Dear Future Potential Republican Voter:
You might not have caught this last night - which is forgivable, it's been a busy past couple days - but there was a major filibuster that took place in the Texas state legislature. One Democratic senator, Wendy Davis, held the podium for 13 hours, and ended up killing a vote on State Bill 5.
You probably are thinking right now, "that must be one hell of a bill for someone to want to spend 13 hours on their feet trying to kill it". So did I. And we're both right; it is one hell of a bill.
SB5 would have imposed easily the toughest restrictions on abortion in the country. It would have made abortion illegal after 20 weeks of pregnancy, and would have put in place regulations that would have ended up closing almost every clinic that could perform an abortion.
This shouldn't be too difficult to believe. After all, the republican party membership has spent the last few years trying to force mothers that want to get an abortion to receive a transvaginal ultrasound or be subjected to doctoral shame and humiliation, dismiss concerns about pregnancy from rape because "the body just shuts that thing down" or "rape kits clean all of that out", or differentiate "forcible rape" from...umm...whatever "non-forcible rape" is. They're trying to move towards removing the rape & incest exceptions that only the least humane among us would deny a woman.
(I could go on about how their attacks on Planned Parenthood - which only derives a small fraction of their business from abortion services - are going to have horribly detrimental effects on women's health, but that's another story for another day.)
People have all sorts of reasons for deciding to vote one way or the other. But, if you're seriously considering voting republican in any election at the state level or above, you need to accept this:
The Republican party is going to do everything in their power to strip away a woman's right to choose. This is not a threat; they are not screwing around. If they end up becoming the majority party, this will be their top priority. You might disagree with a Democratic candidate on their economic or foreign policy, their views on health care, the 2nd amendment...whatever they are, you're entitled to them. But, if you vote for a Republican, you're going to be putting someone in office that will put in regulations that are going to directly affect you, your wife, your sister, your daughter, your girlfriend, or your best friend's right to choose. And you had better be ok with that, because if they get the chance, they're going to do it, and you're not going to get a chance to take your vote back.
So, before you vote for a candidate with the R next to their name, just think about this and make sure you can accept the results. And if you do, and then don't like the outcome...don't say I didn't warn you.
Respectfully,
A.B.
If it's not the time to have a conversation about guns, let me know when that time will be
I've dealt with such a range of emotions over the last 24 hours - shock, horror, sorrow, anger, among many others - that this post could have taken many forms. Given that, this is about the best I can do to write up something vaguely rational.
We used to be a rational country when it came to guns. People owned them. They used them on their hunting trips, and some had them around the house for protection. By and large, however, we kept them at home. And every now and again there would be a "mass" shooting where a couple people died, and there would be calls for gun control. Sometimes they gained traction; sometimes they didn't.
Somewhere over the last several years - and by several I mean somewhere in the last 10-30 years, given your definition of when everything hit the fan, I don't feel the desire to get into arguments of when the exact moment was - we completely lost that rationality. Gun control has been replaced by gun rights. Concealed carry laws were passed in just about every state. The NRA - who as of the time of this post has said nothing on Twitter since the Sandy Hook massacre - has demonized any sort of effort to regulate gun usage or ownership. Every republican (as well as many Blue Dog and other Democrats) has cowtowed to them at every opportunity.
And this is how we get to where we are. The point where we can't even have a rational discussion about assault weapons, carrying guns into bars, closing gun show loopholes, or passing tougher laws to prevent people with mental disabilities from obtaining guns. The point where any discussion of these topics leads gun owners to scream that the 2nd amendment guarantees their right to bear arms, though the part about a well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state is usually omitted.
(Never mind that the 2nd amendment was written during a time when they could not have envisioned the idea of a weapon that held clips that contained tens of rounds of ammunition, any more than they could envision talking with someone from the other side of the world, or keeping meats in a chilled box so they didn't spoil in a day, or being able to take a pill - whatever a pill is - that ensured that strep throat or an infected cut would not be a death sentence.)
