Governor Candidate Research Articles

Aplikasi AHP dalam Menentukan Kandidat Gubernur DKI Jakarta 2012-2017

July 11, 2012 was chosen as an appropriate day in constitution terms to hold the election of Jakarta’s regional head for the next five years. There are many assumptions and opinions from some people about who would be elected as the governor of Jakarta. A lot of criteria from the candidates of governor and vice governor can be the parameters to be the success key in becoming Jakarta’s number one man. This research is discussing about decision making methods from many options by using AHP (analytical hierarchy process) method. Tthe case model is the election of Jakarta’s governor. The research utilizes two comparative components namely Jakarta’s governor and candidate of vice governor, as well as five criteria such as issues about flood, transportation, economic, public services and credibility. The result of this research is the candidate with number six that should be most chosen in the election.

À margem das margens?: a precisão das pesquisas pré-eleitorais brasileiras em 2010

Este artigo analisa 156 pesquisas pré-eleitorais realizadas em 2010 nas disputas para Presidente e para os 27 governadores com o objetivo de descrever e explicar suas discrepâncias em relação aos resultados apurados nas urnas. O balanço utiliza o Método Mosteller 3 (MM3) para o cálculo do acerto agregado de cada pesquisa pré-eleitoral e sugere o Método de Estimação do Erro para cada Candidato (MEEC), com o propósito de investigar a existência de viés contra partido ou conjunto de partidos naquelas eleições. Os resultados revelam erros superiores às margens informadas à Justiça Eleitoral, mas não permitem condenar a precisão e a neutralidade partidária do conjunto das pesquisas analisadas. Maiores discrepâncias foram encontradas: i) em pesquisas realizadas com maior antecedência, ii) quando ainda no 1º turno, iii) em disputas pouco competitivas, (iv) quando havia poucos candidatos e v) nas eleições de governadores.

Social, creative, human, and political capital effects on sustainability initiatives in Kansas counties: a research note

In a small sample effects analysis of 22 Kansas counties, this research note reports the results of a pilot study of the role of social, creative, human, and political capital in the centrality of environmental and equity concerns in sustainability efforts. Social capital is measured by the relative presence of rent-seeking and non-rent-seeking networks in each county, creative capital by a measure of county creative vitality, human capital by the socio-economic status (SES) level of the county, and political capital by relative support for the Democrat candidate for governor in the most recent election. The level of racial/ethnic diversity and the Gini index of household income inequality are employed as controls. The results show that political capital has the greatest, but not the only, independent effect on the centrality of the two sustainability dimensions, particularly in regard to equity.

Analisis Perilaku Pemilih pada Pemilihan Gubernur DKI Jakarta Periode 2012-2017

This research is an exploratory qualitative approach using secondary data from the Indonesian Survey Institute (LSI), which aims to identify the voters’ behavior of Jakarta Governor candidates period 2012-2017. The results showed that the implementation of the election was considered by the respondents Honest-Fair (JURDIL) and quite satisfying. The selection was won by Joko Widodo – Basuki Tjahaja Purnama. However, the numbers did not reach half of the voters. Therefore, the election took 2 rounds. For Governor-Vice Governor couples socialization, both the majority and not overtaken, Fauzi Bowo – Nachrowi achieved top ranking with very significant. But apparently, successful socialization of media did not match with the victory in the election. This study aims to determine the behavior of voters in Jakarta governor election. The result, in contrary, shows that the couple in number two socialization won the election. For the popularity, it was not in tune with the socialization. Personally, the popularity of Joko Widodo topped more than the incumbent. It is believed that the performance and imaging of Joko Widodo as mayor of Solo viewed favorably by the public. Close relationship with lower level people and hawkers handling gained the voters’ sympathy. Regarding the evaluation of the incumbent, the majority responded quite satisfied because they could understand the complexity of the Jakarta capital region. But ironically, the majority answered there is no change during the leadership of the incumbent governor. Voters preference based on gender, religion, ethnicity, and age in majority chose the couple of Joko Widodo – Tjahaja Basuki Purnama.

