So party insiders they can make anonymous attacks on their own Party Chairman.
To continue to support Vichy Dem candidates who work against the interests of our base, from the New Yorker (not yet up online, starts on pg 69, NOVEMBER.14,2005 issue):
The fact remains that when Schumer was selling the idea of Caseys candidacy to Beltway Democrats, polls showed Casey leading Santorum by fivepoints. By early summer, that gap had reached seven points, then thirteen. A poll taken in October showedCaseys leadoverSantorum at eighteen points.
That may be why Democratic activists are beginning to sign on. Werthan says that the women in her circle,many of them new to politics, are as motivated by their desire to turn out Santorum as they are by abortion politics. “They are crazy over getting rid of Santorum,” she says. “He scares them to death. I think they sort of woke up and said, ‘Oh, my God! Nutso!’ 1 think that they saw hisambitions unfold, and they saw that he was headed toward trying to run for President.”
Kimberly C. Oxholm, a Democratic activistwho is associated with Planned Parenthood, says that she and some of her friends have begun to develop a rationale for supporting an anti-abortion Democrat. “I’m beginning to feel comfortable,” she says. “1 think a lot of us are. Thinking about it nationally, Bob Casey is going to be, we hope, a member of the Democratic majority. That alone is going to be hugely beneficial for reproductive rights and women. He said he’s not going to Washington to push an anti-abortion agenda. He’ll be, hopefully, part of a majority, and he’ll vote with people like Harry Reid”-the Democratic leader in the Senate. “Reid’s not wonderful on abortion, either, but he’s really good on all the family-planning stuff. Hopefully, there won’t be any major vote coming up where he’ll have to vote differently.”
A Faith-Based Initiative
What the Democrats can learn from Kaine’s Virginia victory
Mr. Happy says that all Democrats and Americans win when we all live under a Theocracy.
Images copyright 2005 Hugh “Mr. Happy” Greenish — used without permission but with appreciation.
I’m offended by the gratuitous use of graphic violence to shock the reader into a state of bias. The imagery stuns, thereby aggravating the exploitation in the controversy of gun control.
Now,…what was the question?
I’m offended that you’ve obviously been spending too much time over at the orange place.
I would be insulted by the obvious insuation of wrongdoing if I had any of what you’re talking about.
Good thing I don’t. I wasn’t really offended by the original post. I take very little in life too seriously so I can save the genuine outrage for when it’s deserved.
I just sensed the author was a madman and I attempted to reply accordingly.
Yesterday there was a whole series of posts on dkos about people being by one thing or another. I wrongly assumed that you were referring to this and made my “joke”. As they say, my bad.
I’m sorry I missed that series of events. I’d enjoy that sense of humor. I was doing the same thing in our exchange here, unaware of the greater conspiracy. I think I got myself in a little trouble at this site taking a controversial stand that involved possible hypersensitivity to issues.
I am dedicated to many issues but I also think more harm can be done in creating divisions unnecessarily.
I still sense that the author is a madman.
I agree. BTW, I’m sure that any controversy was only a prompt for good discussion.
What sane person could live in this world and not be crazy? — Ursula K. LeGuin
Whe reason fails in discussion, all further statements require higher volume
The Radical Moderate
Who is this stupid cow, Kimberly C. Oxholm … seems like she cares more about elephants than women’s reproductive right.
What a tool… almost on par with Kos and Chris Bowers “GENIUS PLAN” that bails out Bush for impeachment…
FUCK CASEY….
*WOMEN WILL BE NOT BE BETTER OFF BY INCREASING ANTI ABORTION DEMOCRATS… IT IS A FUCKING LIE.
this explains it:
“If elephants aren’t breeding in captivity, they’re going to be gone,” Philadelphia Zoo director Alexander L. Hoskins said.
Who is this stupid cow, Kimberly C. Oxholm … seems like she cares more about elephants than women’s reproductive right.
I also asked that question while reading Madman’s diary. It was my first question. She does not appear to be ‘associated with PP”. Indeed the only cite I could find for her which even remotely associated her with any issue affecting women was some association with the Center for Reproductive Law and Policy.
She appears to be a wealthy, Democratic donor with a primary concern for animal welfare issues.
