"We Have to Try"
How down-ballot races can offer hopeful views into the future.
On a sweltering evening this past June, about 300 of us sat shoulder-to-shoulder on the wooden pews of the Old Dutch Church in Kingston, N.Y., fanning our faces and mopping our brows as we watched the Democratic primary debate for the area’s New York State Assembly seat.
In NY-103, the Democratic primary is essentially the election, since the Democratic nominee is all but assured of winning the seat in this reliably blue district.
So the conversation was very different from what we’re hearing on a national level. To me, that made it more interesting, since incumbent Sarahana Shrestha, a progressive, and challenger Gabi Madden, a moderate, agree on the basics. Both candidates said abortion should be legal, climate change is a big problem, and schoolchildren should get free lunches. Their stated goals were largely the same, but they had very different views on how to reach them.
June was an emotional and political lifetime ago, and the demogra…