Democrats Rally for Gun Violence Prevention

This story was first published by InDepthNH on June 4, 2022.  For a free subscription to InDepthNH, just fill in the boxes when you visit www.InDepthNH.org.

CONCORD, NEW HAMPSHIRE—It’s been 3 weeks since the killing of 10 African American shoppers and workers in a Buffalo, New York grocery store. It’s been 10 days since the killing of 19 children and 2 teachers in a Uvalde, Texas elementary school. As in other states, people who are fed up with gun violence are taking to the streets of New Hampshire to demand change.

Call it an alternative replacement theory. If the politicians currently holding office won’t do anything about gun violence, voters should replace them with people who will. For the Democrats who rallied in Concord Saturday, that means throwing out Republicans like Governor Chris Sununu.

“The whole point of it is to be here to protest against gun violence and to protest for taking control in our country,” said Wendy Lapham of Concord, who leaned against the wall by Gibson’s Bookstore in downtown Concord with a sign reading “Kids cannot be replaced. Politicians can.” Lapham said she also came to hear Senator Tom Sherman, who wants to replace Sununu in the corner office.

Lapham was one of about five dozen people who gathered outside Gibson’s, cheered for Democratic candidates, and marched with signs through downtown Concord. Many of them were wearing orange, the color designated by national gun violence prevention groups.

“We’re prisoners in our own society,” said Stephanie Payeur or Henniker, co-chair of the NH Democratic Party’s Women’s Caucus and organizer of the rally. “You can’t go to the grocery store. You can’t go to the movies. You can’t go to a concert without the risk and the fear of being gunned down by an AR-15.”

When it was his turn at the microphone, Senator Sherman said, “This is about our families. This is about Columbine, Sandy Hook, Parkland, Aurora, Uvalde, Buffalo, most recently in Tulsa. And this is about politicians not standing up, not just for families, not just for children, but for law enforcement, who are outgunned when the

criminals have these weapons.”

“Sununu vetoed four bills last biennium that were common sense gun safety measures, not taking away anybody’s gun,” he added.

Asked about the Uvalde killings at a press conference last Wednesday, Sununu said, “We’re not looking to make any changes” in the state’s gun laws.

Senator Becky Whitley pointed out that not only had Sununu vetoed measures aimed at reducing gun violence, but he also signed into law a “constitutional carry” bill in 2017, which enables anyone who is not prohibited from owning firearms to carry concealed firearms without a permit.

The time for silence is over, said Melanie Levesque of Brookline, a former state senator who wants to return to the State House. “I thought the tipping point was when 20 children were killed at Sandy Hook. That was not the tipping point. But I feel a tipping point now,” she said. Get to know your elected officials and what they stand for, Levesque urged, then talk to your friends and neighbors.

Representative Debra Altschiller of Stratham, who

is running for Sherman’s Senate seat, passed out pre-printed postcards to Sununu calling on the governor to veto HB 1178, a bill aiming to block state and local cooperation with enforcement of federal gun laws.

Speakers had loads of statistics. Twelve children a day die from gun violence, which is now the leading cause of death among children and teens. There were 233 mass shootings in the first 5 months of 2022, leaving 256 dead and 1010 injured. There have been 2,032 school shootings since 1970, 948 of them since the 2012 massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

Speakers also had a list of names and ages of people who died in mass shootings this year. When the marchers reached the State House, volunteers read the names, concluding with the 10 people killed in Buffalo on May 14, 4 people killed in Stanwood, Michigan, on May 27, 4 people killed in Tulsa on May 27, and 21 killed in Uvalde on May 24.

With a far larger crowd downtown for the weekly farmers’ market, Liz McKinney used the opportunity to pass out postcards about HB 1178. About 80% of the people she spoke to were supportive, she said.

A similar rally took place Friday at City Hall Plaza in Manchester. Next Saturday, high school students will hold a “March for Our Lives” in Nashua.

Wendy Lapham hopes things are different than they were after Columbine, after Sandy Hook, after Parkland, after all the other mass shootings. “People have absolutely had enough, and things will be different this time,” she said.

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Democracy Defenders Rally at State House

My latest ‘Active With the Activists” column for InDepthNH, published there on November 5, 2020.

CONCORD – Alarm bells went off across the country when President Donald Trump began signaling that he might not concede power if he were to lose the election on November 3.

