The GOP establishment threw everything including the kitchen sink at O’Donnell and Palin, and it wasn’t even close. Of course the conventional media wisdom is this helps the . . . Democrats? WTF?
The CW that O’Donnell’s win is good news for Dems does not surprise me. The meme comes from the fact that Mama Grizzlies energize not only the right but the left. We saw this play out in 2008, but we will find out in a matter of weeks whether the Dems in their sick, sad present state can win general elections running on this one-trick pony again. Dems are bankrupt and have nothing else to run on so rallying the base against oddballs like Angle, O’Donnell, etc. is one of the only things that allows the Obama Left to cling bitterly to their cynical version of Hope.
The current lot of Democrats and their progressive enablers love to point out how low-information and stupid their opponents and critics are. But, how smart were Obama and his backers? How good was the quality of their information? How could they have not known that jobs was going to be the number one issue in this election cycle?
There is a stunning amount of stupidity on display right now, but it is not that of ordinary Americans. It is the massive stupidity of so-called “Democratic strategists” and movement progressives who thought that turning their backs on defending working people, women, lgbt, minorities, the environment, a genuine public component in healthcare reform, social security, civil liberties, stem cell research, and so on, would somehow carry them through a period of persistent unemployment and war that most Americans do not want to be in.
For myself, trying to choose between the Pelosis/Obamas and the Angles/Millers is like trying to choose between malaria or smallpox. A plague on both their houses, literally. Voting to continue Washington’s bipartisan desertion of the American people is not the antidote. It is the disease that ensures the corporate hold on our country.
Is there a cure among us from this processed sanity?
Filed under: General |
The Confluence 
Wonk, have you been counting votes in NH for the past week and a half? It’s not like you to miss Election Night! 😉
I go back and forth. It’s funny, but then again, it’s also pretty damn scary. It’s Obama’s fault, but that really doesn’t help us now. We’re just so screwed for the foreseeable future. *sigh*
Exactly.The tea partier storm that’s a brewin is the DNC’s fault, but we are the ones who are going to pay for it.
Sorry I missed last night, Lol. Did we have any trolls make it past spammy’s clutches?
R.I.P.
I am guessing lots of heads exploded before they turned into zombies to gloat about how O’Donnell winning was good news for Democrats.
I saw Maher trying to convince himself of it on Larry King last night.
It’s the only thing they know to say at this point. Obama Claus gave them nothing for Christmas.
Other than some Obot 2-minute hates and a few online wankfests, can you show me where the left has been energized?
It energized them in 2008, while Palin’s fans decided that sitting out the election and letting her take the blame would somehow really help her out. Lol
Context:
It energized in 2008. We’ll find out soon enough if it will work again.
I predict it’ll work to a much lesser extent.
I still see some ObamaDems wailing about Palin and defending Obama but fewer of them. Most have turned their attention elsewhere, either disinterested or more likely feeling like the car is stuck in mud and they just don’t want to deal with it.
And then in two years, the tea bots will probably be in that place, just in time to ensure Obama’s reelection, and the cycle repeats. Ahhhhhhhhh
My concern is that the tea bot well is considerably deeper than anyone realizes. If they play better poker than Obama plays chess (which won’t require much effort), they could have a good long run.
The progressive meme that Sarah Palin is stupid is one of the dumbest and most dangerous mistakes ObamaNation has made (and continues to make). Palin is crazy like a fox, people. They need to put down the koolaid and wake the hell up. And I just don’t see that happening. Instead they will keep feeding the fire that motivates her base.
You know that Chinese curse about living in interesting times? We’re living it.
The progressive obsession with her elevated her and gave her a 24/7 platform from which to be heard, bypassing the MSM. Everything she says on twitter and facebook gets picked up on the newswires and blogs, both left and right. She doesn’t have to do interviews with the “Washington elite.”
I don’t have the answer to that Wonk, but I noticed O’Donnell (whom I know nothing about) used a phrase that I actually like:
“Citizen politicians.”