Electoral Campaigning 2.0—The Case of Italian Regional Elections

ABSTRACT This article investigates the use of social media by the 53 candidates for governor at the last Italian regional elections in April 2010 and further explores the two hypotheses on the role of online technologies for political parties—the “politics as usual” and the “equalization” hypotheses—which begin from two different points of view: first, regional elections, and second, the candidate's appropriation, negotiation, or resistance to the convergence and participatory culture distinctive of the contemporary media ecology. The aim of this article is to address the following research questions: (a) Which are the different degrees of appropriation of convergence and participatory culture among Italian candidates during the 2010 regional elections according to political parties' dimension in terms of members, voters and resources?; and (b) Are different degrees of appropriation of convergence and participatory culture positively associated with political parties dimensions?

REPRESENTASI TINDAK TUTUR CALON GUBERNUR SULAWESI SELATAN: ANALISIS WACANA KESOPANAN BERBAHASA

The research looks into the Governor Candidate of South Sulawesi’s representation of speech acts leading up to the governor’s election in 2013, in particular into politeness and the relation between cultural speech acts in South Sulawesi society and universal politeness maxim. The research is qualitative with pragmatic approach. This research uses written data from the utterances of the South Sulawesi’s incumbent Governors printed in the biggest mass media in South Sulawesi—Harian Fajar and Tribun Timur—for 4 months, in April, May, June, and July. The data, in the form of utterances produced by the politicians, are analyzed based on maxims that are universally used to show politeness towards their addresses. In analyzing meanings, researchers also consider the cultural context in which speech acts occured in South Sulawesi society. The maxim involved tact maxim, generosity maxim, approbation maxim, modesty maxim, agreement maxim, and sympathy maxim. The research finds that the utterances by the incumbent Governors of South Sulawesi conform to politeness maxim in accordance with approbation maxim, while the utterances by the governor candidate of South Sulawesi that violate the politeness maxim tend to adhere to modesty maxim. Utterances that are analyzed show that the utterances produced by the governor candidate of South Sulawesi are more likely to conform to politeness maxim. Several utterances that are interpreted within South Sulawesi cultural context of speech acts show that there is appropriateness between cultural speech act in South Sulawesi society and maxim of politeness used in this research.

Media Baru dan Fenomena Komunikasi Politik pada Pemilukada di Provinsi Banten 2011

Political system in Indonesia after New Order regime has entered into a new phase, which is both fundamentally and practically different. With the growth of freedom of expression and the rise of information and communication technology (ICT), the use and practices of political communication is also striking a fair balance, two-ways direction, no longer dominated by government-only apparatuses. The use of internet and New Media in political communication realm has been pioneered since 1997, and has been growing ever since, thanks to the new practices of local election (Pilkada). This paper will address firstly, the theoretical framework of political communication in e-Democracy, and secondly, the application of New Media (website, blog, and social media sites) in local-based political communication, namely Pilkada in Banten at October 23, 2011. Having analysed the phenomenon in question, a surprising result appears. Even though all candidates of Governor and Deputy Governor of recent Pilkada Banten have used New Media as their communication and campaign media, nevertheless the interactivity factor embedded within those “New Media use” are largely neglected.
 Keywords: e-Democracy, political communication, New Media, interactivity.

