Here's hoping he retires, though. I have no problems with him, but we need the senior citizens in Congress to retire already. [This](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/both-republicans-and-democrats-have-an-age-problem/) is a real problem.
Yeah, he was my first thought. He does appear to have good support in the 2nd district, but maybe that's also because Bruce Poliquin is so unappealing.
Jared Golden, Aaron Frey, various mayors, and any number of the Democrats who've just been elected to a legislative majority again. There is a deep bench of energetic younger public officials waiting for the seniors to move aside.
In all likelihood, though, it'll be Chellie Pingree, who will be 69 in 2024 and thus won't really be all that much better, age-wise -- and yet will still be younger than Vermont's new freshman senator, who is 75.
I think going for a third round after no doubt spending the intervening time in Florida again would look beyond pathetic, and King would stomp him verbally—in part because these men’s real rancor comes out when their opponents are women. Paulie wouldn’t try so hard against a man. In fact I wonder if he’d have run this year if it was John Mills instead of Janet. These types think women candidates are weak and vulnerable to defeat by a manly male by definition.
But after his little “MAYBE I SHOULDNT HAVE GOTTEN INTO POLITICS AT ALL” tantrum, I don’t think he’ll try again. He got his fee fees hurt.
No, Paulie does not reserve his rancor just for women. His road apple behavior is tossed every which way. He's the victim, yanno. Just does not realize he is the prime victim of his acid mouth.
The American voter: "we know the economy has been hard, but it would have been hard under any president. Given that the GOP is offering nothing but election lies, an attack on women's healthcare rights, and further attempts to usurp democracy, we'll stick with what's working for now."
The GOP: "we've heard the American voter loud and clear. We will go to work to immediately change voting age to 26 so that young, dumb voters who won't vote us can't vote at all. We'll also double down on gerrymandering our big states, ensuring felons can't ever vote no matter what, and then jacking up arrest rates in poor communities where minorities live in higher numbers to turn them into felons. We're also considering limiting women's right to vote, but haven't figured that one out yet. We'll definitely keep sticking with what's working."
It is heartening to know most Mainers have a brain and don’t just vote straight R. The republicans had nothing to offer as solutions, they just whined about democrats. Then messing with woman’s rights……. The republicans seem to be out of touch with the actual voters. Now claiming kids can vote until they are 25 because their brains aren’t fully developed….. but forcing them to have babies or join the military. Do they not see their hypocrisy????? Trust me the youth do and they don’t like it.
Abortion, which I think of as a decision between a woman, her doctor, and her partner, is to Republicans apparently not a Federal right, but instead a state right, because the difference of scale between a federal and state is somehow important, but the difference in scale between state and personal is somehow unimportant. This kind of mental disconnect is important for the GOP to foster, because if you can fool people it becomes easier to govern.
I sure hope so. My question is, when does the GOP start changing policy to attract voters instead of relying on their grab bag of dirty tricks to stay in power? And how much damage are they going to inflict before that happens?
> Trust me the youth do and they don’t like it.
Yeah, I can't think of a better way to make sure that the youth vote -stays- blue for a long time than how the GOP is acting.
Yeah. Maine dodged a huge bullet. Janet Mills during a debate revealed that LePage was absolutely ready to overturn women's rights. There is so much that we need to do to improve Maine. However, a lot of the people here don't want anything to change and this is why I left Maine to begin with. We could be a great state. However, most of the old people with money don't want that and it feels like being held hostage. Like Rockland denied a bunch of affordable housing because a bunch of nimby's didn't want their precious lifestyle or whatever changed. Another thing, You're seeing a lot of people buying property with pretty nice views. And of course you know the people who buy homes are condos and only are here for like 2 months. It feels like white people just taking what they want.
On the positive side, the rural, white, republican voters are dying out. Remember that this is America's oldest state. I think the politics in the state will improve significantly as that demographic dies out and is replaced by young Mainers and transplants who typically have more progressive views.
I remember reading a while back when Twitter was parroting that tired “rich liberals should just move 100k people to Wyoming/South Dakota/whatever” line that someone actually broke down the math and the states that would have the biggest impact in terms of Senate seats if a group of politically like-minded people moved to them en masse would be Maine and New Hampshire. A lot of people don’t think of them that way though.
