Politics Was It Good for Hugh?
posted by on November 8 at 14:54 PM
They’re attempting to do a little election analysis over at Capitol Hill Seattle.
We will celebrate Santorum’s demise with Dan Savage and the rest of the lovers of freedom in this fine country—but take a look at the local “impact” of Savage’s neener-neener teasing of Jamie Pedersen and the neverending joke endorsement of proto-Republican Hugh Foskett.Savage’s Abercrombie-esque funny boy pulled 13.75% of the vote so far. Wow. Looks familiar. In 2004, the ‘publicans also put up a fuzzy cheeked pretender in the race and he pulled… 13%.
CHS is straining to imply that The Stranger’s coveted endorsement didn’t do much good for Hugh Foskett—or likely any of the other candidates we endorsed this year. The 43rd District’s sacrificial R candidate in 2004 got 13%, Hugh got 13.75%. Big whoop, right?
But the comparison isn’t valid, CHS. This was a very good year for Democrats, as everyone is now surely aware, and a very bad year for Republicans. The reverse was true in 2004. That’s why comparing 2004 election results to 2006 election results doesn’t tell us anything relevant, CHS. If you want to measure the impact of our endorsement—our joke endorsement—on Hugh Foskett, you need to compare Foskett’s performance last night to that of the other two sacrificial Republicans running this year in the 43rd District.
In the race for State Senate in the 43rd, Ed Murray got 89.25%, his Republican challenger Loren Nelson got 10.74%. In the race for 43rd District State House Position #2, Frank Chopp got 90.03%, his Republican challenger Will “Chopper” Sohn got 9.69%.
And now—drum-roll, please—here are the most current results in the race for 43rd District House Position #1:
Jamie Pedersen: 81.81%
Hugh Foskett: 13.82%
So our endorsement—our joke endorsement of a joke Republican running in the 43rd joke district—was worth somewhere between 3 and 4 percentage points. Our non-joke endorsements be worth a bit more than even that. Can we win your ass an election? No, probably not. But if it’s close, we can help. Just ask Greg “3,158” Nickels.
You really think the only difference between one race and the next is a Stranger endorsement? Not the actual candidates who are running? It seems like a lot of people didn't like Pedersen for a variety of reasons, and voted against him. I don't think you can compare him and Ed Murray or anybody else. I suppose you could do a study on how much effect a Stranger endorsement has, but to draw any conclusion from this election cycle is pretty silly.
If only elections were won by the "gallon challenge", Hugh would have had it in the bag.
i was wondering when you were going to point this out. here's to all of us that voted for hugh! (or those of us that couldn't bring ourselves to vote for jaime.)
though, perhaps the inflated portion of the vote that hugh took could be attributed to a higher number of write-in votes?
just checked on that: though the number of write-ins for 43rd - H1 was substantially higher than other 43rd races, it looks like the stranger's endorsement might have been good for anywhere between 600 and 900 votes.
smarter people than me will point out: that's a governor's race.
I stand corrected on the Hugh Foskette endorsement. I tip my hat to your wisdom (or is it refusal to take seriously) regarding seattle politics.
Now that the election is over, you think Foskette might be open for a lil' man on man experimentation?
joke hell, they like them young at the strange - or so goes the street talk
Have you met my 35 year-old boyfriend?
I couldn't bring myself to vote for Pedersen either - for the first time ever, I wrote in a candidate: Stephanie Pure.
Dan - have you never married the guy? I thought he was your hubby - what goes with the boyfriend tag?
He's my husband in Canada and the UK, my boyfriend in the states...
Actually, our mistake. We should measure all of this by the delta between Hugh's and Gomez's paycheck in 5 years.
It's worth mentioning that Linde Knighton probably took more votes away from Pederson than Foskett did.
Ahem, excuse me? I am now the replacement-level baseline for humanity?
Comments Closed
In order to combat spam, we are no longer accepting comments on this post (or any post more than 14 days old).