Richard Yates: An Appraisal of his Value as the Civil War Governor of Illinois

The general public mostly remembers George Armstrong Custer for his fatal action at Little Big Horn. Richard Yates is, to some extent, remembered for his periodic drunken behavior while he was Illinois Governor during the Civil War. Both public conceptions follow the old maxim, A half-truth is worse than a whole lie, because it obscures the positive attributes, contributions, and actions of each of these notable characters in American history. Custer actively participated in the Battle of 1st Bull Run, the Peninsula Campaign, Antietam, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, Overland Campaign, the Wilderness, Yellow Tavern, Shenandoah Valley Campaigns of 1864, the siege of Petersburg, and the Appomattox Campaign. He was present at the Appomattox surrender. After the Civil War, Brevet Major General Custer returned to the Regular Army with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. 7th Cavalry. On June 25, 1876, Custer and his entire command were killed at Little Big Horn. Custer's wife, Libbie, published books on his life, which contributed greatly to his image as a tragic military hero, and so, Custer's very distinguished Civil War record has been overshadowed by his fate at Little Big Horn. Richard Yates was elected Governor of Illinois in the 1860 election that put his friend, Abraham Lincoln, into the White House. Yates was an outspoken opponent of slavery. He was personally and actively involved in raising volunteer soldiers for Illinois and became known as the Soldiers' Friend, a title he both earned and welcomed. When the war began, Illinois Governor Yates sent more troops to aid the Union than any other state. As early as April 19, 1861, Yates sent armed troops to Cairo and other locations in order to save and secure the arms stored there, so that this essential equipment would not fall into the hands of southern sympathizers. Yates gave U.S. Grant his first recognition as a soldier in the Civil War by appointing him as mustering officer for the state and afterward, Colonel of the 21st Illinois Regiment. He gave Lincoln much-needed support for his Emancipation Proclamation. He set up a training camp which later became Camp Douglas, the prisoner of war encampment in Chicago. Yet, when Yates was elected U.S. Senator in January of 1865, he served only one term. The reason, in part, for his not gaining a second term was his reputation - rightly or wrongly - for being an ineffectual drunkard. We will attempt to determine if this classification is justified as we explore the value of Governor Yates in the Civil War. Richard Yates was born in Warsaw, Gallatin County, Kentucky, on January 18, 1815. He moved to Jacksonville, Illinois, in 1831, and graduated from Illinois College in 1835. He studied law at Transylvania University in Lexington, Kentucky, and was admitted to the bar in 1837, when he then opened his law practice at Jacksonville, Illinois. In July of 1839, he married Catherine Geers of Lexington, Kentucky.' An intimate friend of Yates, William Pitt Kellogg, described him as Striking in appearance, with bright auburn hair and bright blue eyes. Yates was elected to the Illinois State House of Representatives and served from 1842 to 1845, and again from 1848 to 1849. As a Whig candidate, he was elected to the United States Congress from 1851 to 1855, but was an unsuccessful candidate for re-election. He served as Illinois Governor from 1861 through 1865, when he was elected as a Republican to the United States Senate, where he served from 1865 to 1871. He was not a candidate for re-election. President Grant then appointed Yates as a United States commissioner to inspect a land-subsidy railroad. While on this assignment, Yates died suddenly of a stroke caused by a brain hemorrhage in St. Louis, Missouri, on November 27, 1873. He is buried in Diamond Grove Cemetery, Jacksonville, Illinois.2 Richard Yates was a veteran politician by the fall of 1860 when he attended the Republican Convention in Chicago as a candidate for Governor of Illinois. …

The Novelty Impact: The Politics of Trailblazing Women in Gubernatorial Elections

Although women candidates for public office have experienced greater success recently, women candidates for executive offices are still considered to be a novelty in much of the country. This study examines the electoral impact of novelty status for female gubernatorial candidates. We propose that the novelty of female gubernatorial candidates negatively affects the level of support women candidates receive from voters and their likelihood of winning the gubernatorial election. We develop the concept of novelty status and test its impact on female gubernatorial candidates by examining female-male gubernatorial elections from 1980 to 2006. Our findings suggest that novelty status negatively impacts the success of women candidates for governor. These results are important as we continue to develop our understanding of the barriers women face when they seek elective office and how this situation might change when a woman's candidacy is no longer considered a novel event.

