WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.100 Imagine sitting down in a quiet room, right? 00:00:02.569 --> 00:00:05.490 The year is 1950. Okay, setting the scene. You 00:00:05.490 --> 00:00:07.230 pick up this brand new science fiction novel 00:00:07.230 --> 00:00:10.109 by James Blish. It's titled They Shall Have Stars. 00:00:10.529 --> 00:00:13.550 Oh, classic mid -century sci -fi. Exactly. So 00:00:13.550 --> 00:00:15.810 you open the cover, start reading, and the story 00:00:15.810 --> 00:00:18.690 throws you into the far -off futuristic year 00:00:18.690 --> 00:00:22.489 of 2013. Which I guess was very far off back 00:00:22.489 --> 00:00:25.089 then. Right. And the plot centers around this 00:00:25.089 --> 00:00:27.890 powerful United States senator from Alaska named 00:00:27.890 --> 00:00:30.629 Bliss Wagoner. He's busy steering the future 00:00:30.629 --> 00:00:33.079 of human space exploration. So it's like standard 00:00:33.079 --> 00:00:35.460 genre fare on the surface. It does, except for 00:00:35.460 --> 00:00:39.140 one mind -bending detail. In 1950, Alaska wasn't 00:00:39.140 --> 00:00:41.380 even a state. It was still a territory. Exactly. 00:00:41.500 --> 00:00:43.679 It was a territory. The very concept of a U .S. 00:00:43.700 --> 00:00:45.600 senator from Alaska was completely fictional. 00:00:45.799 --> 00:00:48.399 It would be another nine years before that star 00:00:48.399 --> 00:00:51.250 was even added to the American flag. Wow. You 00:00:51.250 --> 00:00:54.250 know, that specific creative choice by Blish 00:00:54.250 --> 00:00:57.390 perfectly sets the thematic stage for what we 00:00:57.390 --> 00:00:59.429 are looking at today. Yeah. Yeah, because it 00:00:59.429 --> 00:01:01.969 suggests that even before Alaska had a seat at 00:01:01.969 --> 00:01:04.530 the federal table, it occupied a very specific 00:01:04.530 --> 00:01:07.560 place in the American cultural imagination. The 00:01:07.560 --> 00:01:09.819 ultimate frontier. Precisely. The ultimate frontier. 00:01:09.900 --> 00:01:11.780 And as we'll see by looking at the actual data 00:01:11.780 --> 00:01:14.480 of who has held those Senate seats, that frontier 00:01:14.480 --> 00:01:18.000 mentality didn't just apply to geography or space 00:01:18.000 --> 00:01:20.640 exploration. It applied heavily to their political 00:01:20.640 --> 00:01:23.879 mechanics as well. Man, that is the perfect framing 00:01:23.879 --> 00:01:26.319 for our mission today. Glad you think so. We 00:01:26.319 --> 00:01:28.680 are going to explore this surprisingly wild, 00:01:29.019 --> 00:01:32.140 dramatic, and honestly incredibly brief history 00:01:32.140 --> 00:01:34.959 of Alaska's representation in the Senate. And 00:01:34.959 --> 00:01:37.920 we're using the Wikipedia article detailing the 00:01:37.920 --> 00:01:41.200 list of United States senators from Alaska as 00:01:41.200 --> 00:01:43.640 our foundational map for this deep dive. Yep. 00:01:43.680 --> 00:01:46.859 We are going to track the political trailblazing 00:01:46.859 --> 00:01:49.400 of the exact individuals who have held these 00:01:49.400 --> 00:01:52.400 two seats since 1959. It's a fascinating roster. 00:01:52.620 --> 00:01:55.040 Okay, let's unpack this. Alaska officially joined 00:01:55.040 --> 00:01:58.560 the union on January 3, 1959. Right. From that 00:01:58.560 --> 00:02:01.319 day all the way to the present, only eight individuals 00:02:01.319 --> 00:02:03.500 have ever represented the state in the United 00:02:03.500 --> 00:02:06.329 States Senate. Just eight. Only eight. When you 00:02:06.329 --> 00:02:08.349 consider the sheer volume of history that has 00:02:08.349 --> 00:02:11.229 occurred since 1959, eight people feels like 00:02:11.229 --> 00:02:13.330 an impossibly small roster for you to wrap your 00:02:13.330 --> 00:02:15.449 head around. What's fascinating here is just 00:02:15.449 --> 00:02:18.409 how small that number is when you give it proper 