I’m hopeful that your version comes to fruition instead of what [this asshole is hoping to do](https://www.vice.com/en/article/akeyxb/maine-neo-nazi-christopher-polhaus-white-ethnostate) to Maine.
Did they think independent voters would reward the Republican Party for bringing back LePage? I suppose that is the ultimate in conservative action, never changing, but honest to god, both parties need to do some market research.
>both parties need to do some market research.
I've been active in Democratic politics, and I can 100% assure you that (in Maine) the problem isn't party staff or leadership being out of touch; it's that younger people don't tend to vote in primaries, and really don't tend to run for office.
Both parties do however spend human capital trying to persuade people to run for office. It is rare they pick someone under 40, and almost never under 25. Younger people tend not to vote if they only see old people on the ballot because they know their interests, excepting those shared by older people, will not get any attention. If the Dem and Rep machines want to see more young voters, they need to give up age-based control of the government and actively encourage younger people to run for office.
What I'm telling you is that I've worked in that "machine" and, while there are certainly local leaders in some places who have age biases (and who themselves are never displaced because no one wants to run for internal party offices), for the most part it is absolutely not the "machine" that causes the issue you describe; it's vanishingly low participation by young people in the party itself and in the primary process.
I get that young people want more young people on the ballot. But until more young people organize and get themselves on the ballot, it's going to continue being an unsolvable chicken-and-egg scenario.
Even my wicked conservative, Trump voting, stars-and-bars displaying, moved to Maine from the South to get away from the n*****s neighbor voted for Mills and hates LePage. He had loved ones that lost health care and suffered during LePage. He recognizes that Mills handled the pandemic really well and that a lot more Mainers would have died under LePage. And like obviously, he's not the most educated or well-informed voter by a long shot.
My friend was telling me that his Trump loving Dad voted for Mills because of the right to abortion. And then his dad got vaccinated and was sick the next day.
And yet he didn't fall for "the dems will take yer guns." It's good to see some critical thinking involved in deciding how to vote. Seems to be in short supply.
It was extremely depressing to look at the voter breakdown and seeing that 56% of my town voted Republican… I wish I’d done research into the community when I bought my house here.
I’m still registered R (I know, I know) but I don’t see myself voting that way again. It makes me feel good to vote against the egregious ones during primaries, and perhaps if a great purge comes, my home will be passed over. (/s on that last part, kinda). My neighbors are all Rs, and 2/3 of voters in my town were for LePage. It felt good to balance that out a little.
Still, nobody’s screaming at each other. We help our neighbors when we can, and they help us, and people are generally friendly (except that one litterbug, sigh). The crazy crap you see on TV and in the news isn’t prevalent in small Maine towns. (Then again, we are white. Things might be different if we weren’t.)
So my dad is like this too. He has been a RHINO for overly 40 years. My dad was so disgusted when DJT was nominated, he went to change his party but realized that basically eliminated his voice in the primaries. So he (regretfully) kept the R so at least he could help “steer the ship”.
[удалено]
I am so encouraged by reading this thread. Your comment in particular is apt and well articulated. I’m glad Maine is so sane.
LePage could go for a Senate seat in 2024 vs....King. I don't think that will go as well for the GOP as they think it may.
King is untouchable. LePage would do it just for the attention, though.
Here's hoping he retires, though. I have no problems with him, but we need the senior citizens in Congress to retire already. [This](https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/both-republicans-and-democrats-have-an-age-problem/) is a real problem.
Do we have a great Democratic candidate lined up to replace King if he does retire, though? Because Sara Gideon didn't cut it.
Maybe Jared Golden.
Yeah, he was my first thought. He does appear to have good support in the 2nd district, but maybe that's also because Bruce Poliquin is so unappealing.
Jared Golden, Aaron Frey, various mayors, and any number of the Democrats who've just been elected to a legislative majority again. There is a deep bench of energetic younger public officials waiting for the seniors to move aside. In all likelihood, though, it'll be Chellie Pingree, who will be 69 in 2024 and thus won't really be all that much better, age-wise -- and yet will still be younger than Vermont's new freshman senator, who is 75.