Who Influences Whom? The Agenda-Building Relationship Between Political Candidates and the Media in the 2002 Michigan Governor's Race

Building on previous research in the field of agenda-building by examining the relationships between candidates and the media, this study used content analysis to examine how the 2002 Michigan candidates for governor presented election issues in press releases, and the subsequent media coverage of the issues in Michigan newspapers. The analysis revealed positive cross-lagged correlations between candidate and media issue agendas at certain times of the campaign. While the current study suggests that certain news sources can have an influence on the subsequent media agenda, results indicated a reciprocal effect, indicating that candidates also run the risk of being influenced by the same media they are attempting to influence.

The 1830 Contest for Governor and the Politics of Resentment

On October 15, 1829, Lieutenant of Illinois William sent a letter Samuel D. Ingham, newly installed as Andrew Jackson's Secretary of Treasury. prayed that policy of the late [Adams] administration upon... public be repudiated, for whole western country... disapproved it. The new administration ought instead encourage Congress reduce the price of existing public lands; to make donations of the public lands actual settlers; and to make a final surrender of the lands the states respectively in which they are situated. Knowing that these policies would be unpopular in Congress, supported his request with compelling evidence. He quoted a U.S. Marshall's census report on the number nationwide of free taxable inhabitants which are not freeholders. The report revealed that approximately 140,000 heads of families in the nation's nine newest states were not freeholders; there were 9,000 such families, about half the total, in Illinois alone. concluded his letter: When I consider the great number of people whose hearts would be gladdened by the adoption of a law in Congress give donations actual settlers, it creates in me an anxiety in favor of those measures which words cannot express.1 William was clearly taking land reform in the egalitarian tradition heart. Since today we think of the Age of as epitomizing equality for white males, it is perhaps surprising learn that Kinney's public lands proposal did not attract much attention in the 1830 contest for governor. The story of how Governor Kinney lost the contest is worth telling only explain how and why his egalitarian politics failed take root in the state's rich Jacksonian loam. But Kinney's failure is also noteworthy because of the light it sheds on the American political system. It illuminates the system's structural bias against egalitarian policies. The bias is significant because it shaped how the Democratic Party developed in Illinois and nationally2 Called the candidate for governor, announced his campaign for the office in the spring of 1829 well before the letter Ingham. He had just returned from a triumphant visit Washington, D.C.. He attended the Inauguration and met President Jackson several times. He was an ultra in the eyes of his opponent John Reynolds because he favored removal of Adams men from federal offices simply because they were Adams men. Jackson sent deliver commissions in Boston; he came back more convinced than ever of necessity of removals... [for] the republicans had fought hard and had gained a great victory but the old Federalists were left in office the same battle will have be fought over again. told the president if it was left [me, I] would drive them all out as. . .a parcel of dogs out of a meat house. Jackson laughed, hartily (sic) at this remark but made no reply. repeated the story gleefully as he traveled Illinois during the summer of 1829. Yet one year later in June of 1830, whatever momentum Kinney's campaign once had was gone. In hindsight, the last of his steam was used deliver a keynote speech in April. A large crowd of citizens had gathered at the statehouse hear him defend himself. Over the next few weeks he proceeded deliver the fiery oration from memory, sounding unctuous while sweating in the shade of the county seats. It was not surprising that grew hot and animated while defending his reputation from the arrows of calumny. Heat and rhetoric rose together throughout that summer and everything converged on the August 2 poll. Nor was mudslinging new an Illinois election. It was second nature for Kinney, a political veteran, former state senator, incumbent lieutenant governor, and selfproclaimed defender of poor people. What was new was finding so prominent a devotee of Andrew Jackson on the defensive in a state gushing with support for Old Hickory. …

