Year: 2018

A reminder to the editors of The Arizona Republic

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The Arizona Republic fka The Arizona Republican has long existed to support Republican candidates. But The Republic appears to be having a tough time supporting Arizona’s incumbent Republican congressional delegation.

Back in February, the Arizona Republic editorialized, Our View: Rep. Paul Gosar is a disgrace to Arizona. Somebody please unseat him. The editors were encouraging a primary challenge that didn’t happen. But Gosar does have a credible general election opponent, Dr. David Brill.

And who can forget that Rep. Paul Gosar’s siblings endorse his opponent … on video.Rep. Paul Gosar’s siblings have criticized him before. This time they’ve decided that they could no longer stand by their brother – at all – and have endorsed his opponent, Democrat David Brill. Even providing him with a video to be used as a campaign commercial. “Listen to them.”

The Republic similarly editorialized against the equally awful David Schweikert. 5 reasons a Democrat could win David Schweikert’s seat, even in a Republican stronghold:

Some of us on The Arizona Republic editorial board have been interviewing candidates for endorsement for 20 years or more. And the Democrats running in this race make up one of the strongest panels we’ve seen. All three are accomplished people with energy and magnetism.

If the Democratic Party has suffered from a weak bench in recent decades, those days may be over. We believe we are looking at the future of the party in these three candidates, and that they could be important leaders one day in Arizona.

Anita Malik: The daughter of east Indian immigrants, she knows the district well. She grew up attending Scottsdale public schools. A graduate in computer information systems and finance at Arizona State University with a masters in journalism from the University of Southern California, Malik was the chief operating officer of a content technology company, a job she left to run for Congress.

Her primary focus would be the development of emerging industries in the economy. “Every issue is a jobs issue,” Malik said, and that means she will be looking at all legislation under the lens of job creation. She would promote economic innovation and simplify the tax code.

Her health-care agenda is progressive, calling for universal coverage through Medicare for All. She would allow insurance providers to sell across state lines and would consolidate aspects of Medicare, the Department of Veterans Affairs and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

On the immigration front, she would put DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) recipients on a path to citizenship.

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The Arizona Republic endorses Dr. Hiral Tipirneni for CD 8

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It should not come as any great surprise that the Arizona Republic endorses Democrat  Dr. Hiral Tipirneni for Congress in CD 8, given the deceitfulness and “fake doctor” dirty tricks smear campaign waged by her Republican opponent Debbie Lesko, who has adequately demonstrated that she is unfit to serve in pubic office. What we missed about the ‘blue wave’ in the race between Debbie Lesko and Hiral Tipirneni (excerpt):

Hiral Tipirneni, a political unknown, a first-time candidate for office, a first-generation immigrant and, most remarkably, a Democrat with virtually no backing or money from her national party went into one of the GOP’s lock-down districts and put a huge scare into them [in the special election.]

The mountain she climbed could not have been steeper. The Republican Party enjoyed a 17-point registration advantage. And that didn’t begin to describe the challenge. Recent history showed District 8 voters went 2-1 for Republican candidates.

After winning the Republican primary, Debbie Lesko was not just a shoo-in, but a preordained fact. Win the Republican primary and she would be a congresswoman.

In the way that prophecy turns to fact, Lesko won the special election. But she did by such a narrow a margin, less than 5 percentage points, that a funereal gloom set upon the Republican Party.

“It’s a warning shot,” said Republican Sen. Jeff Flake. “Anything below a 10-point margin is not good news.”

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The Arizona Republic endorses former Congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick for CD 2

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Arizona’s 2nd congressional district is a competitive district, which for the past two years has been without representation as Rep. Martha McSally focused on running for the U.S. Senate (good riddance to her).

Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick, who unsuccessfully ran for U.S. Senate against Senator John McCain after serving in Congress from CD 1, switched  to southern Arizona’s CD 2. The Arizona Republic endorses Ann Kirkpatrick for CD 2. The race between Ann Kirkpatrick and Lea Marquez Peterson comes down to 1 simple question:

Former Congresswoman Ann Kirkpatrick

Arizona’s 2nd Congressional District is being closely watched nationally because it is key to the Democratic hope of taking over the U.S. House.

This is one of 25 House seats currently held by Republicans that were won by Hillary Clinton in 2016. That Republican is Rep. Martha McSally, who is running for Senate, so this is an open seat.

The two women running to replace McSally are Democrat Ann Kirkpatrick and Republican Lea Marquez Peterson.

Both are smart, accomplished women. But they bring very different political philosophies and experience to the job of serving this district, which includes parts of Tucson and stretches south to the Mexican border and east to Arizona’s border with New Mexico.