We have just accepted that guns are just going to be everywhere. We've resigned ourself to accept that things like Stand Your Ground Laws and Castle Doctrines are just how things are going to be. We are powerless to fight against local and state judiciaries that, after being packed by local republican parties over the past 30 years, have struck down just about any sort of legal impediments to carrying a gun wherever and whenever people want.
But yesterday's massacre (and yes, it was a massacre)...this has to be the tipping point. We have to start having a real conversation about our gun culture. We have to start asking ourselves what can be done to preventing something like this from ever happening again.
And I refuse to tolerate arguments that "it's too soon to talk about this" from the same people whose intransigence on this issue has allowed for tragedies like this to continue to occur. And I don't want to hear how this would politicize the issue, and use the families of the dead as political pawns, when I'm certain that every one of them wishes that we had "politicized" this issue a long time ago. I don't want to hear that we just need to handle crazy people and that will take care of everything, because the great majority of people that feel that is the magic solution probably also believe that Obamacare is socialism. And I will not dignify the position of "guns don't kill people", because its just senseless anymore. Guns just make it easy to kill a bunch of people really quickly - feel free to provide the laundry list of times when 25 people died because one person delivered a mass beating, or mass stabbing.
Understand, I'm not in any way saying that we need to get rid of guns, but there's room to discuss things like assault weapons, multiple round clips, improved mental health care, among others, in a civilized manner. But it needs to happen. And if you're going to say that it's just too soon to talk about guns, then it is imperative upon you to provide me with a date and time when you will feel it's ok to talk, or what will get you to that point. Because I need to know, if something like yesterday's massacre won't make you at least consider that something needs to change, what exactly will get you that point. It's no longer acceptable to say that this conversation is for another day. You have to commit to when that day will be.
We used to be a rational country when it came to guns. People owned them. They used them on their hunting trips, and some had them around the house for protection. By and large, however, we kept them at home. And every now and again there would be a "mass" shooting where a couple people died, and there would be calls for gun control. Sometimes they gained traction; sometimes they didn't.
Somewhere over the last several years - and by several I mean somewhere in the last 10-30 years, given your definition of when everything hit the fan, I don't feel the desire to get into arguments of when the exact moment was - we completely lost that rationality. Gun control has been replaced by gun rights. Concealed carry laws were passed in just about every state. The NRA - who as of the time of this post has said nothing on Twitter since the Sandy Hook massacre - has demonized any sort of effort to regulate gun usage or ownership. Every republican (as well as many Blue Dog and other Democrats) has cowtowed to them at every opportunity.
And this is how we get to where we are. The point where we can't even have a rational discussion about assault weapons, carrying guns into bars, closing gun show loopholes, or passing tougher laws to prevent people with mental disabilities from obtaining guns. The point where any discussion of these topics leads gun owners to scream that the 2nd amendment guarantees their right to bear arms, though the part about a well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state is usually omitted.
(Never mind that the 2nd amendment was written during a time when they could not have envisioned the idea of a weapon that held clips that contained tens of rounds of ammunition, any more than they could envision talking with someone from the other side of the world, or keeping meats in a chilled box so they didn't spoil in a day, or being able to take a pill - whatever a pill is - that ensured that strep throat or an infected cut would not be a death sentence.)
We have just accepted that guns are just going to be everywhere. We've resigned ourself to accept that things like Stand Your Ground Laws and Castle Doctrines are just how things are going to be. We are powerless to fight against local and state judiciaries that, after being packed by local republican parties over the past 30 years, have struck down just about any sort of legal impediments to carrying a gun wherever and whenever people want.
But yesterday's massacre (and yes, it was a massacre)...this has to be the tipping point. We have to start having a real conversation about our gun culture. We have to start asking ourselves what can be done to preventing something like this from ever happening again.
And I refuse to tolerate arguments that "it's too soon to talk about this" from the same people whose intransigence on this issue has allowed for tragedies like this to continue to occur. And I don't want to hear how this would politicize the issue, and use the families of the dead as political pawns, when I'm certain that every one of them wishes that we had "politicized" this issue a long time ago. I don't want to hear that we just need to handle crazy people and that will take care of everything, because the great majority of people that feel that is the magic solution probably also believe that Obamacare is socialism. And I will not dignify the position of "guns don't kill people", because its just senseless anymore. Guns just make it easy to kill a bunch of people really quickly - feel free to provide the laundry list of times when 25 people died because one person delivered a mass beating, or mass stabbing.
