By Ronald Sampson When following elected leaders, you have to be used to disappointment. They need to make myriad decisions on votes and even the best of them have to make difficult and sometimes bad decisions. It’s a part of life…you can never expect perfection. But what this lame-duck iteration of the Scottsdale City Council has done has been beyond … Read More
Tearing Apart the Data of the Scottsdale Elections: Propositions 490 and 491
Scottsdale’s recent elections were interesting ones, with an incumbent mayor losing and two incumbent councilmembers losing their bids for re-election. And there was one (well, two) very clear winners in this election: Propositions 490 and 491. As a reminder, Proposition 490 served as an extension of the existing 0.2% sales tax which was expiring this year, reducing it to 0.15% … Read More
Guest Editorial: An Open Letter to Axon CEO Rick Smith from Former Scottsdale City Councilman and Chairman of Taxpayers Against Awful Apartment Zoning Exemptions (TAAAZE), Bob Littlefield
Dear Mr. Smith: As you are no doubt aware thousands of Scottsdale residents from conservatives to liberals have come together to put the recent Scottsdale City Council approval, awarding Axon the largest apartment complex in Scottsdale history, to a public vote. What you may not be aware is that as of today, the halfway point of the 30 day period the … Read More
Tearing Apart the Data of the Scottsdale Elections: the Mayoral Race
It was a truly interesting election season in Scottsdale this year, as incumbent Mayor Dave Ortega was ousted by a significant margin, the city council will welcome three new members, and two propositions won by wide margins. Some of these items are related and some are indicative of wider trends within the city’s electorate. In this three-part series we get … Read More
Local Democrats Pivot Towards Awful Policy, Demonstrating Why They Lose
By Alexander Lomax It was a tough year for Democrats all around this year, and Arizona was yet another example of this. They lost ground in the state legislature and have made Governor Hobbs’s intention to get a majority in at least either the State House or Senate a pipe dream. Perhaps the biggest issue nationally was a question as … Read More
Hey Democrats…Your Celebrity Endorsements are Stupid and Counterproductive
By Ronald Sampson For the last couple decades the prevailing view of the two political parties generally depends on who you ask, but if you ask those who are not a fan of the Democratic party, their description of the party would likely revolve around it being a party of the coastal elites and of Hollywood (or Hollyweird, as some … Read More
Change is Afoot in Arizona: What the Final Elections Results Tell Us
While as of the time of writing, there are still a few votes to count in Arizona and we do not have full confirmation of how every race will play out, we do have quite a bit of insight as to how our area may change or not change. For instance, one of the most interesting and perhaps surprising results … Read More
AZ General Election Poll: Republicans Lead Presidential and US Senate Contests
From Data Orbital Data Orbital has released the results of its latest statewide, mixed mode (live caller and text to web) survey of likely General Election voters. The survey was conducted from October 26th 2024 – October 28th 2024. The survey measured support for candidates in Arizona’s Presidential and US Senate contests.With just one week to go until the 2024 … Read More
The Vice President/Presidential Candidate Comes to Scottsdale: What I Wish They Actually Would Have Talked About
By Ronald Sampson Arizona is once again the center of the political universe. As any high school civics student understands, the President is elected by way of the electoral college, and the number of states that can materially swing that vote has narrowed significantly over the years. There are about 5-8 states are can legitimately vote either direction, and Arizona … Read More
BREAKING NEWS: They’re Back…
A movie phrase made famous by Poltergeist apparently is the long rumored reality as Axon is purportedly readying to return its immensely unpopular apartment plan to Scottsdale decision-making dais. And in the “you can’t make this up” category, they are apparently targeting Planning Commission and City Council hearings immediately after the election on November 13th and November 19th. Too cute by half, but more … Read More