;)
The Commentariat -- Nov. 5, 2014
Defunct video, photo removed.
Unless you live in a solidly-blue neighborhood, look around. The majority of your neighbors are stupid or selfish or both. But, hey, what the fuck do I care? Yesterday was my birthday, & the Stupid & the Selfish gave ME, ME, ME a buncha great birthday presents.
Yeah, a lot of people are going to get sick & die unnecessarily because they can't afford health insurance & their Republican governors & legislatures will keep denying the Medicaid expansion. But I'm on Medicare & it's too late for Republicans to take it away.
A lot of decent, hard-working immigrants are going to remain in the shadows, suffering all manner of indignities & inconveniences (including death!), but I've got my genuine U.S. birth certificate, so I'm cool. Also, I no longer have to worry about the hordes of Ebola-carrying terrorists swimming the Rio Grande.
Yeah, black people will continue to get the shaft in too many ways to count. But you should see me: I am whitey, white, white. Nobody's going to stop me for driving while white or question what I'm doing in my nice neighborhood or keep me from voting.
Low-wage workers won't get decent wages in most states, but I'm not looking for a job at McDonalds or WalMart, so why should I care? My burgers are cheap & I can keep getting swell bargains at WalMart. Wages a bit further up the pay scale will remain stagnant, but my stock portfolio should be fine, so lucky me. Those wonderful Republicans will keep Democrats from raising my taxes, so thank goodness I won't have to kick in my fair share.
Public schools will get crappier, but I'm long past worrying about that. My neighbors might be ignorant, but their kids will definitely be ignorant. So what? Public universities? Aaah, let students be saddled for life with debt. I paid off the $750 loan that covered my college shortfall, so they can pay off the tens of thousands they'll owe. Good luck, kids!
Sure, the overall economy will continue to stagger along, but relatively-speaking, I'm doing fine. Okay, I've got that house in Florida in danger of falling into the Caloosahatchee, but I'm sure I can sell it for a good price to a climate-change denier before it submerges. Wahoo!
Justin Sink of the Hill: "President Obama will hold a news conference Wednesday afternoon, facing the White House press corps one day after Democrats were blown out in the midterm elections.... President Obama attempted to call Sen. Mitch McConnell, slated to become the new majority leader, last night, but couldn't connect with the newly reelected Kentucky Republican. The president left a message for McConnell, and spoke to numerous other Republican and Democratic House, Senate and gubernatorial candidates." ...
... AND, No, Peter Baker of the New York Times, Obama is NOT "left fighting for his own relevance." Presidents are relevant.
Marin Cogan of New York writes an excellent summary of the "meaning" of the Republican sweep.
John Cassidy of the New Yorker: "... if a 'wave election' is one that signifies important changes in the underlying dynamics of the American electorate, then this wasn't a wave election."
Victoria D. recommends Charles Pierce's liveblog of the results. So do I.
AND Rand Paul taunts Hillary Clinton & her gallery of losers.
The New York Times' liveblog of the election has a handy tabulator in the upper-right-hand corner of the page, which will show the Senate & House totals, by party, as races are called.
The Washington Post's liveblog is here.
Here's the Guardian's livefeed.
Greg Sargent says at 6:46 that exit polls show the demographics for Democrats are looking better than in 2010, not as good as in 2012.
Jim Kuhnhenn of the AP: "President Barack Obama compared the political landscape for the midterm election Tuesday to the 1958 elections during the presidency of Dwight Eisenhower when Republicans suffered severe losses in the Senate. One-third of Senate seats are up for election this year and Obama says many states with contested races tilt to the Republican Party. 'In this election cycle this is probably the worst possible group of states for Democrats since Dwight Eisenhower,' Obama said Tuesday on WNPR, a Connecticut public radio station."
Paul Rosenberg in Salon: This election is all about race. CW: I have wondered for a long time why Southern white voters were willing to put up with their own poverty levels in states which over the last several decades have been largely governed by Republicans. Rosenberg has the answer: the white voters blame blacks -- not government policies -- for their states' poverty.
