Voters will head to the polls tomorrow to cast their ballots in what may be an unusually high-turnout off-year election.
Polling centers will be open from 6:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. With the weather predicted to be warm and sunny, and with the chances of another significant earthquake happening on election day very slim, there’s little to keep voters from the polls. A list of polling locations can be found on the Arlington County website.
Below are the races taking place in Arlington in which there is more than one candidate.
State Senate, 30th District
- Timothy McGhee (R) (candidate essay, website)
- Adam Ebbin (D) (candidate essay, website)
State Senate, 31st District
- Caren Merrick (R) (candidate essay, website)
- Barbara Favola (D) (candidate essay, website)
State Senate, 32nd District
- Patrick Forrest (R) (candidate essay, website)
- Janet Howell (D) (website)
House of Delegates, 48th District
- Bob Brink (D) (candidate essay, website)
- Janet Murphy (IG) (candidate essay, website)
- Kathy Gillette-Mallard (I) (candidate essay, website)
County Board (At-Large)
- Mary Hynes (D) (candidate essay, website)
- Walter Tejada (D) (candidate essay, website)
- Audrey Clement (G) (candidate essay, website)
The word cloud above was generated from all three County Board candidate essays. Courtesy of Jeremy Cannon.
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Should I vote for the guy that is lying to tell me what I want to hear to get elected or the guy that is lying to tell me what I want to hear to get elected? I’m torn.
I’m voting for the turd sandwich.
No way! Giant douche 2012!
I think it’s telling that the word cloud is shaped like a turd sandwich. Or a manatee.
Definitely a manatee. The district lines are shaped like a turd sandwich.
@Pocket,
Isn’t that the truth! Yeah, I voted around 6:15 this morning. Since all but one of the slots in my area of Arlington were unopposed, I used the write-in option. Won’t change anything in Arl, of course, but I’m in an anti-incumbent mood, so what the hey!
So, who got your vote? Jim Morrison? Elvis?
You don’t have to be embarrassed. One vote for Ochocinco!
Let’s just say that I got very “creative” for someone who hadn’t had any coffee when I voted!
Shouldn’t those “word cloud” things only have a word appearing once? Isn’t that the whole point?
Lou, you are correct. I suspect Jeremy Cannon generated this word cloud using Wordle, which is the most popular online tool for doing so. If you read Wordle’s FAQ, you’ll notice that their algorithm does not do stemming, which refers to grouping words by their common base (e.g. work = working, choice = choices, etc). That would explain why such words are repeated within this particular cloud.
However, “County” appears twice in this particular word cloud, and I don’t have a good explanation for that without viewing the actual text Cannon entered.
Do you see other identical words appearing twice?
Take pride, Arlington! We’re probably the only municipality in America where the words “jobs” and “economy” aren’t mentioned in a single political campaign.
That’s what you get when your employment rate is the highest in the Nation already. Just like we don’t talk about clean drinking water very often (since we have it) or electricity for every home (have that, too)… you get the idea.
It is also what you get when you have county wide winner take all elections.
If that weren’t the case why would have the ACDC funded Alan Howze ??
Just looked at my ballot. Other than Merrick vs whatsherface, it’s all liberals running unopposed. Can I nominate my cats? Remy?
Go Remy! I am looking at the ballot and wonder why bother.
all positions have write-in candidates.
I haven’t the slightest doubt that Remy Munasifi would be a better County Board member than the three individuals on the ballot.
Then again, so would Jeremy Kapinos, Michael Landrum, Justin Trawick, et al.
How many of us ArlNow’ers do you suppose it would take to get Remy into the officially reported results? 25? 100?
Just do what I did when I voted early this morning. Use the write-in option. Won’t change anything, of course, but at least one can vote for someone besides the endless usual incumbents.
Reminds me of the elections in Iraq when Saddam was in power. Hell, any dictatorship with a facade of an “election” actually.
Merrick won’t win, but I hope she at least gets some decent votes for having the guts to run here. Sombody needs to challenge the nudnicks.
I always wonder why anyone running unopposed would even need to be on the ballot. I suppose they have to be on the ballot and have a slot for write ins, just to keep up appearances. I long for the day when all elected offices, not just the President, have term limits at the federal, state, and local level. I don’t believe that having any one party or person in power for too long is a good thing, whether Democrat, Republican, or anything else. For example, some Senators and Representatives were/have been in office for way too long and some of them only leave by an Act of the Almighty.
