Oh so now Obama's going all "um, I'm the president, Mitt Romney is not now and never will be the president, for which the nation can give thanks, so let's go through the motions over the next couple of months and hopefully a handful of Republicans will grow a brain cell or two after the election but if they don't we'll forge ahead best we can and at least weirdo Mitt Romney won't be president."
Fair enough. As I 'splain in this week's CityLife, that message, or something like it, has been working in Nevada for months.
The big fat X factor -- emphasis on big -- is the amount of money Sheldon Adelson and the rest of America's drooling rich old angry white guys (as Harry Reid might say) are going to spend on anti-Obama ads in Nevada and other swing states over the next two months. Romney's SuperPac has raised four times as much as Obama's, and that's not even counting the jillions that will be casually spent by secretly funded Hellmouth spawn like Karl Rove's Crossroads abomination and the Koch Brothers' Americans for the Koch Brothers' Prosperity.
By the by, we had Obama campaign press secretary Ben LaBolt on The Agenda the other day. Inasmuch as the Obama campaign is about to be terrifyingly outspent, I asked, might the campaign step back from advertising in smallish swing states like Nevada to concentrate spending on Florida, Virginia and Ohio (that latter of course is the ball game)? Never, LaBolt answered, more or less.
That's good, because the more active Obama's campaign is in Nevada, the better for Democrats down ticket (although the fact is evidently lost on several down-ticket Nevada Democrats).
Meantime, if America's campaign finance system is going to be a revolting exercise in corruption and an immoral offense against democracy, revolting, immoral and corrupt billionaire wingnuts might as well keep spending lavishly to offend Nevadans on TV. It's not like the American right has any other plan to stimulate Nevada's economy.
The current elections in the US can be compared with elections a few years ago in Iran, where to be on the ballot, you have to be approved by a board of Islamic clergy.
The Iranian elections were widely criticized because of that restriction. And the critics were justified.
But what about our elections? To be a serious candidate in the US, you have to be rich, or have rich friends, or be friends with lobbyists for the big corporations. So the same kind of criticism aimed at the undemocratic Iranian elections can also be leveled at the US big budget elections, where victory usually goes to the candidate with the biggest campaign war chest.
Recent election
Posted by: Observer | 09/13/2012 at 01:36 PM
BREAKING NEWS!
Joe Heck sponsors legislation to actually ends work for welfare.
"There’s little Republicans love more these days than falsely attacking President Obama for stripping work requirements out of welfare.
"But in their zeal to slash and de-federalize safety net programs, they’ve advanced legislation that would do exactly that.
"The bill — sponsored by Reps. Virginia Foxx (R-NC), Joseph J. Heck, (R-NV), and Buck McKeon (R-CA) and called the Workforce Investment Improvement Act..."
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/09/how-a-bunch-of-republicans-accidentally-voted-to-end-welfare-to-work-requirements.php
Posted by: gonza | 09/15/2012 at 10:27 AM