It appears that the Democrats are employing the GOP ‘token’ strategy in regard to ‘women’s issues’ and the women’s vote. How sad is that?
He would be much better than Santorum, but I would like Pennachio to do well. We need to make a case against Casey and make sure the pro-choice wing of the party gets heard.
Furthermore, I don’t want to see Pennachio defined as a one-issue candidate. The problem with McGovern is that he was defined as a one-issue candidate and lost. I would like to see the candidates lay out their visions and let the voters decide who the best candidate is.
I am very disappointed with the conduct of Casey’s supporters over at Kos. I asked them if Casey would denounce the self-righteous Pharms who would deny a prescription to a woman who had been raped, and I did not get a satisfactory answer from them.
I would vote for Casey over Santorum any day, but I would vote for Chuck in the primary and would totally understand why anybody here would not vote for Casey in the general election.
but he wouldn’t be … he’d be another traitor crossing the aisle to pass TRAP laws and giving them the shine of being “bipartisain”, the same way the corporate asskissers like Biden do when passing shit like bankruptcy bills.
Enough of this. the working people and women who want to determine their own destinies deserve to have a party that fights for them.
You should also know that Bob Casey’s brother is on the board of Democrats for Life, the folks who are ready to roll out the 95-10 plan against abortion.
If Casey is anti-EC, they don’t want to admit it, because it would take away from his ability to say he is pro-family planning.
He would be much better than Santorum
How? When people make this statement I keep asking this question because I don’t see how a guy offended by the notion of gays adopting children, a guy who is opposed to all abortions except for those caused by rape, incest or to save the life (but not the health) of the woman, a guy who, in order to demonstrate that he’s really not trying to shove his religion down our throats, supports the death penalty, I do not see how this guy would be much better than Santorum or Zell Miller, for that matter. They’re peas in the abstinence only pod.
Especially since recent history has very clearly shown that misogynist “Democrats” like Casey will put their misogyny before anything else when it comes time to vote. His pro-worker stances often get trumpeted, for example. But take Supreme Court nominations. I’m willing to bet that he supports both Roberts and Bush’s latest bag of shit, even though both hold overwhelmingly worker-hostile beliefs. Why? Because they’re part of the same Cult of Social Conservativism.
Electing an anti-choice Democrat is a recipe for disaster, because they will vote with the other party on any important vote. And they will work tirelessly to move the party to the right. The only reason to support an anti-choice Democrat is if you don’t think the Republicans are right-wing enough.
Maybe I should do some diaries endorsing Pennachio. I’ve been on the sidelines on this one for a while, but we need to give Casey a run for his money and force him to earn our votes and not just assume he will automatically get them. We all know what happens when you assume; for a hint, it is in the first three letters of the word.
With Democrats like this, who needs…ughh. A candidate should not be getting support only because he is less extreme than the incumbent against whom he is running.
Especially when he is only marginally less extreme than the other wingnut.
The sad thing is that I’ve seen people I know who are pro-choice, and involved in pro-choice groups locally, have been so anxious to get rid of Santorum that they try to find some reason to support Casey. In my book, there is none. I know the fashionable excuse is that he’s great for labor issues, but frankly, an increase in the minimum wage doesn’t mean jack to me if women are second-class citizens who have fewer rights than men and fetuses.
And for those that say “but, he’s on our side!” (big orange, not here), I say, where’s the evidence? He went after PP when he was auditor general here in PA (yes, I need to dig up the link). How do you think he’d vote as a senator? I’m pretty sure he’d pull a Nelson and back Alito. He sure hasn’t told us via his campaign.
Some of us pro-choice people are actually more pro-life than the proclaimed pro-lifers. I think each life is valuable but it’s not up to me to decide when one begins, which ones continue and when one should end. This includes areas of war and the death penalty that many pro-life folks do support. By that standard, I can’t pass judgment on others faced with that decision. Society passes judgment when the circumstance is defined by law.
The issue is the right for each person to hold their own moral standard to apply in areas where we have no solid answers to matters that some groups want regulated by law. Many groups are not pro-life but anti-choice.
I do know that when settling to choose between the lesser of two evils, the choice is still an evil one.