Mexican American support for third parties: the case of La Raza Unida

Given barriers generated by racism, direct appeals for political solidarity should resonate strongly among racial and ethnic groups. Yet, such appeals can be mitigated as those barriers are overcome and minorities assimilate into society. We examine the case of Mexican Americans during the Chicano Movement. At this time, many Mexican Americans were assimilating and finding a place in the social hierarchy while others argued against assimilation. An important example of racial identity politics came in 1972 when La Raza Unida Party [LRUP] fielded a candidate for governor in Texas. Counter to what standard theories of assimilation and acculturation would predict, Mexican Americans responded to this call for racial solidarity. Based on quantitative and qualitative evidence, we argue that the election revealed intense alienation among Mexican Americans from Anglo-dominated politics. However, Mexican American support for LRUP was uneven across Texas and reflected differing levels of economic attainment and incorporation.

Gubernatorial Coattails and Mexican Congressional Elections Since 1979

Mexican congressional elections between 1979 and 2009 are examined to determine if successful candidates for governor have coattails helping candidates in the same ticket get elected to higher office, and if so to what extent. Presidential coattails are also examined for reference. Regression estimates reveal that state parties transferred, on average, 42% of their electoral success in the gubernatorial quest to those competing for Congress in a concurrent election. Depending on which of the major parties we look at, gubernatorial coattails in Mexico are about two-fifths (for the PRI) and one-tenth (for the PAN) shorter than presidential ones; the left's are two-fifths larger. Local forces appear to move Mexican congressional campaigns and elections as much as national forces since at least 1979, raising questions as to how new is the new federalism in Mexico.

What Goes Around, Comes Around

The authors contrast the 2002 Senate and 2003 gubernatorial runoffs in Louisiana, noting that the margin and the breadth of victory were greater for a gubernatorial candidate who enjoyed less political resources than her copartisan. The authors argue that the GOP's southern strategy has constrained its ability to diversify its coalition and contributed to the defeat of its nonwhite candidate for governor. Using aggregate parish level data and individual survey responses, the authors demonstrate that the customary polarization of whites in favor of Republican nominees was undermined in the 2003 election. The authors offer some thoughts on the implications of the findings.

