Virginia, New Jersey vote to attack Iran

The voters of Virginia and New Jersey have elected Republican governors, thereby nullifying the results of last year's presidential election. Health care reform is dead, because if it ain't broke, don't fix it! Ditto for climate change legislation, because let's face it, the science just isn't in on that yet. The key economic policy question now facing lawmakers in Washington is not whether businesses and rich people should get a big tax cut, but if they should get a bigger tax cut. And of course in foreign affairs, throughout the remainder of his one and only failed term, the president must do whatever Dick Cheney says.

Or maybe that's reading too much into the breathless media accounts about the thundering significance of two off-year low-turnout state-level elections.

Your Gleaner is genuinely saddened (sniffle), however, at the defeat of that full-on teabagging nutjob in New York's 23rd congressional district. For one thing, the last thing we need is one more Democrat in Congress fearfully looking over his shoulder at his conservative constituents and voting accordingly, i.e., with the Blue Dogs, which seems the likely result in this instance. But far more importantly, hopes were so high that the little foot soldier in Glenn Beck's army of enraged paranoid mouthbreathers would eke out a victory and even further embolden the kooks and the flakes and the nuts from coast to coast and especially right here in Nevada.

Oh well. The takeaway: Chins up, fruitcakes. I'm talking to you Jim Gibbons, Sueny Talklowdian and the rest of you birther-sympathizing glassy-eyed Republicans who have demonstrated you are willing to do or say anything to appeal to angry white people who hold a misspelled sign in one fist while angrily shaking their other at the sky. Pay no heed to fanciful accounts of alleged Nevada Republican moderation -- that sort of talk is so 2002. Your strategy is still sound, and the only way to seal the deal in Nevada is to run, run, run to the right as fast as your wingnutted feet will carry you. You know it in your heart, and in your gut, and in your head. OK, maybe not your head. But never mind. Soar, little wingnuts, soar, on to glorious victory.

In the primary, anyway.

Comments

[Rich]

The more that comes down convinces me further that we need a viable third party. The Democrats havbe become the right and the Republicans the extreme far right. Looking at what happened in Maine says we'll not get out equal civil rights in my lifetime. I've picked up my marbles and not playing anymore,

[texas dem]

Oh please.

White, RURAL, Catholic Maine voted 47% for letting two men solemnize our buttsex-based-relationships as marriage. The city of Portland voted 73% for dyke weddings. The main campus of the University of Maine voted 81% for equality for fags.

In three to five years, depending on the jurisdiction, we'll start winning these things. Let the breakdown of the vote by age give you hope. The very old people are dying and being replaced by very young people. Demographically, we've already won. We may not be changing any more minds in the Medicare crowd, but we don't really need to. The kids are growing up in a completely different world than you or I did, and they will outnumber the old people soon enough.

If you want to believe you won't get your civil rights in your lifetime, then either you're not expecting to live very long, or you're willfully ignoring the numbers. I hope it's the latter.

[Rich]

Bullshit!

[edna]

since when is marriage a civil right?

[atdleft]

Since the US Supreme Court said so in Loving vs. Virginia...

[A Done of Reality]

Perfect, Rich. That is exactly how the right wing wants you to react.

[Goldy]

How do you know what the right wing wants? Suspect....

[atdleft]

And btw, Washington voted last night to expand domestic partnerships... Which is also in a way a win in what turned out to be a proxy war over marriage. It at least gives me hope we'll keep SB 283 here next year if Richard Ziser tries another H8 initiative.

[dave404]

atleft:

@ 12:28 Touche'!

...and thanks for the info @ 12:57 as it wasn't mentioned on Faux this morning.

Just learned of a new initiative in CA that purports to recognize the sanctification of marriage in that it seeks to "ELIMINATE THE LAW ALLOWING MARRIED COUPLES TO DIVORCE."

