George W Bush got a gift when the Massachusetts Supreme court legalized same sex marriage. Many states had ballot initiatives banning same sex marriage in 2004, including Ohio. There’s no doubt that helped Bush win Ohio and thus the election.
Are there any state issues out there that might help get the vote out for either party? I wouldn’t be surprised to see some anti immigration measures in some states.
Ohio right now is going through a voter repeal or affirmation of Senate Bill 5, the collective bargaining bill. But that will pass or fail in two weeks. It’s way too early to know what will be on the ballot for next election day. But there’ll be something.
Rachel Maddow has claimed that ballot initiatives that call for raising the minimum wage do for the left what gay marriage bans do for the right.
Right now, California only has one that has qualified for November 2012 (an $11.4 billion dollar bond act for “safe drinking water”), although there is currently another one undergoing signature verification that could make it (dealing with the ability of unions to mandate payroll deductions for political purposes). It looks like the people who keep putting a “minors cannot get abortions without parental notification” measure on the ballot have had enough.
Isn’t Equality California trying to get a repeal of Prop 8 on the Nov. ballot in case the court case doesn’t work out (or drags on past Nov)?
I think they’ve decided not to put on any propositions for the time being.
More interesting is an overall change in the landscape for propostions in California that was just signed into law by Governor Brown. According to this new law, propositions can only go on the November ballot, when turnout is higher than on other elections. This is expected to help Democratic positions on those propositions.