So, you are voting for a house rep and/or Senator soon (I certainly HOPE you are all voting). Which are the most important, second most important and third most important characteristics in your US Senator or House Rep?

Once this has been up for a while, I'll devise a point system, and see what it tells us.

 

1. Policy views

2. Political affiliation (let's be real here. a dyed-in-the-wool liberal is not often going to vote for a conservative and vice versa)

3. Charisma/likability (mostly because all politicians need this for various reasons)

 

Leadership style isn't as important until later in one's career. Resume and background matters, but if I like Candidate A's ideas and he is new on the scene, I'm not voting for Candidate B if I think they are a hack just because they've been around a long time (see Obama vs. McCain).

 

I really don't give a f*** about character and IMO this is what ruins elections for most people. I mean if he is a complete and utter bag of s*** then yes of course. But, you've got Krystal Ball running for Congress in Virginia and someone released some photos of her sucking a dildo that was attached to a guy's nose from when she was in college. First off this is a) pretty god damn awesome but more importantly B) completely irrelevant to how fit she is to be a legislator and c) the reaction it's intended to provoke makes me like the candidate MORE if someone releases a photo of someone smoking a bong in college or whatever. That means they're just a regular person who's done dumb things just like me.

No choice for sex appeal? What kind of poll is this.

Character, Party, Resume

 

Their individual policy views and meaningless until they achieve some sort of leadership position. It's gonna be the party. In the senate I am much more willing to vote GOP because of the nature of the debate than in the House.