Understand, I'm not in any way saying that we need to get rid of guns, but there's room to discuss things like assault weapons, multiple round clips, improved mental health care, among others, in a civilized manner. But it needs to happen. And if you're going to say that it's just too soon to talk about guns, then it is imperative upon you to provide me with a date and time when you will feel it's ok to talk, or what will get you to that point. Because I need to know, if something like yesterday's massacre won't make you at least consider that something needs to change, what exactly will get you that point. It's no longer acceptable to say that this conversation is for another day. You have to commit to when that day will be.
2012: The Post-Gut Election: A Victory for Facts
Nate Silver nailed it. Andrew Tanenbaum nailed it. Sam Wang nailed it. Josh Putnam was close. So was TPM Poll Tracker. All of them used polls and/or statistical modeling to predict the outcome of the election. And they were right.
Peggy Noonan? She thought "the vibrations were right" for a Romney win. Dick Morris? Landslide for Romney, because "we got to know Mitt - and we liked him". Joe Scarborough? He told Nate there was no way he could be so sure of an Obama win, because it just felt like it was too close to call.
This is 2012. There is no excuse for not knowing something anymore, or for going with your gut feeling despite all evidence to the contrary. And the numbers people won. Big.
So next time around, pay attention to the people that show their work. Don't listen to a pundit that tells you that a 3% lead with a 3% margin of error is a dead heat, because they don't understand statistics. Don't listen to reporters that declare a race too close to call when 90% of the polls don't support that statement. Don't listen to a guy that "unskews" polls, because they just don't look right. And for the love of God, don't listen to anyone that quotes a Rasmussen poll.
Peggy Noonan? She thought "the vibrations were right" for a Romney win. Dick Morris? Landslide for Romney, because "we got to know Mitt - and we liked him". Joe Scarborough? He told Nate there was no way he could be so sure of an Obama win, because it just felt like it was too close to call.
This is 2012. There is no excuse for not knowing something anymore, or for going with your gut feeling despite all evidence to the contrary. And the numbers people won. Big.
So next time around, pay attention to the people that show their work. Don't listen to a pundit that tells you that a 3% lead with a 3% margin of error is a dead heat, because they don't understand statistics. Don't listen to reporters that declare a race too close to call when 90% of the polls don't support that statement. Don't listen to a guy that "unskews" polls, because they just don't look right. And for the love of God, don't listen to anyone that quotes a Rasmussen poll.
Reading Liberally Invitation for Republic, Lost
If you are interested in joining a reading group for Larry Lessig's book Republic, Lost, please contact us.
Reminder: Drinking Liberally Keystone Hyde Park is tonight at 7PM.
Reminder: Drinking Liberally Keystone Hyde Park is tonight at 7PM.
Volunteer Opportunities
The Norwood/Oakley team of Organizing for America
is looking for canvassers and other volunteers to help get out the vote for Barack Obama . If you can help please contact Field Organizer Jenn Hoyer at (513) 417-7610 (Email EHoyer@ofaoh.com).Current schedule includes:
Thurs 10/25, Tues 10/30,
Thurs 11/1 at 5-8 pm Canvassing -- meet at Whole Foods
Wed 10/24 Fri 10/26,
Wed 10/31, Fri 11/2 at
5-8 pm: Phone Bank at the Roselawn office -- 7364 Reading (intersects with Section)
Sat 10/27 at 9:30, 1:00and 4:30 Canvassing - meet at 4100 Reading Road (Old Armory)
Sun 10/28 at 9:30, 1:00and 4:30 Canvassing - meet at 4100 Reading Road (Old Armory)
Sat 11/3 at 9:30, 1:00and 4:30 Canvassing - meet at 4100 Reading Road (Old Armory)
Sun 11/4 at 9:30, 1:00and 4:30 Canvassing - meet at 4100 Reading Road (Old Armory)
Mon 11/5 at 9:30, 1:00and 4:30 Canvassing - meet at 4100 Reading Road (Old Armory)
Tues 11/6 ELECTION DAY -- at 9:30, 1:00and 4:30 -Canvassing - meet at 4100 Reading Road (Old Armory)
Note: – The old Armory at 4100 Reading Road is now the Hope Events/Hope 4 Change building. It is the blue building by the police station just south of intersection with Victoria Pkwy and Sherman.