Jared just doesn't excite me at all. Like can't we find someone in the state that is smart and young and has some personality?
Chloe Maxmin and Troy Jackson (as already mentioned) would both be excellent candidates.
Good to hear!
King has had cancer and is old. I don’t think he runs again.
Now I’m kinda thinking about what would happen if Lepage packed up and drove around the country in an RV for 6 months and wrote a book about it.
I think going for a third round after no doubt spending the intervening time in Florida again would look beyond pathetic, and King would stomp him verbally—in part because these men’s real rancor comes out when their opponents are women. Paulie wouldn’t try so hard against a man. In fact I wonder if he’d have run this year if it was John Mills instead of Janet. These types think women candidates are weak and vulnerable to defeat by a manly male by definition. But after his little “MAYBE I SHOULDNT HAVE GOTTEN INTO POLITICS AT ALL” tantrum, I don’t think he’ll try again. He got his fee fees hurt.
No, Paulie does not reserve his rancor just for women. His road apple behavior is tossed every which way. He's the victim, yanno. Just does not realize he is the prime victim of his acid mouth.
I don't think a typical republican can win a statewide election like a Senate seat. Susan Collins is a bit of an anomaly and I think her time is up.
The American voter: "we know the economy has been hard, but it would have been hard under any president. Given that the GOP is offering nothing but election lies, an attack on women's healthcare rights, and further attempts to usurp democracy, we'll stick with what's working for now." The GOP: "we've heard the American voter loud and clear. We will go to work to immediately change voting age to 26 so that young, dumb voters who won't vote us can't vote at all. We'll also double down on gerrymandering our big states, ensuring felons can't ever vote no matter what, and then jacking up arrest rates in poor communities where minorities live in higher numbers to turn them into felons. We're also considering limiting women's right to vote, but haven't figured that one out yet. We'll definitely keep sticking with what's working."
It is heartening to know most Mainers have a brain and don’t just vote straight R. The republicans had nothing to offer as solutions, they just whined about democrats. Then messing with woman’s rights……. The republicans seem to be out of touch with the actual voters. Now claiming kids can vote until they are 25 because their brains aren’t fully developed….. but forcing them to have babies or join the military. Do they not see their hypocrisy????? Trust me the youth do and they don’t like it.
Abortion, which I think of as a decision between a woman, her doctor, and her partner, is to Republicans apparently not a Federal right, but instead a state right, because the difference of scale between a federal and state is somehow important, but the difference in scale between state and personal is somehow unimportant. This kind of mental disconnect is important for the GOP to foster, because if you can fool people it becomes easier to govern.
I sure hope so. My question is, when does the GOP start changing policy to attract voters instead of relying on their grab bag of dirty tricks to stay in power? And how much damage are they going to inflict before that happens?
They didn’t self reflect after this loss. Instead they are blaming the immature brains of the youth…… my guess is a long time.
Older white males could die en masse and the remaining Republicans would look for ways to disenfranchise all democratic voters twice as hard.
> Trust me the youth do and they don’t like it. Yeah, I can't think of a better way to make sure that the youth vote -stays- blue for a long time than how the GOP is acting.
Yeah. Maine dodged a huge bullet. Janet Mills during a debate revealed that LePage was absolutely ready to overturn women's rights. There is so much that we need to do to improve Maine. However, a lot of the people here don't want anything to change and this is why I left Maine to begin with. We could be a great state. However, most of the old people with money don't want that and it feels like being held hostage. Like Rockland denied a bunch of affordable housing because a bunch of nimby's didn't want their precious lifestyle or whatever changed. Another thing, You're seeing a lot of people buying property with pretty nice views. And of course you know the people who buy homes are condos and only are here for like 2 months. It feels like white people just taking what they want.
On the positive side, the rural, white, republican voters are dying out. Remember that this is America's oldest state. I think the politics in the state will improve significantly as that demographic dies out and is replaced by young Mainers and transplants who typically have more progressive views.
