Friday, November 5. 2010
Two competing programs are proposed to Congress from the left and from America�s manufacturers. One protects domestic unions while further burdening US manufacturers and consumers. The other grows US competitiveness.
The Nation, in its inimical leftward way, analyzes the problems with �free trade globalization.� Its National Affairs correspondent, William Greider, longtime journalist, describes �a huge hole in the world�a massive loss of demand. Think of the trade wars as the largest producers fighting over an abrupt shortage of buyers.
The situation, as Greider sees it: A Wall Street Journal poll found that 53 percent (including 61 percent of Tea Party adherents) think free-trade globalization has hurt the US economy. Only 17 percent think it has helped. But the trouble with Americans claiming injured innocence is that it blinds them to the complexities of the predicament. The fact is, the United States and China, motivated by different but mutually reinforcing reasons, collaborated to create the unbalanced trading system. American multinationals eagerly sought access to China's market. The Chinese wanted factories and the modern technologies needed to develop a first-class industrial base. American companies agreed to the basic trade-off: China would let them in to make and sell stuff, and they would share technology and teach Chinese partners how it's done. Not coincidentally, US corporations also gained enormous bargaining power over workers back home by threatening to go abroad for cheaper labor if unions didn't give wage concessions.
Greider points out, correctly, that multinational corporations, clever devils, have profited from US subsidies but, anyways, shipped production overseas for less costly labor and regulation.
Greider�s prescription is to impose more regulation and taxes upon multinationals that ship production elsewhere. Greider does not even suggest that unions negotiate less costly labor contracts or that our government reduce its regulatory burdens upon domestic manufacturers.
Greider, finally, does admit that his recommendation �would raise prices for Americans.� US manufacturing unions, however, would � though still likely to hemorrhage jobs � keep high wages and benefits for their remaining members, and dues flowing for contributions to Democrat political campaigns.
By contrast, the National Association of Manufacturers just issued its Manufacturing Strategy for Jobs and a Competitive America. Some recommendations are clearly self-serving, like not taxing foreign earnings, but most make much more sense than Greider�s � get ready for this euphemism � �national loyalty program.�
Continue reading "US Consumers Vs Unions: Which Program For Congress?"
 Bag of uncounted ballots discovered in Bridgeport.
Sounds like Bridgeport. They always have bags of stuff, when needed.
Powerline: Annals of the welfare state
E-mail shows illegal activity in Reid's campaign
What happens in Vegas is supposed to stay in Vegas.
Bishop Tutu and "Israeli Apartheid"
Krauthammer's take at NRO. Electric cars?
Somebody told me yesterday that electric cars will save the human race from extinction because they have no emissions. What can you say to people like that? I am not kidding: She said electricity comes from the wall outlets. College-educated.
Democrats have to be more competitive in states that don’t touch an ocean if they want to bounce back.
Must be the toxic ozone from the salt water. Ban the oceans, along with the Happy Meals.
Driscoll: How the Gray Lady Became Margaret Dumont
Nancy Pelosi Seriously Considers Staying as Democratic Leader
Goody.
More good links later today, when I find the time to post them.
Our antique server broke down. Nothing a little duct tape and baling wire couldn't fix. Sorry.
This from Dick Morris on Why Triangulation Won't Work This Time:
Obama's programs have been so far-reaching and fundamental that any compromise would leave the nation far to the left of where it's always been and wants to be. When he took office, government (federal, state and local combined) controlled 35 percent of the US economy -- 15th among the two-dozen advanced countries. Now, it controls 44.7 percent, ranking us 7th, ahead of Germany and Britain. So where's the compromise -- leave government in control of, say, 40 percent?
Thursday, November 4. 2010
A spanking is what was administered to the Dems on Tuesday, minus (or not) the fun sado-masochistic eroticism. (Don't ever try to tell me that you've never had kinky thoughts.) Pic is from Vintage Spanking.
Still strange in CT - who won?
First they came for my Happy Meals...
"Soft tyranny"
TNR: The Gates Foundation's Delusional Techno-Messianism
GOP sweeps FL, wins Maine (!) governorship
Wins keep coming in
Harsanyi:
No matter what happens, for now, we can look forward to two glorious years of hyper-partisan acrimonious gridlock: Washington's most moral and productive state.
Gridlock is good.
Wherein Ace gets a taste of Politics 101
Opinion: Why Are Voters Only 'Angry' When They're Tossing Dems Out?
Well, who says it?
