Election 2014: Do Not Fold, Spindle, or Mutilate

by Sunnyjane

Come January 20, 2015, President Barack Obama will have two years left to carry out those visions for the United States for which he was elected in 2008 and again in 2012.  He cannot do those things that would really benefit the country unless the American electorate is determined enough to get a majority in the House and enough of a majority (60) in the Senate to overcome the Republican Tea Party's ability to filibuster.

So many issues desperately need to be addressed:  jobs, gun control, equal pay for women, climate control...the list is endless.  The GOP has nothing to offer the electorate except Benghazi, repealing (still) the Affordable Care Act, protecting the Second Amendment, trying to stop the war on religion (huh?), repealing a woman's right to choose, and suppressing votes.  That is hardly a list on which to campaign, it seems to me.  Well, they can't exactly win votes by reminding people that they've taken away much-needed programs in order to protect the super-rich, now can they?

Of course, now they're going to campaign on the Veterans Administration scandal, which would actually make a lot of sense if they hadn't added to that misery by denying U.S. veterans much needed programs.  But then, no one has ever accused the Republican Tea Party of possessing an overabundance of integrity.

Voter Suppression Laws

After the black-robed Supremes gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965 in 2013, the very states that had been kept in check by its enactment began shoving voter suppression laws through their legislatures as fast as possible.  Rick Perry glowed like a nuclear reactor on steroids, while Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott nearly ruined his rotator cuff with all his fist-pumping.  The Department of Justice filed suit and in April of this year asked for copies of the Lone Star legislators' emails that dealt with the state's voter suppression ID Laws.  They don't exactly wanna do that, of course, and 189 have claimed legislative privilege.  That's pending.

How Low Will They Go?

--  When Rick Scott's urge-to-purge ploy didn't work out too well, something else had to be done in Florida to keep Democrats from winning in 2014.  Hey, Scott's gotta do something, right?  He's not too popular in the Sunshine State, and at the moment, former governor Charlie Chris is way ahead of him in the latest polls.  So making restrooms unavailable at polling places in Dade County -- which traditionally votes Democratic and has a large population of Latino and African American voters -- seemed like a good idea.  There's something that stinks about this, and it can't be blamed on someone going  #1 or #2.  Snopes.com tried to get an official response on the issue and came up with only vague conclusions.  Briefly, if the polling place is in a public, restrooms will be available.  If it's in a church or other private building, they do not have to offer restroom availability.  (I remember my parents voting in our small-town gas station in the fifties, and I can guarantee neither of them would have dared relieve themselves there.) 

--  While judges in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have struck down voter ID laws this year, North Carolina continues to have the most restrictive voter suppression laws in the nation.  They are being challenged, but the trial will not be held until July of this year, and there is some question as to whether it will be in time to overturn them in time for the November elections should the plaintiffs prevail.

The GOP in Ye Olde Tar Heel State was not helped in their endeavors to support their repressive voting laws.  Seems one of their County precinct chairmen might have just slipped up and screwed the pooch.  Late last year, Don Yelton went on television and made rather telling statements, such as:  The [new ID] law is going to kick the Democrats in the butt and added if it hurts a bunch of lazy blacks that want the government to give them everything, so be it.  The GOP went ballistic and Yelton was forced to resign.

I do believe we can expect that to come up at trial.

So What Makes the GOP So Desperate?

Hmmmm...could be.
 
End Note

    +++

BONUS (by Patrick):

There were some important comments made on the last post, and I would like to repeat some of them here. 

 NebraskaNativetoo wrote:

It finally occurred to me tonight that I am profoundly depressed. My real daily life is better than it has ever been with home, hearth and family-- whatever that phrase is, I love my job, I have so much to be thankful for... and then I read about politics and it breaks my heart. Rachel M had a segment on about the ark park thing postulating about a dinosaur being found in/by Noah's ark, another mass shooting, idiot congresspeople from Nebraska, the race to be as far right as humanly possible, fucking Biblical references in the Constitution?, global warming. My list grows. WTF has happened?