Isn’t that what (among many other bloggers) Conflucians are? It seems to me, that is the most likely place/people to consult looking for the answer. 🙂
Pips, good morning or whatever time of day it is where you are 🙂
I noticed O’Donnell has been crediting Hillary a lot and trying to court Hillary voters. She may be the citizen pol that the grassroots right want, and that’s their prerogative, but her history with SALT (Saviors Alliance for Lifting the Truth) turns me off.
Actually the question–is there a cure among us–was meant to hint at the answer, the operative words being ‘among us.’ Until there is an uprising of Americans who reject the phony posturing of both parties and demand actions that put people before profit, I suspect nothing will get better no matter what happens in November.
Hi! No, lunch break actually. 🙂
See, there again I get somewhat “lost in translation”, heh. I perceived the term more as representing the non-politician citizens being interested in politics but seeing things more from the point of ordinary citizens than actual politicians do/can.
But I stand by my “intention” that the answer is to be found among real and informed people.
Just my non-politician 50 ører. 😉
Unfortunately when I hear the rightwingers say terms like “citizen politician,” I hear echoes of both the right and the left attacking Hillary for being a “career politician.”
I think the problem is less about how long one has worked in Washington. It is more about how quickly they forget who they are supposed to be working for.
So she’s doing what Obama did, get out and say she can get Hillary’s voters, but she (Hillary) can’t get her
voters.
What the tea party is doing is back tracking to the Clinton camp, in order to influence the voters.
My question, is what democrat is the tea party supporting, they are all republicans at this point.
Then this morning I get email from John Kerry who tells me O’Donnell is delusional, and would I send
him a donation to fight the Sarah Palin Party.
I told him to dream on!
O’Donnell is just trying to snag the votes of Republican woman who crossed over to vote for Hillary. I really don’t think O’Donnell is the kind of candidate most Hillary supporters would be receptive to.
Yes, we kinda are citizen politicians.
HOWEVER, we are not:
Tea Partiers
Sarah Palin supporters
Republicans
Birthers
Just to clear up any misconceptions of any media people or political operatives who may be lurking. We know you’re here. Of course, we keep saying we are liberals but you guys have your own agenda.
Whatever. In the end, you may wish you’d paid better attention to us in the future.
I know RD (as I hope you know, I know). I actually did contemplate whether the reference would be a good idea and guess I should have listened to my instincts. I’ll be even more careful in the future.
Pips, nah, you provoked interesting discussion. The lamebots will always lie about who we are.
“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
We’re just flying under the Democrats’ radar. They are vaguely aware of us but they keep miscategorizing us. We are independents who are liberals and lean Democratic. But we’re not part of the party anymore. But we also do not like Republicans, in spite of the fact that some of us voted for McCain in 2008 as a protest.
I think it is the protest vote that is confusing them. I kind of imagine the party loyalists getting a “Does not compute” look in their electronic eyes while smoke pours out of their ears. How could self described liberals vote for McCain in 2008 *unless* they were uneducated raycist republicans???
And yet, it happened.
Go figure.
I’m guessing that right after the election in November, they will suddenly get a clue.
They’re not confused about us, RD, they’re disinterested except in denigrating us because we refused, and still refuse, to join in with them. And the fact that we were, and continue to be, right (as in correct) just makes it worse.
They’re herd mentality, go-alongs, wannabes who fancy themselves independent thinkers. And if they’re confused it’s because they know how they want things to be but core principles do not guide their choices.
Maybe the hard core Obots are like that. But by and large, they are not politicians.
The politicians and party operatives are the ones I am thinking of and believe me, they do not want to lose power. They waited years to get committee chairmanships and seniority and campaign money. They will have to take a back seat if the party loses in 2010. I don’t believe they are not concerned. But I don’t think they have figured us out yet. WE’RE the ones who keep staying home.
Of course, I have no intention of staying home this fall. I’m going to go vote for a third party, just like I voted last year for NJ governor. My candidate didn’t win but Corzine lost, painfully, at the hands of Democrats who deserted him.
That would be us.
Third party as well.
If the Democratic Party wants my vote they’ll have to earn it. (and Warren on some commission is not nearly enough.)