00:02:18.409 --> 00:02:21.319 political context. How so? Well, we're looking 00:02:21.319 --> 00:02:24.219 at a state that has been in the Union for well 00:02:24.219 --> 00:02:27.300 over 60 years. That timeline spans the height 00:02:27.300 --> 00:02:30.780 of the Cold War. Oh, true. Multiple massive economic 00:02:30.780 --> 00:02:34.199 shifts, the dawn of the digital age, profound 00:02:34.199 --> 00:02:37.280 cultural transformations. And through all of 00:02:37.280 --> 00:02:40.039 that turbulence, having only eight individuals 00:02:40.039 --> 00:02:42.620 hold these incredibly powerful federal roles 00:02:42.620 --> 00:02:45.900 indicates a staggering level of political longevity. 00:02:46.240 --> 00:02:49.030 And stability, really. And stability. When a 00:02:49.030 --> 00:02:51.729 state experiences that exceptionally low turnover, 00:02:52.030 --> 00:02:55.110 every single shift in power ceases to be just... 00:02:55.550 --> 00:02:57.610 you know, a routine election. Right. It's bigger 00:02:57.610 --> 00:02:59.669 than that. It becomes a monumental generational 00:02:59.669 --> 00:03:02.870 event that completely redefines the state's relationship 00:03:02.870 --> 00:03:04.490 with the federal government. So let's look at 00:03:04.490 --> 00:03:06.169 the mechanics of how that stability actually 00:03:06.169 --> 00:03:08.169 played out. We should examine the Senate structure 00:03:08.169 --> 00:03:10.229 outlined in the source. Right. The seats are 00:03:10.229 --> 00:03:12.689 divided into classes to stagger the elections. 00:03:13.250 --> 00:03:15.949 Exactly. Our source tracks Alaska's class two 00:03:15.949 --> 00:03:18.650 and class three seats. And the class two seat 00:03:18.650 --> 00:03:21.050 really exemplifies that generational stability 00:03:21.050 --> 00:03:23.150 you just mentioned. It really does. The first 00:03:23.150 --> 00:03:25.379 person to hold this seat was a Democrat from 00:03:25.379 --> 00:03:27.960 Fairbanks named Bob Bartlett. A founding figure 00:03:27.960 --> 00:03:30.960 for the state. He was. He took office on day 00:03:30.960 --> 00:03:34.000 one of statehood in 1959 and served until he 00:03:34.000 --> 00:03:37.580 tragically died in office in December 1968. Which 00:03:37.580 --> 00:03:40.960 makes you wonder, when a towering founding figure 00:03:40.960 --> 00:03:43.520 like Bartlett dies right at the dawn of statehood, 00:03:43.699 --> 00:03:47.259 how does a brand new state handle that sudden 00:03:47.259 --> 00:03:50.120 power vacuum? Well, the immediate mechanism is 00:03:50.120 --> 00:03:52.409 an executive appointment. You have to ensure 00:03:52.409 --> 00:03:54.729 the state maintains its voting power in Washington. 00:03:54.909 --> 00:03:57.430 Right. So the governor steps in. Exactly. The 00:03:57.430 --> 00:03:59.310 governor must select someone to fill the gap. 00:03:59.530 --> 00:04:02.169 In this case, the vacancy lasted just under two 00:04:02.169 --> 00:04:04.949 weeks. Wow, that's fast. It had to be. On Christmas 00:04:04.949 --> 00:04:08.849 Eve, December 24th, 1968, a Republican from Anchorage 00:04:08.849 --> 00:04:11.729 named Ted Stevens was appointed to continue Bartlett's 00:04:11.729 --> 00:04:14.789 term. At the time, it was mostly seen as a necessary 00:04:14.789 --> 00:04:17.879 administrative move to fill a void. But it ended 00:04:17.879 --> 00:04:19.800 up being one of the most consequential appointments 00:04:19.800 --> 00:04:21.540 in the history of the Senate. And here's where 00:04:21.540 --> 00:04:24.160 it gets really interesting. Oh, yeah. Ted Stevens 00:04:24.160 --> 00:04:26.680 doesn't just act as a temporary placeholder. 00:04:27.139 --> 00:04:30.500 He gets officially elected in 1970 to finish 00:04:30.500 --> 00:04:34.279 the term. And then he simply never leaves. Never 00:04:34.279 --> 00:04:36.660 leaves. He stays in that exact same Senate seat 00:04:36.660 --> 00:04:40.060 until January 3, 2009. It's incredible. He becomes 00:04:40.060 --> 00:04:43.000 Alaska's longest serving U .S. senator, holding 00:04:43.000 --> 00:04:47.060 the position for 40 years. 