Let's Do the Election Over.....

Oh for cryin out loud!

(are you impressed that I cleaned up my language?).

Florida and Michigan are said to be close to a plan to redo the primary elections with a mail-in ballot. I am not wild about the idea for two reasons. First, the idea of a mail-in ballot will begin to undermine the voting process in this country. The chance of fraud is already significant, being able to mail a ballot in will not improve things.

Second, the issue here is NOT how the elections in Florida and Michigan were conducted, it is when. The primary elections were conducted on dates that were in violation of both Democratic and Republican party rules, and as such, the results of both races, delegates to the national conventions, were sanctioned in a manner that was deemed to be fitting by the leadership of the respective parties. The dates were selected in those states in an effort to make those states primaries a bit more important, to carry more weight that they ordinarily would in the overall scheme of things. They do affect the national elections, in that they carry weight with a national party, but they select no officeholder, nor bestow no power or authority on anyone. They are, in a sense, private, in that they carry no governmental or public authorizations. This is not an issue of denial of the right to be heard, or to have one's vote counted by government or some other authoritarian rabble. It is an effort for a candidate of one party to pull a lot of strings and call in a lot of markers to make an end run around the rules of the game in order to better his/her positionin the race for the parties nomination.

Period.

It is cheating.

It is the kind of bullshit the Karl Rove and Dick Cheney would come up with, then sit and keep a straight face as they explained it away in a perfectly low-keyed and reasonable tone of voice. It is the kind of bullshit the the likes of Rush Limbaugh would come up with as a fair way of winning without having to use a gun.

This kind of crap is why G.W. Bush is the kind of man and President that he is.

Pay no attention to the man/woman behind the curtain.

This is embarrassing. And painful.

The states of Florida and Michigan, behaving like two screaming toddlers, are in talks to weasel under the sanctions imposed on both states over their violation of the rules of both major parties in moving the dates of the primaries up this year. In the case of the GOP, the outcome of this effort will have little impact as the nomination has been sewn up, one way or another. On the Democratic side, guess who benefits by an easing of the rules.


Hillary Rodham Clinton.


Between the yet-to-be seen arsenal of super delegates, and the threat of a challenge to the party sanctions on the convention floor, Ms Clinton gives herself the air of an old time machine politician, determined to get the nomination at all costs. If she succeeds, (as opposed to honestly winning), her credibility will be just below that of the current maggot-in-chief, GW Bush, and she will make Karl Rove, (in comparison), look a lot like a modern day saint.


From my point of view, the party that best represents my interests, (and that is being magnanimously generous), is doing its best to kill itself, and me with it. Hillary is a political Jim Jones. Should she become the nominee of her party, (I don't know if I can claim affiliation anymore...), I might expect to see a large keg or tank or nice red kool-aid at the convention, with smiling, contented delegates lining up for a nice drink. As late as a couple of months ago, I had nothing good to say about the party on the right, (and come to think of it, that hasn't changed), but this weeks withdrawal by Mike Huckabee was really a class act, something not seen at this level in American politics. Whatever you might think of that party or the candidate, the way that the campaign was handled was first class. Hilly, take note. Even if you pull it out, your reputation will always precede you.


And these are the people that I am hoping will protect me, at least marginally, against warrantless wiretapping, national ID and tracking systems, data mining and other hallmarks of the apocalypse.


I would say that it is time to leave, but there really is no place to go.

the game is still afoot. or under foot. or something.

A lot of writers and pundits seem to think that today is the day for the Democratic Party, or, conversely, that today is the day that the party's over for Hillary Clinton.

Not me.

She, (or at least a spokesperson for her campaign), has said for the record that she will stay in the race until the convention.

One has to wonder whether she has something up her sleeve, whether she is channeling the spirit of Dick Nixon in attempting to capture the nomination, and whether she thinks that the American electorate would not see through such a maneuver, and go with a candidate that is widely perceived, (at least today), as being not too bad, even for a Republican?

How the race unfolds in the party on the left could speak volumes about how it will govern, the conduct of the candidates, (and one in particular), will be the focus of much deserved attention in the coming days and weeks.

Please, please pay close attention to the actions as well as the words.


And now, a few words about something on my mind.

Rush Limbaugh.

Ann Coulter.

Bill O'Reilly.

These are the new pornographers.

The product that they sell is something that really does not exist, it is a fantasy that exists only in the back of small minds unable to digest a reality that does not resemble the expectation that they have made and harbored. They are irrelevant, they contribute nothing. They use their audience to serve another master, in the short term its name is money, in the long term its name may be perdition, (utter destruction).

I don't hate or despise them, I just ignore them.

Any attention that they are given strengthens them, so, to these people, I say, so what?

stay focused

vote. or not. I wonder if it really makes a difference.




Late Breaking Update: (5 hours later):

from the New York Times. I told you so.