Does the GOP Need to Rig Elections This Time?

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Monday September 20, 2010 · 5:54 PM PDT

2010/09/20 · 17:54

A while back, someone answered one of my posts with the comment that no one was worrying about Republicans rigging elections in 2010.

My thoughts then were (1) They certainly have done that since 2002, and (2) Maybe they will not bother to this time.

Then I read the post about documented evidence to prevent minorities and college students from voting in Wisconsin. What is planned as a "caging" operation. Its illegal, but it works long enough to decide elections.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Friday September 17, 2010 · 3:00 PM PDT

2010/09/17 · 15:00

In 1933, this nation was gripped by fear, but Franklin Roosevelt offered it hope and a willingness to experiment. He tried many things, and some did not work. There were Roosevelt haters, of course, but most people were glad FDR was trying.

Barack Obama did not sugar coat the situation we face, and he has come forward with plans to deal with the crisis. But there was a great difference between Obama's situation and FDR's. Roosevelt had some help in addressing the problem. Obama has faced almost solid Republican opposition and obstruction.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Monday September 13, 2010 · 12:54 PM PDT

2010/09/13 · 12:54

I'm asking you to put on your academician's tam for a moment.

Your column on President Obama’s counterattack was excellent. The only antidote to Tea Bagger hysteria is reasoned discussion.

Unlike some, I do not apply Anthony Wallace's "revitalization movements" theory to all sorts of things, and I do not subscribe to the various stages people write about. However, the Tea Baggers do seem very much like the Ghost Dancers of the late 19th Century.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Sunday September 12, 2010 · 12:59 PM PDT

2010/09/12 · 12:59

The key to the Republican message is not admitting that Barack Obama's Recovery Act accomplished anything. The CBO analysis and the opinions of most economists may as well not exist.

The message has two variants. One is that the Recovery aCt made things worse. How one proves that is , of course, irrelevant.

The main thrust is that nearly $800 billion was spent and nothing was done. Of course, all sorts of much higher numbers have been used. The press does not fact check, and most Democrats will not defend their work for fear of reminding voters that they are linked to the stimulus.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Wednesday September 08, 2010 · 7:26 AM PDT

2010/09/08 · 07:26

The Tea Bag wing of the Republican Party has a constitutional philosophy based upon the discredited legal theories that led the South to leave the federal union. They are "Tenthers," relying on the Tenth Amendment to assert state sovereignty and the right of states to leave the union. Their goal is to establish the supremacy of the states. Their quarrel is with the supremacy clause of the U.S. Constitution and all the constitutional law that defines it.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Tuesday September 07, 2010 · 2:06 PM PDT

2010/09/07 · 14:06

Eric Cantor, the House Majority Leader in waiting, says the GOP will again shut down government. He promises to defund federal health care, which would effectively shut down government.

Fourteen years ago, Republicans pulled this stunt and were punished by the voters.

But public support for the Republicans now seems to have hit a new high water mark, and they are sure that shutting down government will be popular.

Dick Morris, the Republican strategist, is sure the move will be popular and looks forward to it.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Sunday September 05, 2010 · 11:45 AM PDT

2010/09/05 · 11:45

This by-election is national in character, and there is no good news to help the Democrats. Their strategy seems to be a non-strategy, letting local candidates distance themselves from Washington. There seems to be no national effort to answer Republican charges.

There is more money in "Democratic" caufers, but the Republicans have a 2 to 1 advantage when all their auxiliaries are taken into account.

Because the mainstream media uses the "she said-he said" approach, the GOP has been able to dominate the national conversation since early 2009.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Saturday September 04, 2010 · 5:49 PM PDT

2010/09/04 · 17:49

We know that the mainstream media treats deliberate lies as beliefs and places them on the same level as facts. Hence, FOX News treats the birthers as having just as legitimate a belief as folks who point to Obama's birth certificate and the two Honolulu newspaper nmotices of his birth. News is a business, and they do not want to alienate viewers.

Eduction is more of a business than people think. Can you imagine a professor of constitutional law treating nullificatio as just one legitimatge belief among many?

ShermanDeBrosse

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Friday September 03, 2010 · 8:04 AM PDT

2010/09/03 · 08:04

Ronald Reagan's aides talked about "starving the beast." They said it meant "big government," but they had no intention of starving the war machine or the mechanism that dols out corporate welfare. The plan was to let the deficits and national debt get so large that there would be no choice but to slash Social Security and entitlements. He borrowed vast amounts to cover two tax cuts for the rich in 1981 ansd 1986.

Now voters are rightly concerned about the deficit and national debt and are help bent on giving the GOP the power to slash Social Security and entitlements. There are a lot of emotional red flags in this election to distort and confuse, but there is enough data out there to conclude that the GOP will not cut the deficit by hurting the war machine or cutting the George W. Bush 2001 and 2003 tax cuts for the wealthy.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Wednesday September 01, 2010 · 8:05 AM PDT

2010/09/01 · 08:05

Some voters think the election is about punishing Democrats who borrowed money to save jobs. Others are registering their unhappiness that there is an "African-born, Socialist, Muslim" in the White House, and they "want to take their country back." Some old folks are so confused they see Democrats and Health Care Reform as a greater threat to their Medicare than what the Republicans could eventually do.

Social Security and Entitlements must be put on a sustainable basis very soon, and this election is about who has the greatest say in what is done.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Sunday August 29, 2010 · 2:37 PM PDT

2010/08/29 · 14:37

The former Labour Government in Great Britain was in so much financial trouble that it had to cut pensions of people already retired. The Economist recommended that the US federal government and the states do the same. Since then there has been much talk in Congress and in state legislatures by Republicans who want to slashj benefits of public workers nor retired and yet to retire.

There are political and legal obstacles to doing so, but state pension plans are in deep trouble and the time is fast approaching when a choice must be made between raising taxes or slashing pensions.

It is possible that the momentum of the Tea Baggers will continue or increase and that pensioners will be in trouble.

ShermanDeBrosse

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Thursday August 26, 2010 · 4:36 PM PDT

2010/08/26 · 16:36

The mainstream press invariably call Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe Republican "moderates."

One wonders what kind of yardstick they are using. Are they in the Jacob Javits-Lowell Weicker league? Not by a long shot.

No one ever called Robert A. Taft a moderate, but a good argument could be made that Mr. Republican of the 1940s and 1950s had more compassion than these two ladies.

They break ranks from their extremist colleagues just often enough to fool the voters of Maine into thinking they are not completely under the sway of Mitch McConnell and the Hard Right.

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