I blame the election of 2008. It awakened my inner progressive political person and I have not been able to break away from politics since. The only other elections I remember being emotionally invested in before then were McGovern and Gore.

My entire family is Republican, except for my mom, who voted for Kennedy and took that fact to her death bed (except when she secretly told me) I grew up thinking box elder bugs were actually called democrats. I was in the Young Republicans in high school. (hanging head) Watergate changed everything for me, it was probably the watershed moment for many people my age.

So here I am, in my "golden years" looking at working for at least the next 7 years until I am 70. I don't get this. I really don't. We worked so hard for equality and respect and it seems to have been for naught. I have faith in my adult children... they didn't have to "unlearn" many of the things I did-- best example is gay marriage... they think it is stupid that it is even an issue. So I take hope from them, but what happens in the meantime? Ah, the meantime... the devil is in those details.

Haven't ranted in awhile, forgot how good it felt. Thank you for your indulgence for an old hippie's random thoughts.

Our reader yknott replied:

NebraskaNative.....I couldn't have put it better. I must be the same age as you are and come from a similar family background.

I look at my grandkids and wonder what will they be dealing with when they come of age. I don't know what has happened/is happening in this country, but I do know that money in politics is ruining our country. Our Democracy is in dire straits.

Our 24/7 nonstop media along with Social Media has given every crazed loon a platform to promote their craziness and hope it goes viral. I'm with you. It seems all the gains we made in the last 100 years are falling by the wayside.

Thank you for your wonderful random thoughts. I couldn't agree more.

Another reply by Freebird4:

I understand your frustration and concerns. Things today seem to be moving so fast and erratic. 2008 brought the very best in our country (AA POTUS) - but at the same time the very worst (bigots). The times are a changing and sure as hell not for the better... not yet anyway. Got to keep faith!

Our reader comeonpeople added:

We are seriously seriously looking at living abroad when we retire. If this is an option for you, think about it. If we then miss the states enough to come back to what is fast becoming nonsense, then we would....but we doubt it.

Our reader laprofesora952 replied:

We're right behind you. It gets more ridiculous every day and I become less and less tolerant. Just when you think you've heard it all, "Joe the Plumber" comes out with the most hateful, insensitive, horrible statement I've heard in a long time. It made me ashamed to live in a country that would tolerate such self-absorbed behavior. I agree, we're outta here.

April 2014: A Big Month for Right-Wing 'Common Sense'

by Sunnyjane

The pervasive stench of right-wing lies, hypocrisy, deceit, fraud, hatred...

It's as if the earth stopped spinning on its axis for seven-hundred-twenty-hours and the entire month of April became one big, bad Tea Party Fools Day -- even with the House of Idiots in recess almost half of that time.  What, did John Boehner send out a memo reading: Just continue acting stupid until we get back.

From bigotry to indictments to more plagiarism to cruelly bungled prison executions, to an outbreak of foot-in-mouth disease, the GOPers seemed to find it necessary to further demonstrate what total fools they are.

So, in no particular order, let's review why April 2014 was a terrible, no-good, very bad month for the far-right idiots in this country.

Racism, The Musical

♫♪ Brothers, brothers, we go together like no others... ♫♪

-- Cliven Bundy, who made his Politicalgates debut just recently, has made it necessary to once again receive our attention.  In the ongoing saga out at the Bigot Ranch, where the cattle roam free on public land, there's now a clash between rival militias as to which of these anti-government groups will make the bigger asses of themselves because there's a civil war a'comin', y'all.  Well ain't that just dandy.

Similar to the Jets and the Sharks in West Side Story, the Three Percenters and the Oath Keepers are staring into the opposite gangs' gun barrels.  It seems that Oath Keepers are persona non grata because they walked away from the ranch after the BLM showdown, and the Three Percenters are calling them out for deserting the cause.  In fact, the leader of the Three Percenters has threatened the deserters with shooting them in the back.  This, um, leader, one Mike Vanderboegh, has also threatened to castrate Harry Reid.  It's all pretty icky, don't you think?  One peculiar thing, however, is how Mr. Vanderboegh is able to lead a gang of anti-government hooligans into onward-Christian-soldiers battle when he's been receiving a $1,300 a month disability check from, uh, the same government he says he doesn't want or need.  I admit it: I'm confused.

