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Philadelphia write-in candidate: I won with one vote
- johnnyo 9y agoIronically, a judge of elections using his first act to call for impeachment of a candidate likely running in an election he will preside over is extremely inappropriate.
- kbenson 9y agoAlthough when the same sentence ends with "... and also now every Tuesday in Manayunk is officially Taco Tuesday." it's easy to interpret it as in jest, which I think was the point. Depending on your views, you might also think it's inappropriate for this position to even joke about that, which I can sort of see. I don't think it was a serious suggestion though.
- cabaalis 9y agoI would bet that he was indeed serious about the call for impeachment. If anything, it represents the current state of the public's awareness of appropriateness in politics.
- kbenson 9y ago> I would bet that he was indeed serious about the call for impeachment. If anything, it represents the current state of the public's awareness of appropriateness in politics. Would you also bet he's serious about Taco Tuesday? Because you have exactly as much evidence for one as the other. Although I do take your comment and apparent inability to extend the benefit of a doubt as fairly negative indicator of the public's ability to work through the current political divide productively. :/
- aseipp 9y ago"I would definitely bet he's serious because it totally fulfills my preconceived notions about how he behaves, and I don't have to do anymore work to justify that." The tweet before the quoted one, made less than 10 minutes before the impeachment one, is: > Please move to Manayunk, where I now rule and now plan to secede from the United States. There are also nearly a dozen tweets following that of the same form (e.g. "The weird thing is, I demanded people always call me Judge Garcia, way before this even happened!") It's also quite laughable to chatter about "appropriateness in politics" referring to America, considering a bunch of idiot republicans drafted a tax bill in the middle of the night with scribbles in margins and passed it as law in our country without reading it, less than 24 hours ago (as of the time of writing this comment.) "Appropriateness" is a code word for "it's ok to make things measurably worse, if you just smile while doing it." But if you make a stupid joke about the Sex Crime President on Twitter, apparently -- that's just not cool, maaaaan, and it like, you know, like, tells us tons about the lame politics of the people, maaaaaaaaaan, it's soooooooo obvious, so easy to see. That's why I'm a genius of political analysis.
- lamarpye 9y agoDoes "idiot republicans" violate the comment guidelines for this site?
- yorwba 9y agoThe guidelines are here: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html I think the part that applies is: Be civil. Don't say things you wouldn't say face-to-face. Don't be snarky. Comments should get more civil and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive. So I guess "idiot republicans" is a bit uncivil; but on the other hand rushing the approval of an important bill drafted under the influence of sleep deprivation is pretty idiotic. Whenever a political committee or similar announces that they will discuss until agreement, even if that means working through the night, I take it to mean "We are going to get drunk until we're too sick to care and just sign that stupid paper to get home.", since the result is functionally equivalent.
- RyanZAG 9y ago
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- aphexairlines 9y agoThere is no such thing as appropriate in US politics anymore.
- adventured 9y agoSure there is. That's precisely why so many people keep polling with disapproval at the Trump Presidency (~62%-67% disapproval per the latest Gallup polls, exceptionally high numbers). I don't mean that in snark in the least. I mean it factually, the polls keep coming back with record disapproval. There's a reason for that. More people would prefer a higher degree of civility in politics, rather than lower. A lot of people disagreed with George W Bush for example, but he had to launch a catastrophic, protracted, pointless war that lasted for years, to erode his approval numbers to where Trump is at during his first year. Bush was far more civil and respected as a politician (and he wasn't regarded as all that great at it).
- pornel 9y agoWhy? That's exactly what his voters wanted.
- dannyw 9y agoVoter*.
- desertrider12 9y agoIn fact, he has a 100% approval rating among all known constituents.
- dwighttk 9y agoThere were two other voters who wanted someone else
- panarky 9y agoCall it inappropriate, call it biased, call it funny, but don't call it irony.
- njharman 9y agoIf you don't like him, you should have voted for another candidate.
- tedwasright 9y agoI’m gonna impeach drumbf take that Nazis
- dang 9y agoPlease don't post unsubstantive comments here.