The Mt. Auburn/Clifton Height Get-Out-The-Vote Operation
This election will come down to turnout in Ohio. We absolutely have the better turnout operation -- we just have to work it! We have a few key positions still open that we need to fill for the FINAL GOTV PUSH, which is next weekend (11/3 - 11/4), Monday (11/5) and Election Day itself (11/6).
In a perfect world, a person could work all four days in a particular position. But I know that's not possible for most people. I'd be thrilled to have someone who could work a given position for at least 2 days ... but any help is welcome.
I've got descriptions of the various jobs we need to fill below. You do NOT need to be a registered voter or an Ohio resident to help.
Please contact me ASAP if you can help in some way ....
Thank you!
Debby deborah_herman (at) earthlink dot net
(C) 513-258-4960
_____________________________________________________________
WHITE TEAM
This is the logistics team. Their primary functions are: On all four GOTV days, do confirmation/turnout calls for the scheduled volunteers; and (2) on Election Day itself monitor polling locations and help ensure that voters don't leave the lines.
Team members: Captain, Runners, Callers
White Team Captain: Help with turnout calls, keep track of what's been done, report that info to Staging Location Director (that's me). On Election Day, get info by phone from runners relay info and problems to Staging Location Director.
Callers: Make confirmation/turnout calls to scheduled volunteers; if necessary, make calls to known volunteers to ask them to work a shift
Runners: Visit 1 - 3 polling location in our neighborhoods (Mt. Auburn/Clifton Heights). How long are the lines?Does the line reach outside the building so that people are having to stand in the cold? Is it taking a long time for people to get into the building and vote? Do they seem to be getting restless? (we don't want them to leave --- pass out snacks and hot drinks if this is a problem -- runners are provided with these items by the campaign)
BLUE TEAM
This is the voter turnout team. Its sole function is to go door-to-door to ensure that our voters (and we know who they are) get to the polls. THIS REALLY REALLY MATTERS. It has the added plus of being easy to do.
Team Members: Blue Team Captain, Canvassers
Blue Team Captain: Help get canvassers signed in to the Staging Location; separate them into "experienced" and "inexperienced" groups. Give the experienced canvassers their materials and sign out those materials properly Give those who need it a 10-minute training session; then sign out their materials. (This is all a lot easier than it might sound, and I can coach anyone into this position who's organized, reliable, and not afraid to talk to people. )
Canvassers: These folks go door-to-door to identified Obama voters in Mt. Auburn and Clifton Heights.
RED TEAM
This is the polling numbers team. Its sole function is to check in at the polls at certain points during Election Day and report certain publicly posted information back to the Staging Location.
Red Team Captain: Do confirmation calls to make sure scheduled red team volunteers are coming in for their shifts. Get polling information from red team members, collate and organize, give to Staging Location Director
Polling messangers: Check in at the polls at certain points during Election Day and report certain publicly posted information back to the Red Team Captain. (Polling messangers work Election Day only)
Drinking Liberally Northern Kentucky on Dutch TV
Fast forward to about 6:00 to see some familiar faces.
Issue of the Week: Issue 1
Issue 1 is a call for an Ohio Constitutional Convention. It is mandated by a constitutional amendment made to the Ohio Constitution about 80 years ago. You can find more about arguments for and against it on the SmartVoter site.
Given the current influence of money in our political life, this one seems like a no-brainer. If we hold a constitutional convention in today's political climate, our democracy may drown in a sea of money.
Vote No on 1.
Given the current influence of money in our political life, this one seems like a no-brainer. If we hold a constitutional convention in today's political climate, our democracy may drown in a sea of money.
