Thank you to the Matt, Mike, and Chris at OpenLeft.com for inviting me to blog here. As a blog reader, but infrequent contributer, I'm excited to join the discussion about how to propel this movement forward and bring together all the allies - national and local, insider and outsider, public figures and grassroots activists. My day job is in the political department of the AFL-CIO. I also work on the Analyst Group which is convened by the AFL-CIO and am co-founder and board member of the New Organizing Institute. That's for disclosure, though what I post here isn't official work of these organizations. Mike's post yesterday about the opportunities and challenges for labor and the netroots to build a strong relationship, has particular resonance for me - and sparked a great discussion. Thanks again to Matt, Chris and Mike for all your work to create this incredible, new space.
Last night, the former Alaskan Democratic party chairman Jake Metcalfe was in DC and stopped to meet with some folks. There was an interesting discussion with him about his background, family, why he decided to run for Congress, and what's important to the Alaskan electorate. Jake stepped down from the state party on Saturday to throw his hat into the ring in 2008 for the single house seat in Alaska. Jake has also worked as an attorney for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (Local 1547) and has a lot to say about labor in Alaska, one of the most union-dense states. Pending the primary in August of 08, the winner will face off against Don Young, who is currently the subject of a criminal inquiry.
Geographically, running a campaign is challenging because of the shear size of the state. Face to face campaigning with people outside the major population centers takes a lot of small plane flight. Costal communities are often reached by boat, particularly in the summer. As Jake refers to in the video, privacy and gun rights are two strong issues in Alaska politics.
Being a state that also relies on oil, timber, mining and other extraction industries also shapes the political dialogue. It's always good to be reminded about these geographic and cultural differences that shape peoples reactions.
It was only when I lived in Canada that I began to have a completely different take on some issues based on these geographic differences. For example, I had always been against wearing fur, but becuase it's so frakin' cold in Canada, all the sudden it made sense to me why people wore it. It's obvious, but good to be reminded of how difficult it is to manage these types of biases we forget are there.
One thing that people tend to agree on is that corruption is bad. Even that can play out differently though when people view it as a part of politics. It's hard to know what these corruption stories in Alaska will look like over the next 16 months and how that will shape the election. It is something people are looking at in Kentucky in the 2007 governors race, so we'll have to watch the approval ratings of these politicians closely to see if there's any similarities that can be drawn.
STATE BLOGS
