Maine's Question 1

[Dan the Roman]

Well, this isn't technically 2010, and it isn't a congressional or gubernatorial race, but I think this is the most appropriate board to post it? I'll use this thread to dump all the news stories I find on this Question.

The question before the voters is "Do you want to reject the new law that lets same-sex couples marry and allows individuals and religious groups to refuse to perform these marriages?"

Why didn't the legislature veto this referendumb from appearing on the ballot?

Once a law expands the public's rights, there is no "people's veto."

That's why this is a republic - not a pure democracy.

That is not the Maine Constitution, or the US one for that matter. There is no "expanding rights" clause that makes certain things irreversible. People are free to do stupid things, like ban alcohol if they feel like it.

[Dan the Roman]

And of course, interracial marriage (still between a man and a woman, no relevance to gay marriage), women's suffrage, and segregation are all of course on the same level of fundamental importance as satisfying the indulgences of a minority.

I didn't realize love was an indulgence in your twisted, bigoted world.

I don't think I could have said anything so nonsenical as whatever I placed in bold that you just posted. My original argument, was that higher GOP turnout would benefit Propsition One (that's a given fact, GOP voters support marriage.) and then you tried to say that higher GOP turnout wouldn't help One, at which point I said support for marrige is often even higher than GOP support. Now you're trying to tell me I was right the first time, not the second. Which is it?

You clearly have no idea what you said. You stated that as GOP support increased support for marriage inequality would increase. Such a notion is ridiculous.

How do you figure? GOP voters oppose gay "marriage" so if more people believe in the philosophy of the GOP then more people are going to vote in favor of marriage. GIVEN NOT ALL people who support the GOP are going to vote for marriage as well, but the fact that so many people who normally don't vote for the GOP will vote for marriage makes this fact irrelevant.

The reason people switch between parties is not because of a change in social values year to year. They switch because of either economic reasons, corruption issues, personal flavor, resentment at a President, etc. People don't go "Obama isn't doing so well... oh and now I don't favor gay marriage". Again, you appear to lack a basic understanding of many of these issues. You appear to be quite young from your writing style so I hope you change some as you mature.

And being open to the values of the other party doesn't mean you can form a new opinion or a first opinion altogether? That's quite an assumption to make. Like I said, so many people who don't vote GOP will vote for marriage which makes the people who will vote for the GOP but not marriage a moot point.

There might be truth to that if the Maine GOP opposed Gay Marriage. Both Senators are against the repeal, and the likely GOP candidate for Governor voted for the Gay Marriage Bill.

This is par for course in large parts of the country. In New Hampshire, 11 Republicans voted for the Gay Marriage bill in the legislature and in Massachusetts a majority of the GOP senate caucus voted against putting the amendment on the ballot. In Conneticut the Republican Governor signed the bill, while in California the Republican Governor urged the legislature to overturn Prop 8.

What is happening is not voters moving to accommodate a party. Voters are too self-centered for that. If Republicans are doing better in the NE than a few years ago its because they have accommodated their voters and have dropped opposition to Gay Rights even if they don't openly support marriage.

[Dan the Roman]

Both Senators are against the repeal.

Source? All I can find is Collins saying she'll stay neutral like she always does for statewide issues.

Speaking of Peter Mills - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K60a6kjzpfI

Collins may be presumptive, but she did eventually come out and record an ad against Question 1 back in 2005, so I assumed that she probably would here. I guess she sees no reason to act yet. But she definitely doubt she would support it, she has like an 86 from HCR, and I thought she said something positive about the law when it was passed. Oh well.

Peter Mills is awesome. If he wins the nomination he is Maine's next Governor. Granted that was true in 2006 as well.

[Dan the Roman]

PPP:

48% YES
48% NO

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_ME_1020.pdf

Ugh. Not good.

Undecideds will probably break towards no, just my gut feeling.

Hard to say. What I will say though is that I am skeptical of their likely voter screen. I worked on the last Gay Rights Iniaitive in Maine in 2005 as well as the general elections in 2004 and 2006, and from what i recall there is simply no comparison in terms of the GOTV operations of the Democratic leaning groups, especially the Maine Gay Rights groups. Because of early voting, they spend the three weeks leading up to the election bagging large numbers of voters, and the combination of same-day registration and early voting tends to make it incredibly easy to mobilize groups with a low-chance of turning out, like college students.

