Month: October 2013

The mythical moderate Republicans fail to materialize

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

It has been widely reported there are a large number of Republican congressmen and senators who say they
disagree with their House leadership strategy, and who say they want to
end the government shutdown. 

Screenshot-14But when it comes time to actually take a stand and put their votes
where their big mouths are, these mythical moderate Republicans are
always gutless wonders. Their votes rarely, if ever, materialize.

Democrats put forward  a clean CR bill in the Senate on Saturday — what these mythical moderate Republicans all say they are willing to vote for — they could have voted to end the government shutdown today.

But these mythical moderate Republicans voted in lockstep with their
Tea Party economic terrorist captors holding the GOP hostage, and in a
classic case of Stockholm syndrome filibustered the Democratic clean CR bill. Just call them "Tania" from now on.

This was a critical lost opportunity. Voting to proceed to debate would have started the Senate's 30 hour rule for debate running so that the government could reopen early in the week. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he was open to amendments to fashion a compromise during debate. Instead, the clock is running down on the default bomb on October 17, and these gutless wonders are playing to run out the clock. Reid, McConnell begin bipartisan shutdown talks:

[T]he Senate, as expected, on Saturday rejected debate on a Democratic
plan to raise the federal debt ceiling for more than a year with no
strings attached. The party-line vote failed to meet the 60 vote
threshold needed to hold a vote on the proposal. [i.e., a GOP filibuster]

* * *

Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch
McConnell (R-Ky.) have launched discussions over a proposal to raise the
debt ceiling and end the government shutdown, after talks between House
Republicans and President Obama reached an impasse.

New York Times on Arizona’s ‘two-tier’ voter registration

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

AZConfederacyArizona Attorney General Tom "banned for life by the SEC" Horne and Arizona Secretary of State Ken "Birther" Bennett have conspired with nativist anti-immigrant activist and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach to devise a "two-tier" voter registration system in their Neo-Confederate temper tantrum for "states' rights!" against the federal government. Creating two separate classes of voters based solely upon the registration form used violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, and is an overt act of voter suppression.

Today the New York Times takes notice, After
Court Ruling, 2 States Plan 2-Tier Voting System:

Barred by the Supreme Court from requiring proof of citizenship for
federal elections, Arizona is complying — but setting up a separate
registration system for local and state elections that will demand such
proof.

The
state this week joined Kansas in planning for such a two-tiered voting
system, which could keep thousands of people from participating in state
and local elections, including next year’s critical cycle, when top
posts in both states will be on the ballot.

The
states are using an opening left in June by the United States Supreme
Court when it said that the power of Congress over federal elections was
paramount but did not rule on proof of citizenship in state elections.
Such proof was required under Arizona’s Proposition 200, which passed in
2004 and is one of the weapons in the border state’s arsenal of laws
enacted in its battle against illegal immigration.

The
two states are also jointly suing the federal Election Assistance
Commission, arguing that it should change the federal voter registration
form for their states to include state citizenship requirements. While
the agency has previously denied such requests, the justices said the
states could try again and seek judicial review of those decisions.

Apparently Sean Noble is not on the outs – at least with the AZ GOP

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie: I have posted at length about the political corruption of GOP operative and "Kochtopus" bag man Sean Noble. The national news media also has done some exceptional reporting on Sean Noble. It is only our GOP-friendly Arizona political media that fails to report on his political corruption. A cover-up? The Daily Beast … Read more

VoteVets.org ad: ‘Open’

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Posted by AzBlueMeannie:

The progressive VoteVets.org on Thursday launched a new ad campaign
attacking Speaker John Boehner and congressional Republicans over the
government shutdown. Progressive Veterans Group Slams Boehner, Republicans Over Shutdown :

The 30 second ad — which features Redge Ranyard, a 91-year-old World War II Navy Veteran who
chastises Republicans, and specifically Boehner, over their partisan
rhetoric in the shutdown fight and accuses them of not working on behalf
of average Americans and veterans.

* * *

“Republicans in Congress say their government shutdown is an ‘epic
battle.’ I fought in six epic battles, fighting the Nazis. Congressmen,
your shutdown is not an epic battle. It’s bad governance,” Raynard says
over images of Boehner and his war memorabilia.

“Americans and
American veterans like me depend on the entire government being open. I
served this nation with honor. Today, I can’t say the same about most
Republicans in Congress,” Raynard adds before the ad ends with
instructions on calling Boehner’s office.

Video below the fold.

GOP government shutdown strategy damages the GOP

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Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The brand new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll Read
the full poll here (.pdf) is a jaw-dropping disaster for the GOP. First Read: NBC/WSJ poll: Shutdown debate damages GOP:

By a 22-point margin (53 percent to 31 percent), the public
blames the Republican Party more for the shutdown than President Barack
Obama – a wider margin of blame for the GOP than the party received
during the poll during the last shutdown in 1995-96.

Just 24 percent of respondents have a favorable opinion about the
GOP, and only 21 percent have a favorable view of the Tea Party, which
are both at all-time lows in the history of poll. […]

Yet what is perhaps even more worrisome for the GOP is the
“boomerang” effect: As the party has used the shutdown and fiscal fight
to campaign against the nation’s health-care law and for limited
government, the poll shows those efforts have backfired.

For one thing, the health-care law has become more popular since the
shutdown began. Thirty-eight percent see the Affordable Care Act (or
“Obamacare”) as a good idea, versus 43 percent who see it as a bad idea –
up from 31 percent good idea, 44 percent bad idea last month.

In addition, 50 percent say they oppose totally eliminating funding
for the law, even if it that means a partial shutdown of the government.
That’s up from 46 percent who said they opposed that move in a Sept.
2013 CNBC poll.

Seventy-eight percent of the country, according to this poll, says the
country is moving in the wrong direction and pretty much all of them
blame it on the Republicans.

These are the kind of poll numbers that if this was October 2014 instead of October 2013, we would be looking at a Democratic "wave" election next month. Princeton’s Sam Wang examines the possibility of a Democratic “wave” in House elections next year given the shutdown backlash.