Digifesto

Tag: sheldon silver

May 12, 2008

Challenger challenge

Kim Hynes has cross-posted to the Common Cause blog urging readers in Connecticut to get political exercise by running for office against their incumbent representatives. As she points out, there are great democratic effects of challenged seats even when the challenger is not elected.

After I ran in 2004, many people would ask me if I `won’. I would tell them that I did win. I didn’t get elected, but I won. What I mean by this is that I became a better person because of the experience. Why, you ask – what good did it really do? I may not have gotten elected, but the electorate sure did get energized by my race. Hundreds of people showed up for the debates. People started talking about local issues that they care about. People got to know my opponent better, and found out how she stands on the issues. I provided reverse coat tails – in the areas in which I ran, the Congressional candidate did demonstrably better than in areas where the incumbents were unopposed. Finally, I provided the inspiration for a candidate in the next district over – who ran in 2006 and lost by just 200 votes. This year the incumbent in that district has decided to retire, and the same candidate has a very good chance at winning this seat – in a district considered unwinnable for challengers.

I’m wholeheartedly in support of Hynes’ call for challengers. But can there be too many challengers?

Yes and no. Yes, when we use a plurality voting system for our elections. FairVote succinctly sums up the problems of plurality voting:

Three is a crowd in our current voting system. Plurality voting, where the candidate with the most votes wins, is dysfunctional when more than two candidates run. It promotes zero-sum politics that discourage new candidates, suppress new ideas and encourage negative campaigns rather than inclusive efforts to build consensus.

Plurality voting weakens candidates the more their politics agree with each other. So two challengers both fighting for the same reforms against an entrenched incumbent can become each others’ greatest enemy.

But in principle, we should stand strong that No, there can’t be too many challengers. Rather, we should be working to change the system so that our democratic process can be as lively as possible.

As I write this, I am worried about the upcoming election in New York’s Assembly District 64. Paul Newell, who I’ve written about here before, has a challenger, Luke Henry, who appears to have less press but a sexier website. (That is, since he fixed up its blog section, which used to contain his del.icio.us page embedded in an IFrame.) So far I haven’t traced out their policy differences; I don’t think it should matter much, since the greatest strength of both is pluck and the promise of Albany reform.

I worry about the chance that they will split the protest vote. It’s unfair for them to have to work around that consideration (instant runoff voting would allow them to run in friendly, undistorted competition). My hope is that they can come to some agreement between themselves, and then add voting system reform to their toolbox for fixing Albany.

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April 27, 2008

Paul Newell’s e-campaign gains steam

Though rough around the edges, Paul Newell‘s campaign has started to take advantage of the internet’s finest social media institutions–or perhaps vice versa.

In the blogosphere, TOPP’s high-powered streets renaissance blog, StreetsBlog, has posted about Paul Newell after several anticipatory posts calling for challengers to Silver.

Meanwhile, while the first unofficial YouTube video announcing Newell’s candidacy was unflatteringly shot in a sports bar, his campaign has started to make a more careful contribution. The lighting on “Paul Newell For State Assembly” betrays the campaign’s inexperience and penury, but “Three Men in a Room” shows more promise.

Finally, in a story too illustrative of the ubiquity of social media to let fall through the cracks, The New York Observer quaintly reports:

Minutes after [Mayor Bloomberg’s political aide] Kevin Sheekey went on NY1 and blasted Sheldon Silver for not having the “courage” to vote on the mayor’s congestion pricing plan, Sheekey officially made a new Facebook friend: Paul Newell, one of two Democrats seeking to oust Sheldon Silver in the September primary.

I remember when Facebook was just a way to figure out whether anyone hot was planning to take your seminar. Now its a subtle indicator of political support. I’m glad the Observer is watching.

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April 20, 2008

Sheldon Silver vs. The Internet

Today, while performing an innocuous search for “nyc weather”, I was presented with the first Google ad to catch my eye for a long time: Stop SIlver from Slithering Into His Seat Again.

For those of you that don’t know, Sheldon Silver is the Speaker of New York’s House of Representatives and an asshole. New York’s state government is one of the most dysfunctional in America, known for its “three men in a room” style politics, and Silver was part of the triumvirate when it was at its height. His recent back room scuttling of the popular congestion pricing bill proves that he remains as autocratic as ever.

For the first time in 20 years, Silver has a challenger in the primary, Paul Newell, who seems like a decent guy.

One of the many reasons that this election will be interesting is that it provides an opportunity to see internet-supported civil society in action, and test its ability to cause real change.

In anticipation of that aspect of the race, note the internet presence of the two candidates. The first three links on a Google search of Sheldon Silver are his New York State Assembly page, a Wikipedia entry, and a page declaring him to be a creep and a fraud. The second link on a search for Paul Newell, well above his campaign site, is his LinkedIn profile. It is too early to tell, but we could be seeing a marked shift in how politics gets done, especially on the local level.

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