It's been said what ever major event or events that are shaping our lives within two weeks of an election are influential to the voters. If a big meteor was going to hit Earth, then anyone with a background in astrological science probably wood get elected and other problems he may cause or can't repair would be sorted out later. Forgetting party affiliations for the moment and the extreme example I gave above, do you think there are any announced candidates for presidential office capable of handling tasks at hand and the unexpected? If not, is the presidential elections really a popularity contest and we just keep our fingers crossed?
On a much smaller scale, our first afro-American governor Duval Patrick is in his "honeymoon stage" and he's doing a lot of thinking out loud about the
1 billion dollar deficit. After becoming governor he announced there was indeed a deficit. I'm not black and I can't pick up on subtle facial expressions but I will say if Duval was white he would have been pale with embarrassment. It's rather sad nobody gets to see the books until they are elected. The good news though is we learn how the previous administration shuffled things around, putting it off and off. What is a man who wants to put another 1000 police on the streets gonna do?