Sparked in part by articles published by George Lakey and Daniel Hunter, who pointed out that in other countries coups have been successfully resisted by mass nonviolent action, groups in New Hampshire started to plan for contingencies.  With analysis and models provided by national projects such as Choose Democracy and Protect the Results, New Hampshire activist groups hatched plans for active resistance should it be called for.

Sure enough, Trump tweeted late on election night, that “they are trying to STEAL the Election” by actually counting votes cast through mailed-in ballots.  “We want all voting to stop,” he ranted, after all voting had in fact stopped but while votes were still being counted.  

Later on Wednesday, as the sun went down over the State House and vote counts in Michigan and Wisconsin were indicating that Joe Biden had probably won, a crowd of nearly  200 people gathered in Concord to “send a clear message that all the votes are counted nationally,” in the words of Asma Elhuni, Movement Politics Director for Rights and Democracy.

Joined by members of 350NH, the NH Youth Movement, and the Manchester, Nashua, and Seacoast chapters of Black Lives Matter, speakers made clear that they were not there just to bid adieu to Donald Trump.

Debbie Opramolla of NH Poor People’s Campaign speaks to the crowd in Concord.

While obviously looking forward to the departure from the White House of a man who has openly given comfort to white supremacists, the speakers, mostly young women of color, delivered emphatic statements that the defense of the interests of Black people, immigrants, workers, and the LGBTQ community can’t be left to Joe Biden and the traditional leaders of the Democratic Party.   

Elhuni, whose organization campaigns on issues such as raising the minimum wage, promoting Medicare for All, and stopping the use of fossil fuels, said they were also there to send “a strong message to our local government that we are going to continue organizing and that they need to listen to the people, and that we are going to continue to demand fair and equitable policies.” Elhuni and other speakers made it clear that whatever the election’s outcome, an end to racism and inequality will require continued vigilance and more.

In the meantime, “we could be dealing with a coup-like situation,” commented Josie Pinto, Political Director for the NH Youth Movement, when the rally ended.  “Today we made it clear that we are going to do everything we can to make sure every vote is counted, that we are watching, and that we are not going anywhere,” Pinto added.

Plans for additional rallies, tentatively set for Hanover, Manchester, Dover, Laconia, Portsmouth, Keene, Exeter, and Plymouth on Saturday, may be called off if it looks like Trump has lost and is willing to concede defeat.  On the other hand, if Trump follows through on threats to refuse to go along with a peaceful transition in defiance of the will of voters, New Hampshire groups are ready to take to the streets.  

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Plutocratic Populism and the Flight from Democracy

A review of Let Them Eat Tweets: How the Right Rules in an Age of Extreme Inequality, by Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson, Liveright Publishing, 2020.

This was posted first at InDepthNH, a great place to find news and commentary about New Hampshire. 

Members of the Lincoln Project, out to save the Republican Party from Trumpism, should look deeper than the current president’s failings, too numerous to count. For that matter, Democrats and their allies, out to stave off authoritarianism, should look beyond Trump and the next election as well. As Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson see it, Trumpism sits on top of a deepening alignment between the nation’s economic elite and the Republican Party. It is that alignment which threatens democracy and which commands our attention, they argue in their latest book, Let Them Eat Tweets: How the Right Rules in a Age of Extreme Inequality.

The clever title is no doubt intended to grab attention, but as they say right up front, the book is not primarily about Donald Trump’s style of communication. The book is about the modern Republican Party, which in dogged pursuit of an unpopular agenda serving the interests of large corporations and the wealthy overclass has maneuvered itself into a position where it has no choice but to follow a path hostile to majoritarian governance.

They call it “plutocratic populism,” bolstered by the “3 R’s,” resentment, racialization, and rigging.

As Hacker and Pierson see it, the new perils facing our always imperfect democracy stem from “the Conservative Dilemma.” If conservatism can be understood largely as defense of entrenched economic interests, conservative parties face a perpetual problem if they want to win support from voters whose interests don’t align with the upper class. As the franchise expanded, the dilemma grew larger. And as our society has become ever more unequal in recent decades, defenders of the upper class faced a bigger challenge. Had they followed the example of British conservatives, they would have moderated their policies to bring more voters into the fold. Instead, Republicans have time after time stuck with the wealthy and adopted politics rooted in social division, especially racism, to reach for a majority.

