Cross-posted from Daily Kos, this piece by IllinoyedR (who is, I believe, a Republican) reviews the recent history of Massachusetts’ 6th Congressional District (North Shore-Tierney), including the elections featuring Peter Torkildsen and Richard Tisei. I came across this over breakfast and found it interesting reading.
Please share widely!
Which is why we shouldn’t be as surprised by Leah Coles win, Peabody has been trending Republican for awhile. And yeah I was shocked to hear how Republican Salem used to be, my dad said they didn’t get a Democrat as Mayor until the time he graduated from high school and my grandpa lost his race for City Council in the 50s since his ward was solidly Republican at the time. When Michael Harrington won it was a big deal, the whole town came out to the Hawthorne to celebrate. Michael Harrington is a friend of my family’s, his mother was my grandparents neighbor, and she’d let me play on her beach when I was a kid. I wish she hadn’t passed as soon as she did. I later learned she was the scion of a major political clan (wife of a State judge, mother to a Congressman, Aunt of a State Senate President) and it would’ve been great to have heard stories from her. And I wish I could’ve asked my grandpa about his campaign too, only heard about it after he passed.
that the diary was clearly written by a conservative.
That said, on the surface, the analysis looks pretty fair and was strongest where he busted out the red-and-blue maps.
I’d squibble a bit on a few different things, though. The writer painted the picture that the district is getting more liberal. Perhaps, when you go back and look at things over the past century, that’s the case.
Presently, the district is trending red, both in terms of the towns that have been added in, as well as several communities shifting red, like Saugus… which has been pulling its best impression of neighboring Lynnfield these past couple elections.
MA-06 simply won’t go blue without a very strong turnout for Democrats in Lynn. We got that turnout this time through herculean effort, but it doesn’t always shake out that way. We need to invest a lot of time into MA-06 in between elections to register voters, especially in places like Lynn… because that’s the kind of stuff that will really pay dividends in keeping MA-06 blue and reversing the recent trends.
and I’m still not entirely convinced. A few months ago, when that post about the data came out, it seemed to me that Scott Brown races were skewing the trends in the 6th.
This year was a particularly tough election for Dems because Tierney had a ton of baggage and the Republicans ran perhaps their strongest, and certainly best-known, candidate. I don’t know if that means the district is unwinnable without high turnout in Lynn. But I’m all for registering voters in Lynn and organizing to make the district much stronger for Democrats.
Tierney should go quietly into that good night and allow a new Democrat to take his place. Kim Driscoll would do a fine job, not sure about the reps or state senators from that district who have the profiles and bona fides to represent it well. But 14′ will be an uphill battle, if Brown or North Shore native Baker top the gubernatorial ticket, depressed turnout due to a midterm, and without Obama or Warren on the ballot, it will be a lot harder for Tierney. Watch the GOP to also keep libertarians off the ballot this time with better legal challenges (they were totally caught off guard by his performance).
would be just about our strongest choice in the district, should Tierney retire.
I just wonder if she wants to go that direction, given most of the rumors I’ve heard (for whatever that’s worth) are about LG.
Are her and Curtatone, both rumored LG candidates and they were both on NECN yesterday discussing gun control. I’d prefer them to be your future MA-6 and MA-8 Reps, respectively. If Cap goes for Gov the 8th is Joe’s for the taking IMO, and if we can persuade Tierney to retire we keep the seat.
If Tierney didn’t win Lynn big and with a large turnout, things could have been very, very different.
Going back to your link… I don’t disagree with your assessment here:
My concern is if we allow places like Saugus to go too many electoral cycles where they go red for Senate, Pres, Gov and even local state rep seats, they’re going to get used to it and it’ll stick.
Plus, I don’t think Liz Warren comes anywhere close to being a limousine liberal. We’ll see how MA-06 goes when she’s up for reelection.
We need to do the work for sure, but I don’t think the last election is representative of the district’s trends. Despite the (literal) October surprise Tierney did fine in 2010, a crap year for Democrats in most of the nation. But he had a lot of baggage in 2012. It might be that another Democrat would run better in 2014 and going forward, but I don’t think the district as a whole is as red as the Tierney-Tisei race would suggest. Warren and Obama both ran well ahead of Tierney in the 6th.
I do think that a fair amount of the population of Saugus might see Warren as a limousine liberal because of Harvard, etc. But also because, since Reagan, progressive politics generally has been a tough sell in those towns.