While I am willing to believe many college age students may well have said they were unsure or might not vote when called, most will in fact vote, when all of their friends go down to vote on the iniative. Peer pressure in this regard is a very powerful force, especially on the campuses, and I fully expect a much higher turnout of young voters than PPP is predicting, including many who fully do not intend to right now, but will get talked into taking a fifteen minute diversion sometime in the next week.

The other thing to remember is the light residency requirements. Basically any college students, including out-of-state ones can vote if they are living in a dorm. Almost none have land-lines, and I sincerely doubt that those who would be inclined to vote yes will bother voting, while those who support NO or are indifferent will fall victim to the same peer affect.

Furthermore, I do not buy the 47-45 no lead in the 18-29 category. I think we are getting to the point where polls can't properly measure a demographic the majority of which has no land-line nor will answer one if they do. Especially this year when it makes sense to expect if not quite Obama levels of turnout on campuses, at least 2005 levels.

[Dan the Roman]

http://www.openleft.com/diary/15805/gametime-by-Adam-Bink

Matthew Dunlap now thinks that turnout could reach 50% rather than the 35% he predicted or the 23% of the last off-year elections. I really think PPP was out to lunch here on turnout. That said, incidental reports suggest they were right on everywhere else. It is probably just unfamiliarity with Maine, and the local dynamics.

[Dan the Roman]

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/1109/Turnout_high_in_Maine.html?showall

Turnout high in Maine

Maine Secretary of State Matt Dunlap told me just now that turnout there is far exceeding his projections -- news that would be good news for backers of same-sex marriage.

"We're seeing heavy and very steady turnout," he said, attributing the surprise to the contested vote on a "people's veto" of a same-sex marriage law driving Mainers to the polls.

The city of Bangor -- Maine's third largest, and likely to tilt against repeal -- is projecting turnout over 50%, he said, and local analysts have said that higher turnout would likely favor the marriage law.

"I think we could be over 50%" for the state," Dunlap said. "We originally projected 35%."

The day is "comfortable," he said, by local standards, partly cloudy with weather in the upper 40s. The polls close at 8:00 p.m.
Posted by Ben Smith 01:28 PM

[Dan the Roman]

Everyone talking about the results is missing one thing. This was not a turnout issue. Turnout was substantially greater than in the 2006 general election and was well over 60% of registered voters, and  I doubt Young voters or Democrats stayed home much at all. There are no similarities between Maine and what happened in New Jersey and Virginia.

 In fact, I would argue that had you told the NO campaign two days ago they would get 270,000+ votes they would have been overjoyed and expected a ten to twelve point win.  The real problem here had nothing to do with enthuisasm or base turnout. It had to do with the utter failure of the NO campaign to make headway in the traditionally Democratic but socially conservative places like Lewiston. A democrat can not lose Lewiston by 20 points and win an election in Maine. They ran a campaign focused on running up the margin in Cumberland county and hoped for regular off-year turnout everywhere else. They succeeded in the first and failed in the latter.

This realy does reinforce however how different Cumberland county is from the rest of Maine. Without Cumberland, Maine is the poorest state in the Union, and it has more in common with suburban Massachusetts than with the rest of Maine. Look at the results in Portland, Cape Elizabeth, Brunswick, 71%, 68% and 65% NO. The big divide was not age or partisan politics but class. The elite have a consensus in favor of Gay Marriage, but it was not spead outside that elite, even to Democrats or Young Voters who might otherwise be attracted to it.

[Dan the Roman]

Everyone talking about the results is missing one thing. This was not a turnout issue. Turnout was substantially greater than in the 2006 general election and was well over 60% of registered voters, and  I doubt Young voters or Democrats stayed home much at all. There are no similarities between Maine and what happened in New Jersey and Virginia.

 In fact, I would argue that had you told the NO campaign two days ago they would get 270,000+ votes they would have been overjoyed and expected a ten to twelve point win.  The real problem here had nothing to do with enthuisasm or base turnout. It had to do with the utter failure of the NO campaign to make headway in the traditionally Democratic but socially conservative places like Lewiston. A democrat can not lose Lewiston by 20 points and win an election in Maine. They ran a campaign focused on running up the margin in Cumberland county and hoped for regular off-year turnout everywhere else. They succeeded in the first and failed in the latter.