Who most closely mirrors the district?

Kirkpatrick is well known in Arizona politics. She served three terms as representative from Arizona’s sprawling CD1, lost a lopsided Senate run to the iconic Sen. John McCain in 2016, and is now seeking to return to Congress from this border district.

As a native of McNary – a tiny town in the east-central part of the state – Kirkpatrick has been accused of opportunism for moving to CD2 to run. Kirkpatrick says she has deep ties to the district. She attended the University of Arizona as an undergrad and a law student, and worked for the Pima County Attorney’s Office before moving farther north in Arizona.

Kirkpatrick came back to Tucson in 2017 to help with her grandchildren while her daughter was in medical school. Efforts by one of her primary opponents to get her thrown off the ballot failed in June when Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Joshua Rogers ruled she met the legal definition of being a resident of Tucson. [Congressional candidates do not have to live in the district they represent in any event.]

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Republican ballot advantage is +9.4% — or 114,512 ballots

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Data Orbital, a data analytics and survey research firm, released the following announcement:

With only 6 days remaining until Election Day, over 1.2 million ballots have already been cast in Arizona. Shattering past midterm election turnout figures for the state, these early ballot returns reveal major trends that will continue to play out through Election Day.

The major takeaways for current ballot returns are:

Republican ballot advantage far ahead of 2016: On this same day in 2016 – a Presidential election year – 1,228,936 ballots had been returned, with the Republican Ballot Advantage being +6.4% percentage points, with a margin of 79,180 ballots. With a larger ballot advantage of +9.4% this cycle and a margin of 114,512 ballots, the statewide ballot advantage is likely to see only minor shifts, barring any unprecedented Democratic return numbers in the final week.

Democratic voters holding their ballots longer than 2016: Democratic voters are holding onto their ballots longer than in 2016, averaging 12.44 days compared to 11.36 days in 2016, but shorter than their 13.26 day average in 2014. Meanwhile, Republican voters aren’t holding onto their ballots as long, sitting at an average of 11.76 days compared with 11.97 days in 2016 and 13.48 in 2014.

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Shaped to Bore, Confuse, and Mislead– What Arizonans Need to Know About The “What’s On My Ballot?” Booklet

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Did you find that the proposition descriptions in the official booklet put you to sleep?  Made you doubt your ability to grasp the ins-and-outs of economic and technical analysis?  Gave you a knee-jerk reaction to support the proposition without giving it a second’s thought?  Guess what?  That’s what they were designed to do.

The descriptive language of the official, “What’s On My Ballot?” 2018 General Election Booklet, may be a bit officially dull, sometimes a bit too technical to grasp, but it took a lot of effort to write it that way.  The ballot titles and summaries have been finely crafted to be devoid of context, history, and critical analysis.  They mislead Arizonans into voting against their own interests.   Arizonans will fail to protect their health and the environment and will vote to enrich out-of-state energy corporations, outside private interests, and their individual in-state allies.

To find accurate facts about the Ballot propositions, voters should turn to the Guide jointly put out by the Arizona Advocacy Network and the League of Women Voters of Arizona at http://azballotguide.com/ This Guide gives you an accurate description of the ballot measure, its background, provisions, impact on Arizonans, summarizes arguments for and against, and most importantly lists the organizations that support and oppose the ballot measure.

The presentation of Proposition 126 is a glaring example of how the official ballot proposition guide misrepresents the proposition and misleads the voters.

Proposition 126, The Protect Arizona Taxpayers Act:

To read the official ballot guide, you would think that Arizonans are unprotected from taxes that hurt the poor and elderly (categories which I mostly fall under), and that ordinary concerned citizens have organized to bring this proposition to the ballot to protect themselves.

But Arizona already requires that the imposition of a new tax must be passed with a 2/3 majority vote.  You wouldn’t know that from the official guide.

Arizona is already taxing some businesses which could be called services to raise money for our roads, public schools, police, fire, and emergency services.  Those taxes would not be renewed if Prop 126 is passed and we would lose that major funding source for our public institutions.  It would take another amendment to the Arizona Constitution to restore that funding.  But that fact is not clear in the official guide. See Approval of Prop. 126 will Cut Education and Road Funding.

You wouldn’t get to know from reading the official guide that the major funders of the proposition are the Realtors Issue Mobilization Fund and the National Association of Realtors, (who, by the way, created and funded the seemingly local Citizens for Fair Tax Policy), and the so-called National Federation of Independent Businesses – a group which purports to represent the interests of small businesses, but actually promotes the interests of large corporations, has received a lot of funding in its many efforts from the Koch brothers, and counts  Republican Congressman Paul Gosar among its members.

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