Elliot Hannon of Slate: "A federal judge on Tuesday ordered Kansas to stop enforcing the state's ban on same-sex marriage, because the law violates gay couples' constitutional rights to due process and equal protection. District Court Judge Daniel Crabtree granted a preliminary injunction but put a hold on the ruling until Nov. 11 in order to give the state the chance to appeal."
34 Comments
Reader Comments (34)
Uhh, Fucking Kansas.
Republicans, per usual, won down the line. Tribal politics, pure and simple. I'm less convinced it's the "message" of the Republicans but rather an innate fear of voting otherwise, after remaining loyal all those years. And no thanks to the worthless fucking media, exemplified by Thomas Frank and his witness of the carnivalesque attention span of the mass media, looking for the pictures rather than the stories.
I went through all the hassles of overseas voting thinking my liberal vote could actually make a difference for once in my life, but tribal loyalty is entrenched hard in the Land of Oz, and even against the advice of the entire moderate conservative wing, Kansans voted for more incompetent leadership and economic malaise. How does Pat Roberts do it??? I'm baffled at how he still has a following when he admits, in public, his official Kansas residence is on a friend's couch. He doesn't even fucking live there! I can't help but laugh. That fucking guy, worthless all around, even according to his own colleagues. Devoting his civil service to following orders and voting in line with whoever can guarantee his reelection, so he can return to his tired corner and suck on the government's teat for a few more years. Call me a cynic (I am right now) but I'm even half glad Brownback won again. If Paul Davis had miracuously won, he would have inherited the sinking ship that is Kansas with a huge majority of extremist wingers who would've cooperated about as well as Repubes do with Obama. It would've been grinding gridlock until the next election when Republicans would surely snort and squeal and throw feces about how much of a disaster his leadership has been. Then we'd go back to decades of status quo. Thus, despite my friends and family having to live through this morbid "experiment", let's let it runs its course there Brownback. This grand conservative experiment is going to play out for the better or worse in Kansas, for all the country to see. Four years later Kansans and their beloved Republicans will only have themselves to blame for their intransigence and ideological impurity, because Democrats (and even less, liberals) have no control over the direction of this sad little state. I bet the Kochs will open their coffers to increased "philanthropy" across the blood-red portions of the state to glaze over the crumbling realities.
This is further proof nationwide that dark money can have huge influences on elections, where an entire political party that has never even proposed an alternative plan and has instead chopped down progress at each opportunity can win across the country, all thanks to mind games and snazzy propaganda tricks. With the foundation laid for the shadow campaign infrastructure now cemented across the country, future elections are going to get even uglier. The Kochs have said they're in this for the long haul, and their manipulative schemes just got validated yesterday.
Before indulging in any sort of commentary, and believe me, I've been trying all night to tamp down the rage, I want to ask for a big round of applause for the work Marie has done this election season, and especially in the last few days, to give us all a place to go for information without having to wade through mendacity, both-sides-bullshit, and intemperate twaddle.
You don't really appreciate what a gift RC is until you start trying to round up all this stuff on your own. I saw a headline this morning on Google News from the Times about how the Republicans won because they shut down the crazies. Say what? You mean like Joni Ernst? You mean like Sam Brownback? You mean like Walker and Scott and Thom Tillis? You mean like Paul LePage and Cory Gardner? You mean like Tom Cotton? People talking rot straight out of their asses? People telling lies and scary fairy tales and complete and utter rubbish. Unless the Times writer means that those are the sane ones.
I'd hate to see what the place would look like if Republicans hadn't "handled" the extremists.
And this is supposed to be one of the most trusted sources of news in the world?
No. What they did wallpaper over the crazy. It's all still there ready to burn through. All they did was throw enough dark money at races to overcome any objections. All they did was play down to the worst in people, to their fears and hatreds and biases and ignorance.