40 years. If we connect 00:04:47.060 --> 00:04:50.319 this to the bigger picture, a 40 -year incumbency 00:04:50.319 --> 00:04:53.300 fundamentally alters the political DNA of a state. 00:04:53.459 --> 00:04:55.699 How does that actually look on the ground? It 00:04:55.699 --> 00:04:57.540 isn't just about winning elections. It's about 00:04:57.540 --> 00:04:59.920 the complete monopolization of a state's federal 00:04:59.920 --> 00:05:03.439 identity. When a single individual holds a Senate 00:05:03.439 --> 00:05:06.259 seat for four decades, they accumulate an almost 00:05:06.259 --> 00:05:09.220 insurmountable level of seniority. And seniority 00:05:09.220 --> 00:05:11.160 is everything in the Senate. It dictates committee 00:05:11.160 --> 00:05:13.980 chairmanships, which in turn dictates how massive 00:05:13.980 --> 00:05:16.000 federal infrastructure projects are allocated. 00:05:16.569 --> 00:05:18.550 Oh, and Alaska has a lot of natural resources 00:05:18.550 --> 00:05:20.550 to manage. Exactly. It shapes the legislative 00:05:20.550 --> 00:05:23.329 framework around oil, around timber. An entire 00:05:23.329 --> 00:05:26.290 generation of Alaskans grew up, entered the workforce, 00:05:26.610 --> 00:05:29.069 had children of their own, all under the shadow 00:05:29.069 --> 00:05:31.829 of a single senator directing their federal funds 00:05:31.829 --> 00:05:34.889 and legislative identity. That's wild to think 00:05:34.889 --> 00:05:37.810 about. It builds an institutional inertia that 00:05:37.810 --> 00:05:40.449 is incredibly difficult for any challenger to 00:05:40.449 --> 00:05:42.779 overcome. It basically turns the representative 00:05:42.779 --> 00:05:45.500 into a permanent fixture of the state's architecture. 00:05:45.800 --> 00:05:48.899 Precisely. But even a 40 year tenure eventually 00:05:48.899 --> 00:05:51.339 meets the realities of modern electoral cycles. 00:05:51.620 --> 00:05:54.160 The source details that the modern era finally 00:05:54.160 --> 00:05:56.399 brought turnover to the class two seat. Right. 00:05:56.439 --> 00:05:59.040 The end of an era. Democrat Mark Begich from 00:05:59.040 --> 00:06:02.079 Anchorage won the seat in 2008. He took office 00:06:02.079 --> 00:06:04.540 in 2009, officially bringing the Stevens era 00:06:04.540 --> 00:06:07.399 to a close. Right. Begich served one term before 00:06:07.399 --> 00:06:10.660 losing his reelection bid. Then in 2014, Republican 00:06:10.660 --> 00:06:13.620 Dan Sullivan won the seat. A return to a more 00:06:13.620 --> 00:06:16.480 standard turnover. Yeah, he took office in 2015 00:06:16.480 --> 00:06:19.879 and has held it through the 2016 and 2020 elections, 00:06:19.980 --> 00:06:24.459 with his next race slated for 2026. So after 00:06:24.459 --> 00:06:27.459 40 years of an unmovable institution, the class 00:06:27.459 --> 00:06:29.959 two seat returned to a much more standard rhythm 00:06:29.959 --> 00:06:32.500 of political competition. And the normalization 00:06:32.500 --> 00:06:35.860 of that seat provides a vital baseline for understanding 00:06:35.860 --> 00:06:38.339 the state's political dynamics. Because of what 00:06:38.339 --> 00:06:41.000 was happening with the other seat. Yes, because 00:06:41.000 --> 00:06:43.259 as entrenched and predictable as the class two 00:06:43.259 --> 00:06:45.920 seat became under Ted Stevens, the other half 00:06:45.920 --> 00:06:48.180 of Alaska's delegation took the exact opposite 00:06:48.180 --> 00:06:51.110 path. The class three seat has operated entirely 00:06:51.110 --> 00:06:53.529 outside the traditional political playbook. It 00:06:53.529 --> 00:06:55.250 is the political frontier we were talking about 00:06:55.250 --> 00:06:57.110 earlier. The history of the class three seat 00:06:57.110 --> 00:07:00.069 is an absolute wild ride of electoral anomalies. 