Here’s a link to a Time article than looks at Democrat candidates combining faith/religion with politics.
I’ve tried to discuss the choice issue with people who bundle it in as a matter of faith. I can’t understand basing war and the death penalty on religion while claiming a moral law where no definite answers exist.
I think that the foundation of any faith is the view that it is achieved by making the right choices in life. A sincere faith-based political platform would almost have to be based on the respect of individuals to come to any faith by choice and not by force. The unique characteristic of having respect for others to make individual personal decisions in these matters should be a fundamental principle.
and that is nothing new. I’ve met the man and I have heard him speak about why he is a Democrat. He told us about his father-in-law Linwood Holton, the first Republican governor of Virginia since Reconstruction, who desegregated the schools and after that never held elected office again. He told us about wanting something more than being just another lawyer, so he took a year off law school to go be a missionary in Honduras, and that affected everything he did since. After he finished law school he worked as a civil rights attorney. He also told us how people were all excited about how this faith thing worked for him and kept calling him up asking how they could duplicate it. Which is sort of dumbfounding if you think about it.
I am not religious but I was raised up Catholic so I absolutely understand this call to service he feels as a result of his faith, and I respect it. People who think they can duplicate Tim’s election results by cutting some commercials about God or values or whatever, are fooling themselves. Voters can tell when you’re for real about that stuff and when you’re making it up as you go along.
Also, the issue was muddied in the campaign, but Tim is basically pro-choice. Yes he supports those so-called “reasonable restrictions” that none of us pro-choicers like. But what it comes down to is, when they go to challenge Roe, he’s going to be on our side.
I was present at one of the debates that Jerry Kilgore didn’t bother to show up to, the Kaine-Potts debate at George Mason University. Afterward I was hanging around watching the candidates and their people and the journalists and everyone. And I was standing near Tim Kaine when he got into a spirited discussion with a young woman who was pro-life. They were talking about all those bullshit restrictions that try to shut down abortion clinics by saying what shape the building should be or how big the parking spaces should be or stupid stuff like that. And I was floored by the fact that, instead of obfuscation and sound bites, he was laying out a clear position to her and defending it, that these laws were not for the protection of women’s health (as she claimed) and that it was not appropriate nor good policy to use them as a backhanded way to shut down clinics.
He’s a good man, he’s a smart man, he’s on our side, and I’m awfully glad he’s going to be my governor.
Thanks for that great insight.
I cannot get over how, when you take the time and trouble to say stuff on this site, people thank you for it instead of looking for any excuse to rip you a new one.
So thanks for reminding me we’re all human. 🙂
I rely on others to present information to help fill in the gaps of my ignorance as I form my own opinions.
ha!…The jury is still out on my level of humanity. My only hope is that the jury is merciful
Give me a fucking break… Kaine is about as pro-choice as Sanatorum…. not only that he fucking believes in this abstinence only bullshit… which has put over a 7th of the entire female population of Timken High School into the local Maternity Ward…. so please do not try to rewrite history… he was NOT pro-choice candidate but a NO-CHOICE Democrat… either Kaine or the Devil… (which was not an obvious choice) and it only broke towards Kaine in the last week…
This is that same shit over and over again and the Democratic leadership is in league with the GOP… the put up the Devil incarnate candidate and the Democratic leadership responds by running the Republican candidate for them.
As for Sanatorum… IIRC he is slotted for some kind of high ranking nomination… so the GOP is just “replacing” him with Casey… the same shit.
Last I checked Timken High School was in Stark County, Ohio. I’m not trying to rewrite anything, Parker, but I do live in Virginia, and I would appreciate it if you would
That’s good for a start. And then if you want to go on attacking Tim Kaine, you might take the time to learn a little bit about him. In the meantime? Cut it out with the lies.
Kaine backs abstinence-only education. Abstinence-only education has been shown to have many negative effects, including the incident she documented. It’s a horrible, horrible program that causes far more damage than it prevents.
What’s so hard to understand about that?
