Ah, the Midterm elections. Not sexy and traumatizing like the Presidential, but often a political barometer, with seats shifting to or from a governing party, so the result can be high drama. Remember that in 1994, the Democrats’ lost both congressional chambers and Bill Clinton was forced to govern with the (1990’s versions of) hostile Republicans, huffing and fuming with sexual jealousy. The Dems’ 2006 resurgence saw the party take back control of both, foreshadowing Barack Obamas win two years later. Granted, things have never looked worse. But rather than sitting at home bemoaning the Teabag Party’s intrusion into our system let’s take a moment to soak in this unprecedented insanity.
Tuesday’s election is less a referendum on President Obama and more a referendum on Fox News, who dictated the entire ridiculous narrative of this election. The engine of their comeback, the Tea Parties, the faux scandals, the unrelenting anti Obama propaganda, the unrestricted airtime to any GOP candidate. Tomorrow is just the fait accompli of a campaign that Fox has been waging since the day after the black guy took office. Congressional Republicans admirably maintained their discipline in uniformly voting “Nay†on every black proposal, because the Fox Special Ops Force was looming over their bony white shoulders, threatening anyone who waffled. Well, I don’t know about you but I’m not ready to hand the country over to a TV network that came to power via Married with Children, not just yet.
And on the eve of handing over power to the Bonzocracy, let’s at least relish the irony of a group of “populists” who popped up in response to outrage at the government for bailing out the banks and the American auto industry and Wall Street. Of course, it is the wrong government they are raging against, but, hey, while they’re in the neighborhood, tea baggers might as well chortle out in favor of abolishing social security, unemployment benefits and the minimum wage, cutting health benefits, deporting Mexicans, and championing tax breaks for the super duper rich. Oh and and so-called free market economics. You know, good old American Racism, Retardation and Reaganomics.
the Republicans filibustered unemployment extensions, state budget aid that would have prevented layoffs of hundreds of thousands small business tax credits, job-heavy infrastructure investment and green energy development. Every single one of those things would’ve helped the job and economy picture. But they would have helped Obama, too, so they all had to be filibustered and killed by the Republican Senate. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has said his top goal is to make President Barack Obama a one-term president: “it’s not inappropriate for us to do business” with Obama said the white man about the black man. If Obama wants to pursue international trade agreements and build nuclear power plants, Republicans will be on board. Beyond that, McConnell and his party have made clear they will reverse or undermine any major Democratic achievements of the last two years, stop all future Democratic initiatives, and put their own very different ideas into practice, Fox News and it’s Teabaggers will have their backs. Here are the top 10 issues at stake:
1. Taxes. The first test of the new post-election order will be Bush tax cuts that expire at the end of the year. Both parties want to extend the lower rates for household income under $250,000. Republicans want to extend the lower rates for income above those levels as well, a step the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates would increase the federal deficit by $700 billion over 10 years.
2. The Deficit. All hell will break loose on Dec. 1, when recommendations are due from the president’s bipartisan deficit reduction commission. Republicans have campaigned on pledges to dramatically cut spending, but haven’t offered any details. The only specific plan out there – proposals by Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin to privatize Social Security, turn Medicare into a voucher system and the like – is anathema to Democrats. Republicans won’t accept a mix of tax increases and spending cuts.
3. Social Security. Any proposal that wins support from 14 of the 18 commission members will come up for a vote in Congress.
4. Jobs. Obama has proposed a $50 billion infrastructure investment as a way to create jobs and lay the groundwork for future economic growth. He also wants to make a research and development tax credit permanent, let companies immediately deduct the cost of capital investments, and provide spurs for investment in such innovative sectors as clean energy. Republicans generally support the R&D and capital investment proposals but blocked them before the election.
5. Health care. Dreaded, dreaded health insurance company reform will continue to send Republicans into conniptions. “Obamacare” provisions are being phased in over time, all of which are appealing – patient protections, free preventive tests and care, etc.. One outgoing Republican senator — deficit hawk Judd Gregg of New Hampshire — has said the law’s $500 billion in Medicare savings and cuts over 10 years “actually made some sense” and should not be repealed. Public attitudes are confused.
6. Financial regulation. Passage of the law tightening regulation of Wall Street is another signature Obama achievement that Republicans have taken a “pledge” to repeal. The overhaul was designed to prevent another 2008-style collapse and everyone bickering over it who does not directly benefit from it, deep down actually wants it. Banks call it “intrusive” and Republicans call it “socialist”. But its money comes through the self-financed Federal Reserve, so Congress can’t cut it off.
