{"id":9011,"date":"2010-10-30T12:13:46","date_gmt":"2010-10-30T12:13:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/gregladen\/2010\/10\/30\/my-ballot-for-next-tuesday-pag-1\/"},"modified":"2010-10-30T12:13:46","modified_gmt":"2010-10-30T12:13:46","slug":"my-ballot-for-next-tuesday-pag-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/2010\/10\/30\/my-ballot-for-next-tuesday-pag-1\/","title":{"rendered":"My Ballot for Next Tuesday: Page Two"},"content":{"rendered":"

I already posted my Page One voting choices for this year’s election<\/a>. Now it is time to turn the ballot over and talk about judges. In the mean time, if you are in or near Minneapolis, Hennepin County or the Fifth Congressional District, I invite you to have a look at this ballot<\/a>, as it might be useful to you.
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\nJudges are difficult as elections are inherently political and judges try to pretend to not be. However, a little digging can help determine the philosophical leanings of judges in a way that may matter, or information about their competence or lack thereof. Or, if the are a teabagger or something appalling like that.<\/p>\n

In the following, I rely in large part (though not entirely) on three posts at Minnesota Progressive: Minnesota Judicial Elections 2010<\/a>, Minnesota Judicial Elections 2010 (part 2)<\/a>, Minnesota Judicial Elections 2010 (part 3)<\/a>, and Minnesota Judicial Elections 2010 (part 4)<\/a>, all by Progressive writer Rachel Nygaard. If you don’t see a judge from your ballot in my discussion, check out Rachel’s posts, as she may have covered that race there. (I’m only giving you my local ballot.)<\/p>\n

Supreme Court Associate Justice Seat 2<\/strong><\/p>\n

For this seat on the Minnesota Supreme Court, I’m voting for Helen Meyer<\/strong>, the incumbent. She is being challenged by a meathead libertairan teabagger who has an understanding of the Constitution that reminds me of Michel Bachmann: I.e, he is a moron. I don’t need to know much about Meyer to vote for her.<\/p>\n

Supreme Court Associate Justice Seat 6<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life (the yahooistic anti-choice organization) has a candidate in the race, and his name is Tim Tingelstat. He wants scripture to guide what we teach in schools, and has suggested that the churches simply be contracted to run our school system. The guy is a total nutcase. I’m voting, therefore, for Alan Page<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

For those of you from out of state, I should note that Tingelstat is a really common name around here. There is a Tinglestat or two in our legislature, and there is one running for Soil and Water supervisor.<\/p>\n

Supreme Court Associate Justice Seat 5<\/strong><\/p>\n

There is only one candidate running, Christopher Dietzen. I don’t like Penwell, and won’t vote for him. For example, he does not think it is the job of the judiciary to protect people from abuse of rights that are not written in the constitution (even though the Constitution actually provides a special “meta-right” for all the rights that are generally accepted but not written specifically in the constitution, which is readily evoked by Republicans and Teabaggers when convenient). I may write someone in. Suggestions would be appreciated<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Court of Appeals Judge 13<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the race of challenger Roxann Klugman vs Randolph Peterson is harder to call with real information, as little is available, but the dogwhistles and subtle hints seem to indicate that Klugman is a Repulbican and I have yet to meet one I’d vote for. So, I’m sticking with Randolph Peterson<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Court of Appeals Judge 14<\/strong><\/p>\n

In this race, an apparent teabagger, Dan Griffith, is challenging the incumbant, Larry Stauber Jr. Griffith is one of those who think our country has been taken away from “us” (by Obama and the Mosslemansymp Libruls). He has stated “It is not just about meaningful elections. It is about what you do once you get elected. We need to take our country back!” So, I’m voting for the seeming compentant Larry Stauber<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

There is a whole slew of court of appeals candidates running unopposed. I am not inclined to write in alternatives, and will likely not vote for any of them. I’m sure many of them are fine, but voting is about choice, and with no choice, why not send the message that there should be a choice?<\/p>\n

10th District Court, Seat 3<\/strong><\/p>\n

There are 24 candidates running for this seat and we get to pick one. This is n open eat, and the bar is low for running in this race, and apparently everyone wants this job. I used hthis<\/a> to narrow the field to a half dozen or so, reapplied some of Rachel’s own criteria to knock off a couple of others, eliminated anyone who was mainly a prosecutor, and then ended up picking Lindy Yokanovich<\/strong> because she won the Pro Bono award. So I figure she’s more on our side than their side, depending on who they are (and who we are).<\/p>\n

10th District Judge 27<\/strong><\/p>\n

Teabagger John Dehen, a misogynist anti-choice violent would be felon is challenging the respected and experienced Michael Roith. Hmmm let’s see … I think I’ll vote for Michael Roith<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The remaining Judaical seats in my voting area are uncontested.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I already posted my Page One voting choices for this year’s election. Now it is time to turn the ballot over and talk about judges. In the mean time, if you are in or near Minneapolis, Hennepin County or the Fifth Congressional District, I invite you to have a look at this ballot, as it … Continue reading My Ballot for Next Tuesday: Page Two<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[4588],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5fhV1-2ll","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9011"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9011"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9011\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9011"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9011"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gregladen.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9011"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}