Friday, 7/28/17, Public Square

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How Obama plans to lose in 2012

All Evangelicals Are Not Alike

This article from Mother Jones suggests there is a difference of opinion  between Evangelicals when it comes to giving illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship.  And to think there is a man from Jerry Falwell’s Liberty University that is joining this group.  This could become very interesting.  How will this play in the structure of the GOP?  Will these opposing Evangelicals bring more moderates back to the GOP or will the Radical Evangelicals still  flex their muscle and keep their control?

Indypendent

http://herjones.com/politics/2010/05/right-wing-clash-over-immigration-reform

How much does the Tea Party influence who wins?

“I have a message, a message from the Tea Party,” said Rand Paul, a political candidate who made headlines across the United States this week. “We have come to take our government back.”

The Tea Party isn’t really a “party,” in the conventional sense.  They describe themselves as a loose movement of activists who draw their inspiration from the Boston Tea Party — an 18th-century anti-taxation uprising that helped spark the American War of Independence.

Today’s Tea Party wants lower taxes and less government spending, policies it says the Republican Party has promised but not delivered.  So now the Tea Party is supporting candidates who are officially running for office as Republicans, in hope they can change the party from the inside. This week Paul became the most prominent yet to win a Republican nomination, running for the U.S. Senate and sharing credit for his win with the Tea Party.

Paul wasn’t the only anti-establishment candidate to do well this week. Americans nationwide are angry at their elected leaders and several states had a chance to choose both Republican and Democratic nominees for elected office. There were setbacks for well-known candidates in both parties.

“It was an anti-incumbency vote across the nation,” said Bill Richardson, a Democratic Party governor. “If you ran against Washington, you did well.”

With President Obama in the White House and his supporters in control of Congress, the Democrats are currently America’s governing party. The Tea Party is unhappy with the government so the conflict with the Democrats is clear.

But Republicans aren’t entirely sure where they stand. Some have embraced the newcomers, while others have politely pushed them away. The party’s leaders refused to support Paul, at least in part because he doesn’t really support them.

Can the Tea Party take hold among Republicans?  Will their chosen candidates win against Republicans and Democrats?  Will the winners come from among candidates who run against Washington with or without support from the Tea Party?  Are the extremes making most of the noise but the moderates will make the most difference?

House Democrats May Ban Earmarks

In a possible strategic move to regain the “ethical high ground,” House Democratic leaders are floating the idea of a party-wide ban on earmarks for the remainder of the year. The idea was mentioned by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, but would most likely face resistance from those who use earmarks as a way to send placating pork back home in a tough year for incumbents. But scrapping them now might be a strategic coup, as gridlock in the Senate means House spending bills could get tied up there, and their earmarks could get cut anyway. The decision to proceed with this strategy would have to come soon as earmark requests are due to the Appropriations panel by March 19. Nearly 9,500 earmarks worth $15.9 billion have already been secured by both parties in this fiscal year alone.

Read it at Roll Call.

Reconciliation only for GOP

Thanks to the 2006 and 2008 elections, conservatives no longer control the American government. They do, however, continue to essentially control the American media. As a case in point, you’ve probably heard that part of the Obama administration’s plan to pass health reform is to use the budget reconciliation process. The reason you’ve probably heard is that the press has been obsessed with the topic, repeatedly labeling it a “controversial” move that would “ram” legislation via an end-run around the normal legislative process.”

In fact, though most bills do not go through the reconciliation process—typically because their subject matter makes them ineligible—the process has been invoked frequently since 1980. And the reason it’s remained obscure until 2010 is that until the health-care debate, the press never saw fit to go into conniptions over congressional procedure.

Some of the mainstream media coverage of the reconciliation issue has been bad. Some of it, like this excellent NPR story, has been good.

Continue reading here.

Intraparty battles between Democrats?

It’s been open season on the right for primary challengers, with bids to unseat incumbents like John McCain and establishment favorites for open seats like Charlie Crist. But despite heightened tensions on the left between progressive and conservative Democrats, there has been little to no corresponding electoral pressure from the base to keep members in line—until now.

A major primary battle is developing in Arkansas between one of the Senate’s most prominent conservative Democrats, Blanche Lincoln, and progressive-backed Bill Halter, the state’s lieutenant governor.

continue reading here.

Public Square 1-27-10

The State of the Union Address.  Time to reflect on what we have done and what needs to be done.  Will anyone be listening with an open mind or has partisan politics already spread its cancer on Obama’s presidency?

The Threat of Bioterrorism

Bioterrorism – the next phase of the War on Terror?  Where will the billions for this war come from?    We’ve been at risk for a long time but we are still too busy debating the merits of the wars we have already spent billions on (and currently spending) trying to kill all radical Muslims – and that has not done much good, has it?

