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Are all the voters as well-informed as you might like? Probably not. But at least folks are energized to get off their butts and really dig in and participate this year.
Can you feel it? A change is gonna come…and that is worth a "boo yah!" all by itself.
To everyone who has voted, worked the polls, knocked on doors, made phone calls or whatever else for a candidate this year — especially those of you working for all those very important down ticket races for school board and city council and magistrate judge and all those other positions that impact our lives every single day — thank you.
Really…thank you. None of this works properly without active participation. And for everyone who is doing just that this year? YOU are the change you want to see. Bravo! Would love to hear about what you’ve been doing and working on this election cycle for folks who have been.
And for the folks who haven’t? What are you waiting for? Your voice could make all the difference.
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Thanks for the post, Christy. I can’t enough people to get out there and do something for your candidate of choice (best way to channel frustration and overall pissiness *g*)
Thanks for the post, Christy. I can’t tell enough people to get out there and do something for your candidate of choice (best way to channel frustration and overall pissiness *g*)
The Blame for Bush’s reign shall fall mainly on McCain.
After this election, I hope we look closely at reforming the primary system. All of those hard working folks who came out to the Texas caucus still don’t know the results, with only 41% reported. And having both a primary and a caucus is bizarre.
I’d love to see a regional primary system with no caucuses.
As far as getting people involved, the candidates have really done great work on that themselves. Everyone is talking about this race.
And I’d like to see closed primaries so the Pukes and Indies can’t pick our nominee for us.
A nice snapshot so to speak of the process. I’ll take freedom and all that goes with it any day over orderly fascism.
I don’t have an issue with open primaries
I begged for a chance for my primary vote to matter yet somehow I am afraid.
the source of this laugh is not an endorsement of the political views of that site owner by me or any of my staff (that would be the tortoiseshell, the gray tabby with white trim, and the registered D dog)
hehehehe that is cute but ahh the frustration. See you all in a bit, we’re off to yoga class
hey – I get to vote Tuesday! Special run-off election for the late Julia Carson’s seat.
Her grandson Andre is running for the D’s – and he looks good. Endorsed by former Congressman Andy Jacobs, Jr., and, ugh, Evan Buh-Bayh.
i did some phone banking for rick noriega (for TX senate) and talking to friends and neighbors around here about Obama. nothing major though.
I was working with the candidacy of Barry Welsh vs. Mike Pence. But since fini resigned, the campaign has gone kinda dead in the water unfortunately. Hopefully, it’ll come back to life here soon…
Are you certain that’s Texas ?
There was not one big old cowboy hat.
They WUZ plenty o’ ten gallon hats at the Republican Caucus.
OT..Things are going to get much uglier..(This is interesting for proceedure wonks)
dkos
they’re no longer required. and the guns are concealed.
OMG! They did their caucus outside! We were in the school gym. Lights, electricity, all that.
I loved this video — you could just feel the energy and excitement form the folks participating. We’ve been seeing this sort of excitement across any number of primary states this year on the Dem side.
I only want to bring up one thing. Does the community believe that the king and his puppeteer will go to other countries that won’t extradite them back to the US or the Hague, or not relinquish power? There are thousands of crimes that have been perpetrated that would come to light. That light would never go out.
remember what we get this year. 1929 will seem simple by comparison. 2001 was a banner year for treason. It has gotten worse and worse each subsequent year. War profiteers don’t give up willingly, nor do they choose death or prison.
I mention this because the reality based community doesn’t usually address the “what if” on this subject. We still believe in democracy, even though we know it is gone. We watched as it was destroyed. We “participated” Our dependence causes us to ignore some startling realities that affect each of us. The country seems to understand, and it looks like a 70/30 election putting the democrats in charge. Even a super majority likely for congress and state elected bodies.
We know our justice system is corrupt all the way to the supreme court. How do we weigh “justice” and “reality” in this day and age?
We have closed primaries in Florida. Volusia County has 500,000 residents. 105,000 Registered Repubs, 117,000 Democrats and 65,000 NPA. I can’t figure out why 65,000 voters in a closed primary state can’t figure out which party best represents their interests. It could be worse. They could all be Republican.
It’s almost as if the country is beginning to heal from a very bad injury – we know we have survived, with some scars to be sure, but survived.
and i am also watching the video to see if i can figure out which school it is!
I actually got my entire school’s staff to commit to contacting their state representatives regarding massive funding cuts for public education.