It wasn’t always this way. As Hacker and Pierson explain, Richard Nixon’s infamous “southern strategy” mobilized the forces of racist white backlash to flip southern states from the Democratic to the Republican camp. But Nixon also expanded Social Security, supported a guaranteed family income, established the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, and created the Environmental Protection Agency. “In other words,” the authors say, “Nixon paired resentment and reassurance, employing ‘dog whistle’ racial appeals but also affirming the New Deal’s commitments to a strong welfare state and federal support for organized labor.”

Post-Nixon, the GOP put the welfare state on its enemies list. Instead of a Nixonian party “that moved left on economics while moving right on race,” the conservatives forgot about the interests of those Nixon had termed “the forgotten Americans.”

The rise of plutocracy is better documented elsewhere, for example in Nancy McLean’s Democracy in Chains, focused on the influence of James Buchanan; Jane Mayer’s Dark Money, examining the Koch network; Dollarocracy, John Nichols’ and Robert McChesney’s look at the impact of the Citizens United ruling; and Hedrick Smith’s Who Stole the American Dream, which traces the rise of the “bosses’ revolt” to Lewis Powell’s 1971 memo recommending a multi-faceted influence operation led by big business to counter rising popular demands.

The right-wing economic agenda was disturbingly successful, setting off organized labor’s decline, stagnation of wages for most working Americans, the rise of financial services sector, and the now irrefutable chasm between the ultra-rich and everyone else. Republicans embraced plutocracy and haven’t looked back. By the second decade of the 21^st century, “the growing resource and power gap between the rich and the rest – and the divergent interests and commitments that came with it – would put the GOP in a tightening vise.” As the plutocrat lobby pushed Republicans further into the realm of unpopular policies (very few people really support tax cuts for the ultra-rich, for example), Republicans waded deeper into the politics of racism and resentment in order to have any hopes of winning elections. That, in turn, meant tightening their bonds with white evangelicals, the firearms lobby, and a network of right-wing media organizations, all of which depended on racism to mobilize outrage among white voters whose class interests were of no interest to the party.

Of interest is that Trump, who boasted, “I’m really rich” on the campaign trails, did not run on a plutocratic agenda in 2016. On health care, he said, “I’m going to take care of everybody.” He said he wouldn’t cut Medicare or Medicaid. He pledged to bring back industrial jobs lost to the dynamics of capitalist globalization and technological change. And, of course, he pledged to “drain the swamp.” Once in office, though, the plutocrats took over, with Mike Pence serving as the essential liaison with both the social right and the Koch-funded network on the economic right. Trump’s cabinet would soon resemble an elite club, populated with the likes of Betsy DeVos, Wilbur Ross, and Steve Mnuchin, joined by a swampful of corporate lobbyists.

“What the Republican establishment wanted to do,” write Hacker and Pierson, ”was not in doubt. Over the prior two decades, since Gingrich led the GOP’s takeover of Congress in 1994, the party had pushed a consistent, albeit ever more aggressive, policy agenda design to advance plutocratic interests. Republican leaders sought to sharply cut taxes on the wealthy and corporations, roll back expensive social welfare programs and remove irksome environmental and consumer regulations. And they sought to install judges who would extend and protect those achievements.”

The final point deserves emphasis. Protection of an undemocratic agenda has relied on support from the branch of government least under the influence of voters, the judiciary. It is there where the conservatives have stealthily organized to win appointments for jurists embracing a “judicial philosophy that combines a retreat of the state on economics and the advancement of the state to protect and sometimes enforce the views of religious conservatives.”

“The fundamental problem is now familiar,” write Hacker and Pierson. “The Republican Party is ever more committed to the narrow and unpopular priorities of corporations and the superrich. It is ever more dependent on radical surrogate groups to mobilize voters its economic policies do not help. And among those voters, it is ever more reliant on a demographic group in relative decline: older whites without a college degree living outside urban areas, particularly older white men.”

“None of these trends is sustainable,” they state. “Or at least none is sustainable in the context of free and fair elections and majority rule,” which explains why Republicans have become so committed to gerrymandering and voter suppression.

Arguing with backing from historical examples and public opinion surveys, the two political scientists carefully lay out their case and in conclusion, provide advice on saving Republicanism from plutocracy. “The core challenge,” they say, “is finding a path that brings the conservative party into the democratic fold and encourages it to stay there.” Step One would be a decisive defeat for Trumpism, not just Trump. Step Two would be an aggressive campaign that deals reversals to the plutocrats, rejects ethnonationalism, and addresses the economic interests of the non-plutocrat majority.

