Denver November 2004 Election
Esther Dyson: "I think the big lesson was really that technology mattered very little in this election. Many people used the Net; some even posted blogs, wrote or disseminated campaign messages, and otherwise used technology. But in the end, I don't think 'technology' changed many people's minds about any of the issues. In the end, it was about politics, not technology. Perhaps the most important thing technology has done - for this election and for politics and life in general - is shorten our timescale. Stories that used to unfold over days now unfold in hours or even minutes."
Here's a recap of last Tuesday's elections in Colorado from Floyd Ciruli published in the Rocky Mountain News [November 6, 2004, "The color purple"]. He writes, "It was as if Colorado experienced two elections on Nov. 2, handing President Bush a solid re-election victory - reaffirming itself as a 'red' state - then shifting political direction and giving Democratic candidates and issues a major boost."
Ed Quillen, as usual, has his own opinion with regard to last Tuesday's election in his column in the Denver Post [November 7, 2004, "State Dems get surprise"]. He writes, "I keep wondering how long the Republican coalition can hold together. It did well on a national basis this year, with Bush's election and gains in the U.S. Senate and House. But how much longer can the fiscal conservatives keep supporting a party that runs record deficits with a President who never vetoes a spending bill? How much longer will the small-government conservatives support a party that encourages more federal snooping into every aspect of our lives? How much longer will the isolationist conservatives support a foreign policy of pre-emptive invasion based on bad intelligence? And how much longer will the social conservatives support a party that talks a lot but never delivers on abortion, school prayer and other issues dear to fundamentalists who insist on minding other peoples' business?...And now Democrats control the legislature. This could mean tough times for a columnist, having a legislature that worries about health and education rather than magazine racks and the Pledge of Allegiance, but we all have to make sacrifices, I suppose."
Update: The Nation: "The rise of Open Source politics." I'm waiting for the "Open Source solution for turning out voters."
6:22:57 AM 
|
|
