Ranked Choice Voting Will Be Associated With Defeating Poliquin, Who Chose The Racist Wall As His Last Stand

Photo credit: Jim Anderberg

I'm no Democrat and I don't expect much from Jared Golden who unseated incumbent Bruce Poliquin because Maine voters got to use Ranked Choice Voting. The Maine constitution has language that will need to be amended for RCV to work for state elections, but nothing in the U.S. constitution stood in the way of using RCV to choose who would represent the 2nd district in the House of Representatives.

RCV allowed me to vote my conscience rather than hold my nose and vote for Democrats I believe are just as warlike as the other corporate party's candidates.

Last month I got a phone call from a nice woman at the League of Women Voters. She was responding to my affirming that I had ranked independent candidates in slots #1 and #2. She wondered if I would be interested in being party to the lawsuit the League will conduct to uphold RCV.

Yes, please! (Turns out they probably don't need me after all but that is ok because they won!!!)

Told the League of Women Voters person that I created the spybook page Where's Bruce Poliquin? in response to a request from my friend Ridgely Fuller. We used to be able to meet with our former representative Mike Michaud and share our concerns as his constituents, but Poliquin's Wall Street handlers put a stop to that sort of thing. He's best known for ducking into a women's bathroom to avoid reporters asking questions about his votes against health care coverage for the multitude of poor people in Maine's 2nd district.

Now he's being a sore loser and challenging RCV with a lawsuit. Which was thrown out of court but is now being appealed.

The Green Party, of which I am a member, fought for RCV for years before Maine voters passed it by referendum on November 8, 2016.

It was pretty clear that the Republican Party feared RCV as they fought it every step of the way.

When the oligarchs are united against a voting method, you can be pretty sure that it favors democracy rather than kleptocracy. 

Finally, we see some poetic justice in the end of Poliquin's term. He chose to make his last stand slavish obedience to The Wall.

You know, the pet project of the demagogue with bad hair in the White House. The one who shut down the federal government at midnight last night in a hissy fit over congressional opposition to the racist artifact he insists will be built. The one who tweeted his support for the losing candidate back in October.

What a fitting end for Poliquin. His defeat via ranked choice voting will historically be associated with cruel and injust immigration policy on our border with Mexico. 

He must be licking his chops in anticipation of the cash rewards headed his way.