For the Democrats, that doesn’t just mean capturing some “can’t we all just get along” place in the shifting center, but actually taking progressive stands on issues like taxes, wages, health, education, and combating racism. It may not be an easy lift, but it’s no doubt the essential one.

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Someone Tell Paul Ryan

How the Pie is Sliced

When Paul Ryan appears in Dover NH tomorrow morning (11 am at the McConnell Center), someone should tell him about a new report from the Congressional Research Service, a non-partisan arm of the Library of Congress, on the impact of tax cuts.

In a report released Friday, September 14, Thomas L. Hungerford analyzed the changes in the top tax rates in relationship to GDP growth. 

Throughout the late-1940s and 1950s, the top marginal tax rate was typically above 90%; today it is 35%. Additionally, the top capital gains tax rate was 25% in the 1950s and 1960s, 35% in the 1970s; today it is 15%. The real GDP growth rate averaged 4.2% and real per capita GDP increased annually by 2.4% in the 1950s. In the 2000s, the average real GDP growth rate was 1.7% and real per capita GDP increased annually by less than 1%.

Before you tax-and-spenders out there conclude that high taxes produce faster growth, read on:

There is not conclusive evidence, however, to substantiate a clear relationship between the 65-year steady reduction in the top tax rates and economic growth. Analysis of such data suggests the reduction in the top tax rates have had little association with saving, investment, or productivity growth.

So do changes in the tax rates of people at the top of the income ladder make any difference whatsoever?  Well, yes.  Hungerford concludes:

The top tax rate reductions appear to be associated with the increasing concentration of income at the top of the income distribution….    The evidence does not suggest necessarily a relationship between tax policy with regard to the top tax rates and the size of the economic pie, but there may be a relationship to how the economic pie is sliced.

On this anniversary of the beginning of the Occupy Wall Street protests, this report provides more evidence that the government is working well for the 1%.  So if you get a chance to chat with Paul Ryan tomorrow, ask him if he’s had a chance to read the new CRS study and if it changes his views.

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Soon to be a Statistic

Life in a “Battleground State”

I just got off the phone with a pollster who asked to speak to the youngest male voter in the house.  That was me.  It was no surprise to get a “right track, wrong track” question at the beginning.  Pollsters love that question, but since it seems to assume the country is on a single track I refused to answer.  My pollster let that slide and went on to ask my opinion of Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, Kevin Smith, Ovide LaMontagne, Jackie Cilley, and Maggie Hassan and how I would vote if the election were held today.  (I helped her with pronunciation of “Ovide” and “Hassan.”)

At first the questions seemed even-handed.  Then she said something like, “President Obama has said the private sector is doing fine but the latest jobs reports show increased unemployment.” 

“Now I know where the sponsor of your poll is coming from,” I responded.  Then I explained that one of the reasons unemployment has been so high is because of layoffs in the public sector.  I told her that due to teacher layoffs in Manchester, classes this fall have as many as 40 kids.  

To other questions, I just said “that’s a lie.”   As to whether some factor would make me more likely or less likely to vote for Mitt Romney, I explained that nothing could make me less likely to vote for Mitt Romney.   (I told her I’d write her in for President before voting for Mitt, but she’s under 35 so she wouldn’t be able to serve.)

At the end she said she was calling on behalf of American Crossroads, a right-wing anti-Obama group headed by a bunch of GOP operatives.   The caller said she didn’t know anything about them.  It was an educational experience for me, and maybe the caller learned something, too.

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Justice, Reconciliation, and the Oaxacan Election

I wrote the first version of this in Spanish as a homework assignment.  This is a translation, with a few extra details and minor changes.  You can read the Spanish version below.  Many thanks to Lety, my Spanish teacher, for help with grammar.

– Arnie

Tranquility Comes to the Zócalo, but what is Coming to Oaxaca?

It’s the day after the election in Oaxaca and the Zócalo, the picturesque park at the city’s center, seems normal. Tourists and Oaxacans enjoy the newly planted flowers. Elderly couples dance to a marimba band. The waiters are busy. Tables in the sidewalk cafes are full.

Three days ago, the Zócalo was occupied by thousands of teachers, and was full of tarps, ropes, and street vendors. What a difference!

It’s the day after the election, and the relief is palpable. The voters have thrown out the Institutional Revolutionary Party (the PRI) after 80 years in power, the most recent of which were marked by repression. Oaxaca will have a new governor, Gabino Cue. He campaigned on a platform of “peace and progress,” and in his first speech after the election, he said, “We know that after the election it is a time for reconciliation.”