00:07:00.170 --> 00:07:02.810 A total roller coaster. It starts in 1959 with 00:07:02.810 --> 00:07:05.569 Democrat Ernest Gruening from Juneau. He serves 00:07:05.569 --> 00:07:08.310 his first term, gets reelected in 1962, but then 00:07:08.310 --> 00:07:11.089 hits a wall in 1968. A major wall. He actually 00:07:11.089 --> 00:07:13.790 loses his party's renomination, but Gruening 00:07:13.790 --> 00:07:16.009 refuses to step aside. He launches a write -in 00:07:16.009 --> 00:07:18.250 campaign for the general election, which ultimately 00:07:18.250 --> 00:07:21.550 fails. While Gruning lost, his decision to bypass 00:07:21.550 --> 00:07:24.189 the formal party apparatus through a writing 00:07:24.189 --> 00:07:27.350 campaign established a critical behavioral precedent 00:07:27.350 --> 00:07:29.670 for this specific seat. Just showing that it 00:07:29.670 --> 00:07:32.949 was possible to go rogue. Exactly. It signaled 00:07:32.949 --> 00:07:35.430 that the formal party nomination was not necessarily 00:07:35.430 --> 00:07:38.589 the final word in Alaska's political culture. 00:07:38.750 --> 00:07:40.990 And we see that turbulence immediately repeat 00:07:40.990 --> 00:07:44.180 itself. Democrat Mike Gravel takes over the seat 00:07:44.180 --> 00:07:48.060 in 1969. He serves through the 70s, gets reelected. 00:07:48.060 --> 00:07:50.660 And then in 1980, the exact same thing happens 00:07:50.660 --> 00:07:53.180 to him. He loses his renomination. Having two 00:07:53.180 --> 00:07:55.720 consecutive senators in the same seat lose the 00:07:55.720 --> 00:07:58.540 support of their own party for renomination highlights 00:07:58.540 --> 00:08:01.839 a profound disconnect. Between who? Between the 00:08:01.839 --> 00:08:04.500 internal party machinery and the broader electorate 00:08:04.500 --> 00:08:06.990 during that era. The party delegates and primary 00:08:06.990 --> 00:08:09.629 voters were clearly demanding different ideological 00:08:09.629 --> 00:08:12.230 representation than the general voting public. 00:08:12.449 --> 00:08:14.949 And that internal friction paves the way for 00:08:14.949 --> 00:08:17.410 a Republican from Ketchikan named Frank Murkowski 00:08:17.410 --> 00:08:21.089 to win the class three seat in 1980. Frank Murkowski 00:08:21.089 --> 00:08:24.110 manages to halt the chaos for a while. He holds 00:08:24.110 --> 00:08:26.750 the seat through the 80s and 90s, winning reelection 00:08:26.750 --> 00:08:31.269 in 1986, 1992 and 1998. Good long run. Yeah, 00:08:31.329 --> 00:08:35.540 he serves all the way until December 2002. So 00:08:35.540 --> 00:08:38.460 what does this all mean? Why did he suddenly 00:08:38.460 --> 00:08:41.159 leave a secure Senate seat right at the start 00:08:41.159 --> 00:08:42.960 of the new millennium? Because of the governor's 00:08:42.960 --> 00:08:45.360 race. Right. He resigned because he was elected 00:08:45.360 --> 00:08:48.080 governor of Alaska. Now, moving from the federal 00:08:48.080 --> 00:08:50.860 legislative branch to the top executive role 00:08:50.860 --> 00:08:54.179 of the state is a significant pivot. Huge. But 00:08:54.179 --> 00:08:56.600 crucially, as we discussed with Bob Bartlett 00:08:56.600 --> 00:09:00.139 earlier, a vacant Senate seat triggers the governor's 00:09:00.139 --> 00:09:02.940 appointment power. Oh, man, this part is crazy. 00:09:03.600 --> 00:09:05.799 Right. Because this time, the governor making 00:09:05.799 --> 00:09:08.220 the appointment is the very person who just vacated 00:09:08.220 --> 00:09:10.279 the seat. And the person Governor Frank Murkowski 00:09:10.279 --> 00:09:13.559 chooses to fill his own vacant Senate seat is 00:09:13.559 --> 00:09:16.419 his daughter, Lisa Murkowski. A family succession. 00:09:16.679 --> 00:09:19.799 She officially takes office on December 20, 2002. 00:09:20.279 --> 00:09:23.639 On paper, to anyone looking, it looks like a 00:09:23.639 --> 00:09:26.639 staggering display of pure political nepotism. 