Vote No on 1.
Genetically Modified Foods, Monsanto and the Law of Code
There was quite a bit of news last week about a study that purported to show tumor growth in rats who were fed a diet of genetically modified corn, specifically Monsanto's Roundup-Ready variety. This corn has had a gene from a bacteria added to the corn's genome so it's tolerant of the Roundup herbicide.
Neurodojo has a great summary of the conflicts of interest that the people running the study failed to disclose, and others have criticized the methodology and results.
There is little doubt that this particular variety of GM corn is safe to eat. We've been eating it here in the USA for years. There is little question that GM crops need extensive safety testing before they can be fielded.
But there's a larger question about *how* Monsanto uses GM technology. They're locking farmers into an all-Monsanto system of seed, pesticides, etc. using GM crops as the keystone. It's like Microsoft locking people into their tools via proprietary web technologies built into Internet Explorer, but with food. Or Google being able to decide which videos to censor. Or MERS, the consortium of home title and mortgage processors, deciding what foreclosure rules are.
There's a saying that Larry Lessig coined for situations like this: code is law. Monsanto makes genetic code into law, using it to create a classic network-effect lock-in, turning small farmers into techno-sharecroppers. It short-circuits the democratic process we've put together to regulate intellectual property and commerce.
GM will feed the world, I have no doubt. But, like all technologies, it needs a heavy dose of democracy if we're going to have the kind of world we want.
Bad science will not help us make the decisions we need to make where technology, markets and hunger intersect.
Neurodojo has a great summary of the conflicts of interest that the people running the study failed to disclose, and others have criticized the methodology and results.
There is little doubt that this particular variety of GM corn is safe to eat. We've been eating it here in the USA for years. There is little question that GM crops need extensive safety testing before they can be fielded.
But there's a larger question about *how* Monsanto uses GM technology. They're locking farmers into an all-Monsanto system of seed, pesticides, etc. using GM crops as the keystone. It's like Microsoft locking people into their tools via proprietary web technologies built into Internet Explorer, but with food. Or Google being able to decide which videos to censor. Or MERS, the consortium of home title and mortgage processors, deciding what foreclosure rules are.
There's a saying that Larry Lessig coined for situations like this: code is law. Monsanto makes genetic code into law, using it to create a classic network-effect lock-in, turning small farmers into techno-sharecroppers. It short-circuits the democratic process we've put together to regulate intellectual property and commerce.
GM will feed the world, I have no doubt. But, like all technologies, it needs a heavy dose of democracy if we're going to have the kind of world we want.
Bad science will not help us make the decisions we need to make where technology, markets and hunger intersect.
Polls Which Will Change Polling
In a post tonight in FiveThirtyEight, Nate Silver points out that Obama's relection chances improve dramatically if only polls which include mobile phones are counted.
In this universe, Mr. Obama seems poised for victory. The model forecasts him for a 4.1 percentage points win in the national popular vote. That compares with 2.9 percentage points in the regular FiveThirtyEight forecast, which includes polls both with and without cellphones.Mr. Obama's advantage is also clearer in the swing states. The cellphone-inclusive polls give him an 80 percent chance to win Virginia, a 79 percent chance in Ohio, and a 68 percent chance to win Florida, all considerably higher than in the official FiveThirtyEight forecast.Overall, this version of the model gives Mr. Obama an 83 percent chance of winning the Electoral College, a full 10 percentage points higher than the 73 percent chance that the official FiveThirtyEight forecast gave him as of Monday night. So the methodological differences are showing up in a big way this year.
I think we're on the brink of a revolution in polling. Back in 1936, the well-respected magazine The Literary Digest ran a poll of its ten million readers that ran into the millions of responses. The results were overwhelming: a landslide for...Alf Landon.
In actuality, it was, as the link describes, the poll that changed polling. The audience of the The Literary Digest was as skewed Republican as we're likely to find those who have landlines are.
Where I try to make political sense of Romney's speech, and then give up and just call him an asshole
As a follow-up to jk's earlier post today, I've thought about this I guess from more of a political point of view. Initially I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt - politicians tend to play to their crowds at fundraisers like this, mostly because they've paid a ton of money to share the room with them. And, generally speaking, those crowds lean farther from center than the average voter.