John J. Parker and the Beginning of the Modern Confirmation Process

John J. Parker and the Beginning of the Modern Confirmation Process ERNESTO J. SANCHEZ* Ideological concerns’ dominance ofthe Supreme Court confirmation process has certainly become routine, especially in the form ofissue-driven interest groups’ influence over the agenda for Senate debates. More significantly, the Senate normally focuses on what Laurence Tribe has called “the net impact ofadding [a] candidate to the Court”1 interms ofsteering the Courttoward adherence to a particular judicial philosophy, such as originalism2 or pragmatism,3 or toward a specific outlook on a given constitutional issue. And when the President nominates someone with priorjudicial experience, the candidate’s decisions, as well as his or her prior speeches or other public activities, become fair game as supposed indications ofhis or her fitness for service on the Court. This article tells the story ofthe first such confirmation controversy that resulted in the Senate’s rejection of a Supreme Court nom­ inee. President Herbert Hoover’s nomination ofFourth Circuit Court ofAppeals Judge John J. Parker to the Court in 1930 prompted un­ precedented opposition that extended beyond traditional party lines and concerns over basic competence to single-issue agendas. Almost immediately, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), onlytwenty-two years old, launched a lobbying campaign against Judge Parker because of a purportedlyracist statement he had made asthe Republican candidate for governor of North Carolina in 1920. The American Federation of Labor (AFL) initiated an equally virulent movement against the judge because of one prior decision in which he had upheld a com­ pany’s “yellow dog” contracts, or agreements by the company’s workers not to join unions. A closer analysis of the Parker contro­ versy, however, reveals its parallels to contem­ porary disagreements over presidential nom­ inations to both the Supreme Court and, more recently, lower federal courts. Reflect­ ing Tribe’s assessment, a central issue un­ derlying the dispute was not Parker himself, but the course the Court would follow in resolving a seminal legal issue: Congress’s ability to pass legislation to rebuild the col­ lapsed American economy in the wake of the BEGINNING OF THE MODERN CONFIRMATION PROCESS 23 Court’s invalidation of many such laws with that same intent.4 A secondary question in­ volvedthe degree to which the Court would ex­ amine the constitutionality ofstate “Jim Crow” laws, the reason for the NAACP’s involve­ ment in the Parker debate. And in the form of modern controversies over whether a nom­ inee will, for example, vote to overturn Roe v. Wade, Judge Parker’s opponents felt that only a personally like-minded Justice could en­ sure their desired outcome in labor and civil rights cases. Thus, just as in some modern judicial confirmation battles, which Supreme Court scholar Henry Abraham has likened to “emotion-packed, politicized drama[s],”5 the Parker episode involved misrepresentations of the judge’s record and apparently groundless accusations for the sake of achieving specific agendas. Of course, one might argue that this trend toward ideologically oriented confirma­ tion processes with a level of discourse equal to that of a crass political campaign instead commenced with Woodrow Wilson’s nomi­ nation of Louis D. Brandeis to the Court in 1916. Numerous business interests, angered by Brandeis’s support of such causes as trade union rights and antitrust regulation, pres­ sured Senators to oppose a nomination that was to guarantee one more Court vote in fa­ vor of the Wilson administration’s generally progressive economic program.6 But the fact that the Parker controversy constituted the first time the Senate actually rejected a Supreme Court nominee under such politically charged circumstances—albeit a nominee who would likely have differed from Brandeis philosoph­ ically as a Supreme Court Justice—arguably makes it, rather than earlier confirmation bat­ tles, the definitive event that set forth the overall thematic context underlying the con­ temporary judicial nomination scene.7 Criticism by the NAACP helped torpedo Judge John Parker’s nomination to the Supreme Court, but the alle­ gations against the moderate Southerner focused on a single racist remark he made during an unsuccessful gubernatorial campaign in 1920. Above, NAACP members picketed the practice of lynching, an underprose­ cuted crime in many...

Little Newspaper Coverage for Lt. Governor Candidates

Nominees for lieutenant governor received little or no attention in 2002 in capital dailies in seven states. References that appeared were often cursory, treating candidates as “invisipols.”

A Hybrid Method to Determine Inter-Clause Dependency

The longer the input sentences, the worse the syntactic parsing results. Therefore, a long sentence is first divided into several clauses, and the syntactic analysis for each clause is performed. Finally, all the analysis results are merged into one. In the merging process, it is difficult to determine the dependency among clauses. To handle such syntactic ambiguity in determining inter-clause dependency, this paper proposes a hybrid method using restriction rules and Decision Trees-based machine learning. Based on restriction rules, clauses that cannot be the governor of a dependent clause are excluded from the governor candidates. Next, using Decision Trees machine learning algorithm, one clause is selected as the governor of a dependent clause. We extract various features from a clause, and analyze the effect of each feature on the performance. Experimental results show that our hybrid method outperformed both methods of using restriction rules and using Decision Trees.

Unintended Consequence of Centralized Public School Funding in Michigan Education

