Hurricane Sandy has barely made landfall, and more than 2 million people on the east coast are already without power. Although the storm no longer has 90-mph winds, it’s still creating huge storm surges and breaking flood records nearly 200 years old. Flooding inland may be even worse than along the coast, and blizzards are possible in several states.
Any comments related to the storm or its political implications are welcome in this thread. Both President Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney cancelled some campaign events scheduled for today and tomorrow, but Romney did headline a Davenport rally this afternoon, and First Lady Michelle Obama stopped in Iowa City and Sioux City today, as planned. Romney’s campaign walked back comments he made during the Republican primaries about privatizing the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
1 Comment
political implications
(1) O’Malley jumped on PEPCO, DC’s (and 2 MD counties) third world power company. He’s not going to look like Nagin for 2016.
(2) Marriage equality, DREAM and the redistricting ballot questions in MD are all now in “toss-up” territory. I am less optimistic because the “consequences” guy is now here in MD targeting the AA vote, and successfully, according to polling. Since MD is a “safe” state, we just don’t have the GOTV infrastructure for presidential-level elections.
In the past I’ve been ambivalent about these elections revolving around a handful of states. Less so these days, now that we have issues that matter on the ballot. I am still agnostic about NPV as I just see the flip happening — all the attention in high-density population areas like the NE, which isn’t fair, either.
The pro-equality activists are relying on the college vote, but we just had two days of classes cancelled, w/ midterm postponement and all that. Even before the storm, interest was low. UMD held a rally on a campus of 35K-40K and only 200 ppl showed up.
There’s been very little public campaigning on the redistricting, so I’m surprised that so many appear to be aware of it.
albert Tue 30 Oct 6:45 AM