I just saw Darla put a second soap box on top of the one she's been using.
I think Lex gets to a good point about the demographic slice that put the negative vote in on 8. So it isn't essentially a political question really, it concerns a non-reflective social bias from having internalized norms from three generations ago. So he's right about still needing to do a lot more work to get people to unlearn what they've internalized. The people who voted 8 in weren't really making a reasoned political decision based on party affiliation or even a mis-guided morality really. They did it out of social habit. And if it is true it was over 65ers who went for 8 it also then means initiatives like 8 will loose significant backing when that democraphic slice passes out of the voting population. So even if a massive political effort fails to turn those people's minds around they won't be here all that much longer, relatively speaking, to keep passing similar referendums. And remember it's been 40 years since Dr. King set Obama's trajectory in motion. Social change of something so deeply internalized is incremental at best. Another example is this election cycle's referendum of decriminalizing marijuana in Massachusettes. It's been over 30 years since many states and municipalities, a lot of them in the upper mid-west, all had pot decriminalized and here it is coming back again after such a long time.