SDA: Bits you might have missed
Including Alabama
North Carolina: The strangest beast in all of politics
NRO: New York Wrap
As hopeless as CA
How did Harry Reid do it?
He won ugly.
Podhoretz: No time to celebrate- GOP remarkably sober at win
Us, too.
Wednesday, November 3. 2010
Image above stolen from Surber
Fred Barnes: The Republican Landslide
Wehner: Obama after the fall
Strange.
China's Christians: China could not silence 200 empty chairs in Capetown
Summary of governor's races.
CT's Tom Foley lost, by a Bridgeport.
Some Liberals Still Head Over Heels In Love With Obama
Being in love with a politician is a perversion.
Krauthammer: 'Obama Agenda is Dead,' 'He Tried a 2-Year Experiment in Hyper-Liberalism and the Country Has said No'. (Here's the good video)
Powerline: The trouble with California
Hopeless.
More attacks in Bagdad: Sunni vs. Shiite
Yes, they are mad about Gitmo and American Imperialism. Gotta bomb somebody, for Pete's sake, or your life will have no meaning.
Michelle: Moonbeam wins weirdest victory speech award
Sure sounds stoned. California is in good hands.
The Wrong Sort of Scepticism is a Crime against Humanity Says Penn State Prof
Sheesh. I'm a criminal against humanity. Shame on me.
Here. It affects the Congressional race and the Governor's race.
It's lawyer time.
My two cents are to echo Marco Rubio:
"We make a great mistake if we believe that tonight these results are somehow an embrace of the Republican Party," said incoming Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida. A rising GOP star, Rubio seized his new role as a party leader and potential presidential candidate, casting the results as "a second chance for Republicans to be what they said they were going to be not so long ago."
Similar from Jay Cost:
This is not an endorsement of the Republican party, but much more of a rejection of the Democratic party, specifically the claims the Democrats have made since 1996 to be broad in its appeal and moderate in its policies.
Democrats built a congressional majority in 2006 and 2008 by persuading Bush voters to cross the aisle to support them, with an implicit promise of bipartisanship and moderation. The party under Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi did not deliver on that promise -- and thus they lost the support of these Republican-leaning districts.
Related, how does somebody please all the independent voters?
... for all the decisiveness of the independents' shift, this election hasn't resolved the most fundamental question facing the country: What should the role of government be in the 21st century?
Instead it has simply set up what figures to be a two-year debate over that question in Washington, and ensures that it will be a focal point of the 2012 election.
Thanks to independents—along with other crucial swing blocs, such as suburban women, blue-collar workers and retirees, all of whom also shifted toward the Republicans—the GOP now has the strength to stop pieces of the Obama agenda and, perhaps in some instances, roll it back.
Iraq and Afghanistan played little roles in the 2010 elections. However, President Obama will likely pay a price in 2012 for the withdrawal of US armed forces from Iraq. The Iraqis are already paying the price. The AP's Robert Burns reports:
The Obama administration could be overstating what U.S. diplomats can do to contain Iraq's ethnic and sectarian tensions without U.S. military forces, a State Department audit concluded Tuesday, raising fresh concerns about the planned pullout of American troops next year.
The auditors also questioned whether American diplomats who remain behind will be adequately protected against insurgent violence, and their report faulted Washington for its planning of the transition from a U.S. military-led mission in Iraq to one run by American civilians in 2011.
The audit's findings echo worries expressed by some U.S. defense analysts and former diplomats. They say hard-won security gains in Iraq could crumble if U.S. forces leave on schedule….
The report said the first six months of 2012 are likely to be "especially dangerous as extremists test U.S. resolve and Iraqi security forces' capabilities." It questioned whether the U.S. can meet President Barack Obama's goal of ensuring a safe work environment for remaining U.S. personnel in Iraq in 2012. "Security risks are expected to increase," the report said.
Ohio returned to its Republican roots yesterday. It's the Heartland.
That's a decent excuse to post one more of my Ohio pics from 2 weeks ago - the new Paul Newman Field House at Kenyon College. Fantastic for such a tiny college. Kenyon is strong in swimming.
The story is that alumnus Newman offered Kenyon a blank check for new theater and auditorium facilities. Kenyon said "Thanks - but we're good with the old stuff we have." So Newman asked "Well, then what can I do?"
 Pic is Kristi Noem, gun-totin' Conservative who happily won in South Dakota.