7. WAR! Warmongers will take up arms as Obama’s stated intention to start drawing down U.S. troops in Afghanistan at that point. Most Republicans have been highly critical of that deadline and are likely to challenge whether conditions are right for us to start reducing our presence. The country is turning increasingly against the war, now in its 10th year.
8.The Environment. The energy and climate bill that stalled in the Senate was the highest profile legislative failure in Obama’s first two years. You know, an all-around win that would create jobs, reduce carbon emissions, reduce dependence on foreign oil and improve national security,  yet the Republicans tarred as a consumer-unfriendly “cap-and-tax” system. It’ss dead now, the prospect of a law that puts an overall cap on carbon pollution and allows companies to buy and sell pollution permits. Furthermore, many of the conservative Republicans expected on Capitol Hill next year, you know the Godless freaks, do not believe there is evidence of global warming.
9. START Treaty. The goal of ousting Obama could thwart movement even on issues where there is common ground, or has been in the past. One of those would be a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty that Obama agreed to with Russia. Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) said recently that some opponents falsely contend the treaty would inhibit U.S. missile defense and some are “of a conspiratorial frame of mind” about it. Speaking at the Council on Foreign Relations, he predicted that incoming Republicans will say that “we want more time” to study the treaty.
10. Edumacation. Obama’s His Race to the Top grant competition and charter schools and teacher performance, incorporates ideas that should generally appeal to Republicans. Moderate Rep. Mike Castle of Delaware was the leading House Republican working on the new bill. But, unsurprisingly, Â he was defeated in a Senate primary and won’t be back. Several Republican candidates who appear headed for victory, meanwhile, have said they want to abolish the Education Department entirely.
WHY I AM AN IDIOT.
During the heated lead-up to the 2008 Democratic nominations, my mom – an ardent supporter of Hillary Clinton – and my dad – for Obama – were at a rare political impasse (it was Oprah that swayed my dad). Now, my dad was suffering from Alzheimer’s, and there were only a few things he held firm on: that my sister and I were “coffee snobs”, that the Phillies should have never have fired Larry Bowa, that no one would vote for John McCain – like he wouldn’t get one vote, and that Barack Obama was his guy. Wherever he and my mom went, my dad would grill strangers about Obama. My mom was furious. Not just because of my dad’s relentless, almost criminal harassing of strangers on the boardwalk and in line at CVS, but because he was an indicator that Hillary might actually lose the nomination.When tensions were at their highest everywhere – when I was caught redhanded secretly making marker signs to plant on my idiot neighbor’s lawn, when I momentarily lost decorum and confronted a little old lady with a McCain/Palin button in the movies – my mom actually said to my sister; “Dad shouldn’t even be allowed to vote because of the Alzhemeirs.” As uncharacteristic a thing for her to say as it was, look, it’s not as if she’s alone in the thinking that maybe what we need is a better electorate. Ingeborg, like I, spend a good deal of time snopsing, getting the facts, figuring out how to vote for a bunch of obscure offices. We know that we’re in the extreme minority; most of the people who vote tomorrow will be taking wild stabs in the dark on propositions and non-partisan offices. So I am sharing my correct, 100% correct opinions on tomorrow’s election. Because alas, in a Democracy, the people rule. All of them. Not just the well-educated. Not just the reasonable. Not just the well-informed. Not just the intelligent. Everyone. At various times within any democratic political system, all sorts of people have outsized influence, but on Election Day, in casting our ballots, we’re all supposed to be equal. One person, one vote.
FIRST:
DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU’RE DOING? I went to a “progressive” (hippie) school and besides stumping for McGovern, we did not learn anything about Government, geography, multiplication tables or handwriting. Everything I learned I learned about the Government I learned from Schoolhouse Rock. Sadly, many are too young or too old to have gotten the benefit of even the cartoon government class.
The two-chamber system of Congress works exactly the same way the Framers of the Constitution envisioned in 1787 when they created the bicameral system that would share power among all units of government, the two houses employing checks and balances to prevent the dreaded tyranny and all the tar and feathering that comes with it. The intent of the Founding Fathers – who lay out the formation of Congress to the people in the Federalist Papers – was that the House and Senate not be Siamese twins, so that all legislation would be carefully considered, taking both the short and long-term effects into account. One house was intended to be a “people’s house†that would be sensitive to public opinion, the second, a more deliberate forum of erudition, snootery and of elite wisdom that represented the state legislatures. Yes, teabaggers, the Founding Fathers wanted the elitist snobs with fancy eduction running the important stuff.