This realy does reinforce however how different Cumberland county is from the rest of Maine. Without Cumberland, Maine is the poorest state in the Union, and it has more in common with suburban Massachusetts than with the rest of Maine. Look at the results in Portland, Cape Elizabeth, Brunswick, 71%, 68% and 65% NO. The big divide was not age or partisan politics but class. The elite have a consensus in favor of Gay Marriage, but it was not spead outside that elite, even to Democrats or Young Voters who might otherwise be attracted to it.

Old people tend to vote in large numbers for things like this, as they are more religious than any other age group.

True and they probably were overpresented versus 2008. But this was a higher turnout than 2006 or 2002 and is approaching the 2000 Presidential eleection. The problem was that this was an off-year. The problem was deeper. Young voters did turnout. NO got the votes they thought they needed. The Yes people just got more.

[Dan the Roman]

You know I keep coming here hoping for a conversation about the results, turnout, what we can learn from this about Maine, what we can extrapolulate from that about New Hampshire and Massachusetts or even Iowa, and then I keep seeing the argument about gods will.

Frankly I think this is a problem on both sides, namely the venom with which they both approached this issue in California and Maine versus Massachusetts where the Gay groups sat back calm and moderate as the out-of-state anti-gay marriage people destroyed themselves. And then I wonder if there was something to that strategy.

[Dan the Roman]

You know I keep coming here hoping for a conversation about the results, turnout, what we can learn from this about Maine, what we can extrapolate from that about New Hampshire and Massachusetts or even Iowa, and then I keep seeing the argument about gods will.

Frankly I think this is a problem on both sides, namely the venom with which they both approached this issue in California and Maine versus Massachusetts where the Gay groups sat back calm and moderate as the out-of-state anti-gay marriage people destroyed themselves. And then I wonder if there was something to that strategy.

I gave some observations about 10 (maybe 20) pages back, but they got lost.

All I can do is echo what Al said, which is class, class, class and point out that a Hillary-Obama primary would have looked eerily similar (even the caucus looks pretty damn similar).

I'll give a substantive commentary later.

Ah, thats it. To do an addendum, I think this was far more important than California because it should blow up the inevitability argument someone like Nate Silver peddles. Some young voters definitely voted heavily no, and the majority of young voters probably did narrowly, but the big divide was not age, but class.

More than that it was culture. The race this really looked like is not Clinton-Obama, which was caucus based, but Collins-Allen. There you had a Portland-based candidate with a campaign run by Portland-based advisers, including in the number two position Jesse Connelly, who ran No on One this year. They ran a campaign based around knowing absolutely nothing about Maine outside of York and Cumberland, which systematically ignored local democratic bosses like Mayor Larry Gilbert of Lewiston and treated traditional democratic groups like labor with contempt. It was a campaign by yuppies for yuppies, and was dependent on Obama bringing out enough yuppies to win. Unfortunately for the strategy, there were not enough coastal yuppies to win, no matter what percent turned out.

No on One featured Allen's field director running a campaign predicated on turning out as many voters in the high-income areas and college towns as possible, and then hoping for normal referendum turnout in the rest of Maine. Towards this end they set up and ran one of the best referendum campaigns I have ever seen, on its own terms. And they succeeded, turning out 270,000 voters(perhaps even more when absentees are counted). That was more than the Democratic candidates for governor won in 2006 or 2002 and was 16,000 less than George Bush got in 2000 while winning 44% of the vote. Their problem was not that young voters turned out. Their problem was not that high income voters did not turn out. Both did, and both voted for them overwhelmingly. They carried Portland 71-29, Cape Elizabeth 69-31, Brunswick 66-34(on a turnout on par with the 2008 election). The problem was no amount of turnout among those groups could have won against what they faced. They needed the Democratic machine in the second district which is labor dominated to support them and it didn't.

A good example though of what they faced is in Lewiston.
In Lewiston they got 5100 votes in 2005 on the Gay Rights referendum to 4400 for the Yes side. This year they got 5300, but Yes got over 8000. They benefited not at all from the increased turnout, not even proportionately to their loss. Its the same story throughout the second district. The same vote totals for No from 2005, but 30% or even 40% or 50% increases for Yes.

