2008 Election: Timothy Horrigan for State Representative

Timothy Horrigan September-November 2008

November 11, 2008:
I have had a 2008 Presidential Election page up since 2005. At first its title was "Anyone But Jeb," but Jeb Bush dropped out of the 2008 Presidential race (or more accurately failed to enter the race in the first place.) The 2008 Presidential Election page has links to a wide variety of information about the Presidential candidates, and its URL is:

http://www.TimothyHorrigan.com/election2008-president.html

I was a candidate for office myself, so I decided that I should use http://www.TimothyHorrigan.com/election2008.html to promote my own candidacy for the New Hampshire State House of Representatives. I ran from the Strafford County District #7 as a Democrat. This six-member district consists of the towns of Durham, Lee and Madbury, and I am running alongside 5 veteran state reps. (The 6^th one, Dr. Joe Miller, retired.)

I was one of four Columbia College alumni on the ballot: Barack Obama '83 successfully ran for President— and Wayne Root '83 and Matt Gonzales '87 ran for Vice President and lost..

I am a liberal Democrat, but I am one of those liberal Democrats who believes that the liberalism is the truest form of conservatism.

This was the third time I have had the chance to run. In 1992 I could have run from Orford, which at the time was a very Republican town. (I would have had to quit my day job, because I was a federal government employee covered by the "Hatch Act" at the time. And, I would have almost certainly lost, although liberal gadfly Arnie Arnesen did manage to win several elections while living there.) In 2000, I could have run from Lebanon (which is a "purple" town of a blueish shade of purple), but I opted not to. This time, I had no excuse. On September 9, 2008, I got 625 votes in a very low turnout election, finishing sixth out of six Democrats. No Republicans were running (although my colleague Janet Wall got more than enough write-ins— 52— to also be on the Republican side of the ballot. I got zero Republican votes.)

Strafford County District No. 7 (6)	Horrigan, d	Kaen, d	Rous, d	Smith, d	Spang, d	Wall, d	Others
Durham	373	410	434	412	402	418	4
Lee	153	195	176	166	179	188
Madbury	99	110	106	102	102	121	1
TOTALS	625	715	716	680	683	727	5

On November 4, 2008, Durham, like the country as a whole, had a record turnout: 7318 just in Durham. We exceeded the primary day turnout in the first hour of voting. There were a lot of undervotes for our race, since we were halfway down the ballot. Even Janet Wall only got a little over 75% of the vote. We tried to get voters to vote from the bottom up, beginning with the county commissioners,. But this gimmick only registered with the zealots like me who would have voted all the way up and down the ballot no matter where we started. Unlike the 2004 election,

I have confidence in the 2008 election results, though maybe just because they mostly turned out the way I wanted them to. I will say however that the Presidential undervote in my three towns was 1%-1.5%, which is higher than I expected. So, I am not 100% confident. We do take pride in running fair elections in New Hampshire. One good thing about our elections are that touch-screen voting machines are illegal (along with punch cards) although towns can count the ballots with optical scanners (which I think is risky— although the optiscan does speed up the count. By the way, if you just want a fast count, nothing beats the Florida-style punch cards. In 1988, I witnessed the count of the Presidential primary votes for Brown County, Wisconsin—whose county seat is Green Bay. It took less than half an hour to count tens of thousands of cards. The votes were presumably counted all wrong, but they sure got counted fast. And my guy, Michael Dukakis, did win.)

The November vote was:

Strafford County District No. 7 (6)	Horrigan, d	Kaen, d	Rous, d	Smith, d	Spang, d	Wall, d&r	Other
Durham	3772	3861	3907	3851	3763	5135	33
Lee	1336	1521	1362	1345	1379	2019	11
Madbury	521	554	546	534	526	902	8
TOTALS	5629	5936	5815	5730	5668	8056	52

The polling places on Tuesday, September 9 and November 4th, were:

Durham: Oyster River High School, Coe Drive & Bagdad Road, 7am-7pm
Lee: Lee Public Safety Complex, George Bennett Road, just west of Lee Five Corners, 8am-7pm
Madbury: Madbury Town Hall, Town Hall Road, just north of Route 155 , 8am-7pm

These are the same polling places used for every election. The next ones are the town and school district elections in the spring of 2009.

My term begins on December 3, 2008— although I have a party caucus and three days of training to attend before then.