Residents around the area are being harassed and endangered by roaming gangs of well-armed out-of-state militiamen, and local law enforcement refuses to get involved.  In fact, à la Gov. Pontius Pilate, Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval has pretty much washed his hands of the whole thing.   

-- So then along came Donald Sterling -- who should know better -- telling his African-American/Mexican mistress, oh excuse me, personal assistant, that he doesn't want her to put photos of herself with The Blacks on any of her social media pages.  And gracious goodness, do not bring them to one of the Clippers games!

The NBA fined Sterling $2.5 million and took away all his basketballs for life.  Now both parties in this affair are speaking out.  Sterling wishes he'd just paid her off, and Stiviano says that while he should apologize for his remarks, he's actually not a racist and she is merely his silly rabbit.  I mean, does it get any tackier than this?

Actually, I have it on somewhat dubious authority that Sterling wants to sell the Clippers to  Bundy, who plans to rename the team the ShuckNJivers.  No, seriously...sort of.

Never Let that Christian Stuff Get in the Way of Your Stupidity

The Gospel According to Sarah Palin.  Amen.  Also. Too.

Possibly more blasphemous and cringe-inducing than her blood libel spoutrage after the January 2011 shootings in Tuscon, Sarah Palin earned herself a huge, well-deserved media wedgie recently by screeching that water-boarding (also known as torture) is the way America would baptize terrorists if she were in charge.  (Translation: If you numbskulls had just elected John McCain and me!)   The world over, those of every religion or no religion are breathing great sighs of relief and muttering, Well, thank God she's NOT in charge.

Granted, I'm no Biblical scholar, but I'm sure we'd have all heard about it if there were a passage where Jesus said, Let he who is without sin be the first to water-board people in my name.

Makes you wonder what Maverick Mac -- who was himself tortured in a Vietnam prison --  thinks of his North Star Nutjob now.  Looks like the Tea Party Republicans may need a new brand of diva.  Dontcha think?

Still Behaving Badly -- Very Badly

So how are those 2016 presidential aspirations going for you, Governor?

-- The fecal matter just keeps falling on Chris Christie's head these days.  There is now a Securities and Exchange Commission investigation into a little fund-finagling going on in New Jersey.  Seems that in 2011, Christie had $1.8 Billion transferred from the Port Authority to New Jersey so that he could use it to fix some crumbling structures issues, thereby keeping a 2010 campaign promise not to raise taxes.

-- Congressman Michael Grimm from New York has been indicted on charges of mail and wire fraud, filing false tax returns and health care payments, hiring undocumented workers and obstruction of justice.  Of course, he's innocent because he's a moral man and this is all just a political witch hunt.  But you knew that, didn't you?  I guess he was also being a moral man when he threatened a reporter that he'd throw him off the balcony in the Capitol Building.

-- Crazy old Steve Stockman is being investigated by the House Ethics Committee for some sort of, um, reporting error he made with the Federal Election Commission.  Of course, it probably doesn't make much difference, since he's not running again.

-- Congressman Vance McAllister, the guy who was caught on video in an extended lip-lock with a campaign staffer, has decided not to run for office this year.  Good idea.

--  It seems that North Carolina con artist pastor and senate candidate Mark Harris, who doesn't believe in the separation of church and state -- he openly begs his congregation for love offerings for his campaign -- has been lifting text from Georgia Rep. Phil Gingrey's website for his own use.  You know, sort of like Rand Paul's little game of plagiarism?  Well, Paul got a little of his own back when Greg Brannon lifted text from his website.  Does it ever end?  Perhaps it doesn't matter; both Harris and Brannon (who was endorsed by Sarah Palin, of course) lost in their respective primaries.