The Constitution provides that the approval of both chambers is necessary for the passage of legislation. Hence, the passing of any bills is a boondoggling process, even when the President is a white guy. As much as I’d like to see an actual Teabagger, Joe Miller for instance, ride into an actual welfare state, Alaska for instance, and start stripping away all the federal assistance that the idiots who voted them in rely on, eventually we all have to suffer because of these cretins. If Republicans take over the majority in both the Senate and House of Representatives, we will no doubt see the blank-eyed, blanket rolling back the gains that President Obama rode to victory in 2008. And just like that, Sarah Palin isn’t one “heartbeat away from the white house”, her horrible brood is in the White House.
A famous simile, likely apocryphal, often quoted to point out the differences between the House and Senate involves a spate between George Washington, who favored the two chamber system and Thomas Jefferson, who believed a second chamber unnecessary. The story goes that the two dudes were arguing the issue over coffee. Suddenly, Washington asked Jefferson, “Why did you pour that coffee into your saucer?” “To cool it,” replied Jefferson. “My throat is not made of brass”. “Even so,” said Washington, “we pour legislation into the senatorial saucer to cool it”.
Here are my 10 voting rules to live by:
1. RESPECT YOUR ELDERS. Get off your gross couch and show up.The Founding Fathers expended a lot of brainpower figuring out a system, so that you could just stumble down the street to stick a pen on a string in a ballot card like a silver backed gorilla. Nobody ever got elected by shadow voters. Well, that is, almost nobody. not our guys. So put down that remote, walk away from your computer, and go to the polls. Cheer up, trendy. You can TWITTER while voting, so it actually means something.
2. REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE.
Women: Don’t let those teahags co-opt our gender. Remember how in 2008, the GOP patted themselves on the back for the “historic†choice to put a “woman” on the presidential ticket? Conveniently forgetting that Democrats had already made history doing exactly that in 1984. After denigrating, mocking, failing to protect and opposing us for 2 decades they are now ready to acknowledge that women have a right to participate in the public and political sphere, of course via uneducated, short-skirted fruitcakes. This is, after all, the party that prays at the alter of Rush Limbaugh, a gentleman whose great linguistic contribution to American culture is the word “Feminazi.â€And now they’re at it again, patting themselves on the back for the “historic†candidacies of Republican women running for governorships, quitting said governorships, the House, and the Senate. Never mind that in 1992, Democrats sent a record number of women to Congress. Carly Fiorina’s bid for senate is nothing new in California! Both our  Senate seats have been filled by women for nearly twenty years. The traditional media is always happy to perpetuate the idiotic meme that these teahags, “Carly”, “Christy”, “Michelle”,  are pioneering a “new wave” of feminism, bucking the stereotype of shag-headed, hairy-legged, man-hating, bra-burning baby killers. They are tarted up – unlike Hillary and Barbara or Nancy, the “old breed”, you know, qualified – and making laws/babies. Take Sarah Palin’s nauseating, never-before-seen example of a mother-of-five runnin’ for political office, while heaping cruel insults on the mother-of-five Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. These modern gals can call themselves feminists. They can strut around arbitrarily saying whatever comes to mind on their Facebook pages or on Twitter. They can cry “sexism†whenever anyone questions their questionable college records or their non existent knowledge. They can co-opt the language and feminist icons, from Susan B. Anthony to Gloria Steinam, but not to Lady Gaga. But that doesn’t mean they are on the side of women. Ask yourself: who is working to improve the lives of women – Meg Whitman or Kamala Harris? Do you consider MIchelle Bachman and Carly your advocates or allies? Would you share a Pinkberry with Meg Whitman? Would you trust Christine O’Donnnell to balance your checkbook? Size 2 power suits with short skirts and empty platitudes about “family” and “freedom” are not the same as policies that benefit women. You can tell that Meg Whitman has no girlfriends and that Sarah Palin reviles other women.
Men: Vote with your penis. When adorable Christine O’Donnell talks about masturbation as adultery, she is referring to you.
Conflicted Children of Republicans. Grow up. Get over it. Get a life.