Nothing at all. I don’t agree with abstinence-only education. I would also point out that, according to his website, Tim Kaine supports abstinence-focused education, which is quite a different thing from abstinecne-only education. The sex ed unit I had in 9th grade biology contained information on pregnancy, birth control, sex acts other than missionary male-female vaginal sex, and more than you ever wanted to know about STDs and their prevention and treatment. A lot of this information was geared toward encouraging us to wait to have sex, and interspersed with warnings that we really ought to wait to have sex. It could be accurately described as abstinence-focused, and it was everything a sex-ed program should be.
So again, it would be nice if Parker would stop with the lies.
We’ve just elected a good governor for Virginia. When they gun for Roe here – and you may be sure that the ultra-conservatives in the state legislature will – Tim Kaine will be on our side, not theirs. He doesn’t support criminalizing abortion. His opponent, Jerry Kilgore, did. Therefore if you care deeply about reproductive choice (as I do) Tim Kaine was the obvious candidate to support.
What’s so hard to understand about that?
The sex ed unit I had in 9th grade biology contained information on pregnancy, birth control, sex acts other than missionary male-female vaginal sex, and more than you ever wanted to know about STDs and their prevention and treatment. A lot of this information was geared toward encouraging us to wait to have sex, and interspersed with warnings that we really ought to wait to have sex.
Uh… that would be your average Sex Ed class which
EVERY SINGLE SEX ED CLASS IS MANDATED TO ENCOURAGE ABSTINECE… Kaine seems to be very good at “muddying” the issue.
What’s the matter with Kaine… it has given the Dem Leaderhip the green light to force more anti abortion Dems into office… Massa… Taylor… Casey
So what’s wrong with it? What’s wrong with abstinence-focused sex education? Which is what Tim Kaine supports.
This isn’t a hard concept.
that’s wrong with the teenage pregnancy rate in places like Texas, where we’ve been focusing on abstinence for quite a while now (that’s why Molly Ivins calls Texas the national laboratory for bad government — it was us years ago, and the rest of you now).
They’ve started calling it abstinence “focused” now because abstinence “only” isn’t selling as well as it used to in the provinces anymore. And either way, it’s a hell of a hard concept if you’re a pregnant teenager.
Hi moiv. I’ve followed your diaries for a while now and really appreciate your writing.
Lying to kids about sex and birth control, and treating pregnant girls like pariahs, is bad.
Now that we’ve got that out of the way… I just don’t believe, based on what I know about Tim Kaine, that he supports either of those things. His campaign finessed this issue way more than I like, and used a lot of language that could be heard one way by the extreme pro-lifers, and another way by us. In fact, midway through, I got discouraged enough almost to give up, I was so tired of all the BS.
But like I said. I’ve heard him talk about why he’s a Democrat; and I’ve heard him talk about abortion rights off-mike; and I’ve had enough interactions with him to determine that he’s basically a good, decent guy. That’s why I don’t believe he supports lying to kids about sex and birth control. If I get a chance to see him again, I’ll ask him to his face. And if he doesn’t give the “right” answer I’ll make you proud – don’t worry. How’s that sound?
You sound like you have buyers remorse with the blatant blindess to Kaines short comings.
The problem that I have with Kaine and Casey et al… is not the fact that they are anti-abortion… but this ridiculous charade that everyone is trying to paint them as something that they are not.
Why can’t you and other just be truthful and say… “We sold out womens reproductive rights… to win an election”. This endless string of lies that these guys are not really against abortion and that myteriously they will protect the very issue that they campaigned against is tiring. Give it a break…
No Kaine is not pro-choice and Casey is as bad as Sanatorum… actually Casey is worse… at least Sanatorum can blame the GOP… Casey has no excuses.
Go take a flying leap, Parker. I don’t have any buyer’s remorse whatsoever. I’m glad to have Tim Kaine for my governor and relieved almost to the point of bladder failure that Jerry Kilgore won’t be. And I don’t give a hoot about Bob Casey. Or – well – I do, but you’re never going to catch me flaming people from Pennsylvania over him, one way or the other.
The only lie I see is you calling him pro choice
you have a short memory.
Please take a look at moiv’s reply to you about “abstnence focused education”.
A lot of women are looking very critically at the Democratic Party, at the gaming to sell us out and the push online that we “go along” to suit the party, the online whips and that “majority” sales pitch..
a lot of us are over 40, over 50 and over 60.