00:09:26.820 --> 00:09:28.899 It certainly invites that immediate criticism. 00:09:29.019 --> 00:09:31.080 I mean, it's his daughter. But we have to look 00:09:31.080 --> 00:09:33.980 past the surface -level optics and consider the 00:09:33.980 --> 00:09:36.659 strategic institutional logic behind the move. 00:09:36.799 --> 00:09:39.480 Okay, lay it out. Frank Murkowski had spent 22 00:09:39.480 --> 00:09:42.659 years building a highly sophisticated, deeply 00:09:42.659 --> 00:09:45.259 entrenched political apparatus in the Senate. 00:09:45.799 --> 00:09:48.500 By appointing his daughter, he wasn't just handing 00:09:48.500 --> 00:09:51.259 over a title. What was he doing? He was transferring 00:09:51.259 --> 00:09:54.340 a fully operational political machine to someone 00:09:54.340 --> 00:09:56.919 who would seamlessly maintain his faction's influence 00:09:56.919 --> 00:10:01.000 and ideological trajectory. In the ruthless calculus 00:10:01.000 --> 00:10:04.399 of maintaining party and factional control, ensuring 00:10:04.399 --> 00:10:06.840 the immediate continuity of that apparatus is 00:10:06.840 --> 00:10:10.159 a highly strategic, if controversial, maneuver. 00:10:10.480 --> 00:10:12.580 That makes a lot of sense mechanically. But that 00:10:12.580 --> 00:10:14.899 strategic continuity is immediately put to the 00:10:14.899 --> 00:10:17.200 test. Very quickly. Lisa Murkowski secures a 00:10:17.200 --> 00:10:20.460 full term in 2004. But then we hit the 2010 election 00:10:20.460 --> 00:10:23.620 cycle and the script completely flips. In a massive 00:10:23.620 --> 00:10:26.039 political upset, she loses her renomination. 00:10:26.440 --> 00:10:28.879 It's that class three curse again. Yes. Just 00:10:28.879 --> 00:10:30.940 like Ernest Gruening did decades earlier in the 00:10:30.940 --> 00:10:33.259 very same seat, the party goes in a different 00:10:33.259 --> 00:10:35.820 direction. And just like Gruening, Lisa Murkowski 00:10:35.820 --> 00:10:38.220 mounts a write -in campaign for the general election. 00:10:38.559 --> 00:10:41.279 History repeating itself. But unlike Grooning, 00:10:41.419 --> 00:10:44.220 she actually pulls it off and wins. Which is 00:10:44.220 --> 00:10:46.899 astounding. Walk us through the mechanics of 00:10:46.899 --> 00:10:49.840 why a write -in victory at the senatorial level 00:10:49.840 --> 00:10:52.779 is considered such a massive anomaly. It is nearly 00:10:52.779 --> 00:10:55.919 impossible because it requires entirely subverting 00:10:55.919 --> 00:10:58.360 the automated mechanics of an election. Because 00:10:58.360 --> 00:11:01.340 normally you just check a box. Right. In a standard 00:11:01.340 --> 00:11:04.200 race, a candidate relies on the party infrastructure 00:11:04.200 --> 00:11:07.830 to secure their name on the printed ballot. Voters 00:11:07.830 --> 00:11:10.509 simply walk into the booth, look for the R or 00:11:10.509 --> 00:11:13.649 D next to a familiar name and fill in a bubble. 00:11:13.929 --> 00:11:16.570 A write -in campaign strips all of that away. 00:11:16.809 --> 00:11:18.809 You actually have to know who you're voting for. 00:11:18.950 --> 00:11:21.250 You are asking hundreds of thousands of voters 00:11:21.250 --> 00:11:24.009 to physically write a candidate's name on a blank 00:11:24.009 --> 00:11:26.830 line. If the name is misspelled, the vote is 00:11:26.830 --> 00:11:29.340 often invalidated. Oh, I didn't even think about 00:11:29.340 --> 00:11:31.919 spelling errors. It's a huge hurdle. Furthermore, 00:11:32.120 --> 00:11:34.019 you have to build a shadow campaign infrastructure 00:11:34.019 --> 00:11:37.480 entirely from scratch to educate the voter base 00:11:37.480 --> 00:11:39.299 on this manual process. While fighting your own 00:11:39.299 --> 00:11:41.889 party. All while fighting against the massive 00:11:41.889 --> 00:11:44.429 financial and organizational weight of your own 00:11:44.429 --> 00:11:47.629 party's