C’mon, a little hyperbole is a good thing, but we’re nowhere near the level of Saddam’s Iraq and we’re still a good ways ahead of places like the District. If anything, Arlington is more like Mexico from 1929 to 2000, where intense partisanship ensured a perfect dictatorship could continue nearly forever.
More importantly, Merrick’s chances are looking better than any local non-Democrat’s in quite a while.
So get off your butt and run for office, OB, instead of whining about how “someone” should challenge them.
I’m not a politician, drax. No thanks. I support the system in other ways.
Let’s Write “GoRemy” in for County Board instead of voting for Walter.
I am going to write in Antonelli for my second candidate…..
Write in his real name. Remy Munasifi. That’s what I’m doing. Going to vote in an hour.
I’ve been constantly amused by the campaign literature of both Merrick and Forrest passing themselves off as “independent” candidates. Funny how they’re trying to lose that R after their names. You can’t fool me, Ken Cuccinelli !
How’s voting for democrats working out for you?
You can always move to R dominated places like Mississippi. But you’re right – other than the low crime, high employment, nationally ranked schools, top notch county services like trash removal, leaf collection, and library facilities, and overall quality of life, Arlington is the pits. Throw those bum D’s out
If Arlington were not a stone’s throw from the big FAT federal government, it wouldn’t be this way and you might not be so happy, D. The rest of the country is the model. The DC area isn’t because of the FAT feds proping things up. Arlington Democrats can hardly take credit for that, but they should be held accountable for stupid decisions and wasted monies.
As for R dominated places, I would not be surprised to see Virginia red in the next Presidential election the way the economy is going. The immediate DC area will always be blue (as are many Northeast urban areas), but being outside of the beltway is hardly Mississippi.
So basically you want Dems to get no credit and all blame. Sure OB.
I didn’t say that, you did.
Sure.
You must not have been very far outside the beltway.
Fairfax = Mississippi? Nope.
Prince William = Mississippi? Nope.
Loudoun = Mississippi? Nope.
How far out should I go?
Try Page County (Luray). 90 miles west of Arlington, 9.7% unemployment, Republican senator and delegate. There are some areas in southern VA with +10% unemployment and deep Red representatives
These are rural areas with no massive Federal Government job base. Duh. Apples and oranges. Let’s look at an urban area with a massive industry. Detroit. Massive automobile industry. Democrat. In the pits big time. THAT is the comparison to make. Not Northern VA to Appalachia or Mississippi. What a joke….
Poisson distribution FTW
Just as a reminder, as understand it, Virginia law dosen’t allow party designation on state and local elections. With federal elections (e.g., representative, senator, president) the party affiliation can be shown for those folks on Virginia ballots.
The Delegate and State Senate races have party affiliations the local ones will not.
I don’t believe it’s an across the board Virginia law. The rules have to do with the governing charter for the community/jurisdiction. Many local jurisdictions don’t allow party designations because it disqualifies federal employee’s from running due to Hatch act restrictions. In this area that disqualifies an excessively large number of folks.
Well, there have been over 600 aftershocks in central Virginia since the Aug. earthquake. You can’t predict what will happen tomorrow. Never say never…
Wapo’s “unbiased” endorsements, ironically all democrats..
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/our-endorsements-for-virginia-races/2011/11/04/gIQAqwUHxM_story.html
We non liberals may not make a difference this time, but enough is enough! WE need to do something to stop the domination of Arlington by one party. This isn’t China or Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.
“This isn’t China or Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.”
Correct.
Give us better candidates from other parties, then I’ll vote for them.
All you folks complaining about how bad things are and all the dems running unopposed, why didn’t you run? We’d love to hear your ideas for change!
Guess it’s easier to complain online.
I’m not a sociopath, nor do I particularly like republicans. I just think they are the lesser of two evils. Anyone who desires to be a politician should be disqualified from being one. Politics attracts sociopaths like flies to you know what.
All you folks complaining about potholes in our roads get out there and fill them too!
I’m complaining because I think my dentist is too expensive. I should just take care of it myself.
LOL! Overgrown Bush, I don’t know how long you’ve lived in Arlington, but I assume long enough to see what some of us who’ve lived here long enough as a pattern: that nobody running against any incumbent in Arlington has a snowball’s chance in hell, so most opponents or potential opponents usually just write off Arlington. Ditto situation for a non-Republican, non-conservative, or even a moderate Dem or Republican in Mississippi – the long dominant party (machine?!) is solidly entrenched. Hence why I’d like term limits on all elected officials and offices, regardless of party or person.
BM, I would agree with you. We need term limits. Politicians should not have a career in one spot.