When Voter Suppression Becomes a GOP Voter Obsession

Voters in two states got some relief in April from the repressive far-right ID laws.

--  In Wisconsin, the judge ruled that the requirement that voters show state-issued IDs imposed an undue burden on poor and minority voters.  He also pointed out that Gov. Scott Walker's team could not point to even one instance of voter fraud in Wisconsin in the recent past, saying, ...virtually no voter impersonation occurs in Wisconsin and it is exceedingly unlikely that voter impersonation will become a problem in Wisconsin in the foreseeable future.

--  Democratic Governor Mike Beebe vetoed the original bill, stating that, I cannot approve such an unnecessary measure that would negatively impact one of our most precious rights as citizens.  However, both chambers of the Arkansas legislature voted to overturn the veto, and opponents of the bill took it to court.  However, the court agreed with the plaintiffs that not only was it aimed unfairly at young, low-income, and minority voters, it was simply against the state constitution, which reads ...no power, civil or military, shall ever interfere to prevent the free exercise of the right of suffrage; nor shall any law be enacted whereby such right shall be impaired or forfeited, except for the commission of a felony, upon lawful conviction thereof.

Cruel and Unusual Punishment is Unlawful -- Except in Oklahoma

Rabid pro-death penalty Governor Mary Fallin is so anxious to catch up with Rick Perry's execution numbers that she screwed the pooch on one recently.  After a panel of judges ruled that the execution should not take place because the potpourri of three drugs needed to do the job had not been tested, Fallin overruled them with an Executive Order.  (Why is it that when President Obama uses EOs he's an Imperialist, but when a Republican governor does it...well, never mind all that.)

With that sharply worded The Show Must Go On directive, the prisoner was strapped to the execution table in a timely manner and the death drugs were administered.  Well, everyone knows what happened, so I shall not repeat it.  Suffice it to say, it ended badly.  Fallin has called for a review of the procedure, but has stated that the next execution will take place as scheduled. Perhaps she is asking Perry for his recipe; I dunno.

Sick of the whole bunch yet?  Yeah, me too.

End Note

 

The Republican Tea Party Election Strategy: Suppress the Vote

by Sunnyjane

The media and all the political pundits -- both conservative and liberal -- have relished yammering on about what a lousy year 2013 was for President Obama.

Well, there hasn't been much high-fiving by the GOP, either.  They came out of the 2012 election bruised and bleeding, but determined to change their whole strategy around the meme that GOP policies GOOD, GOP messaging BAD.  That's right, they just don't GET IT.  So after another year of bad messaging, combined with their inability to pin a scandal on the current administration -- think: IRS, Benghazi, pressing the flesh with Raul Castro -- they resorted to slamming the woebegone ACA website roll-out:  It's Obama's Katrina!  No...It's Obama's Iraq!  No...It's Obama's Bay of Pigs!  (OK, I made that last one up, but still...)

The GOP's list of, um, saviors seem to be shrinking dramatically through self-inflicted wounds, Big Boy in New Jersey being just the latest.  The former governor of Vagina Virginia, Bob McDonnell, left the Virginia governorship in the middle of a big scandal and is now facing fourteen counts for federal corruption -- and voters elected a clean slate of Democrats.  Ted Cruz shut down the entire government to the tune of at least a $25 Billion loss, a disastrous move that pissed off  further irritated his own party; Marco Rubio cooked his goose by flip-flopping on immigration; Rand Paul, among all his other absurdities, now says that President Obama's winning the majority vote in the last election is similar to how we got Jim Crow laws and the internment of Japanese citizens at the beginning of World War Two -- or something like that; Jeb Bush's mommie won't let him come out and play; and a nun in Italy had a baby boy recently.  (Hey, with the GOP's mental-midget thinking, they could easily try to pin it on that Muslim in the White House.)

The Road to 270 Electoral Votes...