Leaders of the parties which make up the coalition he led are in agreement. “We are clear that the people’s will reflected at the ballot box was not only to search for a new road to change for the state, but also, fundamentally, for reconciliation,” said the president of the state council of the Convergence Party at a press conference the day after the election.

But in the Zócalo, the tranquility is interrupted by a march of about a hundred people, carrying a banner demanding justice for San Juan Copala, an indigenous village that has been besieged by paramilitary groups for months. They are chanting, “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”[i] They don’t want reconciliation, at least not with Ulisses Ruiz Ortiz, who is still Governor, and who is widely thought to be responsible for multiple assassinations, kidnappings, acts of torture, and other human rights violations, including the siege of San Juan Copala.

So far, Gabino is speaking in principles, not details. He speaks of “results,” “a modern government,” “transparency,” and “participation.” He plans to visit each of Oaxaca’s 570 towns at least twice, and also to hold public meetings on the first Wednesday of every month.

With respect to the crimes of the past, he promises to choose a new Attorney General “who will be in the service of the people, not the government.”

“Neither a witch-hunt nor impunity,” says Gabino Cue. If there are accusations of abuse, “The officials will make an investigation and they will give us the results.”

The work of the new governor will be a balancing act. On one side will be the activists from groups of indigenous people, farmers, and teachers. They will want justice, and change. On the other side will be the dinosaurs of the old PRI establishment, and they will be able to interrupt “peace and progress” if they want to.

And underneath all that are problems more fundamental than those of political parties, elections, and occupations. These are poverty, unemployment, the scarcity of water in many communities, the threats to agriculture from climate change and free trade, and conflicts over land and natural resources. According to Abraham Cruz García, writing in Noticias on July 6, “As it has been in the days of Independence and Revolution, foreign companies, like devious birds of prey, favored by the state and federal governments, have appropriated thousands of hectares that small farmers need to raise grains and basic necessities.”

Cruz García also writes about a new book by Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who still insists the last presidential election was stolen from him, and who writes about the 30 people who control the Mexican economy, news media, and federal government. They are singing, “We Shall Not be Moved.”

One can find hope in the rhetoric of Gabino Cue, and in the citizen movement that elected him. Hope and rhetoric are pretty good places to start, but much more will be needed to achieve peace, progress, justice, and reconciliation.

6 July 2010

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[i] This is the beginning of a popular street chant calling for Ulisses Ruiz Ortiz to be held accountable for his crimes.

 

Reconciliación, paz, progreso, y justicia

La tranquilidad viene al zócalo, pero que viene a Oaxaca?

Es un día después de la elección, y el zócalo parece normal. Turistas y Oaxaqueños se pasean, disfrutando las flores nuevas. Parejas mayores bailan al lado de una marimba. Los meseros están ocupados. Las mesas en los cafés están llenos.

Hace tres días, el zócalo estaba lleno de lonas, cuerdas, y tianguis. ¡Que diferencia!

Es un día después de la elección, y el alivio está palpable. Las ciudadanos han echado al PRI después de 80 años. Oaxaca tendrá un gobernador nuevo, Gabino Cue. Tiene promesas de “paz y progreso,” y en su primer discurso después de la elección, dijo, “Sabemos que pasada la elección es el tiempo de la reconciliación.”

Los líderes del PAN, el PRD, el PT, y la Convergencia están de acuerdos. “Tenemos claro que la voluntad ciudadana no solamente se reflejó en las urnas para buscar una nueva ruta de cambio para el estado, sino para que fundamentalmente la misma nos lleve a la reconciliación.,” dijo el presidente del consejo estatal de Partido Convergencia en conferencia de prensa el día siguiente de la elección.

Pero en el zócalo, la tranquilidad está interrumpida por una marcha de cien personas llevando una bandera pidiendo justicia para San Juan Copala. Están coreando, “Ojo por ojo, diente por diente.” No quieren reconciliación, al menos no con Ulisses Ruiz Ortiz, quien todavía está en el Palacio de Gobierno.

El sindicato de maestros, que se fue del zócalo solo 2 días antes de la elección, también está hablando de justicia, no de reconciliación. Todavía el sindicato, el grupo el mas fuerte de los movimientos sociales en Oaxaca, está exigiendo castigo de los crímenes de Ulisses Ruiz Ortiz.