But man, after taking a couple days to think it over, I'm with everyone that thought it was a calamitous mistake. Because it not only showed the contempt he has for the average American. But it also showed just how horrible he is at crisis management - some might even call it the 3 a.m. call test.
Think back to the late Monday press conference, where he only took two questions, and pretty much hemmed and hawed through a feeble attempt to defend his speech. Then the awkward attempt to try and blame Obama for making it about class, the refusal to provide any specifics on how his plan would help the 47% he just trashed, the inability to get any prominent republican to give a full-throated defense of his remarks...it's been a total tire fire.
Contrast this with Obama's handling of the Jeremiah Wright videos four years ago. It took a few days, but when it was really about to hit the fan, Obama Went out and delivered an amazing speech on the role of race in modern American society, a speech that is on the short list of events that sewed up the nomination, and eventually the presidency, for him.
All the politics aside, however, I think what's going to resonate here is the absolutely insensitivity of these remarks, which, combined with his reprehensible attempts to attack Obama for "sympathizing with terrorists" last week, really play into the one, five word, theme that I've hoped all along would prevent Romney from getting elected:
Mitt Romney is an asshole. A giant, major league asshole. He's not a Bobby Knight asshole, where he screams and yells at you and makes your life generally miserable, but at the end of the day he gets results, and in a drill seargant way you actually respect him at the end. No, he's a Francis from Pee Wee's Big Adventure type of asshole. He's a smug, undeserving, entitled prick whose daddy made a ton of cash, and so he decided he could use that money to buy and do whatever he wanted. Like G.W. Bush, he was born on third and thought he hit a triple, but with the added dickish-ness of sneering at anyone he deems unworthy that has the audacity of even stepping up to the plate.
In his world, the John Galt-ian titans of business are to be revered and worshipped at every opportunity, because they got there through sheer hard work, grit, and determination, and the peasants should be grateful they allow them to work for them. Those that disagree with his viewpoint are shiftless, unmotivated moochers. They are losers unworthy of his sympathy or assistance, because they just suffer from a victim mentality, and so they deserve their lot in life, because they refuse to take personal responsibility for their own financial failures. If only they have the drive and desire that he does, they wouldn't be where they are.
In a sane world, this should be the end of Romney's candidacy. Here's hoping we live in a sane world.
But man, after taking a couple days to think it over, I'm with everyone that thought it was a calamitous mistake. Because it not only showed the contempt he has for the average American. But it also showed just how horrible he is at crisis management - some might even call it the 3 a.m. call test.
Think back to the late Monday press conference, where he only took two questions, and pretty much hemmed and hawed through a feeble attempt to defend his speech. Then the awkward attempt to try and blame Obama for making it about class, the refusal to provide any specifics on how his plan would help the 47% he just trashed, the inability to get any prominent republican to give a full-throated defense of his remarks...it's been a total tire fire.
Contrast this with Obama's handling of the Jeremiah Wright videos four years ago. It took a few days, but when it was really about to hit the fan, Obama Went out and delivered an amazing speech on the role of race in modern American society, a speech that is on the short list of events that sewed up the nomination, and eventually the presidency, for him.
All the politics aside, however, I think what's going to resonate here is the absolutely insensitivity of these remarks, which, combined with his reprehensible attempts to attack Obama for "sympathizing with terrorists" last week, really play into the one, five word, theme that I've hoped all along would prevent Romney from getting elected:
Mitt Romney is an asshole. A giant, major league asshole. He's not a Bobby Knight asshole, where he screams and yells at you and makes your life generally miserable, but at the end of the day he gets results, and in a drill seargant way you actually respect him at the end. No, he's a Francis from Pee Wee's Big Adventure type of asshole. He's a smug, undeserving, entitled prick whose daddy made a ton of cash, and so he decided he could use that money to buy and do whatever he wanted. Like G.W. Bush, he was born on third and thought he hit a triple, but with the added dickish-ness of sneering at anyone he deems unworthy that has the audacity of even stepping up to the plate.