Non Whites. Need I really tell you why going to the polls is important?  Rand Paul wouldn’t have voted for the Civil Rights bill, and would leave it up to private establishments to decide whether or not they want you in their clubs. This is the kind of empowerment all those teabaggers would like to extend to your local watering hole along with the right to carry a loaded gun on to the premises. African-American voters are located in key states and congressional districts which could decide the balance of power in Washington and statehouses across the country. If the Democrats — after major gains in 2006 and 2008 — lose a significant number of U.S. House and Senate seats in the mid terms, largely because of high unemployment and a generally poor economy, the extent of those losses will have a major impact on the Obama administration’s ability to pursue its goals through 2012. There are 20 House seats and 14 Senate seats in addition to 14 gubernatorial races where the Black vote has the potential to determine the outcome of this year’s elections. If the Dems can mobilize a strong Black turnout like they did in 2008, the Democrats can significantly reduce their potential losses.The importance of the Black vote can be traced to the 1976 race for president, when African-Americans voted over 80 percent for the Democratic Party nominee Jimmy Carter. Carter won states such as Mississippi, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida, where the Black vote was considered the margin of victory by political experts. Just see it as re-voting for Obama
3. VOTE FOR THE OUTCOME, NOT THE CANDIDATES: Look at this picture. Now think about a country under the thumb of these cretins. Forget about how the media has sexed up the Republican Party by making what has been the same old racist, idiocies into a “movement.” If it talks like a duck talking about the right to bear arms and wanting rescind any attempt to equalize health care in this country, and walks like a duck proposing turning over your social security check to Wall Street and overturning Roe v. Wade than it’s a duck. And if it starts quacking about how anyone who wants to reform a bankrupt and failing economic system is a “socialist” than shoot it in the face like Dick Cheney shot his bff and go home, drunk and vomiting, before finding out if he lived or died.
4.LEARN FROM THE OLD COOTS: Do you ever wonder why the old coots are always better informed than the young uns? It’s because they weren’t born yesterday, The AARP website has a clear and easy voting guide. You can enter your address and it gives you a ballot that with your local candidates and initiative.
5. FORGET ALL THE ATTACK ADS AND BLOGS AND BRUSH UP ON YOUR HISTORY. As the saying goes, those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it. If you are too young to remember the holocaust, the great depression, a time before civil rights, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, or George W Bush, then pick up a book or read a book blog.
6. DON’T BE SCARED. If you’re concerned about the “national security” issue, and who isn’t, what with the Staples Gang on the loose, it was Ronald Reagan who extolled the virtues of bin Laden’s freedom fighters in Afghanistan, and it was U.S. taxpayer dollars, under Reagan, that financed the training of the Taliban in Pakistan .bin Laden exists but for the grace of Ronald Reagan. george W Bush did not keep us safe under his “leadership”. The myth that Repugs are better at keeper us safe before they are dumber and more violent is just that, a myth. So, a vote for those who want to dissolve the difference between church and state only when that church is a Christian church, a vote for those who scream about building Muslim community centers in lower Manhattan is a vote against national security.
7. THEY CHEAT. “Never Forget”. Nothing is beneath this people. They would commit “cooping” if they knew about it (google it).
California has a whopping 53 seats in the US House (the most in the nation) and all seats are up for election. as well as one senate seat. All state wide offices are also up. 20 of the 40 state senate seats (even numbered districts) and all 80 state assembly seats and all 4 districts in the board of equalization and 3 supreme court justices.
CANDIDATES FOR GOVERNOR
JERRY BROWN (D) Vote Governor Moonbeam. Isn’t he everything we really want? The old, white hippy dippy version of Obama? Most California voters don’t remember Jerry’s first stint as Governor Moonbeam because you weren’t born or hadn’t moved here yet, but apparently California was never in a better financial state than when Moonbeam was in office. Look around you. This is the worst piece of shit state I have ever seen. With Jerry in office again, we could have the old golden days of California back again. No, I don’t mean the legalized drugs and the Manson Family. Oh, you want to know why he’s disparaged as “Governor Moonbeamâ€? Not because he was on drugs or anything, but because he predicted, in the 1970s, satellite-driven cellphones. His pitch during his failed presidential bid was simple and rings true today: “VOTE FOR JERRY BROWN OR DIE”. Sadly, because he lost that election to RR, many of those people he predicted would die, did die.
“The prospects are bleak. We are looking down the road to depression and world war. The chickens are coming home to roost. We are an island of affluence, sinking in a rising sea of despair.. There is a deterioration of human, technical and environmental assets. We face increasing social tension, the unraveling of the social fabric, and our economy is out of control.Draft registration is just a way of getting kids to die to make oil companies richer,†he continued. “Nuclear power is grossly immoral. It can destroy our gene pool, irradiate our food chain, and the people making the decisions don’t care. Have you got your iodine for your thyroid cancer yet?â€
That pretty much did it. Somewhere, Ronald Reagan was preaching the politics of joy and sunsets while Governor Moonbeam was talking about thyroid cancer. And while his brutal words repelled Americans in 1980, it wouldn’t today. Today, it sounds like just want California needs.