Anyway, Sam, sorry for interrupting the general gay rights discussion. I look forward to hearing your observations.

[Dan the Roman]

Ah, thats it. To do an addendum, I think this was far more important than California because it should blow up the inevitability argument someone like Nate Silver peddles. Some young voters definitely voted heavily no, and the majority of young voters probably did narrowly, but the big divide was not age, but class.

I agree that class is a divide, but on what basis do you argue that it is more important than age? If young people are voting a majority in favor of same-sex marriage, it won't matter in the long run if 40% don't because they're view gays unfavorably as part of their world view. Class is one cleavage, but how does it make age not at least as important? Did old people vote differently?

40% in Lewiston is not enough to win, but were those 40% all Yuppies, and were they evenly distributed on the age spectrum?

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How did the gay rights referendum do in Lewiston in 1998 and 2000?

2009
Yes   7300
No    5121

2000
Yes(pro-gay rights)  7329
No                            8271

1998
Yes(anti-gay rights) 4514
No                            2685


I do want to see the student precincts, but I doubt that was the only cause for the fall.

[Dan the Roman]

Is anyone suprised by the result of the vote?  (I dont feel like reading 44 pages of replies.)

I must say I was surprised, pleasantly surprised.

not surprised. Gay marriage is not popular, even in liberal territory. I'm curious to see if the liberal theory: "it's a question of time because young voters are more gay-friendly" will work. It's based on the fact that young people will not change their mind in future.

Have you ever heard of prop 22? It was a gay marriage ban passed in California in 2000. Guess how much it passed by? It passed by slightly more than a 22 point margin in hippie, tree huggin, librul California. In 2008 it passed by only a 5 point margin. Why will that trend not continue?

Here is a nice little comparison between the two votes. Have fun. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-2008election-prop8prop22,0,333635.htmlstory

I hate to say this, but the comparison is meaningless.

And why would that be?

Probably because one was a law and one an amendment. And I would agree with that argument if it wasn't for the CA Supreme Court transforming the situation. Nevertheless, one was a vote on a hypothetical, the other on a concrete concept.

[Dan the Roman]

Why would it being a vote on a hypothetical make it a poor comparison?  If anything, that would make the comparison stronger because the differences would only serve to make the shift even greater.

Because voting to ban Gay Marriage in 2000 was a free vote for people. It was something that was never going to happen, and no one was hurt by it in the view of those voting yes. Even the Gay community struggled to come up with a reason why it was bad.

Prop 8 was entirely different. You had people who were already getting married whose status would be thrown into doubt. You had people who could be married who you would be telling that they should not be able to if you voted Yes. Voting Yes was an entirely different matter.

That said, I have my own view on Prop 8, and they mainly relate to the fact that the Gay community has to separate social equality from legal equality. One is guaranteed, the other earned, and even in the best of cases never total. Gay rights groups have to realize that if they are going to use these laws as fronts to force their views on others, then people will vote on that basis, rather than on the basis of legal rights. They did not learn that lesson in California, nor evidently are they learning the correct lesson from Maine.

[Dan the Roman]

Is anyone suprised by the result of the vote?  (I dont feel like reading 44 pages of replies.)

I must say I was surprised, pleasantly surprised.

not surprised. Gay marriage is not popular, even in liberal territory. I'm curious to see if the liberal theory: "it's a question of time because young voters are more gay-friendly" will work. It's based on the fact that young people will not change their mind in future.

Have you ever heard of prop 22? It was a gay marriage ban passed in California in 2000. Guess how much it passed by? It passed by slightly more than a 22 point margin in hippie, tree huggin, librul California. In 2008 it passed by only a 5 point margin. Why will that trend not continue?

Here is a nice little comparison between the two votes. Have fun. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-2008election-prop8prop22,0,333635.htmlstory

I hate to say this, but the comparison is meaningless.

And why would that be?

Probably because one was a law and one an amendment. And I would agree with that argument if it wasn't for the CA Supreme Court transforming the situation. Nevertheless, one was a vote on a hypothetical, the other on a concrete concept.

And you think people saw a difference? LOL

Probably not if the CA Supreme Court had not bothered to point it out to them fairly clearly.