And you wonder why DeLeo doesn’t support Deval’s tax hikes. Any questions? I will admit, I would vote for Leah, no matter what party she is affiliated with.
“A Republican will represent Peabody on Beacon Hill.
That’s the shocking outcome of Tuesday’s special election in the 12th Essex District. There were three candidates vying for the seat left open by the death of Joyce Spiliotis last year.
Republican Leah Cole, who is new to politics, garnered 1,878 votes to Democrat Beverley Griffin Dunne’s 1,805. Unenrolled candidate Dave Gravel took 1,655 votes. According to the City Clerk’s office, total voter turnout was 20 percent.
Before the clerk’s office confirmed those numbers shortly before 9 p.m., Dunne told Peabody Patch the 73-vote margin didn’t appear to leave much room for a recount.
The seat represents Ward 1 through 4 and Precinct 1 and 3 in Ward 5.
Gravel conceded at about 8:30 p.m., according to a Patch reporter at his campaign results-watching event.
We’ll have much more on this breaking news soon.”
were both against Patrick’s tax plan. Ooops. Kind of puts a kink in your pretend made up nonsense.
Ya think they split the vote? Nah, can’t be.
Breaking News: Lifelong Republican (Dan), who seems to only vote Republican admits that he would vote for a Republican candidate.
Thanks Dan, once again you have enlightened us.
Impressed someone my age won an election like this, kudos to Leah Cole. My second thought is that we need IRV, even locally, for
these kinds of races.
She has no experience (in anything really) and her campaign was based on canned lines and general Republican illogic about government spending and jobs. Not good.
I know her stump speech of “personal and fiscal responsibility” would go over like a lead balloon to many here on BMG (she is no Sandra Fluke, thank God), but if she stays true to those two simple ideas, then she will be the most mature person up on Beacon Hill. I hope and believe she will do great, for all of us.
they wanted Greg Bunn to win the primary, they wanted no part of Leah Cole.
The message says Cole is “running to represent the people” and notes her pledges to oppose Gov. Deval Patrick’s tax plan and not take a public pension or extra money to drive to work.
You see that Johnk? NO PUBLIC PENSION!!!!! NO EXTRA MONEY OR STIPEND FOR COMMUTING INTO BEACON HILL!!!!
This woman is amazing, pure and simple. Too bad those people who are running for office as Democrats and post on BMG touting their positions, don’t follow Ms. Cole’s lead. She actually wants to serve, not be served.
Oh, Baker endorsed Leah after the primary, good stuff.
“Leah has made a difference as a health care provider, and she is dedicated to putting people before politics,” said Baker. “She will work hard identifying solutions to some of Peabody’s most pressing economic issues.”
This guy.
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, you quoting me the losers who didn’t get their guy. You are awesome. You are a very enjoyable read, non-stop humor, good stuff!
But thats honestly the most tired and dumbest line of attack against President Obama. Last time I paid my student loans to U Chicago they went to a private institution, not a public one, believe me I can tell the difference. He was on its payroll. As a community organize he worked for a faith based non-profit, again not a public institution.
John McCain spent the entirety of his adult life getting government paychecks, but this line of attack was strangely absent. You could say the same thing about Bob Dole, Paul Celluci or Bill Weld. The American people had a choice between private sector experience built on destroying American jobs and crushing American corporations and public and non-profit experience that defended and created American jobs. They choose the latter over the former. So retire this please.
1878 votes out of 5338 = 35% (of 20% of the voters…) Lower turnout, in the instance where there is no incumbent, favors the Republicans.
Maybe. I like the idea of IRV, but that still wouldn’t solve the problem of so few voters. I’d like to know why so few? Did they not know? Not care?
…because it was a single special election for a downballot race. I don’t like it either, but that seems to be political reality.
As much as I hate most aspects of IL politics-it makes sense that you appoint a vacancy and then allow the ‘special election’ to occur during a general election. It allows for a longer campaign with more information, higher turnout, and it doesn’t cost taxpayers extra funds. Either get the incumbent party committee to select a candidate like IL does with congressional and state house vacancies, or have the Governor appoint like with the Senate until the next scheduled regular election.
However, the federal Constitution requires special elections for the US House. The Governor seems competent to appoint on behalf of the whole state, but for a single district that doesn’t make sense since it’s possible the Governor lost the district in the previous election and therefore is not well-positioned to take the district’s politics into account. What makes more sense is to allow the second-place finisher in the most recent election to take over the seat. Given that’s likely to mean a party switch it may serve as a deterent to people leaving midterm for cushier private sector jobs, though obviously a death cannot be helped.
There is precedence with county jobs though. The Governor appointed DiPaola’s replacement and is appointing Leone’s replacement. And this is for a county that he carried but only barely so. We could also follow the example of Governor’s Council vacancies where the General Court selects a replacement from the district. No reason interested candidates couldn’t make a pitch and send in resumes and have the court vote. Obviously there could be corruption involved, and in the event of a minority party vacancy the majority would certainly expand its power. But these one off elections definitely aren’t a good solution.
One difference though, which also applies in some respects to following the Governor’s Council model, is the incestuous nature of appointing interbranch and intrabranch replacements. In other words, having the executive appoint members of the legislature I think went out of style with the Glorious Revolution, but having the legislature select its own sounds like putting a thumb on the scale in the majority’s favor. For counties I like the county delegation model NH uses so they could be the ones to select county offices.
If the Democrat won, with a wink and a nod, she would have flipped and supported Deval’s tax hikes. Voters are not that stupid. Besides her hard work, Leah got support from Scott Brown who recorded a voice message that was sent out to the entire district.
“On Friday, Cole’s campaign announced that former U.S. Sen. Scott Brown had recorded a phone message in support of Cole, calling her the “true reformer” in the race, which was being sent to Peabody voters.
Scott said “Cole is “running to represent the people” and notes her pledges to oppose Gov. Deval Patrick’s tax plan and not take a public pension or extra money to drive to work.”
Die hard Republican wing nut says all Democrats are liars. Once again we are enlightened.
DFW is not a Republican, he is Independent don’t you know, bless his heart (I am not from the South, but I mean bless his heart in the southern fashion).
DeLeo is a Democrat, no? Did I miss something?
Anybody have a sense of where his votes came from and how the race might have turned out if it were just D vs. R?
Congrats to Leah Cole. She won fair and square and she will represent a portion of the City of Peabody for the remainder of the former Rep. Spiliotis’ term.
However, were I Leah Cole, I wouldn’t get too used to the seat.
When the left side of the spectrum gets its act together in 2014 and runs one candidate instead of two, and when top ballot candidates like John Tierney amp up the war machine in a Democratic stronghold like Peabody, Leah’s toast. Way, way, way too many machine Democrats in that city for her to survive.
The same thing that happened to Brown at the hands of EW will happen to Leah at the hands of ???????? in 2014.
I agree she is toast but I take issue with the idea that Peabody is run by ‘machine Democrats’ Spiliotis was fairly right of center and Brown, Baker and Brown carried Peabody in 09′, 10′ and 14′. Lot of unenrolled voters there. That said, in a general with a stronger Democratic gubernatorial candidate I would agree she is toast.
I honestly wonder if there was a Bradley effect in certain areas because of Tisei’s sexual orientation. Obviously Tierney was helped by a third party candidate who ate into anti-incumbent sentiment and Obama coattails, but a Reagan democratic town like Peabody might have been turned off by his orientation. I know they kept sending anti-equality legislators to Beacon Hill.