Reflections on the Midterm Election in Vermont
I first learned of John Klar on Facebook. He bought his first wave of ads in the late spring. They were professional, yet rustic: photos of him working on his farm or interacting with constituents, promising in several captions to “bring together people from different political views,” and to “bring a critical eye to Montpelier” in another. The State Senate district I live in, encompassing most of rural Orange County, Vt., was the one in which Klar was campaigning, and my first thought was that he seemed made in the image of Phil Scott, Vermont’s prominent Republican governor. My home state has a history of electing moderate conservatives with staggering margins of victory, but in recent years, few other than Scott have been able to put together the pieces of the puzzle on election day. Klar’s ads, heralding his common sense and emphasis on fiscal responsibility, were like those I saw for Scott every election cycle, so I assumed he was trying to replicate the governor’s success.