official nominee. The level of independent 00:11:47.629 --> 00:11:50.409 voter mobilization and sheer name recognition 00:11:50.409 --> 00:11:53.070 required to overcome those logistical hurdles 00:11:53.070 --> 00:11:57.210 makes her 2010 victory a masterclass in grassroots 00:11:57.210 --> 00:11:59.549 mechanics. It completely breaks the traditional 00:11:59.549 --> 00:12:01.830 mold of how a federal election is supposed to 00:12:01.830 --> 00:12:04.350 operate. Completely. But her divergence from 00:12:04.350 --> 00:12:06.789 the traditional political playbook doesn't stop 00:12:06.789 --> 00:12:09.049 with the write -in victory. The source material. 00:12:09.259 --> 00:12:12.679 highlights that in 2022, Lisa Murkowski was reelected 00:12:12.679 --> 00:12:15.840 again, but this time under completely new system. 00:12:15.840 --> 00:12:19.059 Right. An instant runoff election. How does that 00:12:19.059 --> 00:12:21.500 mechanism fundamentally alter the way a candidate 00:12:21.500 --> 00:12:23.600 secures a Senate seat? Well, this is perhaps 00:12:23.600 --> 00:12:25.399 the most significant structural shift in the 00:12:25.399 --> 00:12:27.519 state's modern history. We really need to look 00:12:27.519 --> 00:12:28.980 at this neutrally, just looking at the machinery 00:12:28.980 --> 00:12:31.100 of it. Definitely. Just the mechanics. Traditionally, 00:12:31.240 --> 00:12:34.059 elections rely on closed partisan primaries. 00:12:35.019 --> 00:12:37.960 Those tend to suffer from low turnout and are 00:12:37.960 --> 00:12:40.500 often dominated by the most ideologically extreme 00:12:40.500 --> 00:12:43.200 flanks of a party. The candidate has to cater 00:12:43.200 --> 00:12:45.899 to the fringes just to survive the primary, which 00:12:45.899 --> 00:12:47.840 often leaves the general electorate choosing 00:12:47.840 --> 00:12:51.460 between two highly polarized options. Alaska 00:12:51.460 --> 00:12:54.220 dismantled that bottleneck by adopting a top 00:12:54.220 --> 00:12:56.600 four instant runoff system. Also known as rank 00:12:56.600 --> 00:12:58.919 choice voting, right? Exactly. Rank choice voting. 00:12:59.080 --> 00:13:01.740 So they completely removed the partisan primary 00:13:01.740 --> 00:13:04.840 phase. Precisely. All candidates, regardless 00:13:04.840 --> 00:13:08.000 of party, run on a single open primary ballot. 00:13:08.200 --> 00:13:11.200 Okay. The top four vote -getters advance to the 00:13:11.200 --> 00:13:14.259 general election. In the general, voters don't 00:13:14.259 --> 00:13:17.220 just pick one person. They rank those four candidates 00:13:17.220 --> 00:13:19.399 in order of preference. First choice, second 00:13:19.399 --> 00:13:21.960 choice, and so on. Right. If no one secures an 00:13:21.960 --> 00:13:24.860 outright majority of first choice votes, an instant 00:13:24.860 --> 00:13:27.470 runoff is triggered. The candidate in fourth 00:13:27.470 --> 00:13:29.809 place is eliminated, and the votes of the people 00:13:29.809 --> 00:13:32.110 who chose that eliminated candidate are immediately 00:13:32.110 --> 00:13:34.129 redistributed to their second choice candidate. 00:13:34.269 --> 00:13:36.950 Oh, I see. This process repeats until someone 00:13:36.950 --> 00:13:39.350 crosses the 50 % threshold. Which fundamentally 00:13:39.350 --> 00:13:41.789 changes who a candidate has to appeal to in order 00:13:41.789 --> 00:13:45.110 to win. Exactly. It completely neutralizes the 00:13:45.110 --> 00:13:48.330 power of the ideological fringes. To survive 00:13:48.330 --> 00:13:51.889 an instant runoff, a candidate cannot rely solely 00:13:51.889 --> 00:13:55.240 on a passionate extreme base. They need broader 00:13:55.240 --> 00:13:57.519 appeal. They must actively court the political 00:13:57.519 --> 00:13:59.879 center. They have to appeal to the median voter 00:13:59.879 --> 00:14:02.379 to ensure they are listed as a second or third 00:14:02.379 --> 00:14:04.559 choice on their opponent's ballots. Interesting. 