MEG WHITMAN (R) Failed corporate auctioneer, Washington insider who sat on the BOD of Goldman Sachs, Mother to two monsters. If elected Gov., expect more furlough for our cops, firemen, and teachers, and cripple already hobbled child services. Whitman will block judges who oppose the death penalty, beef up ICE raids, build a bigger fence to keep “illegals” out while secretly employing the undocumented that the state relies on, and make it clear that the upper 1% is going to remain just where it has been for the past 30 years—in the upper 1% of wealth. Her inability to fathom that the world has moved forward while she expounds regressive policies that no longer apply to peoples lives today, that moolah cannot be the deciding factor in government, it has to be ethics and morality  speaks volumes about the kind of person who would sink $141-million into a dying platform. One of  her cornerstone economic proposals is elimination of California’s capital gains tax. If elected and able to abolish the tax that mainly benefits the her – the mega-wealthy, Whitman could net some $40 million during a four-year term as governor. Now that’s making money the old fashioned Republican way, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps.
Her idea of “helping the needy” is shelleing out big bucks to hush up her son’s –  “Griffith Rutherford Harsh the V” - rape allegations. If only she could have figured out how to raise her sons to not fail Princeton, get kicked out of boarding schools, and rape. The entire Whitman clan embodies all that gross kind of wealthy entitlement we all love to hate. Even in a political universe of creeps and dilettantes, the abruptness of Whitman’s conversion from power-suited businesswoman to power-suited politician stands out. Not only has the 2010 gubernatorial candidate never held office, but she hadn’t even registered to vote until she was 46 years old, and only became a Republican two years ago. Among all the elections in which Whitman couldn’t be bothered to cast a ballot, she sat out the historic nail biter, the 2000 presidential contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore, and she didn’t even vote in the 2003 recall of Gov. Gray Davis that swept Schwarzenegger into the office that she seeks to hold. How could someone so lazy and dull and so uninterested in politics suddenly want to govern what is perhaps the most ungovernable state in the union? Because she couldn’t get another big ticket job in the private sector. Between 2004 and 2008 (when Whitman resigned from eBay), the company’s stock plummeted 50%, while she made one horrible decision after another. Whitman tried to force eBay buyers to complete their transactions using the eBay payment-processing service Billpoint, rather than the user-favored PayPal. While on the board at Goldman Sachs, Whitman was appointed to the compensation committee, which is responsible for administering executive pay and bonuses. During her time on the board, the compensation committee handed out over $179 million to top executives in pay and bonuses, decisions that are now cited as causes of the economic meltdown and the ensuing jobs crisis. Between 1998 and 2002, Whitman engaged in a now-illegal practice called “spinning†(not the thing people say they do at the gym), and pocketed almost $2 million in personal rewards from Goldman Sachs, in exchange for hiring them to underwrite eBay’s stock. She paid $3 million to settle the ensuing shareholder lawsuit and resigned from the board. Then there was compared with Meg Whitman’s full-body contact in the boardroom, where, thanks to her “verbal dispute†with an employee, the company had to shell out $200,00 in hush money because, according to Meg, verbally and physically assaulting a subordinate is “one of those things that just happens†in the business world. Worst of all, while Whitman was stockpiling her own personal fortune, buying out eBay competitors, and purchasing companies like Skype, PayPal, and Bill Me Later, she fired 20% of her full time employees.
CANDIDATES FOR LT GOVERNOR:
California’s Republican Lieutenant Governor and his Democratic challenger are both exceedingly more interesting than the dumb job they’re competing for. Democratic challenger, philandering San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom vs former 3-term Republican State Senator Abel Maldonado. Assumedly, both candidates will use this non job as a stepping stone to higher office. California’s lieutenant governor takes over when the governor is incapacitated or out of state, and while waiting for something to happen, he or she sits on the boring State Lands Commission, Economic Development Commission and the boards of the University of California and California State systems. Maldonado, who spurned his own party last year to break a legislative tie on Governor Schwarzenegger’s budget, was appointed by the Terminator to serve out the term of the elected Democrat, John Garamendi, after he won a seat in Congress.
GAVIN NEWSOM (L) VOTE MR. HANDSOME.
ABEL MALDONADO (R)
CANDIDATES FOR SECRETARY OF STATE:
DEBRA BOWEN (D) VOTE FOR HER. Honest, dedicated to total transparency, Bowen has proved her commitment to openness and fairness, and an above-and-beyond-the-call-of-duty commitment to keep Californians informed.