Results of the 2012 Presidential Election: 332 - 206  (Heh)

Each state (and the District of Columbia) is apportioned a certain number of the Electoral College's 538 votes, according to population.  Naturally, this means that states with the higher numbers are coveted by the candidates, such as Texas (38) and California (55).  Texas is considered a safe Red State (Republican) and California is considered a safe Blue State (Democratic); thus, each party concentrates on swing or battleground states -- those that historically are not locked into either party, such as Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, and Ohio.  A candidate must get at least 270 votes to win.

Plotting a path to a win is an exercise conducted by each campaign via continuous polling of  swing states, which determines where they spend advertising money and where they send their candidate to campaign.  You'll remember that in 2008, Sarah Palin went ape-shit over the fact that the Republican campaign was not showing enough ads in Alaska, and Todd whined that he wasn't seeing many yard signs promoting the Geezer/Dingbat Palin/McCain McCain/Palin ticket around Wasilla and Anchorage.  Even Steve Schmidt's patient explanation that Alaska was solidly in the Republican camp (the state hasn't voted Democratic since 1964) and it has only three Electoral votes at stake, did nothing to mollify the Stupid and <<<<I'm With Stupid duo.

...May be a Long One for the GOP in 2016
   

Background checks for gun buyers is too intrusive!  Making minorities jump through hoops to vote is absolutely necessary!

I guess when Chief Justice John Roberts gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965, he was making up to the GOP for his ruling that the Affordable Care Act was constitutional.   Not only that, but Roberts has a long-held hostility toward the VRA's Section 5 because he believes it supports racial preferences, and this was his opportunity get rid of it.   Section 5 of the VRA, requiring certain states that have historically restricted minorities from voting to obtain per-clearance from the Department of Justice before changing any of their voting laws, insured that no new laws would be discriminatory.   

Republican governors nationwide whooped with delight over the Supreme's decision, of course, because it allowed their far-right legislators to enact stifling requirements that affected primarily minority voters.  All kinds of restrictive laws were passed within weeks of the decision, including requiring radical ID changes, purging of voter rolls, limiting absentee voting, etc.  In North Carolina, the extremist governor cut out seven days of early voting, justifying it by saying, We didn't shorten early voting, we compacted the calendar.  No, seriously!

These Republican voter suppression laws have no purpose but to make it harder for minorities to vote.  The country is changing, and conservatives -- having nothing in the way of inclusive policies to offer the precise demographics they need to win an election -- must find a legally effective way to get them NOT to vote.  Paul Weyrich, the co-founder of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), said way-back-when, They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. ...As a matter of fact our leverage in the elections, quite candidly, goes up as the voting populace goes down.  So ALEC, the anti-American legislation group that offers up far-right model legislation like a fast-food restaurant menu -- You want some voter suppression bills to go with that? -- is supplying GOP governors and legislators with whatever tools will inhibit minorities' access to the voting booth.

In truth, there is virtually NO voter fraud in the United States. 

But the Good News is, It Ain't Working Out Too Well

   
Last week, Commonwealth Court Judge Bernard McGinley struck down Pennsylvania's controversial voter ID law, saying, Inescapably, the Voter ID Law infringes upon qualified electors' right to vote.  Disenfranchising voters through no fault of the voter himself is plainly unconstitutional.

The U.S. Election Assistance Commission dealt Kansas, Georgia, and Arizona a blow by denying their requests to modify their respective states' resident registration forms because heightened proof-of-citizenship requirements would likely hinder eligible citizens from voting in federal elections.

In South Carolina, a federal courts is reviewing the legality of the state's voter ID laws because state officials have shown no examples of actual in-person voter impersonation fraud and have conceded that requiring a photo identification to vote would not actually prevent a determined voter impersonator from voting as someone else.

In Florida, Wisconsin, Texas, and Ohio, courts are striking down voter suppression laws such as those regarding strict voter identification laws, provisional voting restrictions, limits on voter registration drives, and reduced availability for early voting.

Let's hope there are more of these decisions to come.

End Note

We Shall Overcome!