Oh and I got my 5 voters that I promised in 2008 I’d be bringing to the polls next go round. Pissing me off is/was a major mistake.
Their interest in us to say that we started the birther movement, we used “Hussein” as his name, and we
questioned his religion, and think that he’s really a muslim. They will start to compare us as teabaggers.
That’s the message they will get out . Fuck em!
yup, Fannie. That’s exactly their mission. If it’s election time or any other crunch time, the ObamaClaus machine has to pull out its list of who’s naughty and nice and remind everyone who the redheaded stepchildren are. They prejudice people against our message from the getgo so people who are worried about catching our cooties don’t listen to what we are saying for what it is, they hear it through the filter of bogus theories about us being racist vagina voters. Oh, and they already compare/conflate us to teabots.
We need a party just for liberals.
Amen.
We need a Party of Nobodies…
Nobody could have predicted Bush-Cheney would be a massive failure.
Nobody could have predicted the Iraq war would be an unfounded war and a diversion.
Nobody could have predicted Obama would make Bush-Cheney’s policies the new normal.
I’m nobody, and I endorse this message.
Vote for Nobody!
That should be a T-shirt.
We need a we are nobody, we are the world theme song.
Yes, one that knows that Single Payer and the Public Option and the Medicare Buy In are what will bring our crazy OUT PRICED health system in line with other Western Countries.
How can we compete if we can’t have affordable health care?
Also, the Worker’s Comp Rates have gone through the roof and Mr. Harvard ‘elite’ isn’t even aware of the problem but during the election cycle was doing the ‘ME TOO’! Mc Cain’s state began to address the problem, but it really needs to be at a national level, tied into health care reform. If the issues of small business aren’t addressed, than the economy will continue to be stagnant and lay offs will pick up steam. The last SkyRocketing Rate Hikes in Health Insurance had an impact and many lost their jobs, many lost benefits, and others weren’t hired back because of the rate hikes.
a party of liberals might not ever win anything. A party of populists on the other hand would get votes across the board and isn’t what we want is what is good for ordinary americans?
Liberalism IS GOOD for ordinary Americans.
We need a party that will sell that message, instead of a bunch of corporate shills.
honk honk honk honk honk!
The Repubs brought more voters to the polls in primaries than the Democrats did for the first time since 1930.
Yeah, and it’s the far-right Tea Party candidates that are winning.
No one can say our hero isn’t bringing about change.
Whoa! Didn’t see *that* coming. /snark
Nobody saw it coming.
Yes I did, tyvm.
18 million nobodies saw it coming.
Historic… unprecedented… change we could have lived without.
Lol sob Now is the time for all sentient Failbots to issue heartfelt mea culpas.
ROTF! That should be on a bumpersticker.
Yeah, it’s scary. But it just shows how unmotivated Dems are, IMO. Really though, primary votes are still at an all time low.
Many are the Hillary voters, but they don’t understand that the Tea Party candidates, have not put forth ideas for the working class folks.
Most of what I hear is THROW THEM BUMS OUT! OK, now what?
the thought process I hear is “whatever they do, it can’t be any worse than what we’ve got already is doing”
I personally think they underestimate. That being said I understand and share their frustration at the current crop of pols we have.
Good points. I was shaking my point reading this spin too.
Here are the tabloids for today – mostly NY
http://edgeoforever.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/tabloids-good-bye-bums/
Glensilla tweets
Joe has some thing going, because why else would President Obama give him the VP spot when he didn’t even get enough votes to compete in the Libertarian Party?
So, it doesn’t surprise me if Joe Biden is trying to do what ever he wants. Hillary R. Clinton didn’t get a ROLL CALL for POTUS, nor one for VP, but Joe Biden got everything handed to him on a silver platter…what does Joe Biden have?
He’s got that certain, I don’t know what. LOL
Every Sheriff needs their Barney Fife.
he is the one guy who doesn’t make obama look stupid by comparison.
