"Dear Friends,
Thank you for your support! We are very excited about the election results. Because of YOUR support, we forced the incumbent into a run-off election on April 17.
I would like to thank Tim Egan, Rachel Goodstein, and Peter Zelchenko for running strong campaigns. They showed up at the forums, knocked on doors, held coffees and shared their views with residents of the ward. Because of their efforts, the ward will be a better place to live.
In a multi-candidate race, a candidate must have a simple majority of 50% plus one vote in order to win outright, or the top two finishers participate in a run-off election. We made a very strong second-place showing, and the current incumbent received less than 50%. As a result, I'll be running as the only candidate against the incumbent on Tuesday, April 17, 2007.
Get involved! Contribute!
Our supporters are energized. There's clearly a mandate for change in this ward and I am eager to continue my campaign to give residents a true and decisive advocate in this community and in City Hall.
Get involved! Volunteer!
After more than 8 years in office, the incumbent has failed to win the confidence of the majority of residents in the 43rd Ward. I look forward to debating the issues with Mrs. Daley during the next phase of this campaign.
Thank you again for all that you do.
Sincerely,
Michele Smith"
Very interesting. Smith is claiming a mandate for change while identifying Daley as an alderman who failed to win the confidence of the majority of voters.
The tone of Daley's letter vs. Smith's was pretty striking to me -- the old guard vs. the potential new one.
Let the games begin!
4 comments:
So smith campaign is very excited by no turnout and lucky to keep Vi just under 50% by less than a few hundred votes according to Vi. Smith is puffing about majority of ward residents not supporting Vi. I guess the majority is really like Smith, they don't care to vote. This should wake Vi and her neighborhood people up.
Mrs. Daley is the one who should wake up.
The truth of the matter is more people in this election voted against the alderman than
for her.
In a 5-person contest Michele received a third
of the vote and that is impressive.
Wonder what excuse TEAM VI comes up with
this time to avoid participating in real debate.
Should be fun.
Wow, I really thought that people who voted for Tim Egan were actually voting for him ( I did) - not against Vi or Michelle. But with your suggestion that people voted against Vi - doesn't that mean that almost 70% of the ward voted against Michelle Smith? I mean, just to be fair, let's look at everything evenly.
Jeannie, my thought is that your rationale would be exactly right if Vi were not an incumbent. If all five candidates were attempting to fill an open position, then your figuring would be right on.
I think it's different because Vi already has the job, though. Everyone who voted *for* Tim or *for* Michele or Peter or Rachel were also voting for change.
They decided they didn't want the person currently in the position and chose whom they were for instead.
If you're going to look at the percentage for or against Michele, I think you have to leave Vi's number of votes out of it and analyze it just by the number of people who voted for change.
--jr
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