In his world, the John Galt-ian titans of business are to be revered and worshipped at every opportunity, because they got there through sheer hard work, grit, and determination, and the peasants should be grateful they allow them to work for them. Those that disagree with his viewpoint are shiftless, unmotivated moochers. They are losers unworthy of his sympathy or assistance, because they just suffer from a victim mentality, and so they deserve their lot in life, because they refuse to take personal responsibility for their own financial failures. If only they have the drive and desire that he does, they wouldn't be where they are.
In a sane world, this should be the end of Romney's candidacy. Here's hoping we live in a sane world.
The Romney Gaffe
When AnotherDem and I were first married, and both in the military, we bought our first house on the east side of Dayton. We paid $27,000 for it. It was in a neighborhood barely hanging on from the deindustrialization of the Miami Valley. The day we moved in, the charming old lady in the house on one side brought us a pie she had baked herself, along with some baby clothes for our newborn. About two years later, she sold her house to a guy who sold drugs and who we nicknamed "vroom vroom" for his habit of revving his motorcycle every morning at 5AM before he disappeared for parts unknown. Neighborhoods change.
[1] It was a big porch. We still miss that porch.
We had more consistent luck with neighbor on the other side. They had two kids, one about the same age as ours. We became friends due to proximity and similarity of family situation, as any new parent can understand. We watched each others kids. We didn't have money to go out to dinner or movies. We spent our time playing board games late into weekend nights on my grandfathers's old kitchen table we kept on our front porch.[1] We kept baby monitors on the table, along with a six pack or bottle of wine. A cheap double date with Trivial Pursuit.
She was a German immigrant who worked part-time at the video store up the street. He was an Army veteran who was now a journeyman machinist. He worked of the many small machine shops that sprang up around the area after NCR laid off most of their machinists in the conversion from mechanical cash registers.
He and I did not see eye-to-eye politically. He was rabidly anti-union, defending his boss's right to shut down his dozen-person shop should he be targeted for unionization. My neighbor worked for minimum wage at skilled job, with no benefits. (He talked about this with pride.) I'm pretty certain he received the Earned-Income Tax Credit, based on that. [2]
My neighbor, even though he probably never paid Federal income tax, would never have thought Romney was talking about him. He would have thought that Romney was talking about someone else, someone who didn't work for a living. Probably someone with a different skin tone than his. My neighbor would probably have thought his EIC was his "refund", rather than a benefit. (I never understood how a machinist could not be good at arithmetic, but I had to help him out with numbers constantly.)
My neighbor said he was independent, but I'm pretty sure he never voted anything but Republican.
That's why this Romney tape doesn't mean much to that "independent" base, or even the Republican base. The low-income, problem-with-Kansas voter will not get angry about it because they don't think Romney is talking about them.
It's more important for the Democratic base. We know who Romney was talking about. He was talking about anyone who's ever had to rely on the government to get us out of a tight spot, for no matter how small a time. Anyone who's ever been helped by a government program.
He and Ryan want to take that away. Forever.
[2] Minimum wage was $3.15. Assuming, generously, that he worked 40 hours a week and 20 hours overtime, for 50 weeks a year, his income would've been $11, 575, smack dab in the middle of the EIC range in the late 80's, the time period I'm referring to in this post.
Today's Reagasm: Holographic Reagan
What's a Reagasm? It's where someone contributes to the cult of Ronald Reagan in such a way that it would bring your average teabagger or conservative near climax.
Every week, we bring you a new Reagasm. Today's is the Holographic Ronald Reagan. Remember the holographic Tupac? Here's a video, in case you don't:
Well, based on the obvious success of that technology, the same company,
Every week, we bring you a new Reagasm. Today's is the Holographic Ronald Reagan. Remember the holographic Tupac? Here's a video, in case you don't:
Well, based on the obvious success of that technology, the same company,
This is even better than Zombie Reagan.
AV Concepts...confirmed today that they are leading the technical and content development for a Ronald Reagan “Hologram” in partnership with Tony Reynolds, founder of A KickIn Crowd.