A lot fo GE elections we have seen come and go, a lot of off year elections. Propositions and wishes lies and dreams.
I suggest you pick up the current issue of The New Yorker. With Peter J Boyer’s piece (not online yet, sometimes they release the article a week post news stand sales) on Schumer Rendell and how Casey came to have the way cleared for him in PA. It is a partial version of a whole story (Pennachiop is never mentoned, but Hafer is), and none of us knows it all yet… Read from our stand point, wiht many elections gone by and long observation of the Party, we find it very devastating. And very telling.
There are lots of hard concepts out there. Very complicated ones too. The party is gaming women and “messy social issues” out of the nonexistant coalitions. There is no Big Tent.
But of course we all have our own take.
I realize a lot of women are upset. Parker curses for them all, I guess. The point I am making here is that Tim Kaine does not equal Bob Casey Jr. or any of those other people Parker was screaming about. I’m not defending Bob Casey. Bob Casey is Pennsylvania’s business. I live in Virginia, and we just elected a governor who’s only partially supportive of women’s rights. But part is better than none (and it’s more than a lot of people seem to think: he’s NOT ‘pro-life’), and he’s going to be a good governor.
So, you know, chew me a new orifice if you want, but what I’ve done here is to take the long view, and support a guy who’ll grudgingly support my rights over one who would certainly do everything he could to take them away. What’s really disappointing is Leslie Byrne’s close loss for the lieutenant governor spot. If she’d won, she could well have been a viable candidate for governor in four years. Imagine that, a progressive female governor in Virginia. So hell yeah I did all I could for the coordinated campaign.
I don’t think you can be involved in electoral politics and still insist that everything is a true/false, black/white, on/off issue. You’d have to either turn into a giant hypocrite, or go slowly crazy.
No you have taken the short term view.
In the long run Kaine does not help but hinder the Democratic Party’s case to support women’s reproductive rights. His win has now justified Casey’s candidacy that will in turn justify Taylor… it is all a domino effect until the Democratic party will cease to be an opposition to the anti-abortion folks not only in actions but in the platform.
I’ve stayed out of much of this argument, but I can’t just let this go by.
There were people who were “partially supportive” of blacks rights too, back in the days of slavery, insisting that such a compromise was “necessary”. Included in those “wise” people were the founders, who defined a race of people as “3/5ths human” for the purposes of counting population. After all, what else were they supposed to do, despite slavery’s evil?
Of course, the difference here is folks like Kaine and Casey (we can argue degrees all we want) want to TAKE AWAY hard won freedoms from half of the citizens of this country, citizens who were considered their husband’s, father’s or brother’s PROPERTY less than a century ago.
Why is this so hard to understand?
If they aren’t free to make their own decisions about their destinies, about their bodies and health and families, then they aren’t free. Period.
So what were the struggles of the Abolition movement, Suffrage movement and the Civil Rights movement about if NOT the insistance that there ARE certain things that ARE true/false? I’m a secular humanist, so my list of those things is pretty short.
In a CIVILIZED country people have a fundamental right to their own autonomy, their own privacy and to make their own life choices as long as they don’t infringe on another person. And no, a bundle of cells is not a “person”, no matter what various patriarchical superstitions declare. Roe is a workable civilized compromise, and yet one side of the debate will not be satified with anything less than a full capitulation to THEIR worldview, and whether you like it or not, Kaine is part of that movement.
Okay, and if you were a 19th century activist and had a choice between supporting a candidate who was “partially supportive” of black rights or standing back and letting another candidate be elected who advocated shooting them all when their joints blew out or at age 30, whichever came sooner – what would you do?
This is the choice that was before me and other Virginia progressives. I don’t disagree with a word of what you say about the issue of choice itself. I believe firmly that the government and the courts have no role in the choice whether or not to terminate a pregnancy. It’s the woman’s choice. Period.
But when you enter the world of electoral politics, you have to accept that there is no candidate who is going to agree with you 100 percent on every issue. Come on, Madman, you know this. And you know that we have to have those ideological activists who keep themselves ideologically pure and never compromise on their one issue and pressure candidates and elected officials – and we have to have the partisan activists who get very friendly or kinda friendly or maybe only a little bit friendly people elected to office in the first place.