00:14:04.620 --> 00:14:06.899 In the context of the class three seat, this 00:14:06.899 --> 00:14:09.759 system allowed Lisa Murkowski to bypass the very 00:14:09.759 --> 00:14:12.860 party primary mechanism that rejected her back 00:14:12.860 --> 00:14:17.019 in 2010 and instead build a broad, moderate coalition 00:14:17.019 --> 00:14:19.720 across the general electorate. It acts as a mechanical 00:14:19.720 --> 00:14:22.240 safeguard against extreme polarization. It's 00:14:22.240 --> 00:14:24.480 essentially a laboratory for democratic innovation. 00:14:24.799 --> 00:14:26.639 It really is. I mean, over the history of just 00:14:26.639 --> 00:14:29.220 this one class three Senate seat, we have witnessed 00:14:29.220 --> 00:14:32.500 traditional primary defeats, the sheer logistical 00:14:32.500 --> 00:14:34.740 impossibility of a successful write -in campaign, 00:14:35.059 --> 00:14:37.200 a familial appointment designed to preserve a 00:14:37.200 --> 00:14:39.399 political apparatus, and the implementation of 00:14:39.399 --> 00:14:41.679 instant runoffs to bypass partisan gridlock. 00:14:41.779 --> 00:14:44.240 Very busy seat. It is a continuous narrative 00:14:44.240 --> 00:14:46.500 of breaking the established rules to find new 00:14:46.500 --> 00:14:49.220 ways forward, which brings us perfectly back 00:14:49.220 --> 00:14:51.200 to where we started. The realm of science fiction. 00:14:51.440 --> 00:14:55.019 Yes. James Blish's 1950 novel. The connection 00:14:55.019 --> 00:14:57.379 there is much more profound than simple trivia. 00:14:57.539 --> 00:14:59.539 We have just spent several minutes detailing 00:14:59.539 --> 00:15:02.740 how Alaska's political culture has consistently 00:15:02.740 --> 00:15:05.480 acted as a frontier for electoral mechanics. 00:15:05.679 --> 00:15:09.570 Exactly. Blish introduces Blisswagoner. a United 00:15:09.570 --> 00:15:11.649 States senator from Alaska in the year 2013, 00:15:11.970 --> 00:15:14.129 heading the Joint Congressional Committee on 00:15:14.129 --> 00:15:17.049 Spaceflight. And he wrote this nine years before 00:15:17.049 --> 00:15:20.009 Alaska was even granted statehood. This raises 00:15:20.009 --> 00:15:22.590 an important question. What was the cultural 00:15:22.590 --> 00:15:26.029 intuition that led an author to place a non -existent 00:15:26.029 --> 00:15:28.690 senator at the forefront of humanity's expansion 00:15:28.690 --> 00:15:30.929 into the cosmos? That's the million -dollar question. 00:15:31.250 --> 00:15:33.789 Blitch recognized that the idea of Alaska... 00:15:34.090 --> 00:15:37.250 The vastness, the isolation, the harshness was 00:15:37.250 --> 00:15:39.649 synonymous with the American concept of the future. 00:15:39.730 --> 00:15:41.950 It was the physical embodiment of the final frontier. 00:15:42.210 --> 00:15:44.830 Therefore, if humanity was going to push into 00:15:44.830 --> 00:15:47.850 the ultimate frontier of space, it made perfect 00:15:47.850 --> 00:15:50.190 thematic sense that the political leadership 00:15:50.190 --> 00:15:52.250 for that endeavor would hail from the frontier 00:15:52.250 --> 00:15:55.889 of Alaska. Blish accurately assumed that by 2013, 00:15:56.289 --> 00:15:58.809 Alaska would not only be fully integrated into 00:15:58.809 --> 00:16:01.389 the highest levels of federal policy, but that 00:16:01.389 --> 00:16:03.590 it would retain its identity as a trailblazer. 00:16:03.980 --> 00:16:06.480 Art anticipating the trajectory of life. And 00:16:06.480 --> 00:16:09.440 the irony is, Blish's fictional senator steering 00:16:09.440 --> 00:16:12.340 space policy almost feels less dramatic than 00:16:12.340 --> 00:16:14.519 the actual electoral reality we've uncovered. 00:16:14.940 --> 00:16:17.799 It's true. Fact is stranger than fiction. Just 00:16:17.799 --> 00:16:19.940 to summarize the incredible density of history 00:16:19.940 --> 00:16:22.600 packed into this deep dive, we tracked a state 00:16:22.600 --> 00:16:25.220 represented by only eight individuals since 1959. 