According to the (truly amazing) interactive map at www.nytimes.com, Martha Coakley earned 75% of Ashfield's votes--that's 670. Her victorious opponent Scott Brown got only 212, or 23.7%. Libertarian Joe Kennedy took 11 votes, for 1.2%.
Coakley won a higher percentage here than in any of the other west county towns, though all stayed blue except for Hawley (a 63 to 63 split).
Ruth Julian
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I find it a sad day to have Mr. Brown win but very glad to hear the Ashfield did not "Go Red"! I am not sure what prompted people to vote Republican as I find President Obama was left a very big "Mess" to fix and has done a good job so far. Yes, Coakley should have stayed on task instead of being so confident, a good lesson there, "Don't get so comfortable that things will take care of themselves...". I am happy to say that I did not vote for her and would like to know Ashfields stats for that election also. It appears people are holding onto their own pockets and not seeing the bigger picture that health care is a right for all and holding Wall Street accountable for their part in hurting the economy is important. Corporations and Big Business must be held responsible!
ReplyDeleteI don't know if this comment will pass muster with the moderator - but here goes anyway.
ReplyDeleteI have been a faithful observer of this blog - but this Coakley/Brown thread makes me worry.....
There isn't a doubt in ANYONE'S mind that Ashfield has been a divided community for a long time now. There's a glimmer of hope that we might be on our way out of the woods, but there remains a lot of heavy lifting by all sides in the myriad matters that we face.
Which brings me to my point -
I have the slightest suspicion that there is a subtle undercurrent of intolerance in these prior two posts. Indeed, Ashfield went for Coakley in a BIG way - but remember two facts:
1) She lost the election state wide - in a BIG way; and
2) Brown did get 212 Ashfield votes.
Are we to tolerate those 212 Republicans, Democrats, and Independents who cast their votes for the "wrong" candidate? Should we try to find out who they are? Rhetorical questions, of course. But thought provoking, I hope.
I respect the right of each and every one of us to vote, and to talk and write about their candidates. But from an old school administrator's vantage point, talking about election candidates and outcomes was just something that schools had zero tolerance for. Teacher's Room talk of such matters quite often led to a subtle divisiveness among staff. Heaven knows we don’t need any more divineness in our town.
But then again, this is a town not a school. And we didn't hire on to Ashfield, we moved here! So let's move on, and keep in mind that some of the 212 residents that voted for Brown might be a bit discomforted by the remarks. FYI: I'm not one of them ;-)
Paul Swem
Baptist Corner Road
Paul, I just made a comment pertainting to my choice and would never judge any one on their choice in politics, religion or any of the such. I feel strongly about freedom of choice in our Democratic country. I feel we all have our reasons to vote according to how we feel our candidate will serve the majority. "I am not one of them" was not to offend anyone, it was just a statement. I paid a lot of attention to the background of the candidates and Coakley had no Washington experience which led me to vote for her opponent. There were also a few issues she changed her position on which did not fit my personal philosophies such as the right to choose. Please accept my apology if I offended anyone. I will be more sensitive to such comments in the future.
ReplyDeleteKaren,
ReplyDeleteNo worries! And certainly no need for apologies. I didn't take any offense at all for any comments from the above post back to the original comment.
My main concern was that with one party (the majority, at 670 votes) begins touting how proud they are of their voting choice, it distances them from being able to talk about issues with the other party (the minority, at 212 votes). I worry about such matters.
No doubt about it, Ashfield is a "blue town", but thankfully, not totally blue. Can you imagine an Ashfield of 100% Democrats? How awful.
Awful not because of the party affiliation, but awful because of the unanimity of thought. We’re a better town, state, and country for the diversity that our constitution allows us to have.
My real worries for the past year or two is our inability, even at the local level, of being able to discuss differences of opinion in a civil way.
At the national level, our president made big promises to be more bipartisan in his approach to government. It doesn’t take much of a Google search for articles from various periodicals (left, center, and right) to see that this promise was one of the first to be tossed overboard.
He has before him now a HUGE opportunity to re-think these promises, and begin to make good on them. He also promised to bring transparency to big government, even to the point of putting all the health care debate on CSPAN. So much for another big campaign promise broken. So – even if things are deliberated behind closed doors for Health Care II, let’s hope that there are politicians of a different color behind that door – and I men red. Republicans, Independents, and Democrats need to be around that table, for the good of the bill and for the good of the country.
Lastly, and in the spirit of exchanging divergent views and opinions in a civil way, let’s not lose sight of the fact that much of the mess that met the new president did indeed come from a prior administration. But looking a bit further back, the seeds of the housing crisis were planted in yet another administration further back from Bush – yes, during the Clinton years!
Let’s hope the current administration starts to take a “less blame and more game” approach to solving our nation’s many problems. And let’s hope the solutions come from fully transparent, bipartisan committees of Congress.
And let’s keep sharing, talking, and writing!
~ Paul