The role I’ve chosen for myself, for right now, is the latter. Is that the choice you’re criticizing me for? Because seriously, Madman, if all people living in Virginia who cared about women’s rights had decided they couldn’t possibly support Tim Kaine in any way because he wasn’t perfectly supportive of their issue, then we would have Jerry Kilgore for a governor right now, and they’d lose their rights a hell of a lot quicker.
AND AS A SIDE EFFECT, we wouldn’t have made gains in the state legislature, we wouldn’t have come as close as we did in the LG and AG elections (who knows, Creigh Deeds could still come out on top – we are all hoping). We wouldn’t have built on our organization and infrastructure and positioned ourselves well for the next election. These things are all related, as you also must know.
So, every individual has to decide for themselves how much compromise they can accept. Who they can and who they can’t support. As I’ve said elsewhere, I spent a good while wrestling over that question. I really don’t appreciate it when some random blogger who isn’t from Virginia, didn’t do a lick of work to help us win the victories we won, and is too busy screaming about Bob Casey to even think about standing in my shoes for a moment, accuses me of selling out. No, I’m not saying you said that.
Not to make this all about me, or anything. Thanks for your comment, Madman. It’s nice to talk with you even if we disagree.
I compromise on things like highway bills, educational funding … things like that.
What we shouldn’t compromise on is human rights.
Sadly, this endless compromising on OTHER people’s human rights serves only to lock in the onerous gains made by the rabid rightwing in this country.
And what do you mean by “gain”? A willingness to treat women as children, as “lesser than” beings subject to the whims of their husbands, their neighbors?
I reject the idea that it was somehow better to “compromise” with slaveholders, and if Americans had had the decency to deal with that evil at the beginning, perhaps much suffering could have been avoided. One could argue that there wouldn’t BE a United States in that case, but would we STILL be dealing with that cancer even now if more people had been less willing to “compromise”?
I don’t mean to be dismissive, but I find it appalling how cavalier Americans are with other people’s humanity. This is what enables our leaders to commit genocide in the name of Manifest Destiny. This is what allowed capitalists to chain children to machinery. This is what allowed a gentry to treat human beings as chattel, and this is what allows us now to commit atrocities in our own prisons and in prisons scattered throughout the world.
We either respect human rights, or we don’t, and plainly in this country we don’t. For that, I am deeply ashamed, and I thank the fates that I was raised in places other than the benighted South and other states where people are treated like shit in the name of God. As WI increasingly slides toward that backwards state, I am looking at my options to leave here, b/c I want no part of it.
So you’d go with Jerry Kilgore for governor. Great. I didn’t. I’m a woman, as it happens, so these are my rights we are talking about.
By the way, Wisconsin spawned Joe McCarthy – and voted overwhelmingly for George Wallace in a presidential primary. I was raised in Louisiana, where I learned at the age of five that if I ever even thought about saying anything derogatory about black people I would face my father’s wrath in a heartbeat. And worse, his disappointment. I guess southern states don’t have a monopoly on racism, nor northern states on decency. Go figure.
So you want to talk about human rights, you want to talk about racism. Tim Kaine, before he entered politics, was a civil rights attorney. He worked on fair housing issues. And he served as a court-appointed defender for people on death row. And he was an ardent anti-death penalty activist.
Jerry Kilgore made an ad that accused Tim Kaine of being a horrible person because he wouldn’t even want Hitler to get the death penalty. (Apparently the Kilgore campaign didn’t know about Godwin’s law.) And here’s a story one of my fellow Democratic activists told me last week. Jerry Kilgore was attorney general of Virginia when a woman saw a house she wanted. It was for sale. She walked up the dirt driveway to ask how much, but the owner told her he couldn’t sell it to her because there was a covenant on the house that prohibited it being sold to a black person. This has been illegal in Virginia for something like half a century. So she reported it and the fair housing people got the guy on tape telling another black person the same thing. Now this case comes across Jerry Kilgore’s desk and what does he do? Absolutely Nothing.