No one could’ve predicted © that the massive property tax cuts (largely benefitting the rich — shocking, I know) that the Repugs got added into our Florida state constitution last election, combined with the bottoming out of the housing/mortgage market (and the resulting decrease in tourism), would have drastically reduced the state’s revenues, resulting in major cuts to infrastructure spending.
And what are the Repugs proposing to fix Florida’s recession? Why, more tax cuts for big businesses and the rich, of course! I’m working as hard as I can to get more progressive Dems elected here and everywhere before our whole state goes down the toilet financially.
In the meantime I hear my colleagues at work talk about Obama’s secret Muslim agenda and how trustworthy McCain seems to be. Ugh. I need to move to a blue state.
I believe the word “motherfuckers” came up in the last thread…
One voice that makes a difference is DCLaw1, who’s comment yesterday (excerpt below, read it all) on Glenn Greenwald’s site, highlighted by Glenn today, should encourage us all, and not just because of its withering criticism of the Russerts and Carlsons:
http://letters.salon.com/opini…..785f3.html
(h/t Glenn Greenwald)
PA has an open primary, I think — I know Chris Bowers (I think it was Chris, anyway…) had a post up the other day at Open Left about working independent and GOP registration folks for the Obama camp. And, although I haven’t seen a post from a Clinton supporter, I’m sure they are doing the same thing. On the one hand, it can allow for claims of gaming the system (just like some Dems tried to do for Romney in MI), but OTOH, starting to work the more moderate ends of that spectrum to mine for votes for the general isn’t a bad strategy either. We’ll need those votes in the fall to take back the WH and more of the Congress, so we might as well start educating them early on the benefits of voting for a particular Dem candidate and the need for change…
….or not relinquish power?
I’ve said several times here that I’m pretty sure that Georgie, at least, can’t *wait* to get the heck of there. Hell, he may be counting the days left in his presidency more assiduously than we are….
Ahhhhhhh…listening to Loreena McKennitt and watching the birdies hit the feeder as the shining sun melts last night’s snow away. Lovely day here, and I hope you all are having the same.
I agree and I’d bet that Laura is counting the minutes because she has just hidden herself.
She must be bored to tears.
Blogger journalists make mainline journalists look bad, and they know it.
Some bloggers really do make the MSM look bad. I religiously read Dionne and Herbert’s pedestrian columns. They are a bad habit.
Virtually every damn day Christy, Jane and Digby write 2 or 3 posts that are far superior to the drivel Dionne and Herbert pen two times a week in the WaPo and NYT.
Pickles hasn’t hidden herself! She’s undercover working on the gang problem in America!
Aw, thanks. I’ve been saying for ages that Digby ought to get a syndicated column gig — she’d be fantastic. Which probably explains why she doesn’t have one… *g*
Virtually every damn day Christy, Jane and Digby write 2 or 3 posts that are far superior to the drivel Dionne and Herbert pen two times a week in the WaPo and NYT.
Ab-so-forkin-lutely….
some days even more. and scarecrow, teddy, blue texan …
That should have some with a spew warning…
or at least colorful bandanas
yo !
Pickles hasn’t hidden herself! She’s undercover working on the gang problem in America!
LOL. Kinda begs the question, however, whether she’s passing herself off as a Blood or a Crip….
Bloods wear red though, right?
PA has an open primary, I think
No, we don’t. :) People must be registered Dem to vote for a Dem in the primary. The deadline is March 24th, well ahead of the April 22nd primary.
PA is a closed primary.
Bonus points if anyone can come up with her gangsta name.
we don’t have an open primary here, have to be party registered to vote in it.
whaddya mean pickles isn’t a gang name???
When I was prosecuting, we had a group of juveniles get in trouble for trying to start a gang at their high school. It was really sad, because they didn’t really know what it meant, they just knew it had something to do with bandanna colors and such, and they’d done some rudimentary research on it…and it came down to two groups of kids that already didn’t like each other and then forming into two different groups in accordance to bandanna color and mutual loathing…and calling each other th requisite names, and then skulking over to one side or the other of the outdoor basketball court to glare at each other a lot.
Totally wigged out the school principal. But glaring at each other and wearing bandannas isn’t exactly a prosecutable offense. *g*
Spanish gang? -> Lupe?
(snip)
link
March 24 is the final date to declare a party for the primary in Pa.
Hmmmm…maybe I misread Bowers, then, and it was an effort to flip independent and GOP registrations to Dem registrations, then? Will have to go back and find that…thanks for the heads up.