DAMON DUNN (R)
CANDIDATES FOR ATTORNEY GENERAL:
KAMALA HARRIS (D) VOTE FOR KAMALA. She is at every EQCA event I attended. She’s committed to protecting families and children and certainly committed to equality for everyone. She’s not in favor of Prop 19 (the marijuana-legalization initiative), but don’t hold that against her, potheads. A mixed-race American (her father is African-American, her mother Indian) who does not feel the need (unlike self-loathing Piyush Amrit Jindal and Nimrata Nikki Randhawa Haley who all seem to be ashamed of who they are and where they came from) to betray her own roots for political gain. A shadowy Virginia-based group funded by the oil industry, tobacco companies, and health insurance industry — and run by Karl Rove — tried to derail her campaign, an unprecedented move in a down-ballot race. Rove’s insidious group, the “The Republican State Leadership Committee,” purchased $1.1 million of TV airtime to run vicious ads attacking her 2004 decision not to seek the death penalty against a police officer’s killer.  And who exactly is funding this group’s attacks? The polluters themselves: the cigarette manufacturers and insurance industry giants. Just look at the satanic names of the big Special Interest Contributors to the “Republican State Leadership Committee”: U.S. Chamber of Commerce –1.15M, American Justice Partnership –925,000, Blue Cross/Blue Shield –918,068, Reynolds American -690,161, Altria Group –483,545, Devon Energy –350,000, Citigroup Inc –200,399, Wal-Mart Stores –195,276, PhRMA –150,861.
STEVE COOLEY (R) He refused again to take a position on Proposition 23, which would suspend the state’s greenhouse-gas law: “I’m not approaching this issue from an ideological position as my opponent seems to be, but a very lawyer-like position of enforcing the will of the people.. ” Steve Cooley says he would defend Proposition 8, the gay-marriage ban, in federal court. In Tuesday’s debate with Kamala Harris, Cooley said, “Proposition 8 was passed by a majority of the California electorate … Therefore, it should be defended by the California attorney general whether the attorney general believes in it or not.”  Or whether it’s unconstitutional or not. . “Lawyer like position of enforcing the will of the people”? Come again? He also received $13,000 in contributions to his attorney general’s campaign from an oil company while his office was prosecuting the firm for violating state environmental laws
CANDIDATES FOR US SENATE:
BARBARA BOXER VOTE FOR BABS. Anti-war, pro-environment, pro-equality — a true-blue progressive who represents us with compassion, intelligence, and logic. She has worked tirelessly in getting the right things done for the people of California. She has earned my respect and deserves re-election. Better an experienced, knowledgeable and highly effective fighter than a failed CEO with zero experience in politics along with a history of outsourcing jobs. A prosperous economy is fundamentally all about job creation, productivity and consumer confidence.  If you’re still undecided because of SoCal drive by radio attacks who call her a “bitch”, consider her opponent:
CARLY FIORINA Ew. NOM-backed radical right-winger, nearly sank Hewlett Packard before Hewlett Packard booted her bony ass out the door. Set a new record for most catty remarks per minute during an election cycle. Repeatedly questioning her fellow Republican Meg Whitman’s “bizarre” decision to be interviewed by Sean Hannity and cracked herself up by mocking the hairstyle of her Democratic opponent, incumbent Sen. Barbara Boxer.“So yesterday,” actually said the woman being hailed around the country as a new brand of feminist. But here’s what’s so yesterday: The Real Candidates of America’s “Mean Girls” approach to female competition. Even as commentators across the good old US of A were saluting Carly as part of the “unprecedented” “new wave” of female Republican candidates who’d prevailed at the polls November 2nd, she was acting like a 50’s school girl, giggling over her opponent’s looks.
CONTROLLER:
JOHN CHIANG VOTE FOR CHIANG. nother one who has proven his commitment to transparency and to keeping Californians informed. Chiang pulls no punches when delivering the news (e.g., if the legislature doesn’t pass a budget by X Date, Cal will be issuing IOUs by X Date). If you didn’t know his party, you wouldn’t know his party. A straight-up guy who takes his job seriously. He launched a website in response to the Bell salary scandal. Users can search for the salary, pension benefits and other compensation for more than 594,000 city and county employees throughout California. “The absence of transparency and accountability invites corruption, self-dealing and the abuse of public funds,” said Chiang “This website will help taxpayers scrutinize local government compensation and force public officials to account for how they spend public resources.”
Vote For:
INSURANCE COMMISSIONER: DAVE JONES. Progressive consumer advocate — and, just as importantly, he is not that vile bigot Mike Villines.