- isostatic 9y ago"being elected as an election judge" Is America unique in having so many elections and positions? This job title reminds me of the "Fuse alarm fuse" (which was the fuse for the alarm that checked if a fuse had blown)
- johnnyo 9y agoIt’s a pretty minimal responsibility. It’s basically the person whose job it is to setup the polling place, collect the ballots, and make sure there is no funny business. You literally work 2 days a year, and have no other responsibilities.
- anigbrowl 9y agoThat's not responsive to the question that was asked. Yes, America is unique in having so many public offices filled by election.
- CaliforniaKarl 9y agoI was a polling place Inspector in Orange County, CA for around six years. In the lead up to an election I’d work, first up was ~2 hours of training. We were the ones in charge of the polling place, so we were the ones who needed to know all the processes and procedures. The weekend before the election, I would pick up the supplies. Probably around 40-50 pounds of stuff. You aren’t allowed to leave In in your car: Once you sign the chain of custody for it, the next time you get out of your car is when you’re parked at home, ready to unload. In the weeks before the election, I also would be getting in touch with whomever is in charge of the polling place site. You think it’s fun dealing with an HOA as a resident? Well, try dealing with them as an outsider. So, leading up to the election (that is, prior to E-1), I would’ve logged about 7 hours, most of which was during a business day (training could be daytime or evening, as there were always multiple sessions available, and supplies pickup was always on a weekend). Oh, and I was also responsible for managing the other people would be at the polling place. On E-1, if I got prior OK from the property, I would set up some time during the evening. Sometimes one or two of my clerks would be available to help, but not always. Anything non-sensitive and nonessential was set up (so, no breaking seals yet!). On E-Day I would be waking up around 4:30. Polls open precisely at 7, so I had to be at the polling place by 6. I would take attendance, administer the oath, go through the same oath myself, and then do all the seal verification and equipment setup. Then, the flood began. If I had a full board, I could give everyone (and myself) a lunch and a break. If we were short, then we would do what we could. Luckily, we all got some sort of break! There would be quiet times during the day, but it would often be nonstop during the morning (there was always a line at opening) and after 4. Polls close at 8. We then had to do full packing, space cleanup, and all of the accounting. It was a win for us if we left by 9. I then had to go to drop off everything, with a clerk driving behind me (to make sure I went directly to the drop off point). If anything was missing, I was on the hook for it. It was a win for me if I was out by 10. Finally, on E+1, I’d have to return the facility key. Then I was truely done. It was a drawn-out process, but almost everything we did had a very good reason. Yes, the hours were long, and the work was often not fun, but I took a _great_ deal of pride in it.
- lowpro 9y agoJokes aside, I wonder if we're really seeing the long term erosion of democracy because people just don't care. You can see it in most aspects of the nation, from the NSA revelations largely being accepted in a sigh of hopelessness to the several social issues that have been in the news since 2014 and haven't seemed to move. People just don't take an interest in the larger issues except to tweet their thoughts and move on. I wonder if, for example, when events like 9/11 or Katrina happened people were moved more to donate or help because they couldn't just say "thinking of the victims" in a public social media space and move on with their day. And I don't think mandatory voting is a solution to this issue because people will default to laziest method, which would probably be whose name they heard the most. The big picture idea is how to make people care, and that is probably the biggest unsolved issue of our day.
- LeoJiWoo 9y agoI think you are right. Also people are being worn down by the 24 hr news cycle and always on social media. It's hijacked our emotions into thinking facebooks likes or retweets matter more than voting or going out in the world and doing something. The other side is most people aren't doing well financially.I know tons of people who work all the time, and are just too exhausted/demoralized by the end of day for anything but tv and beer. The apathy, desperation, political violence/polarization, filter bubbles, poor economy for the average person, rise of the new alt-right, antifa, and resurgence of the extreme/alt-left all make me feel like a collapse is coming.
- warent 9y agoIn addition to all of that, my personal experience has been the following: Setting: 2016 US Election - Everybody is screaming in my ear all day every day "YOUR VOTE COUNTS, GET IN THERE AND VOTE" - Tons of people go to vote - The candidate with the lesser number of votes wins the election And that's why I don't care to vote anymore. I don't know enough about politics, social sciences, or whatever the fuck else gobbledygook to take a stance on whether or not this result makes sense. All I know is, simply put, my vote feels worth nothing and so I now deafen myself to politics as much as possible. Much more worthwhile to focus energy on building businesses and making money that I can donate to charity rather than wasting away in my armchair yelping about politics proven to be outside my control.