Many races I feel good about (like Allen West and Dan webster in FL, Toomey in PA, etc), many I feel badly about (like Debicella losing in CT with a 50-50 result, and Sean Bielat's spanking by the horrible Barney). Angle was a lousy candidate, and it will be good fun to have Dingy Harry to kick around again. Summary of votes at RCP.
I enjoyed this from Gateway:
Racist, sexist teabaggers have elected Marco Rubio, Susanna Martinez, Tim Scott, Nikki Haley, Bill Flores, Allen West, and...
Still, Eugene Robinson says it's about race and Obama.
Pitiful.
From Chantrill:
In the end, of course, it doesn't matter whether President Obama is a socialist, a crypto-socialist or a liberal. From the point of view of the ordinary American it's a distinction without a difference. Faced with a problem, President Obama will always opt for a solution that makes government bigger and Americans smaller.
Unfortunately for the president and his grand plan to transform America, the majority of the American people believe that the solution to our problems is to make the American people bigger and the government smaller.
Former President Bill Clinton - who presided over his own first-term electoral catastrophe in 1994 and is thus something of an expert on Republican landslide wins - denied this election is a referendum on the Obama agenda. "It. Is. A. Choice," he said. "A choice between two different sets of ideas." Well, obviously it's a choice; the people are simply choosing to reject the Democrats' ideas. Mr. Obama quipped, "The big difference here and in '94 was you've got me" - a point on which all sides can agree.
More misc. links later if I can find time to clean up my tabs...
My greatest disappointment was Barney Frank's easy defeat of Sean Bielat. I don't get it. I do notice, however, that the Maine legislature has flipped to Repub. That is remarkable.
Otherwise, this important warning at Pajamas - What Republicans Need to Do Now, subtitled If Republicans avoid over-estimating what this victory means and focus on the business of the American people, the gains of 2010 can be the beginning of a conservative resurgence:
Victorious Republicans should enjoy their election victory, but they should also understand it does not mean that the American people have bought wholesale into conservative political philosophy, as is so tempting to believe after a big election.
Tuesday, November 2. 2010
We will not be live-blogging, drunk-blogging, stoned-blogging, pajamas-blogging, nude-blogging, or otherwise reporting or commenting on election returns tonight.
Furthermore, we promise to post no profound statements about "what this election really means."
 Having some friends over late tonight for a couple of hours to watch the election returns.
We'll have a jolly time, regardless of the results. Richard Baehr advises me not expect too much.
All I want is a "restraining order," for now.
ANY WONDER WHY CALIF. IS GOING BROKE?
California Academic Performance Index (API) California Access for Infants and Mothers California Acupuncture Board California Administrative Office of the Courts California Adoptions Branch California African American Museum California Agricultural Export Program California Agricultural Labor Relations Board California Agricultural Statistics Service California Air Resources Board (CARB) California Allocation Board California Alternative Energy and Advanced Transportation Financing Authority California Animal Health and Food Safety Services California Anti-Terrorism Information Center California Apprenticeship Council California Arbitration Certification Program California Architects Board California Area VI Developmental Disabilities Board California Arts Council California Asian Pacific Islander Legislative Caucus California Assembly Democratic Caucus California Assembly Republican Caucus California Athletic Commission * California Attorney General
Those are just the As. The rest are below the fold.
Continue reading "California state agencies"
With special reference to Dick Blumenthal, at Am Thinker
 I just voted. I enjoyed it.
This Land Is Your Land, This Land Is My Land
Related: This Is America, Stupid! And it's not just the economy. It's the disrespect for the wishes of the electorate, who pay for everything.
The elite without a country
Sharpton: Blacks Unemployed Because Of Racist Republicans
Al should write for The Onion
Chavez Says Venezuela's Golf Courses Should Be Seized, Put to Other Uses
Chavez should write for The Onion, too.
Tina Brown beclowns herself
She could write for The Onion too.
Was stimulus Barack Obama's 'original sin'?
Slaughter at Baghdad Church- 52 Murdered Including 3 Priests During Al-Qaeda Siege , and Churches Set Ablaze
in Russia's Muslim Caucasus
These perps obviously need better jobs, social workers, teachers with better pensions, and more understanding. Or are they just still mad about Gitmo?
MAINE FAMILY ROBINSON’S Top Ten The Hell With It, I’m Outta Here Movies
Somewhat related: The houseboat on the Pawcatuck River
The ‘big dog’ in campaign spending. Unions.
Who's Afraid of Marco Rubio?
Marco looks like a star. They always go after the potential stars, drive up their negatives or break their legs.