So now what, Madman – pretend you live in Virginia – are you still withholding your vote and allowing this man to be elected Governor without doing a thing to stop it? Not me. Do you see where I’m coming from, here?
I would not have voted for Governor.
Perhaps it’s time to admit that Nader was right, and perhaps the only thing that will wake Americans the fuck up is a sudden plunge into the dark ages. Under “democrats” like Kaine, we’re just frogs in hot water being slowly raised to a boil.
You have to follow your conscience, I just know that I can’t make these “compromises” anymore. I can’t look my nephew in the eye when he’s a young man 7 or 8 years from now w/ a pregnant girlfriend and say that I didn’t try to resist it.
Yes, WI has often been backward. It was also a center of the abolitionist movement, had several major office holders who were socialists, including a major city (Milwaukee) which was run by socialists for generations. It did produce McCarthy, but it also produced La Follette, had one of the first statewide systems of roads in the country and had a public health system that was a model for the rest of the country in the early part of the 20th Century. VA, to it’s credit, gave us Jefforson and a State Constitution that enshrined Religious liberties. I’m at a loss since then.
I actually grew up in IL, have lived all over the country and in spirit consider myself a NYer, even though I had to leave to pursue work. One thing I’ve never been, nor will I ever be, is a southerner. My relatives in Southern Illinois gave me enough of a taste of that to convince me to stay away.
I apologize for my stridency, but NO ONE is fighting anymore for human freedom and equality in this country. Both parties are beholden to the corporations and increasingly to religion (which are just tax-free corporations anyway).
Good luck in VA, b/c I think the Dems will just reach across the aisle and work with the Reps to take away more of your rights. Perhaps I’m wrong, but I doubt it.
I know what you mean.
When I moved back to Canada after 9/11 I had a choice in the Canadian elections between voting my conscience and making sure the Conservatives lost power in Ontario by voting for the Liberal party who was slightly ahead in the polls.
I swallowed my deep reservations and headed to the polling place. And as soon as I got there I broke down in the parking lot. My grandparents didn’t fight in a war so I could abuse my democratic right to vote for the candidate whose views I supported fully. So be it if the Conservatives held power again. If that’s what my fellow citizens wanted, then I couldn’t stop them and it would have been dishonest of me to vote for a party I could not abide anymore. So I walked in and voted NDP (socialist/ humanitarian party). And guess what… the Liberals still won and the next day a lot of people were upset they hadn’t voted NDP because they were too scared of the Conservative’s winning… and because of that we lost a much needed leftwing counterbalance in parliament.
Strategic voting didn’t happen in the Federal election that followed it and the NDP made some great gains and are now leading the charge to determine Canada’s future.
I recognize things are different in a two-party system, but you have to stand on principle at some point otherwise you just ain’t a liberal.
I meant to add that to compromise puts off eventual improvements, and I would sooner withhold my vote than support a religious bigot like Kaine. I don’t care how “nice” he is. I’m sure some of the missionaries that cut off my grandfather’s hair and taught him not to speak his nation’s tongue were “nice” people too.
I do not excuse his stance on reproductive freedom, but Kilgore was not an option, and Potts had no support. It’s hard for me, but on the real–my family still lives there.
I’m heartened b/c one of the major anti-choice zealots in the House of Delegates was defeated, but it’s still firmly held in rethug control of the wingnut variety–and they are crazy. Same as the state senate. And don’t forget–a rethug will be Lt. Gov (Leslie Byrne came awfully close, though) and it looks like the Atty Gen will go that way, too–though who knows what will turn out from the recount. Anyway, the rethug AG candidate was so extreme on abortion (not even in life/health of woman, and I believe not even for rape–he was also one of the leading anti-choice zealots in state leg), that the Dem AG candidate Deeds ran ads pointing out it out.
And did I mention that Deeds won the endorsement of the NRA? ((shudder))
All that to say that Kaine’s not perfect, but far, far better than Kilgore, and not even in a “Casey v. Santorum” way. He also will be the only statewide Dem, assuming Deeds loses the recount.
What to do now is to find and back a true progressive candidate who can communicate not just in NOVA but in rural parts of the state to run for gov, lt gov & ag–esp. gov. since they’re ltd to 1 term.