And in a way, the most extreme winner of all is Mitch McConnell because unlike the cuckoo teabaggers and out and out nuts, he stands for only one thing: money.
Instead of being told that the GOP handled the nuts and won because of a grassroots revival of Republican virtues and values, I came here and read a commentary on what was really going on in this election and the real reasons (some of them) for the Republican landslide.
Thanks Marie. And if you want to take the rest of the week off, make yourself a nice big drink, put your feet up and read a good novel. You deserve it.
I second everything AK just said. Thanks Marie. I feel privileged to have been directed to this site.
I also second what Akhileus said, both about Marie and everything else. Especially his point regarding McConnell only standing for one thing, $$$.
This was a tough evening, as the results were in many cases even worse than the already bleak polling suggested.
One small but significant bright note: the background check initiative passed in my state of Washington, despite vigorous gun nut opposition. It may be a relatively small step forward in the context of last night's rout, but it is important.
Lastly, this very funny liveblog of the unfolding results from Charlie Pierce might bring at least a ghost of a smile to some, as it did to me:
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/Election_Night_2014
Thank you, Marie. I don't comment; you and your regulars say it better than I ever could, but thank you. Thank all of you.
Well maybe Marie doesn't feel like a putting her feet up and savoring a nice cocktail or two, but I'll tell you who will.
John Roberts.
A few years ago, Roberts, who sucked everyone in during his confirmation hearings (by the way, there won't be many of those for the next few years, courtesy of Justice Roberts and the Dwarfs) with talk of respect for law and precedence and no interest in radical redesign of the country by fiat from the bench, sat down with a few fellow schemers and decided to begin a little experiment.
What would happen, he may have thought to himself, if we took off all the stops on money in campaigns? And then what if we told donors that they could give as much as they wanted and never have their names connected to the ensuing conflagration? And to put another spin on this experiment in election victories made to order, let's let the racists and connivers and crooks out of their cages and let them do whatever they want: election rigging, vote suppression, let 'em bring back poll taxes and throw as many roadblocks in the way of minority voters. The works.
Then let's see what happens. Let's see if the Democrats have an answer for that.
Well, we just saw.
Yesterday, Roberts' grand experiment in Pay to Play democracy was an unqualified success. Unlimited, untraceable cash, vote suppression, gerrymandering, election rigging, disappearing ballots, dirty tricks, and all of it done with the full backing of the highest court in the land. Can't you just hear the snickering over highballs and martinis? "Where can they go? What can they do? They can't do shit! We ran the table and the Democrats can't do a thing about it! So, what the hell, we'll keep on doing it."
"Waiter, another round for the the Chief Justice and his pals in the black hoods. Oh, and can you send a bottle of your best champagne to that table over there, to the Koch boys? Looks like they've been partying pretty hard. They paid their money and now they can call the shots. Fuck democracy. It's a game that has always begged to be rigged. And so we did it. Cheers, boys!"
Count me in that group, too, Marie. You deserve the claps -- oh, wait, that didn't sound right. (Old joke, couldn't resist, need all the jokes I can get today.)
Seriously, thanks for all your hard work. Loved this morning's rant/analysis. And thanks for the Ellen video. I've watched it 3 times this morning. Recommend it for taking the sting out of yesterday. She is such a talent. Like you, Marie.
As far as I've heard, the savages, every one of them, blathered on, after winning, some by way of voter suppression, most by way of stupidity cubed, about how this was all about the "people speaking".
Funny how people like Ted Cruz only talk about what the people want when it suits their purpose. The rest of time, it's what they want and what their owners and bosses want.
Oh fuck it. I'm just too disgusted to go on. Jack, last night, made a reference to Hunter Thompson's Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail about the brainless swine and those who elect them. Boy is that ever still true. But right about now, I'm ready to take another piece of advice from Thompson, from his other book about Fear and Loathing, a suggestion about what to do under intolerable circumstances:
(It's been a long time and I may not have the quote exactly right, but...)