Americans are about to give Obama a bloody nose. Why? He just doesn't share their core values
Young Voters Say They Feel Abandoned.
Pathetic.
Monday, November 1. 2010
My chimney sweep was here at noon (to check my flue after my fire on Friday). As he was scoping out my chimney and sending his brushes and vision device up there like a colonoscopy, he commented "I hope we send a clear message to Washington tomorrow."
He is retired career USMC. He still lifts and runs every day, and it is obvious. Oorah. His son is a SEAL.
(He has a very good business going - at $150 per chimney, he was booked up solid from August through December, and does a second round in Feb. for heavy users. His preferred customers have multiple chimneys. Like a dentist, he sends out reminder postcards to his people each July to make appointments. He has a deer- and turkey-hunting cabin on 200 acres up in West Nowhere, NY, has a modest life and doesn't really need the money, so he uses his income to bring his entire family, including grandkids, on one-month European trips every June. He rents a big house with a cook and housekeeper in a different place each year, flies the the folks over and back whenever they can get free to come, and rents cars for them. Last year, he did Scotland. In past years he has done a Greek island, Tuscany, the Czech Rep., Sweden. This June he plans on Sicily, which I told him I felt was an excellent choice).
I said to this hearty, red-blooded American: "I think we will send a message, but who will be listening?"
Get your chimneys cleaned, Maggie's Farmers. We cannot afford to lose any readers in house fires.
He thinks the numbers predict a historic Dem smash-up. Says Jay:" I had to rub my eyes and look a second time. I could barely believe it."
I think it's all about turn-out.
From Fernandez' Aftermath at Pajamas:
...the sheer ferocity of the campaign suggests that all sides see it as a Rubicon, which once crossed means that more is to follow. Perhaps nobody sees 2010 as an end, only as the beginning of a very fundamental struggle.
The proximate cause of the conflict, even though he is ultimately not its basic antecedent, is the president. The Washington Post calls Barack Obama the divider-in-chief. He didn’t create the fence; he simply made it impossible to straddle it. The president has made it necessary to choose political sides. In a way, Barack Obama has done more than any recent president to cast the issues starkly.
It has been made clear as day to voters that a vote for a national Dem is a vote for a Leftist agenda.
Lots of Conservatives are excited about the elections tomorrow. It's this year's political World Series. With the numbers running for election, etc., a 45-seat Repub House pick-up would be fairly normal for a first midterm, so anything over that would be a big deal. I have no idea what to expect. All I know is that a wave-type Repub House victory will be like closing the barn door after the cows got out, and that it will be - and will be intended to be - a refudiation (thanks to Mrs. Palin for that handy neologism) of the Dem's national agenda.
Krauthammer:
Over the next two years, Republicans will not be able to pass anything of importance to them - such as repealing Obamacare - because of the presidential veto. And the Democrats will be too politically weakened to advance, let alone complete, Obama's broad transformational agenda.
OCR Editorial: What Tuesday might mean
Politico: Grim Dems await huge House losses
WSJ: A Vote Against Dems, Not for the GOP
Only partly true, I think.
Democrats blaming the victims
They called us names
We don't like that.
Parker: Obama's missing sense of humor
Especially about himself.
Via Driscoll:
“Only one question remains — what area of the private sector — aside from the slip-and-fall attorneys — isn’t hated and vilified by the Obama Democrats?”
Realted from Gerson: Obama the snob
His politics, somebody told me, are those of "the typical upper class Liberal, Ivy-educated, suburban white woman." Well, I see more Alinsky than Escalade in the dude, but I might be wrong.
Barone's Obama's Economists Missed What Voters Plainly Saw
The line from the Obama camp is that voters are confused, ignorant, misled or even racist; they can't be rejecting the president's party on the merits. But voters, in rejecting the Obama Democrats' vast expansion of government, may be more sophisticated than their supposed betters. Leave the private sector alone, they seem to be saying, so it can recover from the financial crisis recession and once again create the bounteous and unscripted growth that has been the norm in American history.
WSJ: CBS Phone Recording Sets Off Firestorm in Alaska
This sort of thing has a history at CBS...
Dick Morris reviews Daniel Hannan's new book
Sunday, October 31. 2010
Diogenes would find an honest man in Mark Tapscott, editorial page editor for The Examiner. Rare in Washington, D.C., Tapscott has not been compromised by decades there, retaining clear conservative vision and fortitude, always reaching out to promote others rather than himself.