Pennsylvania 2008 presidential primary and superdelegates
And one of the even more troublesome aspects is that Dionne and Herbert are among the least offensive purveyors of drivel. Think MoDo, Little Billy, Broderella, Novakula, Will, Richard Cohen, etc.
bandanas are 100% against the dress code around here.
Yes, those are real Texans. Most of us were actually weaned off of cowboy hats in the summer before starting the first grade, because they aren’t allowed in school. At the same time we learned about Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, our parents brutally pointed out to us that we didn’t have horses or cattle. It’s different for those who actually hale from Connecticut
Night Noise is good for that, too.
Florida Republicans are continuing to gut Public Education Funding with expanded tax cuts to corporations with $118,000,000 in tax credits (money that wouild normally go to the state). The corporations, in turn make donations to non-profit groups that provide scholarships to private (often religious) schools. Republicans plan to increase this gutting to $238,000,0000 in 2012. This act runs concurrent with a $233,000,000 cut in public school funding. And everybody loves Charlie Crist.
I see my fellow Pennsylvanians chiming in here. Yes, we rock. :)
Here is the official statement from the PA Department of State:
http://www.dos.state.pa.us/vot…..8;q=443054
“And everybody loves Charlie Crist.”
I don’t.
Gee. Who would have thought of posting DCLaw1’s observation on the site that best illustrates its point?
Via “The Original Gangsta Name Generator“
Wobbly Poo-poo Pants
That is honestly the first thing that came up for Pickles Bush
Participation is what got Bill Foster into Denny Hastert’s old seat in Illinois. Ain’t that sweet?
Should have been John Leasch, but at least Foster’s a Dem.
Salmueras
Sorry, too much polemic in the rhetoric. I don’t like him either. His moderate bona-fides are a ruse – not unlike McCrazy.
Texans wearing big cowboy hats is one thing, among many, that has amused me about Texans. The closest most of them have been to beef is at the local McDonalds.
Here in Iowa the city folk don’t wear seedcorn caps and I assume in West Virginia most folks don’t go out wearing miner helmets.
There are always a few. In my day, we called them “drugstore cowboys.” When my kids were in high school, they called them “goat ropers.” I’m not sure what they are in school, but most of the grownups can safety be called “Republicans.”
lol.
(and yes, I *did* have to look that one up)(somehow that never came up in H.S. spanish)
Dill
hmm..my comments about McCain disappeared into the toobz…Mods????
Don’t wear many bananas neither I would guess.
I am happy to see the Rethugs lost Hastert’s old congressional seat.
Nope, but we do have a lot of folks in baseball caps. Far as I know, none of them are major leaguers… *g*
Great comment!
We need more humor here.
Hmmmm…that’s the second time that’s happened to someone lately. Are you using IE or another browser?
Played out Bitch per Gangsta Name Generator
Fits donit?
;~P
Mozilla Firefox…
…but I used “Laura” not “Pickles”.
People wear baseball caps here. But, they are mostly Cub caps, so no pretense about being major leaguers.
Hmmmm…that’s what I’m using at the moment as well. Scratch that potential dot connection then. Have you cleared out your cache recently — assuming you are on a PC? Sometimes that can cause a comment interface problem with WordPress as well. And thus ends my limited ability to troubleshoot, I’m afraid — but I’m not seeing anything stuck, so I don’t think your comment made it through to the servers, or it would be snagged somewhere…there isn’t one there. We had a hang-up yesterday, but it was what i think may have been a cache issue with someone else.
Yours is a puzzler…
Texas ladies are tough!
yippee! My ass has now been dubbed “Young Dirty Slim Jimma”
(not sure what that means, but I do like the “Young” part)
Speaking of McCain – how can someone that doesn’t believe in a “living Constitution” square equating “the right to life, liberty…” as an unequivocal protection of a fetus?
HAHAHAHA Good one! (And I say that as a life-long Cincinnati Reds fan. *g*)
Just pre-ordered Glenn’s new book!
Dillinger
John did all of the hard work over the past few years; then Foster comes in an buys the primary…another Blue Dog..at least one step above a Thug.
my cache is set daily at midnight or so CT, when I’m more or less set to go to bed…*G* Not to worry: The comment:
CNN said McCain might not be prez even if elected., ‘coz he was born in the Panama Canal Zone (which belonged to the US at that time–but not now). There’s legislation being sponsored in Congress to make this right–for him to be prez–being sponsored by….Obama(rama)…
Good morning everyone. Happy Sunday:)
OT ( of course) I know this probably has already been posted/discussed (bc everyone here is so fast on the news :) but this bit here;
‘”A primary purpose of the educational system is to train school children in good citizenship, patriotism and loyalty to the state and the nation as a means of protecting the public welfare,” the judge wrote, quoting from a 1961 case on a similar issue.’,
really bothers me. Maybe I’m naive, but I thought the primary purpose of an education is pass on knowledge and to teach children to think. Yep, I must be naive
The Second District Court of Appeal ruled that California law requires parents to send their children to full-time public or private schools or have them taught by credentialed tutors at home.
http://rense.com/general81/home.htm
yeah, you pasted that last thread.