Hasta ahora, Gabino está hablando en principios, no detalles. Habla de “resultados,” “un gobierno moderno,” “transparencia,” y “participación.” Hace planes para visitar “en cuando menos dos ocasiones los 570 municipios de Oaxaca,” y también, tener asambleas publicas cada mes, el primer miércoles. Con respecto a los crímenes de pasado, promesa del procurador “que este al servicio de la gente y no del gobierno.”

“Ni cacería de brujas pero tampoco impunidad,” dice Gabino Cue. “Los ministeriales van a estar para investigar y van a tener que dar resultados.”

El trabajo del nuevo gobernador será un malabarismo. Por un lado, habrá militantes de grupos de indígenas, de campesinos, de maestros. Querrán justicia, y también cambio. Y por el otro, habrá los dinosaurios, que podrán interrumpir la “paz y el progreso” si quieren.

Y debajo de todos estás problemas más fundamentales que los partidos, las elecciones, y los plantones. Esas son la pobreza, el desempleo, el escasez de agua en muchas comunidades, las amenazas a la agricultura por los cambios de clima y libre comercio, y los conflictos sobre la tierra y los recursos. Según Abraham Cruz García, escribiendo en Las Noticias (6 Julio de 2010), “Como sucedió en las épocas de Independencia y Revolución, compañías extranjeras, cuales aves de rapiña, protegidas y solapadas por los gobiernos federal y estatal, se han apoderado de miles de hectáreas que campesinos destinan a cultivos de granos de primera necesidad.”

Cruz García también escribe sobre un libro nuevo por Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, sobre las 30 personas que controlan la economía, los medios de comunicación, y el gobierno federal. Cantan ellos, “no nos moverán.”

Se puede encontrar esperanza en la retórica de Gabino Cue, y en el movimiento ciudadano que lo elegía. Esperanza y retórica son bastante buenas, pero hay mucho más para ganar la paz, el progreso, la justicia, y la reconciliación.

6 Julio de 2010

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Oaxaca Voters Throw Out Corrupt Rulers

Another earthquake shook the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca Sunday, this one at the voting booths. After 80 years of rule by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), in recent years marked by repression and corruption, a right-left alliance of the PAN (National Action Party) and PRD (Democratic Revolutionary Party) led by  Gabino Cue Monteagudo will take office December 1.

Although there were reports of vote-buying efforts by PRI officials in various communities, Gabino Cue’s lead and the widespread declarations that he was the victor clinched the election by late in the evening. PRI candidate, Eviel Pérez Magaña, conceded shortly before 1 am.

In the neighborhood where Judy and I are staying Election Day was quiet, but since I’ve never been here before on a Sunday I can’t really say if this is normal or unusual. I can say that the local laundromat was closed despite a sign that indicated they were open on Sundays. I don’t know if the closure had anything to do with the election; I just know I am out of clean clothes.

The local polling place, a neighborhood school, resembled ones at home, though  without the campaign supporters holding signs and passing out leaflets. There were two tables of registrars, and at least one observer from a political party, the PAN. Voters had to present their voter ID cards, which were checked against a registry that included photos. There were two voting stations and three paper ballots, one for Governor, one for Deputy (like a member of the state legislature), and one for the local council. Ballots had names and logos of parties, not names of candidates. A friend speculated this might be confusing to some voters, given that the major candidates were representing coalitions of parties and if more than one box were checked the ballot would be spoiled. There is also a space to annul the ballot, in effect a vote for “none of the above.” After completing their ballots, voters fold and stuff them into boxes, then have their fingers inked to prevent repeat voting.

As of this writing, with 95% of the ballots counted, Gabino has an 8 point lead over  Eviel, a solid victory for the supporters of change, which is surely in the air. The teachers ended their occupation of the city center late last week. That is good news for them, good news for the city’s tourism-based economy, and not bad for tourists like us.

The powerful teachers union, which had been on strike for weeks, exulted at Gabino’s victory despite the fact that they never gave him an explicit endorsement. Union leader Azael Santiago Chepi called it “a historic moment, a veritable parting of the waters.” But he also noted that underlying issues, including the need to bring to justice those responsible for the political crimes of recent years, have yet to be resolved.

As candidate of the Coalition for Peace and Progress, Gabino has promised change, and also promised reconciliation. With the crimes of the current regime still unpunished and political prisoners still in jail, reconciliation will be as much of a challenge as longstanding conflicts over land, water, and other resources. Gabino has a few months left to get ready.

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