"As your lawyer, I advise you to take two more reds and rip his lungs out!"
Pretty much how I'm feeling right now.
Without the reds.
To my fellow comrades and our Queen Marie–-white as she can be:
THANK YOU FOR BEING YOU––the oasis in the desert fer sure.
Yeah, me too, Marie. Thanks for sorting through all the hulls for the few grains worth reading.
I absolutely agree, AK: Thanks Marie.
Marie, add me to the list of admirers who appreciate this site.
In keeping with post election miseries, here's a horror:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2014/11/05/us/ap-us-feeding-the-homeless-arrests.html?ref=news&_r=0
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — Police in Florida arrested two pastors and a 90-year-old man who were feeding the homeless, say they violated a new ordinance in Fort Lauderdale that essentially bans public food sharing.
South Florida television station WPLG (http://bit.ly/1qpgywd ) reports homeless advocate Arnold Abbott and ministers Dwayne Black and Mark Sims were arrested Sunday. They face up to 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.
The ordinance took effect Friday.
Abbot runs a nonprofit group called Love Thy Neighbor, Inc. He says he was feeding the homeless in a park when a police officer told him to "drop that plate right now."
This is emblematic of outcome of elections- ugh.
mae finch
Marie, you are a light in the dark horizon. Thank you for all that you do.
Should have copied the first version of this post. When I hit "create," it popped up as coded gobbledygook on my screen and I knew I was in trouble....
So a shorter version of post-election reflections (the cyberspace genies saved you from the longer).
Here's what yesterday's election said to me. Aside from Marie and Akhilleus' analyses, which reflected my own view that the Republican platform can be summarized by a short list of character flaws--belligerent stupidity, selfishness, short-sightedness and self-satisfaction-- I saw a hint of hope in the economic populist message that propelled raises in the minimum wage in more than one state. Elizabeth Warren has it right.
Most other election results can be seen as exhibits in the Fortress America Museum, the one that memorializes an uncomplicated, as Marie says, mostly white past without a Civil War, a Great Depression or any number of other inconveniences.
Like the Creation Museum, Fortress America is best defined by what it doesn't like and therefore what it chooses to leave out.
A short list:
A black guy in the White House
People of color anywhere, especially near where we live
Gays (Melissa Harris-Parry suggested last night that anti-gay marriage sentiments played a significant part in Kay Hagan's defeat)
Any and all intrusions from outside, anything foreign, from immigrants speaking another language coming to take our jobs, to weird religions that sport odd headgear and want to control their own countries, to diseases from darkest Africa. Fortress America is always under siege...and (except for Washington State), it seems that the only thing besides its personal arsenals that it has to defend itself is what elections allow it to ignore or reject.
I will be thinking a lot about Fortress America in the next two years.
And I suspect most RC adherents will be, too, for though we don't live in Fortress America, sharing its geography as we do, it is we who have a legitimate right to feel under siege.
Mae,
You are absolutely correct that this is emblematic of the new regime that will take over in Washington in January, and representative of not only a lack of empathy on the part of conservatives, but an active and aggressive antipathy towards the poor, the homeless, and the downtrodden.
The ordinance went into effect on Friday and within 48 hours the police are already scouting for someone to arrest? For feeding a fucking homeless person???
Not long ago, some right-wing pig made a comment about the problem with food stamps being that it was like feeding stray cats, you'd never be rid of the little bastards. Better to put them down. That's exactly what this is. This is inhuman cruelty turned into public policy by the same sort of Republicans who were dancing on the tables last night, giddy with the prospect of being able to yank food out of many more poor mouths.
A few days ago an article on Salon, reprinted from Alternet, declared that today's conservatives would have spit on Jesus. As a kid, I remember being in mass one Sunday when a priest asked the congregation if they would recognize Jesus if he came up to them on the street. His question was would people be able to look past the outer trappings to see the real person underneath. It was a good question. It still is. But here's the difference. That priest was making the point that most people probably wouldn't be able to recognize Jesus because of all the noise and hubbub of modern life. My point is that today's conservatives would recognize Jesus right away.