O chose Biden, I think, because he wanted someone close to give him “wisdom” from experience. Don’t laugh. O feels threatened by Hillary, and besides, he would have been immediately compared to G.W., so he went with Biden who had lots of experience. Biden is a common run of the mill legislator, that given his many years in Washington accumulated power by default. Biden can’t help O. Both are doomed to lose in 2012 if they decide to run.
The O machine chose Biden because they can keep Biden in a cone of silence/irrelevance while benefiting from the general impressions of Biden’s having been around so damn long.
The Dems have their site back up and I can’t figure out what was supposed to excite Dems, anyone know?
Oh, it’s a new logo. A circle with a D in it. Whoa, this is pretty exciting stuff.
The new logo looks to me like a target.
all the easier to put a no hopium slash through it.
Heh. It’s all mixed up with Obama gear too. Looks like Dems have moved on to 2012.
2012 is all that O has cared about since 2008, anyway. So it’s about time they got on with it.
very true Wonk
OK, since you solved the big mystery of the Dem announcement everyone was talking about (not), I give you credit
http://edgeoforever.wordpress.com/2010/09/15/revealed-dems-major-announcement-thats-going-to-excite-dems/
Beachballs for every one!!!
There was so much premature fist-bumping going on, and based on some huge fallacies, I had to read some of the wires twice to see what I was missing. I see the reveling as the Dems temporarily putting down their circular firing-squad weaponry in favor of becoming a massive multi-headed fight club.
Fallacy No. 1: A GOP whackjob winning a primary over a less crazy one means the Dem will coast to victory. Er, um, there are already plenty of nutjobs in office already. Being crazy never stopped them from winning before.
Fallacy No. 2: The balls-out racism against Obama, Muslims, but most importantly, Obama, Obama and Obama will invigorate dormant Dem voter turnout like nothing seen since the Doric-columned neo-classically themed imperious media debauchery of yore.
I thought that Glenn Greenwald’s Salon piece on using Sarah Palin for fearmongering was spot-on, with one omission … bringing me to:
Fallacy No. 3: Dems (and supporters) believing that what THEY fear politically automatically translates into something that will terrify the votership towards the polls (whether those voters are likely ones, dormant, apathetic or just plain disgusted.)
Also noticing a lot of pre-emptive blaming of “Hillary supporters” for … whatever will be going wrong.
Blame Hillary supporters, again.
sigh
They just never learn.
Exactly, there is nothing more.
Also noticing a lot of pre-emptive blaming of “Hillary supporters” for … whatever will be going wrong
….just like on the financial TV channels you will find preemptive blaming of the American people for whatever ill of the day… someone how we are responsible for the mess Wall St made….same here,
Obots can’t accept they were wrong…so it has to be Mommy’s fault ! Bad Mommy!
Voting to continue Washington’s bipartisan desertion of the American people is not the antidote. It is the disease that ensures the corporate hold on our country.
well said!
Obama handlers are happy….huge loses by Dems
in 2010 has always been on BO inc’s to do list. I use to urge Dem officials to keep backing Hillary…not for the people’s sake or for the country’s sake…nah…I know that wouldn’t count for much . So I urged them to stay with Hillary for their own sake . But they couldn’t see that what was being done to Hillary and the Dem base was exactly what was in the cards for them too.
lol! (though not funny in reality) So true…
Steve Benen:
“Those morons refuse to vote for who we tell them to vote for”
Stupid “little people”. Why won’t they just do what their betters tell them to do.
It’s not like they’re winning a bunch of low-turnout special elections – the TPers are beating GOP establishment candidates in regular state primaries with record turnouts.
The DC beltway creeps lowered the bar for a faux cowboy and a faux philosopher king to jump over , and now they’re getting indigestion over what they’ve set in motion. Oh noes, the riff raff are trying to jump over… “nobody could have predicted” … c’est la vie.
That Nobody is one smart cookie
Another good tweet from Glenzilla
This is one of those years I feel completely detached from the results. Because I don’t support or believe any of these parties, slogans or promises. I got a laugh out of Karl Rove waving his tiny fists around over O’Donnell’s win. Ooooo, the peanut gallery isn’t following the rules nor listening to the Grand Poopahs.