That comment seems to have come thorugh perfectly.
On the last thread.
One thing I will say about the Texas 2-step system. I think it helped discourage some of the Republican malevolent crossovers which Limbaugh was encouraging. While some primary voters may have done that, I don’t think many were able to wait in congested rooms with the hoi polloi for two or three hours. I didn’t see a single person with a nasty expression or complaining about the waste of their valuable time.
Hmmm. Guess I owes ya a Coke…
I think I saw your post at the end of the last thread.
Karen
The difference between “train” & “educate” is immense.
i’ll take the jinx instead :)
The Rs caucused at the same location as the Ds did for a four precinct group Tuesday night. But Ds ran about 10-1 more than Rs at that location
We’ll have to see if the Blue Dog label is accurate or not. It may not be. See these:
http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=4211
http://www.openleft.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=4144
well that is heartening is it?
I remember when I read about Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester of the 617th Military Police Company, a National Guard unit out of Richmond, Ky., who won the silver star some time ago.
That’s the one thing good about these horrible wars– they can no longer justify treating women as second class citizens.
That whole ‘training’ children thing has never sat well on me, children are small/young people, not bloody puppies…
If it is an issue, legislation won’t solve the problem…SCOTUS will have to make the call of what is a “Natural born citizen” and/or amend the Constitution.
Participation is what makes us strong.
SF bay area firepups might want to come to the state convention in San Jose. They are looking for 800 volunteers and it would a great chance to bend the ears of the delegates. If any of you decide to come, I’ll be the rumpled looking middle aged white guy with a wieght problem.
Yes, but what about single mothers, elderly folks, disabled people, members of the military ………………..
A caucus is bad enough, but a primary and a caucus in one day, with a vote in the primary being a pre-condition to participating in the caucus, denies a lot of people a voice in the caucus.
LOL!!! jetlag still?
Oh! I think that comment appeared in the prior thread…so maybe it was just the wrong comment window open when you were typing it? (I am pretty sure I saw that one…)
That is Howie Klein’s label..hopefully Howie is wrong..
DWT
whatever works for you.
Christy -
Been off thread having a friend to lunch. Just wanna jump in without catching up and say how sorry I am you’re having to play peace maker at the Lake….on top of everything else. I don’t know how you keep your sanity, lady!
On to some newer Joni Mitchell…her latest version of Both Sides Now from her same-titled album (the one with her own artwork on the cover). Gorgeous, richly orchestrated version, full of ache and wisdom…love it.
True. The the detriments probably outweigh the benefits. I wasn’t really espousing it, since I think it was implemented to actually allow some measure of party control, versus popular control, like the superdelegate thing.
‘Tis the season. I just want us all to survive with some measure of sanity and unity by the end of all of this. Because a McCain WH is just not going to cut it for any of us…
Amen! That thought scares the living spit outta me!
I was listening to her Blue album last night, a Christmas gift from my son.
Thanks for the daily motivation to act, Christy. The FDL calls to action are frequently what cause me to cross over from fuming about something to picking up the phone and working my way down a list of Senators or Congressmen. You also provided the extra kick in the butt to get me out going door to door in the 2006 election; and I did that again in this Primary too – door to door for Edwards, driving out of State to help in the NH primaries.
—-
None of this works properly without active participation. And for everyone who is doing just that this year? YOU are the change you want to see. Bravo! Would love to hear about what you’ve been doing and working on this election cycle for folks who have been.
—-
This morning I wrote to my Congressman to thank him for becoming a signatory to Wexler’s impeachment hearing letter to Conyers. I had written him a month ago when he wasn’t a signatory, so maybe I made a difference.
I’m also a delegate to help my Democratic Senate candidate get through the primary process.
- Tom
Oh. Thanks too to you Christy and any who have kept the lid on the primary nastiness that has engulfed other sites. Enough already.
Jane’s upstairs.
Exactly.