Then they'd have him arrested.
Whether for feeding the homeless (against the law), giving comfort to the poor (moochers) and those in prison (evil blah people) or the sick (repeal the ACA! IMPEACH!), Jesus would be anathema in right-wing circles. The central ideas that he preached are avoided like the plague by those who strike the most pious poses whenever cameras or microphones appear.
The fact is that cruelty and hatred, small minds and withered hearts are as central to modern conservatism as fear and stupidity.
When I read about Rand Paul, a guy Time recently declared the most interesting man in politics, a guy who is routinely touted as a Very Serious Person, and someone to watch out for, making fun of Democrats who lost elections yesterday, posting pictures of them under the title "Hillary's Losers" I don't see presidential. I see puerility. I see a small man, small in both ways. Small in every way. I see a petulant little creep.
Teabaggers see the next president.
Any questions?
Oh, and by the way, if you happen to find yourself in Fort Lauderdale with your kids or grandkids, don't even think about letting someone else take a lick of ice cream from your cone. You might be arrested. What about sharing a bag of french fries? Does that constitute public food sharing? Probably not. As long as you're well dressed and have money. But if you have to sleep under a bridge and crawl through dumpsters behind restaurants, anyone kind enough to give you an apple will be locked up faster than Mitch McConnell can tell another lie.
Because that's the conservative way. That's their vision for this country. That's what millions voted for yesterday.
Jed Lewison offers a three-point bit of advice for congressional Democrats during the next two years. The Dems, of course, are likely too wishy-washy to follow it.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/11/05/1342135/-Congrats-GOP-You-just-won-control-of-Congress-with-a-Democratic-president
I wanna find Charlie Pierce's bar...need that double double Prestone or whatever myself today. What dismal results from yesterday, Overall it's a Reince Priebus/GroverNorquist nightmare with too few bright spots to celebrate.
CW, you said it best at the top of today's Commentariat.
Marie - I echo the sentiments of gratitude for all the work you do. And your opinion piece at the top nails it. Thank you.
Thank you Marie,
If you can bear to keep this going I'll be grateful.
RI turned down a new constitutional convention which Grover Norquist came here supporting and in which we didn't know who would be writing the new laws etc, so our tiny state did something right. Also our 2 local towns elected a state senator who is for gun regulation. She seems to be reasonable. And finally.....Buddy Cianci and his good old boys lost his mayoral bid for Providence (his good ole boy cops even tried to fill out the ballots in the Prov. homeless shelter or, better yet, take the blank ballots with them). Maybe we can be a little less corrupt in the future.
I'm here for the long/short haul since my husband won't move. So I'm going to do local things and hope we can be a small beacon for things that can be done. Bristol RI is a great town so it should be all right.
Assholes never sleep.
If you think we can relax for a few weeks before picking up the trail for the 2016 elections, think again. Wingnuts won't be resting. They're already gearing up for more election stealing. I mean, hell, look at how well it went this time out. And Johnny Roberts said they could do it! Could it get any better?
Yesterday, just to remind their readers that even an historic Republican rout due to vote suppression and election rigging wasn't good enough, Investor's Business Daily sounded the call to alarm. Why? Democrats are out there trying to steal their freedoms, godammit.
According to IBD, voter fraud by Democrats is "rampant" and the media is doing nothing about it! Who says it's rampant? Heritage for one, who determined that there were 200 cases of voter fraud around the country in the last election. Two-fucking-hundred!! So, let's see. If there are about 150 million registered voters and let's say only a third come out to vote, 50 million, that means that even if the Heritage "research" is correct, that would put the incidence of voter fraud at around 0.0004%. Holy shit! It's a coup d'état!