- timthelion 9y ago"Judges in the city are paid $100 per election they preside over" For a days work, that's not much for a one off job even by central European standards. It seems to me, that the pay should be increased.
- germanier 9y agoIn the last German election I got paid 50€ for a similar position (well below minimum wage) which is already more then usual. Let's just say nobody does that for the money.
- ajdlinux 9y agoBy comparison, here in Australia, for federal elections, pay rates for polling officials working on election day range from AUD$409 up to AUD$989 + $63 retirement superannuation. $100 is just astoundingly low.
- adventured 9y agoThings like that are regarded as a civic contribution, serving your community. It's the same fundamental reason jury duty is a very low pay task.
- osteele 9y agoOn the one hand, a lower salary ensures people don't do it for the money. On the other hand, low pay can restrict the candidate to wealthier or higher-income individuals. This is a challenge in deciding out how much to compensate people for service, not just for a one-off such as this but for longer-term and more time-consuming roles as well.
- baddox 9y agoMaybe pay each person the same rate they earn in their day job.
- 0xfffafaCrash 9y ago
- pmoriarty 9y agoWere electronic voting machines used here? In past elections, whenever the issue of extremely hackable and vulnerable electronic voting machines was brought up, objections were raised that their use was too limited to make a big enough difference in the election. Well, here that's clearly not the case: the difference was so slight that such fraud could have tipped the scales.
- mathgeek 9y agoThe article states that write-in candidates receiving a single vote commonly win these positions. I'd suggest reading the article before shouting "fraud potential."
- bkohlmann 9y agoIt’s concerning that he wants to use the election judge role to “advance progressive causes.” Election judges should be the most non-partisan role in government.
- ringaroundthetx 9y agotwo votes to get him impeached, after getting 20 signatures
- walshemj 9y agoYour correct it should be, as should all legal posts. In the UK the acting returning officer oversees th election in his/her constituency and they are often non voting (by tradition) civil servants as are the actual poling place staff. There also a ban on any election material within a certain distance of a poling place though blank colours are allowed for poll watchers. Reminds me I must see about volunteering for the next election
- bkohlmann 9y agoCurious as to the downvote. I’d love to see the argument for how partisan election judges serve our Republic.
- ceejayoz 9y agoGiven that he states he's instituting Taco Tuesday as one of his first acts, I'd suspect people are getting the vapors over a trivial joking statement. I'd also imagine the powers of an election judge are pretty limited. It sounds like they're the Philly equivalent of the person who runs an individual polling place in NY. Not much wiggle room for causes of any sort.
- PhasmaFelis 9y agoFor starters, he didn't actually say that. He said: "This actually will be a great way for me to be more involved in my neighborhood and work actively toward more progressive change. I actually have a background in community organizing, and while I'm not entirely sure how this position could align with that, it seems like an opportunity to find some ways to at least more deeply connect with my neighbors." He's talking about becoming more active in his community on a personal level.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- xefer 9y agoIf you go through the election results there are actually quite a number of 1-vote write-in winners for this position across the various ward divisions - and a few with no votes at all. Quickly scanning through the hundreds of results I didn’t see any that even had more than one candidate. Looking at the electoral ward division maps it’s not hard to see why: these political units only cover a few streets. There are hundreds of these subdivisions across the city. I’d argue that this is too minor of a role to even bother having an elected position for. I suppose since these divisions are so tiny one might have a chance of knowing any individuals who might be running against each other, but otherwise, what criteria would one judge the best candidate?
- rcthompson 9y agomy dad once won a local elected position with one write-in vote, and he wasn't the one who wrote his name in. It turned out one of his friends had written his name in.
- dwighttk 9y agoJerk :)
- darkstar999 9y ago...but the official results show that he got 8 votes? http://phillyelectionresults.com/Citywide_Election_Results.html http://phillyelectionresults.com/Citywide_Election_Results.h...
- mar77i 9y agoKind of funny. He appears more qualified than people others vote for or against.
- cuckmaster 9y agoThought this was my boss, he also won to be a judge of Elections in phl by voting for himself!