STATE BOARD OF EQUALIZATION, DISTRICT 1: BETTY T. YEE
UNITED STATES REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 14: ANNA ESHOO
UNITED STATES ASSEMBLY DISTRICT 21: RICH GORDON
SUPERINTENDANT OF PUBLIC INSTRUCTION: TOM TORLAKSON
TREASURER: BILL LOCKYEAR
CALIFORNIA STATE PROPOSITIONS:
– Prop 19: Legalizing Marijuana for recreational use (Medicinal marijuana use has been legal in California since Prop 215 passed 14 years ago) in California over 21. Neutral. Do not want my personal feelings to cloud my judgment, namely my sobriety and my hatred for all things stoner. I go into a trance of boredom whenever I look at anything remotely having to do with pot, so I really don’t know anything about this proposition.
– Prop 20: Congressional Redistricting. VOTE NO. Placed on the ballot by a wealthy right-wing activist, this would give the power to draw Congressional district boundaries to an unelected commission, intended to reduce the number of House seats held by Democrats. Strongly opposed by most progressive organizations.
– Prop 21: Vehicle License Surcharge to Fund State Parks and Wildlife Programs. VOTE YES. Props 21 and 22 California’s 278 state parks have been designated “endangered places”, the state’s so-called “crown jewels”. Prop 22 prevents the Governor and the legislature from seizing money earmarked for cities and counties and spending it on state services. Proposition 21 would establish an $18 surcharge on vehicles when they’re registered every year, commercial vehicles and trailers excepted. The fee would raise $500 million a year to be spent on keeping open 278 state parks. Can you imagine how lame we will look when we close the state parks??
– Prop 22: Prohibits State Borrowing of Transportation, Redevelopment Funds.. VOTE NO. The purpose of Prop 22 is to prevent the state from seizing money earmarked for cities, counties and various transportation projects and spending it instead on state services, limiting the discretion of elected officials to spend money as circumstances require. Prop 22 is a constitutional amendment, which could only be changed by the voters. Could explain this better but am running out of time.
– Prop 23: Suspends Implementation of Air Pollution Control Law (AB 32). VOTE NO. Funded by two OUT OF STATE – Texas-  oil companies — Valero and Tesoro — Prop 23 would effectively repeal California’s global warming law, gutting our clean energy economy, costing hundreds of thousands of jobs, and stopping us from addressing climate change. Proposition 23 would suspend Governor Schwarzenegger’s proudest (only) achievement, AB 32. The law that sets limits on emissions of greenhouse gases would not go back into effect until unemployment stayed at 5.5% for four consecutive quarters.
– Prop 24: Repeals Business’ Ability to Lower Tax Liability. VOTE YES. In 2008 and 2009, Republicans leveraged the 2/3 rule to force the creation of corporate tax loopholes that add $2 billion  year to the states budget deficit. closing the loopholes for the fatcats will help put money back into schools, librarians back into libraries, etc.
– Prop 25: Majority Vote for Legislature to Pass the Budget Act . VOTE  YES. Reduces Vote Required to Pass Budget, Budget-related Legislation vides badly needed reforms by eliminating the 2/3rds majority to pass a state budget in the legislature .depriving right wingers of their power to delay the passing of the budget. would help prevent the most cruel budget cuts and enable the passage of more progressive solution .
PROP 26: Requires that certain state fees are to be approved by two-thirds vote of Legislature. VOTE NO. Funded largely by right-wing corporations, this would require a 2/3rds vote of the legislature to impose a fee making it impossible to force polluters to pay their cleanup costs. Would re-label what now are called “fees,” “levies” and other assessments and call them “taxes” instead.  That means passage would require two-thirds super-majorities in the legislature, instead of the current 51 percent. Fees for air and water pollution, oil-spill clean-up, tobacco and alcohol would be affected.
– Prop 27: YES. Eliminates State Commission on Redistricting
Propositions 20 and 27 are a recipe for confusion, two measures with different answers to the same question: should an independent panel draw the lines for legislative and congressional districts, or should it be the politicians themselves?  Voters can decide to expand what they did two years ago or reverse themselves, with important consequences for the distribution of political power. Two years ago, California voters decided to set up an independent commission to draw the boundaries for legislative districts, a job now done every ten years by the lawmakers themselves. Governor Schwarzenegger and others claimed that was the source of legislative gridlock in Sacramento and more than 50 percent of the voters agreed. Proposition 20 on this year’s ballot would extend the panel’s authority to Congressional district boundaries. Prop 27 would abolish the panel before it’s even created.