Christy:
oldgold could add: hourly workers who don’t have the privilege of getting off work at that particular time and can not afford the loss of income or have to work early the following day, don’t have internet and cell phone communications to organize for the “chaos”, and people with limited English fluency.
Caucuses are open to the charge of being undemocratic and seem to favor the privileged young, white, college-educated singles who tend to vote for Obama, apparently contributing to the difference between Clinton and Obama in caucuses versus primaries. Participation is great, but it’s questionable whether the caucus format is representative of the people. I’ll support either Obama or Clinton; I’m not trying to knock Obama with this, it’s just how it is.
My grandparents (both male and female) wore “cowboy hats”. They were authentic Texans (and 5th generation ones at that…dating from 1810 and 1840, respectively). BTW they never wore those felt “10 gallon hats”. They wore STRAW cowboy hats…much, much cooler! Those felt hats were for “city folk”.
That issue was decided back in the late 1800’s by the US Supreme Court…I’m afraid. There was a citizenship case about a kid born abroad to a two US Citizens on a US military base. The French claimed the kid wasn’t a US citizen. The Supreme court stated that the child was a “natural born” citizen…and referenced the concept in the 1802 Immigration and Naturalization Act that exempted such individuals from needing “naturalization”. This was a clause that had been included in the original 1792 Act, but incidentally deleted in a 1794 revision. The 1802 Act restored it back to it’s original terminology…defining a citizen born withing the US, a citizen born of an American citizen, and a Citizen born of an American citizen while in a US territory or vessel (all “natural born citizen”). These are distinguished from “naturalized citizens”.
Of course, there is a residency requirement for a “natural born citizen” as well.
It is possible that George Romney may not have been a “natural born citizen” as his parents may not have been US citizens after several generations resident in Mexico and their elders leaving to avoid US polygamy laws. George was born in a polygamist Mormon colony in Mexico, his uncles were actually members of the Mexican government (an automatic loss of citizenship). Thus to become a citizen, he would have needed to undergo naturalization…and thus have been ineligible.
No problem with Mittster.
Hmmm! I wonder if anyone would have said this in any other election. Before this year the ones that attended caucuses tended to be elderly or older, married whites with long-term Party ties. I think that what has happened was that these folks, who largely supported Clinton, have had their little games taken away from them.
And not all those who are supporting Obama are “privileged young, white, college-educated singles”. If that were the only demographic that supported Obama he’d be getting less than 15% of the vote in any Primary…and easily be clobbered in every Caucus…which is made up of ALL different demographics. In Texas Obama also received substantial support from Black, under-privileged non-College educated individuals.
And I think that you’ll find that Obama draws caucus support across the board. I really hate it when someone that is drawing 55% of the age 40-50 years old at a caucus is supposedly only drawing “young people”. Or when 45% of the women support a candidate suddenly ALL women support the other candidate! And frankly, I don’t know how one can argue that the young and college-students are “privileged”. Most are living on Top-Ramen and taking out heavy loan burdens to afford to go to college, more attend community colleges part time…than attend four-year schools on their parents ticket!
Frankly this is the sort of patronizing sort of divisiveness that Clinton’s advisors are noted for…the guys that created the concept “Soccer Moms”. It splits, and winnows, and disembodies people down into identities that they may not even relate to. It assumes that people make decisions based upon biological factors out of their control (sex, age, race) rather than social connections.
There’s been a lot of talk about how caucuses are “undemocratic”. Many of the same people who argue this say that the Primaries should be closed to non-Party members. To prevent cross-overs would they also terminate Democratic registration for the elections months in advance? Would they exclude people who were unregistered from participation in the Primary, or those who wish to change party? More and more Parties and States have realized the undemocratic nature of requiring registration a long period of time before an election…some states are allowing walk up registration (and then holding the vote to ascertain legality later).
Caucuses were held in the past in a limited time frame mainly because the participation was low, and it kept costs down for the party. It was a social event…from when the parties were essential clubs, and decided representatives to determine candidates by the membership in attendance.
This year has been something so massive…mainly BECAUSE of the participation of the Obama supporters that it’s clear that some new system will need to evolve. Caucus sites were too small despite the limited time frame scheduled. This suggests that caucuses could be extended into a full day event, organized in ways where rolling meetings occurred. Or maybe the use of multiple-prefential ballots could be utilized for those who could drop them off after listening to short 10-minute candidate presentations on videotape. Or candidates could have representatives there all day, at all caucuses ready to answer questions. Part of the purpose of a caucus is not simply to have someone mark a ballot because they recognize the name or heard a rumor. It’s supposed to be “educated voters” participating.