Here is a letter dated Friday, October 17, 2008 which I sent to the two local dailies in the Durham area: The Portsmouth Herald and The [Dover, NH] Foster's Daily Democrat (which ironically has a rabidly pro-Republican editorial board although the reporters are nonpartisan and do a fine job.)

It ran in the Foster's Daily Democrat on Thursday, October 23rd. The original URL was (subject to linkrot over time):

http://www.fosters.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2008710236999

The Herald. waited almost a week longer: my letter ran on Tuesday, October 29th: The original URL was (also subject to linkrot over time, although the Herald tends to keep its old articles online for many years):

http://www.seacoastonline.com/articles/20081029-OPINION-810290354

I see now that Ididn't mention our excellent Governor John Lynch, who is far ahead in the polls and faces (seemingly) only token opposition. If you live in New Hampshire, please vote for him. I am also running alongside two great State Senate candidates whose districts overlap my House district: Amanda Merrill and Jackie Cilley.

I am running as a Democrat for the New Hampshire House from Strafford District #7, alongside the incumbents Naida Kaen, Emma Rous, Marjorie Smith, Judith Spang and Janet Wall.

I would like to thank my fellow residents of Durham, Lee and Madbury for voting for me in the primary on September 9th, and I would also like to ask for your voting again in the general election on November 4th. The three polling places are the same as they were in September 2008, but they have moved around in recent years: Oyster River High School in Durham, Madbury Town Hall, and the new Lee Public Safety Complex on George Bennett Road. All U.S. Citizens who will be 18 or older by November 4, 2008 have the right to vote in the community where they live, even if they are college students who moved there just to attend college.

I am one of those liberal Democrats who is really a true conservative: we are the ones who want to conserve our nation's traditions and resources.

One of the advantages we have in New Hampshire while dealing with the challenges of this time of national— and worldwide— crisis is that the Granite State is still a functioning democracy. We Granite Staters have managed to conserve our republican (with a small "r") political traditions. This means that our politicians cannot rely on sound bites and innuendoes. If I am elected, I will have no choice but to deal with the issues seriously after listening to all sides respectfully and debating the issues passionately (or after— to use Jeb Bradley's and John McCain's favorite expression— "partisan bickering.")

If we elect Barack Obama and Joe Biden to the White House, Jeanne Shaheen to the Senate and return Carol Shea-Porter (and Paul Hodes) to the House, we will go a long way towards restoring democracy to Washington, DC and to America as a whole.

Thanks, Timothy Horrigan

Timothy Horrigan; 7A Faculty Rd; Durham, NH 03824; ph: 603-868-3342; email: TimothyHorrigan@mac.com

(my campaign flyer):

Timothy Horrigan for NH State Representative

Strafford County District 7; Durham, Lee & Madbury

My name is Tim Horrigan. I am running as a Democrat for the open seat in the New Hampshire General Court for Durham, Lee and Madbury. Some of my priorities as a candidate are:

Preserving our natural enviroment and conserving our natural resources.
Transforming Durham, Lee and Madbury— and all of New Hampshire— into sustainable communities. We need to build communities for our post-Big Oil future.
Fixing the educational system: I will fight to scrap "No Child Left Behind" and restructure our state's schools so they start educating our students rather than training them to fill in bubbles on test booklets. I support universal kindergarten, and I will keep our world-class higher education system world-class
Fixing the tax system: I will help build a tax system which ensures adequate and fair funding for education and other services in every town in the state.
Building a 21^st Century telecommunications infrastructure: I will make sure that the state has affordable, high-quality broadband access
Building a 21^st Century transportation infrastructure: this includes public transportation as well as roads and bridges,
Protecting our personal freedoms and the rule of law.

My background is: I moved to Durham when I was 10 and have lived in New Hampshire most of my life. I attended the Oyster River Schools before graduating from Columbia University and the University of Southern California, earning masters degrees in English and Marketing. I have spent most of my career in information technology. During the current election cycle, I have volunteered for the Edwards campaign, Democracy for America and MoveOn.org. If elected, I would be carrying on a family tradition: my father Jim Horrigan represented this district for several terms in the 1970s.

Timothy Horrigan

7A Faculty Rd

Durham, NH 03824

ph: 603-868-3342

email: TimothyHorrigan@mac.com

Fiscal agent: Timothy Horrigan, Durham

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