Will someone in NV file the same initiative?! Talk about your turnout on voting day! WOW!

http://www.sos.ca.gov/admin/press-releases/2009/db09-063.pdf

[Dude]

@Dave404: That would certainly have a chilling effect on the institution of marriage. I think 2/3rds of the folks would just decide, "meh, co-habitation/shacking up works just fine, thanks."

[Happygirl]

While I understand some of the Gleaner's concern over yesterday's GOP victories, I think the esteemed blogger misses out on a few facts: Deeds was an absoulutely piss-poor candidate in Virginia, while Corzine did not have an impressive term (and the Wall Street background really did not help, earlier.)
It's sad about Maine -- but the sad fact is there is a sizable group that will, never, ever accept gays as equals. Sorry -- that's just how it is. And to hell with them -- we'll just keep on progressing in other ways in the gay rights arena.
However, thank heaven the voters of District 23 reject the paranoid idiocy of the Beck crowd and elected Owens.
Sometimes, the GOP wins. Sometimes, sadly, social conservatives win. It's not the end of the world. It's a teachable moment.
Onward and upward, people -- keep making our leaders accountable, and remind Obama of what he can do with our support behind him.

[Nevada Ned]

Gleaner:

There really is a lesson from the Tuesday election. Obama came in, leading a Democratic sweep a year ago, promising hope and change. So far he hasn't delivered. The economy is still staggering: the best you can say is that it has stopped collapsing. That's cold comfort for the unemployed.

And Obama has continued (and even expanded) Bush's wars of aggression in Iraq and Afghanistan.

So what has Obama actually done? He can give inspiring speeches, but that only gets you so far. The unemployed want jobs. The voters want peace and prosperity.

Voters want results, the Dems have not delivered, and paid a price at the ballot box this week.

This may be the prelude to a major Democratic disaster in 2010.

The Republicans have their base of support among the upper classes, and among anti-abortion, anti-gun control, anti-tax activists. In 2008 the Republicans got clobbered: the Republicans don't have a majority. But they do have something. And you can't beat something with nothing.

[ColinFromLasVegas]

I really don't see where the Democrats have anything to worry about in 2010. It's rather the Republicans have been revealed to have far more things to worry about. Such as the fractured thinking they have and disagreement on what they represent. All I see is turmoil within the GOP where idiots on a tea bag bus that go around the U.S. have taken over the party. And the Republicans have done it to themselves. By granting them anything and everything they want, no matter how way out there it is. And this trend lost them a seat in the 23rd District of New York; a seat that was held by the Republicans for over a century or so. And the Governor races in NJ and VA were decided solely upon State/local issues, not because of President Obama.

And the Republicans are stuck with this. And will be for the longest time to come. Because they have no alternative but to follow talking voices on the radio and bobbing heads on television; seemingly encouraging them to speak for them. Let's face it. People know Mr. Glenn Beck or Mr. Rush Limbaugh more than they know what's-his-face that runs the Republican Party. Nut balls rule, and everyone else just drools. And if they are moderate? BAM! Slap them out of the way and let's get someone from interstellar Republican outer space to replace them.

Most sane thinking people know President Obama was not dealt an ideal hand when he took office. And I have to commend him for working with it. And from all appearances, he is working hard. Here he is, not even one year into his Presidency, and people are scared, anxious, hopeful, expectant, distrustful, and all of these traits combined. We have just went through (and possibly still going through) the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression. And add to this that we are in two wars that both look like they are going nowhere. And he is trying to provide Americans with ammunition in the fight against death; the inalienable right for EVERYONE to live happy, healthy and long lives by introducing a health care reform. And busting through the stranglehold that large health care insurance companies have and continue to lobby for more money without any care for agony, pain and suffering they cause in this search for the almighty dollar.

President Obama and the Democrats got my vote back in 2008. And they will get it in 2010 too. Because right now, things really seem like they are in the process of getting fixed. Fixed more than during any Republican (or any other party) reign.

This is how I see it. And I'm pretty sure the silent majority, which is the LARGEST amount of people in the U.S. that cannot be accurately counted, see it.

[Business Plan Writers]

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