Two races that are not in my state but stand out as particularly egregious:
Oh happy day, 1992.
Russ Feingold, Wisconsin. Once upon a time, Wisconsin’s independent, quirky, unpredictable progressive senator overcame his unpopularity in Washington and was elected 3 times as senator of his home state. Tragically, Feingold is struggling this election season, unbelievably trailing a Ghoulish plastics manufacturing tycoon. For people who don’t know, Feingold was the lone dissenter against the Patriot Act and a vocal, early critic of the Iraq War–warning, presciently, that it would distract the government from graver threats elsewhere. (As early as 2002, he wanted to know why American counter-terrorism officials weren’t focusing more on the danger from Yemen.) He fought for a strong public option to compete with the insurance industry and bring health care spending down, refusing to sign onto a deal to drop the public option from the Senate bill. Feingold’s dedication to the idea of clean elections led him to co-sponsor the McCain-Feingold Act, arguably the most important piece of campaign finance legislation since the late 1970s–at least until the sons of satan in the Supreme Court unraveled it. He did real things .He actually makes your state and this country better, safer, fairer. What does plasticsman do??  In today’s upside down America, the votes Feingold cast over the past two years–for the stimulus, raising the debt ceiling, health care reform–have become liabilities over which plasticsman has attacked him repeatedly. Maybe Feingold was independent before, Johnson suggests. But he’s not anymore. No, maybe the meaning of the word has actually changed, not the man. J Johnson’s attacks work in part because they distract from his own monstrously lack of qualifications  for public office. His inability to provide even the sketchiest of details about his ideas for the economy led even the Green Bay Press-Gazette, one of the state’s most conservative papers, to endorse his liberal opponent. (“Johnson seemed unable to further articulate his plan for job creation–especially for the middle class… “he needs more time to develop and articulate his positions on a range of issues from jobs to foreign policy.”)  Consistent with his longtime opposition to unlimited campaign spending by outside groups, Feingold has told organizations that support him, including the Democratic Senatorial Senate Committee, to stay away from his race. Of the $2.7 million on advertisements in the Wisconsin Senate campaign by outside groups, Of that, $2.67 million have been on ads against Feingold or for Johnson. Feingold’s prohibition on outside money is a form of unilateral disarmament and infuriating to his allies. If you don’t hammer away with your own “negative” campaign ads during football on sunday, the non reading Wisconsonians may not realize how extreme Johnson is. You look at the other senators in trouble: Reid, Boxer, Bennett. They hammered their opponents and they are in better position than Feingold, although they are all at risk of losing as well. He is definitely one of the few senators, on either side of the aisle, who has any principles. Take your plastics manufacturer, Wisconsin and choke on it.
In a fun fact despite  Ron Johnson’s hand-wringing that “manufacturers” are somehow under-represented in Congress (lol), it turns out that the likely future Speaker of the House– the most powerful person in Congress– used to be President of a plastics company, too! Prior to his political career, Boehner was a salesman, and later president, of Nucite Sales, a small distributor of plastics and packaging products.
Ilario Pantano,  North Carolina’s 7th Congressional District. The fact that he is a murderer is undisputed. Ilario Pantano, the “preppy Marine”, Tea Party darling, attended Horace Mann and  NYU, worked at Goldman Sachs before reenlisting in the Marines after 9/11 stating: “our duty as Marines is, quite frankly, to export violence to the four corners of the globe, to make sure that this doesn’t happen again.” As a second lieutenant with the US marines, he stopped and detained two Iraqi men in a car near Fallujah. The Iraqis were unarmed and the car found to be empty of weapons. Pantano ordered the two men to search the car for a second time and then, with no other US soldiers in view, unloaded a magazine of his M16A4 automatic rifle into them, before reloading and blasting a second magazine at them – some 60 rounds in total. Their bodies were later found in a kneeling position having apparently been shot in the back.Over the corpses, he left a placard inscribed with the marine motto: “No better friend, No worse enemy.” He was charged with premeditated murder/ Six years later Pantano is on the verge of a stunning electoral victory that could send him to the US Congress in Washington. He is standing as Republican candidate in North Carolina’s 7th congressional district, which was last represented by his party in 1871.With the help of the Tea Party, and with the added benefit of his image as a war “hero” acquired from his murdering Iraqi civilians, in 2004, he has raised almost $1m  in donations. Pantano is one of the new breed of hardline Republicans thrown up by the turmoil of the economic meltdown and the ensuing Tea Party explosion who just also happens to be a murderer.
Ilario Pantano is fighting the election on a national manifesto for change.