That being said, if I were in Delaware, I would never cast a vote for O’Donnell, anymore than I would cast a vote for Sharron Angle. Prayer Warriors or members of a Saviors Alliance are not and never will be on my menu.
I did read last night that Tim Kaine was scheduled to make a “Big” announcement today, something that would “excite Dems across the country.” Really??
The whole thing is like watching some awful puppet show. The Dems are an utter disaster, the Republicans have no answers and the Tea Party people are royally pissed [and praying hard].
I don’t see this ending well for anyone.
hmmmmnnnn, as someone who has been a loyal democrat since 1976 when I first voted, I can say without hesitation that what would excite me is Biden retiring, Hillary becoming VP, then Obama retiring to spend more time with his family of course.
Yeah, I’m kinda fond of that first amendment thing myself and have no desire for someone to insert their personal faith into policy positioning.
I feel detached from it all too. It’s fun to see the Tea Party challenge the GOP establishment and win. It’s fun to see woman upstarts beat the pants off rich old men, too, to be honest.
I wish we bitter knitters could do the same to the Dem establishment, but the sexism is so entrenched in the so-called left.
It is fun to see the establishments of both parties get the comeuppance they richly deserve, but unfortunately the results of the tea party’s voice being the loudest right now just give Obama and the Democrats *more cover* to move everything even *more to the right.*
I don’t believe that the Tea Party will get any legislation through. I think we’re going for a major gumming of the government gears. I can hear the screeching gears of government coming to a halt because it happens in California every year.
But, I’m not talking about the Tea Party getting legislation through… what I’m saying is the Tea Party’s noise helps O and the Dems go right while they position themselves to the left…of tea partiers, all while wringing their hands and saying they’d really love to do more but they can’t with all the obstructionism.
Kinda like the mean Republicans with their 49-seat Senate majority forced VORI to do their agenda?
And who are we going to vote for then later on? We only have a 2 party system to choose from and so if we become disappointed w/ one party, the only alternative we have is to vote the opposite party. That is why it is imperative for the Tea Party movement to become a viable third party, not a rebel party w/in the Republican Party.
If they(the Tea Party) matures into a separate party after its troubled adolescence, then we as the voters would have a 3rd choice.The only problem is it will take years for them to mature and there would be a lot of obstacles to hurdle. And with the involvement of a small? percentage of the American People(who makes noises to be recognized, one of the signs of a budding adolescence) and a person who has the guts to direct the Party(Sarah Palin), mark my word, the Tea Party could become a viable 3rd party later
The Tea Party will never be a viable option in my books.
Right now we need a second party.
All we have now are the two wings of the Republican party – the DINOcrats and the Tea Partiers.
we HAVE a multi party system. We have and always have had third fourth fifth etc… choices. The problem is that we have a winner take all system that means there is always one party in power and a opposition party close to power. No third party will ever be viable. Any viable third party will just become the 2nd party in a two party dance. To get to that point, given the same election rules and realities, the green party, libertarians, reform or Tea Party will become as dull and corrupt as the democrats and republicans are now.
What we need is public financing of all elections and a free media that is not owned by huge corporate conglomerates.
So, basically, an apocalyptic event and then start over.
I’m down with that.
sounds good to me. You have no idea how often I wish CNN, Msnbc and Fox news would all fall in to the ocean along with the people who own them.
And a whole bunch of the people who work there. Imagine Tweety tingling and glub glub glubbing in oil-thickened waters.
One of the only ways that multi-party systems can work is through proportional representation, used by many European parliaments.
All the systems come with their problems and their champions.
We could have a viable 3rd party if we the people just donate directly to the candidates themselves and not thru the party, That way, there would be no party gratitude if the candidates won w/out any party money.
so why would that have to do anything with the tea party? And, why do third parties have to be destinations? I think we need to focus on how to use third parties to send more effective, cohesive messages rather than trying to jump ahead and worry about whether a third party candidate can win. We don’t need a third party to necessarily win elections, we need them as a holding spot for votes that would have been under the Democratic column had Democrats just been… Democrats!!! (instead of trying to outRepublican the Republicans, who will always outRepublican them.)
