Don’t let anyone conservative see these links. That would be like smacking a beehive with a stick! mjh
(didn’t know I was) unamerican
[Thanks, MR – ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥]
Category Archives: Election
Out of Many, None
E pluribus unum
It is of great importance in a republic not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part. Different interests necessarily exist in different classes of citizens. If a majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure.
In a free government the security for civil rights must be the same as that for religious rights.
It is no less certain than it is important, notwithstanding the contrary opinions which have been entertained, that the larger the society, provided it lie within a practical sphere, the more duly capable it will be of self-government.
— James Madison, Federalist 51
j f l e c k : : a t : : i n k s t a i n
An Abomination Unto the Lord
Paul Weyrich thinks God stepped in during the election “to keep His hand on America one more time despite our national sins,” among which is “ignoring the Biblical injunction against acts which are an abomination unto the Lord.” No doubt he meant eating shellfish.
Talking Points Memo: by Joshua Micah Marshall: November 07, 2004 – November 13, 2004 Archives
In the “Daily Oklahoman,” it quoted [Dr. James Dobson] saying, “Patrick Leahy is a God’s people hater. I don’t know if he hates God, but he hates God’s people.” …
Well, there’s been an awful lot of hate expressed in this election. And most of it has been aimed at those who hold to conservative Christian views.
James C. Dobson, Ph.D., is founder and chairman of Focus on the Family, a non-profit organization that produces his internationally syndicated radio programs heard on nearly 4,000 radio facilities in North America and in twenty languages on approximately 3,300 additional facilities in over 116 other countries.
His commentaries are heard by more than 200 million people by way of radio every day….
Whining Winners
NewMexiKen: Another point of view
I am a libertarian with strong fiscal conservative beliefs. There are a lot of us in the Republican party. They used to call us Rockefeller Republicans. — Byron, “official first son-in-law of NewMexiKen.”
Now they call them RINOs. Don’t miss this chance to see the last of his kind: a Rockefeller Republican. Please don’t poke him with a stick — it will just make him dig in deeper. mjh
Heard on the street
What pisses me off is my fellow Catholics. Kerry doesn’t approve of abortions — neither do I — he just wants to protect a woman’s right to choose. Catholics turning against Catholics!
I didn’t tell my Hispanic neighbor that the abortion rate is rising under Duhbya, the Uniter. Why upset him more? mjh
Red, Blue and Purple States and Counties
Blended Results By State
Purple-USA.jpg (JPEG Image, 616×483 pixels)
By County
Election 2004 Results
Using County-by-County election return data from USA Today together with County boundary data from the US Census’ Tiger database we produced the following graphic depicting the results. Of course, blue is for the democrats, red is for the republicans, and green is for all other. Each county’s color is a mix of these three color components in proportion to the results for that county.
The whole “red state” view serves the Republicans and the Media and dumbs down the facts. Talking about purple states doesn’t exactly fix the matter, but at least it shows more of the truth — Dems and Reps live everywhere; thank god we’re integrated.
The link below leads to a very different kind of map, a cartogram, which I find harder to digest. mjh
Pundits and Pollsters Are Losers — Or Should Be
BEWARE EXPLANATION: We humans reason very poorly, to the extent that we reason at all. Consider the current attempts to “explain” Tuesday’s election results.
First, there may not be much to “explain” here. When the electorate goes from 49-49 (Bush-Gore) to 51-48 (Bush-Kerry), that is a very minor “change.” Except on the micro level at which political pros work, it’s not clear that there’s anything much to explain here. And when a change in the vote is so small, almost any factor can be said to “explain” it. For example, how many points did Kerry lose because of the endless Swift Boat attacks? We don’t know how to answer that question, but we haven’t seen the Swift Boat matter come up very often in the instant “explanations.” [mjh: Pat Buchanan called the Swift Boat Liars For Bush the “winners” in this election.] Instead, Stampeding Pundits have rushed toward a few standard “explanations”? of the minor change in voter behavior. Sorry–there will rarely be a way to “explain”? such a change, although many aspects of Campaign 04 are, of course, well worth discussing.
But we are all human, and we humans reason very poorly unless we work hard to stay on track. Such hard work is foreign to our press corps. How does the press corps approach an election? First, pundits waste their time (and ours) for weeks trying to predict the election’s outcome. And let’s face it, these efforts tend to go very poorly.( In this election, John Zogby couldn’t come close to “predicting” the outcome ten hours after the voting began!) But so what? Hours later, predictions in ruins, pundits begin “explaining”? the outcome–the outcome which they couldn’t predict. Of course, they can’t explain it either–but in that case, there is no objective check on the high theories that they throw off.
Why did this race end up 51-48? Most pundits can’t answer to that question, and don’t even know how to approach it. We make this suggestion: Beware explanation. Many aspects of this election are worth discussing. But most of the pundits you see on TV won’t even know what they are.
I recommend you read the rest of Howler’s column for a discussion of the Religious Right that feels ‘dissed’ by Democratic Elites. mjh
Looking on the Bright Side
Column:Bush term will shift U.S. left By Dustin Habermann
Kerry is as capitalist and authoritarian as any American president in the last 50 years despite Republican claims of his liberalness.
The truth is, the right has been winning for some time now, and that lie is a perfect example. After successfully taking over the Republican Party and polarizing the two available American political platforms, the lie has pulled the Democrats to the right in a frighteningly systematic manner. The Democratic primary of 2004 boasted only two candidates who could claim to be left-wingers. Kerry, of course, wasn’t one of them. …
Unfortunately, this election once again proves that attempting not to scare the center by denying our leftness just doesn’t work. Hiding behind a facade of centrism is just a denial of the fact that the center is already in the hands of the enemy. …
[Americans] need to see the neo-conservative agenda fail. They need to see their economy crumble. They need to see poor children starve. They need to see terrorists attacking us from all sides. They need to see their sons and daughters led into war after war. They need to see the skies blacken and the seas become poison. …
Who better to make a nation of progressives than Bush?