In his editorial, Tapscott writes of the coming major Republican gains and the widespread disillusionment with Democrats� statism, �the message for the GOP: Voters seem willing to give you one more chance to do what you've promised for decades -- cut federal spending, reform entitlements, and restore limited government. Don't blow it.�
As always, Tapscott demands much of our politicians, and of us. He and we will likely have many disappointments.
President Obama will still have the veto, and shows little proclivity to be any less ideologic or self-centered. Even at the most optimistic gains next Tuesday, the Republicans � even if all stick together in legislative battles � will not have a veto-proof weight in Congress. Plus, the regulatory bodies, stocked with Obama allies, will continue to push the left�s agenda.
If the Republicans are wise, there will be many, many opportunities, however, to stall the Obama administration�s leftward march and to expose its waywardness. That will well-serve Republicans and Americans as we consider the 2012 choices.
But, rollbacks, especially major ones, are unlikely, for now.
Just consider, post-1994, how the liberal Congressional minority and its allies in the media even successfully resisted cuts in the federal funding for PBS. And, consider how President Clinton cooperated with Republicans for major welfare reform, compared to the partisan rigidity in all things exhibited by President Obama.
Many will, thus, feel the wind slackening from our sails during the next two years, unless we keep to our oars toward the shore of 2012, to replace President Obama and to send even more courageous Republican conservatives to Congress.
Mark Tapscott and I once reminisced together about how we both started out, lonely in overwhelming Democrat locales in 1964, to see through perseverance following that the growth of a new, vibrant conservatism onto the national stage and mind. I am as optimistic as ever, and so should you be, if we persevere.
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Mark Tapscott, also, points us to this Halloween video:
Swamp Thang Thriller from RightChange on Vimeo.
 Body paint Halloween pics via Tiger
The killjoys come out on Halloween.
Has Boxer ever done anything useful?
The Looming Congressional Investigations
I want the truth out about how Fannie and Freddie - out of control government agencies - caused the financial mess.
City Journal: Already strong in New York, the Working Families Party looks to go national.
Unions Give More Campaign $$ To Dems Than Corporations To GOP
Government unions own the Dems
A bummer from Rick Moran: WHY THE GOP WILL PROBABLY FAIL
Saturday Night Card Game (Bill Maher Out Juan-Williamses Juan Williams, Media Silence Erupts)
Marco Rubio outshines Sarah Palin
The 20 most gerrymandered districts (h/t, reader)
Sinecures with no competition is the goal. No knowledge or skills required, great benefits, a sense of importance, and no heavy lifting or real world responsbility.
Obama appeals for an end to partisan politics — with a jab at GOP
France... "Spoiled and Selfish".... America's View
Inequality Statistics and Poverty Facts
Ronald Reagan was the Tea Party
He was. And even he could not shrink the leviathan.
Michelle: The rise & resilience of conservative women
WSJ: Requiem for the Pelosi Democrats
Radical in the White House:
Katherine Lopez interviews Stanley Kurtz on his new book, Radical-in-Chief; as does Hugh Hewitt — who not too long ago would hang up on all the unserious rightwing “nutters” who intimated that Obama was a Marxist or socialist, in between shilling for whatever candidate the GOP establishment put forward.
Turns out that the evidence, largely circumstantial, but compelling nonetheless, suggests that Obama is a candidate trained in stealth socialism, both a product of — and culmination to — the New Left’s long march through the institutions. Of course, today the “New Left” self-identifies as “liberal” or “progressive,” to hide their socialist/Marxist roots. Their governing style is “pragmatic,” “forward thinking,” and “transformative”; and their message is one of economic populism, class warfare, and identity politics — all couched in the Orwellian inversions of protected groups, set-asides, government-approved speech, and the nannystate tentacles of a growing liberal fascism, into the (ironic) buzzwords “fairness” and “tolerance” and “security.”
Watts:
Reducing human CO2 emissions will likely have no measurable cooling effect on planetary temperatures.
Politico: Suburban nation, but urban policies
Pajamas: NPR and the Liberal Subculture that Worships It
Bunch of good stuff at Moonbattery
Saturday, October 30. 2010
The attack-dog presidency: two liberal Democrats denounce Obama for "pitting group against group for short-term political gain that is exacerbating the divisions in our country"
Also related: US midterm elections: Barack Obama's world turned upside down as Democrats face electoral disaster
The man is not behaving well, and his behavior does not reflect well on the office he holds. He should know, at least, that if there needs to be any nasty and dirty lashing out, it ought to be done by somebody other than the president.