Will Bioterrorism be the next political football that gets kicked down the road for someone else to promise to fix?

Lilac

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/26/us-unprepared-for-bioterr_n_436785.html

Blessing in Disguise?

While Republicans are dancing with glee over Scott Brown’s election to the Senate, what does it mean if by his winning this battle, they lose the war?   Will Obama now promising to get tough on Wall Street really bring about the change the Democrats promised?  Will Rush and other Republicans continue to defend those huge salaries and bonuses of the Wall Street Gang?  Is Scott Brown really the independent vote that he promised to the people in Massachussets or is he going to fall into the lockstepping Party of No and just obstruct everything  Obama – including the call for the end of the greed on Wall Street?    Interesting times, aren’t they?

Lilac

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/feature/2010/01/22/obama_banks_open2010/index.html

Obama may want to look at this….

Thursday, Jan 14, 2010 18:26 EST –  Salon website

Doomsday for Obama in 2012? Not quite

New poll shows Obama losing to unnamed challenger in 2012, but outlook may not be quite as bleak as it seems

By Emily Holleman

Depending on what side of the aisle you’re on, you may have woken up to some dispiriting – or validating – news this morning: A  National Journal poll in which 50 percent of respondents said they’d vote for “someone else” other than President Obama if the presidential election of 2012 were held today. Just 39 percent of those polled said they would “probably” or “definitely” vote to reelect the president.

The results broke fairly predictably along party lines with 86 percent of Republicans saying they would vote for someone else and 77 percent of Democrats reporting they’d vote to keep Obama in office. Among independents, the story’s a bit more troubling for Obama — just 33 percent in that group said they would vote to reelect him, while 54 percent said they’d opt for the alternative to-be-named.

Now, this clearly isn’t great news for the Obama camp, but the outcome isn’t nearly as damning as it appears at first glance.

The results may have been as dim as they are in large part because the question pitted Obama against an unnamed opponent from an unspecified party. Although pollsters often use this type of generic question, it tends to yield the worst imaginable outcome for incumbents, since respondents are free to picture the anonymous opponent any way they like.

“It’s going to tend to be a worst case scenario, because it allows you to imagine whoever you want,” Pollster.com’s Mark Blumenthal says. “If you’re an unhappy progressive, you may be imagining a primary challenger, even though you might be voting for a Democrat in a general election. If you’re a Republican, you may be thinking of your ideal candidate. It may be different if the Republican candidate is Sarah Palin or someone else you’re less happy with.”

Tuesday, 11/03/09, Public Square

Today Virginia and New Jersey are choosing governors, voters in upstate New York and northern California are deciding who should fill two vacant congressional seats, and New York City and Atlanta are picking mayors. Maine will vote on whether to permit gay marriage while Ohio will choose whether to allow casinos.

The political ‘experts’ are saying this handful of elections will give hints about this country’s state of mind, provide lessons for both Republicans and Democrats, and shed light on answers to a few important questions a year before pivotal 2010 midterm contests.

• Did President Barack Obama’s campaigning in Virginia and New Jersey persuade the diverse voting coalition that lifted him to victory in 2008 to turn out for Democratic candidates in 2009?
• Did fickle independents stick with the Democratic Party?
• Did the out-of-power GOP overcome fissures within its ranks to find a winning strategy?

Here’s what I predict — those and other very important questions will be asked and answered by political pundits and there will be at least as many answers as there are pundits asked to share their opinions.

fnord

ARE WE MONSTERS?

As I think about the claim, the Obama care is going to kill your grandmother. How much of a monster one must think the other side is to believe that is even a possible consideration? Seriously in order for Republicans to think that the Democrats would actually think of that as a form to cut costs.

Certainly the cons on tbtsnbn think of thunderbird as some kind of monster often calling him horrible names and accusing him of some mindless actions. It has to be the most unreasoning thing in the partisanship the dehumanizing of the other side.

Can anyone here think of Granny as a loving grandmother and wife? Easier to imagine her drinking the blood of the innocent huh? How unreasoning it is that the lie about the health care bills so demand that the believer must think that the other side is so monstrous. It actually demand that you ignore the very complain about Democrats that they take caring too far and that if it involves money nothing is too expensive.
To then turn around and think that the very same people would let the elderly to die to save money is delusional.

Through out history it is a tactic of war, to dehumanize the enemy. The Japanese so stressed that the Americans if they capture any Japanese the American would eat them alive. The story of the horror of our troops watching men, women and children leaping to their deaths rather then be captured.
We too dehumanized the Japanese, saying they were amoral and without a soul.

But this is too far and disturbing in the name of partisanship, such a illness in our Politics that feels the delusions.