The fact that Joe Biden’s son decided not to run against the moderate kabuki- I mean GOP backed -Castle and that the GOP -now plans on spending nothing on the race tells me EVERYTHING I need to know. I’m glad the machinery cog lost. I may not agree with the tea partiers- however they are a heck of alot more honest then the REPUBLICRAT party. At least with them I’ll know where I stand.
Hope somebody –or better yet everybody– asks Christine O’Donnell about her current stand on masturbation. And I hope they don’t refer to it as you-know-whating. I mean, Rachel, come on.
O’Donnell’s history with SALT is a huge turnoff.
embrace the cult
yup, it’s one of the pentecostal-type cults, of which there seem to be many and multiplying
She just doesn’t want kids going blind.
Or growing hair on their palms because then you can’t read your crib notes.
But she’s cute. I don’t think she needs to worry about doing anything by herself.
I wonder how far that campaign got? Anti-Masturbation? Is that part of the ‘every sperm is sacred” movement?
However, I couldn’t care less about her pandering to the religious right. She would be one more women in office and her more radical views are not going to get any traction. Once it is normal to see women be 51 percent of political leaders we will never have equality. There are plenty of socially conservative men in power, we don’t attack them for their religious views, or maybe we do, but the good old boys network in DC doesn’t. Ms. O’Donnell is going to become another shiny object of the female variety for men on the right and left to disparage and it is going to piss me off.
Some whiny lefty jerk over at talk left described Hillary as a Christian conservative and no one disputed him except me. That is what this paranoia about religion brings us…..tarring Hillary as a Christian Conservative. Such nonsense.
“UNTILL it is normal to see women hold 51 percent of the power we will never have equality”…is what I meant to say.”
I don’t think this was mere pandering. She was actively involved in SALT back in the day.
Not just actively involved. She says, in that video, she’s “the President and Founder of the SALT.”
Yes, from the unpublished President of the Harvard Law Review to the President of SALT on MTV … one was ruthless in hiding that his clothes have no emperor, the other appears to have been hellbent on leaving a trail of just how vapid she is.
O’Donnell’s objection seems to be worry over being left out.
“You’re going to be pleasing each other! If he already knows what pleases him and can please himself then why am I in the picture?”
It’s so mindbogglingly insipid.
Hillary is a christian liberal and a liberal christian
Heh
Yeah masturbation is a real national issue (rolling my eyes).
OF COURSE masturbation is an important issue! If our young men all go blind, how will they be able to see to shoot swarthy furriners, in order to defend the sacred right of US and multinational corporations to plunder weak countries–er, that is, to defend our nation? 😈
That’s what makes 2010 so interesting. The Ds are going to lose to these people. According to Rasmussen, Reid and Angle are tied 48/48. It couldn’t be that Angle is that good, but it’s that the voters will vote for whatever to get rid of Reid. It’s November 2008 all over again. Voters went for O because they did not want another R.
It just shows how pathetic Reid is that he hasn’t pulled away from Angle yet in the polling.
Me too. Bat SHIT crazy vs corrupt and incompetent. Things are really getting out of hand these days. If a huge number of tp candidates get in to congress or the senate, it’ll be interesting to see if the country will be able to govern itself. It feels like a revolution.
It IS a revolution. And a civil war.
Obamabots on one side and Palinpoops on the other.
Clowns to the left of me, jokers to the right, and here I am stuck in the middle with you.
It’s a fake war distracting people from what’s really going on. “Socialist!” “Teabagger!” Meaningless.
Since we’re quoting classic rock: “Meet the new boss/Same as the old boss” 🙄
Maybe it’s time to let O’Donnell sip her cup of delicious tea, as the party applauds another arrival, Ayotte.
Hooray for all these contests between hated candidates. Obama really cleaned Washington up.
“Malaria and smallpox”.
I prefer “strychnine and arsenic” myself, but YMMV. 😉