Americans do not want to make an idol of a president, or of the office, but I think they like to feel that the prez aspires to be the president of all the people, even those who hold policy differences.
Is the mask slipping, revealing an inner anger, a coldness, a disrespect for the American people, and an indifference to truth?
Or is it just Chicago gutter politics, brought to a national stage?
Whatever it is, it is not seemly - and I think it is disturbing to the country. It certainly is disturbing to me to learn that "our" Prez regards me as more of an enemy than he does Ahmadinejad.
And, if he views me that way, how can I be expected to view him as my President?
Brodsky: An endless string of broken promises
Yes, lots of 'em. Let's begin with "post-racial" and "post-partisan."
Islamic Jihad leader: Israel must be wiped out of existence
Organizers say up to 100,000 people attend largest Islamic Jihad rally in Gaza in several years; Hamas leader calls for unity against Israel.
Gardiner on Krugman's piece:
Not only is Krugman’s article one of the most ridiculous pieces of scare-mongering in the history of modern American journalism, but it is the pathetic whimper of a decaying liberal Ancien Regime that is spectacularly crumbling.
TNR: Why John Boehner’s Life Is About To Become a Living Hell
There is truth to this. Every time you shrink government, you gore somebody's ox.
Lowry: Pelosi’s Cannon Fodder
That's what the game is about.
Thornton: What This Election Is About - The free individual versus the overpowering state.
Cushman at Am Thinker:
I think this should be the slogan that the Republicans run on: "Your life belongs to you, not to the government.
Washington Times:
Rather than paring down what they owe, millions of consumers have simply stopped paying the bills, forcing banks to write off hundreds of billions of dollars in mortgages and credit card debts as uncollectible.
People aren't paying down their debt: they are running way from it. A bad idea, if yu care about your credit rating.
California: The tax-me-more state
What are they smoking?
The Impact of Government ‘Student Aid’
Duh. It raises prices.
Blue turns to red - good graphs.
PJ O'Rouke on Democratic hate:
Democrats hate Democrats most of all. Witness the policies that Democrats have inflicted on their core constituencies, resulting in vile schools, lawless slums, economic stagnation, and social immobility. Democrats will do anything to make sure that Democratic voters stay helpless and hopeless enough to vote for Democrats.
Whose parties are they?
...the Democrats have the support of more, and more active, billionaires. Of the 20 richest ZIP codes in America, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, 19 gave the bulk of their money to Democrats in the last election, in most cases the vast bulk - 86 percent in 10024 on the Upper West Side. Meanwhile, only 22 percent of non-high-school educated white males are happy with the direction the country is going in. The Democrats' overlap with elites leaves each party with a distinctive liability. The Democrats appear sincerely deluded about whom they actually represent. Democrats - who would have no trouble discerning elite solidarity in the datum that, say, in the 1930s the upper ranks of Britain's media, church, business and political institutions were dominated by Tories - somehow think their own predominance in similar precincts is ... what? Coincidence? Irony?
I agree with Neptunus:
Nancy Pelosi may lose her gavel, and Harry Reid might well lose his Senate seat, but the damage is done: The entitlement state progresses sometimes by fits, and other times by bounds. But the appetite to spend other peoples’ money on well-intentioned schemes is never sated, and the “progress” thus engendered never seems to unwind.
To what pols does the NFL PAC donate?
Barbara Boxer too? Good grief.
Friday, October 29. 2010
With gerrymandering - especially racial gerrymandering to insure black congressional districts - the Dems become increasing reliant on their safe seats in uban areas, the coasts, and small, isolated Dem islands in the rest of the country.
Thus, except for unusual election years (like this one seems to be), few seats are ever really contested. Congressional seats, like state legislative seats, tend to be sinecures.
The irony is that those "safe seats" and guaranteed black seats that the Dems wanted ended up creating Conservative seats also, by concentrating their voters in specific areas. Dem plantations, as it were - regardless of skin color.
Only in major "wave" elections are very many national seats contested. It's too rare. Every election should be contested or contestable. Safe seats cause us to end up with elderly lunatics like Barney Frank and John Conyers in charge of things - people who wouldn't be voted out even if caught running gay prostitution rings out of their houses.
This is one reason the national Dems become an increasingly Lefty party. It's a shame, because it would be the best for the country for no congressional seat to be taken for granted. I am a believer in the big tent approach for both parties. Debate and disagreement is good for all.
See this:
After midterms, House Democratic Caucus to become more liberal as House becomes more conservative
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