We have term limits. The voters can limit anyone to as many terms as they want at any time. It’s called elections.
Sure, you’d like term limits because you keep losing elections. You’d like to limit the choice of the majority of voters because you don’ t like who they pick. That’s what term limits are all about – thwarting democracy.
Then why does the President only get to be in office for 8 years? Is that not democratic?
Sure isn’t. We’d be happily beginnig the sixth term of the Clinton administration in just over a year.
That’s why we have term limits.
OB, we have term limits because we hate conservative Democrats? Despite his early attempt at socialized medicine (which he knew would fail and smartly got out of the way early to make good on his campaign promise without taking too big of a political hit) he’s the most conservative president we’ve had since Reagan. I understand that people don’t like him because of his lack of fidelity and perjury, but every one of the other presidents since Reagan was a big government-growing politician. Though he’s far from my ideal president, I’ll take Clinton over every single one of them – and Romney. We really shouldn’t get all hung up on the fact that there was a “D” after his name on the ballot since he was more conservative than most of the people who have an “R” after theirs.
ZV: No, we have term limits to keep any leader of the free world from holding power for more than 8 years. I’d agree Clinton was better than many, but I’d also point to him for flaws, just like any other leader. My point is we have term limits to keep overly popular leaders from being in control too long.
Hey OB, did you ever think of term limits as “limiting the choice of the majority of voters because you don’t like who they pick” or that “term limits are all about “thwarting democracy?” I want them to keep ANY political party or ANY politician REGARDLESS OF PARTY from being in power too long, getting too entrenched, etc., etc. Helps keep them more honest, IMHO, REGARDLESS if they are Repub, Dem, Green, or the purple polka dot people eater party.
Hey, at least I go and vote, no matter how jaded and cynical I am.
Term limits keep a democracy from becoming more corrupt and turning into a dictatorship. If you know your term is up, you won’t go around bribing and killing people just so you can stay in power.
My point exactly, OB. While I wouldn’t call Arlington County a dictatorship (they just have the same ole people in office for years without end, change or fresh blood), and Babs, Jay, Zimmie, Mary, Walter, Bea, etc. don’t go around killing people to stay in power, no matter what the party or who the person is, being in power too long makes becoming corrupt a big temptation. Term limits would very likely keep the usual political corruption by BOTH parties (emphasis to try and thwart off the local Stukas) down to a lower level. Term limits would also be more conducive to new and fresh blood in government.
The problem is that you’re comparing an executive position to a legislative body. In the executive position, power is concentrated in one individual; an individual who has the power of veto. That’s not to say that I’m not for term limits for all political offices, but comparing the two isn’t the same thing regardless of which side of the debate you fall on.
We complain here that the board and most of our state representatives keep getting elected uncontested, but there are plenty of conservative enclaves where the liberals suffer the same fate. The bottom line is it’s highly unlikely that anything but a very left-leaning liberal is going to get elected to the Arlington County Board, term limits or not, and the state districts are going to be very unlikely to elect anyone conservative. That’s just the nature of where we live. In other words, I doubt people like you and me would be very happy with the successors if the ACB had term limits. Not that I’m really happy with there being no conservative representation whatsoever in Arlington, but I’d rather it happened locally rather than the state or national level.
So OB and Lou, there are only a few professional politicians in a class that is capable of running for office?
Whiners always have excuses.
So can I assume that since you did not run against Ken Cuccinelli you agree with his positions? That’s awesome to know.
No excuses. Why should anyone who is critical of a leader have to run for office? That’s nuts. We’d have 10 million candidates. Everyone is, and should be, critical of leadership decisions. That’s how things improve. Being a lemming isn’t how to improve things.
I’m not sure what the “few professional politicians in a class” means, but everyone knows what it takes to win an election at any level is copious amounts of cash relative to the position being sought. Since the Republican Party knows they’re not going to win board seats here, they won’t usually fund support candidates running for the Arlington County Board.
Running a successful campaign takes a lot more than a good platform and stump-speech. Marketing, fund raising and political strategery (ha) are all areas that people study for years to learn and for which you must pay money if you want professional services. So to run for office people have to start by spending their own money in hopes of getting enough support from their party to purchase the services they’ll need to mount a reasonable campaign. Since the Republican Party wants to spend their resources where they do have a chance of winning, anyone wanting to run will have to pay all of the bills. I don’t understand why anyone would go through all of that to land a part time job that pays around $50K.
I voted for
SHOWME D. MONEY
for treasurer.
That’s too funny, Hikin’ the pike!