00:16:25.700 --> 00:16:28.159 Just eight. Within that tiny cohort, we found 00:16:28.159 --> 00:16:30.879 a 40 -year incumbency that entirely monopolized 00:16:30.879 --> 00:16:33.279 a state's federal identity, a governor strategically 00:16:33.279 --> 00:16:35.740 appointing his own daughter to preserve factional 00:16:35.740 --> 00:16:38.600 control, the logistical miracle of a senatorship, 00:16:38.600 --> 00:16:41.860 the deliberate dismantling of partisan primaries 00:16:41.860 --> 00:16:45.159 in favor of instant runoffs, and a 1950s sci 00:16:45.159 --> 00:16:47.419 -fi prophecy mapping out the state's forward 00:16:47.419 --> 00:16:49.940 -looking destiny. And for you, the listener, 00:16:50.120 --> 00:16:53.220 navigating a modern world saturated with information 00:16:53.220 --> 00:16:56.120 overload, this is why examining the underlying 00:16:56.120 --> 00:16:59.059 data is so vital. Absolutely. It is incredibly 00:16:59.059 --> 00:17:01.200 easy to glance at a simple list of names and 00:17:01.200 --> 00:17:04.240 dates on Wikipedia and dismiss it as a dry historical 00:17:04.240 --> 00:17:07.299 record. But tracking the actual mechanics of 00:17:07.299 --> 00:17:09.500 these elections reveals the true levers of power. 00:17:09.660 --> 00:17:12.099 It shows you how the machine works. It exposes 00:17:12.099 --> 00:17:15.099 how incumbency builds impenetrable walls, how 00:17:15.099 --> 00:17:17.279 party machinery can disconnect from the electorate, 00:17:17.299 --> 00:17:19.460 and how altering the physical structure of a 00:17:19.460 --> 00:17:22.200 ballot can completely redefine who holds power. 00:17:22.619 --> 00:17:25.259 True political literacy requires looking past 00:17:25.259 --> 00:17:27.819 the outcomes and understanding the systemic machinery 00:17:27.819 --> 00:17:30.480 that produced them. I couldn't agree more. Understanding 00:17:30.480 --> 00:17:33.200 the machinery changes how you view every headline. 00:17:33.460 --> 00:17:35.819 And as we wrap up today's deep dive, I want to 00:17:35.819 --> 00:17:38.559 leave you with one final lingering question to 00:17:38.559 --> 00:17:41.059 ponder on your own, specifically building on 00:17:41.059 --> 00:17:43.259 those ballot mechanics we just analyzed. Good 00:17:43.259 --> 00:17:45.490 thought experiment. Given the incredible shifts 00:17:45.490 --> 00:17:47.990 in power we've seen in Alaska, where a candidate 00:17:47.990 --> 00:17:50.569 can lose a party primary but still fight back 00:17:50.569 --> 00:17:53.170 and win a general election through the mechanism 00:17:53.170 --> 00:17:56.289 of an instant runoff, it makes you wonder. If 00:17:56.289 --> 00:17:59.470 states across the entire country adopted nontraditional 00:17:59.470 --> 00:18:01.829 voting methods like instant runoffs and abolished 00:18:01.829 --> 00:18:05.109 partisan primaries, how many seemingly entrenched, 00:18:05.170 --> 00:18:07.609 highly polarized political landscapes would be 00:18:07.609 --> 00:18:10.029 completely rewritten overnight? Something to 00:18:10.029 --> 00:18:12.670 really think about. How much hidden, moderate 00:18:12.670 --> 00:18:15.150 political diversity is currently trapped behind 00:18:15.150 --> 00:18:17.869 an outdated ballot structure, just waiting for 00:18:17.869 --> 00:18:19.849 the rules to change? Think about that the next 00:18:19.849 --> 00:18:23.230 time you cast your own vote. Well, that is all 00:18:23.230 --> 00:18:25.349 the time we have for today. Thank you so much 00:18:25.349 --> 00:18:27.730 for joining us on this exploration of Alaska's 00:18:27.730 --> 00:18:30.990 Senate history. Thanks for listening. Keep questioning 00:18:30.990 --> 00:18:33.309 the mechanics behind the data, and most importantly, 00:18:33.450 --> 00:18:36.390 keep diving deep into your curiosity. We will 00:18:36.390 --> 00:18:37.130 talk to you next time.