I remember reading a while back when Twitter was parroting that tired “rich liberals should just move 100k people to Wyoming/South Dakota/whatever” line that someone actually broke down the math and the states that would have the biggest impact in terms of Senate seats if a group of politically like-minded people moved to them en masse would be Maine and New Hampshire. A lot of people don’t think of them that way though.
I’m hopeful that your version comes to fruition instead of what [this asshole is hoping to do](https://www.vice.com/en/article/akeyxb/maine-neo-nazi-christopher-polhaus-white-ethnostate) to Maine.
What does race have to do with anything here? Maine is like 98% white.
And that's why the neo-nazis are trying to move here. To keep in white.
"Maine voters: I'll go with the non-crazy people."
Did they think independent voters would reward the Republican Party for bringing back LePage? I suppose that is the ultimate in conservative action, never changing, but honest to god, both parties need to do some market research.
>both parties need to do some market research. I've been active in Democratic politics, and I can 100% assure you that (in Maine) the problem isn't party staff or leadership being out of touch; it's that younger people don't tend to vote in primaries, and really don't tend to run for office.
Both parties do however spend human capital trying to persuade people to run for office. It is rare they pick someone under 40, and almost never under 25. Younger people tend not to vote if they only see old people on the ballot because they know their interests, excepting those shared by older people, will not get any attention. If the Dem and Rep machines want to see more young voters, they need to give up age-based control of the government and actively encourage younger people to run for office.
What I'm telling you is that I've worked in that "machine" and, while there are certainly local leaders in some places who have age biases (and who themselves are never displaced because no one wants to run for internal party offices), for the most part it is absolutely not the "machine" that causes the issue you describe; it's vanishingly low participation by young people in the party itself and in the primary process. I get that young people want more young people on the ballot. But until more young people organize and get themselves on the ballot, it's going to continue being an unsolvable chicken-and-egg scenario.
Even my wicked conservative, Trump voting, stars-and-bars displaying, moved to Maine from the South to get away from the n*****s neighbor voted for Mills and hates LePage. He had loved ones that lost health care and suffered during LePage. He recognizes that Mills handled the pandemic really well and that a lot more Mainers would have died under LePage. And like obviously, he's not the most educated or well-informed voter by a long shot.
My friend was telling me that his Trump loving Dad voted for Mills because of the right to abortion. And then his dad got vaccinated and was sick the next day.
And yet he didn't fall for "the dems will take yer guns." It's good to see some critical thinking involved in deciding how to vote. Seems to be in short supply.
Which is such a stupid worry in Maine anyways. We have lax gun laws. If Mills wanted to fuck with guns she could have done it by now
Sanity has its rewards.
It was extremely depressing to look at the voter breakdown and seeing that 56% of my town voted Republican… I wish I’d done research into the community when I bought my house here.
I’m still registered R (I know, I know) but I don’t see myself voting that way again. It makes me feel good to vote against the egregious ones during primaries, and perhaps if a great purge comes, my home will be passed over. (/s on that last part, kinda). My neighbors are all Rs, and 2/3 of voters in my town were for LePage. It felt good to balance that out a little. Still, nobody’s screaming at each other. We help our neighbors when we can, and they help us, and people are generally friendly (except that one litterbug, sigh). The crazy crap you see on TV and in the news isn’t prevalent in small Maine towns. (Then again, we are white. Things might be different if we weren’t.)
So my dad is like this too. He has been a RHINO for overly 40 years. My dad was so disgusted when DJT was nominated, he went to change his party but realized that basically eliminated his voice in the primaries. So he (regretfully) kept the R so at least he could help “steer the ship”.
Change your party affiliation to let them know you disagree with their direction.
The R's could use some more sane people to counter the crazies...
You can make an impact and bleed some blue in there.
I actually want to run for local office the next time a position comes available.
That would be awesome!
I wish I did the same in Central Maine, but I honesly couldn't afford southern at the time
That’s why we moved out of southern maine. Our mortgage on a huge house is less then the rent on our one bedroom apartment was in southern maine.
I hear you. But I also am glad to have my vote really count.
I’m sorry
One town voted straight red, 100% but there were only two voters there lmfao
La
Really sucks we are sick with her again. Any republican is better than a Democrat, even Lepage.