1. IntroductionIn an effort to create greater equity among school districts, a number of states have shifted the responsibility for school funding from local school districts to the state. Although many researchers have found that centralizing funding for public schools has been successful in creating greater equity (Murray, Evans, and Schwab 1998; Moser and Rubenstein 2002), other researchers have pointed out that centralizing funding can lead to unintended consequences. For example, Fischel (1989, 1992) suggests that families in wealthier districts, which have a stronger demand for education, are no longer able to match their preference for education under a system of equalized funding. In some cases, this may drive parents to seek private school alternatives (Downes and Schoeman 1998).1 In other cases, families meet their preferences by making private contributions to public schools (Sonstelie and Brunner 1997). Furthermore, Theobald and Picus (1991) argue that centralizing funding forces education, as a state service, to compete with other state services for funds, and as a result, the growth rate of spending per pupil decreases over time.2 These articles illustrate that policies designed to centralize control of public school funding can produce unintended consequences.In this article, we introduce into the literature an additional consequence caused by centralizing control of school funding. We argue that centralized control of public school funding with the objective to equalize operating expenditures (i.e., salaries, supplies, and other ongoing expenses) across school districts while leaving capital acquisitions (i.e., purchases of school buildings and other facilities) under local control results in resource-rich school districts becoming more reliant on debt financing.3 We find empirical support for this theory using data in the state of Michigan during its transition to a centralized school financing system in 1994.In the next section, we present an overview of Michigan's move to a centralized funding policy. In the third section, we present the regression model used to test the theory, followed by the description of the data and the estimated results. The final section of the study summarizes our findings.2. Overview of Michigan's Educational SystemIn 1993, a legislative anomaly lead to an abrupt change in the method of financing public education in Michigan. Prior to 1993, Michigan had one of the most locally controlled school systems in the United States. Over 65% of school operating expenditures came from local revenues, whereas the remaining 35% were derived from state and federal sources (Courant, Gramlich, and Loeb 1995). Property owners argued that local reliance on property taxes created an excessive burden and voiced their complaints to state representatives. Attempts to lower these taxes were defeated annually until Debbie Stabenow, a Democrat senator and candidate for governor, frustrated with the tax debate, proposed an absurdity to eliminate all property taxes without suggesting an alternative funding mechanism (Courant and Loeb 1997). Astonishingly, the legislature passed her bill, leaving the public school system with no means of funding. Seizing an opportunity to create greater equity among school districts, Michigan officials quickly devised a centralized system of financing public school operations, known as Proposal A, that reduces districts' reliance on local property taxes by increasing the state's sales tax. Integrated into Proposal A is a distribution formula that reduces the disparity in operating expenditures across high- and low-spending school districts, in part, by constraining the allocation of operating funds for high-spending districts.However, Proposal A does not affect local control of funding for capital projects (Watkins 2002). Michigan's state operating budget typically provides less than 5% of the total revenue needed to service school debt and no revenue for capital expenditures. …

John Phillip Santos and the Creation of Sacred Memories

Historians of the South have ignored the contributions of Mexicans, Cubans, and Latin Americans to the development of southern history and southern autobiography for too long.1 Mexican-Americans living in Texas comprise a significant percentage of the population of that state, so much so that candidates for governor must speak Spanish in their appeal to voters. Although historians of the South only reluctantly think of Texas as "southern," in fact, the Lone Star State, after a short time as an independent republic, entered the Union as a slave state and joined the Confederacy. That Texas is the only southern state with an international border makes it unique. That Native Americans, Spanish, and Mexicans settled it before ambitious Americans seized it puts it in a category akin to Louisiana. Its history, therefore, is both similar to that of other Deep South states and yet admittedly different. Just how similar and also how different can be seen in John Phillip Santos's Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation, an autobiographical memoir, the tale of a family and its spiritual journey across cultures and borders, landscapes and urban vistas, silences and confessions, across time unbounded by geography or space.

Continental Divide: Mothers Against, and: Continental Divide: Daughters of the Revolution (review)

Continental Divide is the collective title for two new plays, Mothers Against and Daughters of the Revolution by English playwright David Edgar. Both plays were jointly commissioned and produced by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and directed by Tony Taccone—the Berkeley Rep's artistic director who previously directed Edgar's Pentecost in1997. The two plays in Continental Divide share issues and characters but happily offer variety in focus and dramaturgy. Mothers Against is an intense chamber piece about Sheldon Vine (Bill Geisslinger)—Republican candidate for governor of an unspecified Pacific coast state—as he prepares for a debate. Daughters of the Revolution on the other hand is an expansive epic theatre play about the diaspora of 1960s student radicals and introduces Vine's Democratic opponent, Rebecca McKeene (a fine performance by Demetra Pittman in a minor role).