Also, stalwart investigative wingnut, James O'Keefe, claims that he was able to get himself 20 ballots somewhere in North Carolina without showing an ID or, or, or ANYthing! He prob'ly went dressed as Osama Bin Laden.
But for a more accurate accounting of voter fraud yesterday, let's go to the numbers amassed by that bastion of Freedoms and Liberty type thingies, True the Vote, one of more virulent proponents of the "Democrats are stealing elections" bullshit.
True the Vote had their thugs and myrmidons out in force yesterday looking high and low for evidence of voter fraud. What did they find? According the numbers collected by True the Vote's own software, they found 18 "irregularities". Eight were incidences of voting machine malfunctions, nothing to do with fraud. Several were reports of people who thought someone was watching over their shoulder while they voted. Not exactly fraud either. And the rest were complaints that legitimate voters were turned away from the polls because of policies pushed by True the Vote.
It appears there was only a single incident that could be considered fraud at the polling place itself, one of the major concerns of voter intimidation groups like TTV. It involved "...an Iowan who reported getting a call about a rejected absentee ballot despite never having submitted one."
So how many cases of actual voter fraud were there, as reported by one of the biggest proponents of the idea of rampant fraud?
Zero.
Plenty of other studies, by reputable groups, not wingnut whacko birds, have established the same result. Evidence of voter impersonation at the polls, the reason for all the voter ID nonsense, is virtually non-existent.
But that won't stop groups like True the Vote and the Republican Party and their wealthy backers from keeping the myth alive.
And to show you what they're really after, I leave you with this from the IBD website:
"In fact, some people shouldn't vote. Those who won't take the time to learn about issues and candidates, for instance. Noncitizens. Serious felons. People who have to be bribed or threatened to vote. And those who could easily get a legal ID, but won't bother...Voting is a precious privilege..."
No asshole, it's not a privilege. It's a right. Who says so? The framers, asshole, that's who. The Constitution never once mentions the "privilege of voting". It does, however, mention "the right to vote".
Five times.
Asshole.
Marie, my thanks. Your effort helps keep the dose of SSRI's down.
For results of races of national interest--that would be governor, US senator, and US rep--the LA Times has a nice interactive page.
http://graphics.latimes.com/2014-election-results-nationwide/#MD
Just to see how the media is spinning the Republican takeover, Jonathan Karl, wingnut mole and GOP apologist pretending to be an unbiased ABC political reporter, just stated, before the president's press conference, that it was clear from the vote that it is Obama's responsibility to make things work in Washington.
No mention of the fact that he's been trying to do this for the last six years. Also no mention of the fact that his (Karl's) party has done all it can to ensure that nothing works.
Before he bowed out for the president, Karl also threw in the dig that Obama planned to legislate by executive order no matter what the congress or the voters wanted.
Sounds pretty fair and balanced to me, doncha think?
One more reason that irrationality and stupidity rule. The next two years are going to fucking miserable. Wonder what the Jonathan Karls and Chuck Todds will say when the Republicans start fucking things up beyond all recognition?
Obama's fault, I guess.
I ask again, what liberal media?
@AK,
I'm afraid the Liberal Media ain't even at NPR. I foolishly turned on the radio, after Senator McConnell's press conference and before President Obama's. Two NPR personalities were talking and a third person, writer for The Daily Beast I believe, chimed in and said "If only Obama would schmooze more." This bullshit never dies!
The media got the story it wanted. I hope we survive.
I am in a relatively blue place here but nearby we've got a new R going to congress. She ran advertisements saying we need to protect and strengthen Social Security. Of course, she didn't give specifics. Her main opponent pointed out that she worked as a staffer in the W administration and was deeply involved in the privatizing scheme that crashed and burned. Did anyone from the press ask her what she meant by "protect" and "strengthen?" Oh no, that would be pushing the other candidate's agenda.
And for Marie, another thank you. Thank you for this little fact-based corner of the world. It helps.
Marie,
I cut the cord five years ago and have no TV. I can't even bear to turn on NPR and that may last for months. Thanks for providing us with a safe place.
