The Trane campaign guy and the Somerville News Photographer……they left at the same time………..they left together in the one car. That is your non-biased press….The Somerville News.
We did the impossible today. We did what couldn’t be done.
I’ve worked a lot of campaigns and I’ve won and I’ve lost. This one is the sweetest ever. This is the one that had to be won. This was very personal for me. I do live in this district. I am a homeowner in this district. I am going to live in this district the rest of my life. And my State Representative is the Best State Representative in this Commonwealth and his name is still Carl Sciortino.
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Katie (aka Carl), you won – congratulations. You can kill the dramatics now. Though I’d still like to see the names of some of the folks who “voted” for Carl as I wonder howmany of them are still in prison, crossed the border last week illegally or… dead.
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Imux, I’ll stop if you stop.
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Question: Can Bob run a campaign as the republican or independent now for the general election this November? Does he have time and is it legal? The problem he had is the same one Hillary had against Barry – where ~50% of the democratic party has become far left wing looneytunes (basically the floatsam of our society) and that is just enough to win any democratic primary. The progressive machine is too well entrenched now.
I think in the general election – when Bob can grab independents & republicans – he would win. He would get his moderate democrats (~1500 he got in the primary), lots of indepedents and then ALL republicans.
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No, Bob can not get on the November ballot as a Democrat, a Republican, an Independent or anything else. The deadline is passed. Yesterday was the Primary. He did not run as a Republican. No one did.
Democrat Carl Sciortino will be the only name for this office on the Ballot in November. If Bob Trane wants to run in November, he would have to run a sticker campaign against Carl. Considering that he could not win a race where He was the only name on the ballot, I doubt very much if he is capable of running or winning a sticker campaign.
No one can win a sticker campaign….Oh wait. I think we did on Tuesday!
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LOL! Katie, gloat much! LOL!
I’m happy for the GLBT community in the 34th. I am sure Carl will take very good care of them… the rest of us. Not so much.
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