Issue of the Week: Voters First, Issue 2
Drinking Liberally Cincinnati's Issue of the Week this week is Issue 2 on your ballot:Voters First.
Voters First is a proposed Ohio constitutional amendment which will remove the responsibility for creating legislative districts directly from elected legislators and give it to an independent, disinterested citizen's commission with no politicians or lobbyists involved. A summary of the amendment language is available on the Voters First website.
As someone who now has an anti-choice, anti-birth-control Democrat as my probable state representative due to the last redistricting clusterfrack, I would love to see this amendment pass.
Voters First is endorsed by a broad coalition of organizations, and you can learn how to help Voters First or just sign up to volunteer.
Oh, Dusty, Where Art Thy Tweets?
Based on my memory of Auditor Dusty Rhodes's twitter stream, I'm sure that if Mars is contaminated, he will blame President Obama. But we'll never know, because Auditor Rhodes has protected his tweetstream. Oh, Dusty, what are you afraid of? Here's an image of his protected profile, so you don't have to go through the trouble of clicking the link:
How Scripted Was The Chair?
Bill Maher made the point in last week's Real Time that the kind of improv Clint did at the RNC is extremely difficult to pull off. Jason Alexander, new hair and all, contested that, recounting conversations with Jerry Seinfeld about how much slack audiences now give him when he does standup.
But it took the Carmel Pine Cone to get the interview with Clint on exactly how improvisational his bit was. Jonathan Chait has a writeup in New York's Daily Intel.
Another Overblown Conspiracy Theory
In last week's New York Magazine, Jon Chait has an article on the vast left-wing conspiracy in the media. He uses examples from modern TV and movies to make the case that Hollywood is moving our culture in a liberal direction.
I'm not sure that holds up as well as he would like, primarily because of way our media has fractured in the last 30 years. The TV shows he cites, such as Modern Family, are getting ratings which, 30 years ago, would have gotten them cancelled after a few episodes. We're no longer a monolithic media environment: there's a lot more available than the three networks I grew up with. And he completely omits conservative media phenomenons like the Left Behind books and movies.
The best story he has, however, comes from out of Brazil:
Several years ago, a trio of researchers working for the Inter-American Development Bank set out to help solve a sociological mystery. Brazil had, over the course of four decades, experienced one of the largest drops in average family size in the world, from 6.3 children per woman in 1960 to 2.3 children in 2000. What made the drop so curious is that, unlike the Draconian one-child policy in China, the Brazilian government had in place no policy to limit family size. (It was actually illegal at some point to advertise contraceptives in the overwhelmingly Catholic country.) What could explain such a steep drop? The researchers zeroed in on one factor: television.
Television spread through Brazil in the mid-sixties. But it didn’t arrive everywhere at once in the sprawling country. Brazil’s main station, Globo, expanded slowly and unevenly. The researchers found that areas that gained access to Globo saw larger drops in fertility than those that didn’t (controlling, of course, for other factors that could affect fertility). It was not any kind of news or educational programming that caused this fertility drop but exposure to the massively popular soap operas, or novelas, that most Brazilians watch every night. The paper also found that areas with exposure to television were dramatically more likely to give their children names shared bynovela characters.
DL Cincinnati Announces New Schedule
Drinking Liberally Cincinnati is proud to announce our new schedule. We'll be rotating among four local venues each week of the month, on Thursdays from 7 to 9.
We've tried to make sure there's a DL one a month within 20 minutes of where you live or work!
- DL MOTR 1st Thursdays
- DL Fries 2nd Thursdays
- DL Blue Goose 3rd Thursdays
- DL Keystone 4th Thursdays
We've tried to make sure there's a DL one a month within 20 minutes of where you live or work!
There are links to each venue which you can see along the left navbar of this blog, a Google calendar you can add to your own, as well as maps to each location. We hope you can join us at one of our regular get togethers!
Verifying Your Voter Registration in Ohio
The Ohio Secretary of State's Office has an easy-to-use web page to verify your registration status. Ohio residents should use it! Here's a handy-dandy short url: http://is.gd/ohiovoter
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