Dear Marie, there is a future and it is not as bleak as it seems today.
Washington to John Jay, May 1786,from Edward J. Larson's ( The Return of George Washington ).
" The people are not yet sufficiently misled to retract from error."
I am quite certain that the public will be "sufficiently misled" by the time of the election of 2016.
New York Times says: “Obama and GOP Speak of Cooperation.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/06/us/politics/midterm-democratic-losses-grow.html?emc=edit_na_20141105&nlid=14046984
Disheartening. He appears not to have learned anything in six years. I’m beginning to think he’s uneducable.
Nisky Guy,
According to Inc.com, schmoozing is a nice skill to have but schmoozers don't necessarily get the job done:
"A good schmoozer needs to remain everybody's friend—keeping things light and informal, smoothing over the rough edges of a commercial relationship. A good closer, on the other hand, needs to know how to ratchet up the pressure in a negotiation, applying just the right amount of leverage to get a customer to decide without turning them off. If a schmoozer is the grease, the closer is the crowbar."
I don't think we need a President Schmoozer, especially when you're dealing with gangsters, schemers, and crazies. For the next two years, I would much prefer going with President Crowbar.
If he could be President Sledgehammer, that'd be okay too.
James,
I'm afraid I have to agree with your assessment of the president's inability to tell the difference between a nice Father's Day necktie and a Mitch McConnell autographed garrote.
"Oh Mitch, thanks so much for the tie you sent me in celebration, I'm sure, of our renewed friendship. Just one thing. It's a little narrow, isn't it? Reminds me of....piano wire!"
I guess we won't be getting President Crowbar after all. We'll be getting Uncle Fluffy.
Crap.
Dear Marie-
A belated Happy Birthday to you. I am going to bake a batch of Alice B. Toklas brownies to send you as a belated gift! Only problem: this will have to wait until next July when pot becomes legal here.
I join with the other RC fans in thanking you for your continuing brilliance, wit and no shit attitude. You are truly a jewel in the pile of coal slurry that is our media. We have "known" each other for so long--beginning with NYT comments and the craziness there--that I have lost track. I do know that you have been a "blessing" in my life for a long time. And I hope you will continue RC to help all of us make it through "the dark night of America's soul! Which could be never ending.)-:
Echoing the thanks, Marie. Now that Scott Walker is promising to be even "bolder" and move even faster so he can get on with his run for president, I've deleted most of the bookmarks I've been going to for the past 3 years. I need to take a break. But I'm keeping Reality Chex because it helps keep me sane.
Marie: you are a jewel among women. I think I have mentioned before, I read you in NYT for a long time (you too, Kate!!)and I am very happy to have you on "speed dial" first thing in the morning. You are so comprehensive in your coverage, and your asides make me wish we were watching the DC (and USA) shenanigans together, either with blood orange margaritas or cookies and tea. Come to PA, about the only state with the luck to toss out a Repug governor. Thanks a bunch, Marie-- you're a joy to read.
Marie: you are a jewel among women. I think I have mentioned before, I read you in NYT for a long time (you too, Kate!!)and I am very happy to have you on "speed dial" first thing in the morning. You are so comprehensive in your coverage, and your asides make me wish we were watching the DC (and USA) shenanigans together, either with blood orange margaritas or cookies and tea. Come to PA, about the only state with the luck to toss out a Repug governor. Thanks a bunch, Marie-- you're a joy to read.
"Some South Carolinians don't like exit polls that ask them if they're racists. CW: Because that's unpossible, I guess."
It is futile to ask anyone today if he or she is a racist. Even a Ku Klux Klanner would say no. One must ask questions that inherently reveal racist responses such as "Do you think blacks don't work as hard as whites?" Or "Do you think whites are more moral than blacks?" Questions such as these clearly point out bigoted responses. When social scientists do these in-depth surveys, they invariably find loads of white racism.