Thanks for the support. Last I heard the gap for the AG race had narrowed to just a little over 400. How that winds up is going to make a lot of difference in the abortion fight in Virginia. I’ve met Creigh too and I like him a lot. He comes across as really a gentle soul – the sort who’d fit in well here on Booman Tribune.
I think that we make a mistake if, in looking for a “true progressive candidate,” we look for just the right collection of issue positions and reject anyone who doesn’t have it. Mark Warner achieved something truly great for our state when he broke the back of the Republican coalition, and peeled off the old-school fiscal conservatives to get them on board with his budget reform. They fixed an $8 billion deficit and the state has prospered. That is the reason for his phenomenal approval ratings – it’s not some cult of personality; it’s that he got results on a very real problem that mattered to people.
And even better still, the Anti-Tax Drown-The-Government dog no longer hunts for voters in Virginia. Oh there are still koolaid drinkers out there, but on-the-fence types, whom we used to lose to calls for tax cuts, now understand what those tax cuts truly mean, and they support fiscal responsibility.
So what Mark Warner achieved is much more than a nice poll number. Or even coattails for Tim Kaine and some house of delegates candidates. What he achieved is a great ideological victory that will be with our state for some time.
The local Democrats are also doing very well, at least where I live. There’s a lot to be optimistic about in Virginia.
No problem. I just think that there are more issues to examine b/4 branding Kaine as Casey-like.
And even better still, the Anti-Tax Drown-The-Government dog no longer hunts for voters in Virginia.
Yes … and a few other things are different, too. One, I have to say that I was shocked to see Deeds run a commercial blasting McDonnell about his abortion stance. Second, the race-tinged use of the death penalty to defeat Democrats didn’t work(I will concede that for wingnuts, abortion may pay higher political dividends these days, but still). Third, commercials talking about “liberal Tim Kaine/too liberal to be governor–a tactic that I call “Liberal, liberal, liberal on the label, label, label”–didn’t work. Kaine won in outer burbs of NOVA; he won in friggin’ Tidewater. Something’s at work here. I don’t claim to know what it is yet, but these are positive steps in a state that still seems to be led by confederates (I’m from the Richmond area; I know of what I speak).
Now, to be clear, I would much rather have someone is pro-choice and unambiguously so. I am sick of these crazy ass wingnuts. But I’d much rather have the Mario Cuomo type (personally opposed but will follow the law) than someone like Casey who seems to me to be in this for the greater glory of his dead daddy.
I’d give money to clone Mark Warner: yes, he came off as a moderate, but he’s pro-choice, not afraid to be seen with people of color, knew how to talk to people in Danville, Martinsville, Staunton etc.
The reality of the matter is that this is still Virginia we’re talking about, home of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell and too damn many people still pining away about the “War of Northern Aggression.” There’s still more work to be done to change attitudes and educate folks who prop up those who only use them, but there’s hope. I just can’t dismiss it.
Absolutely right on all counts.
The first time I saw that Deeds ad (I don’t watch TV much) I was only half paying attention and thought sure it had to be a Republican ad… then I realized… wait a minute. There’s a Democrat talking about being pro-choice?! Amazing.
And he was so overwhelmed in the fundraising. Yet it’s so close. He could yet pull it out! Wouldn’t that be beautiful? If I could do over anything from this year, I’d have called all my friends and asked them to send Creigh Deeds money.
I didn’t even know Creeds was the AG candidate until I saw the commercials. I have no excuse b/c I know how to find out who’s doing what in Va. But the average voter? It’s a shame, but if you’re not on the air, to most people, you don’t exist.
Besides, McDonnel or whoever kept running those “I’ll stop child sex predator” ads which annoyed the hell out of me. What dodo head wouldn’t? The fear and loathing thing again.
But yeah…I’m hoping he can pull it out.
the Casey acolytes are cooing over:
How much do you feel you know about the POLICIES and / CHARACTER of BOB CASEY, Jr? Do you think you…
Know a great deal about him 5%
A good bit about him 17%
Not a lot about him 42%
Very little about him 35%
Do Not Know 2%
That’s right. A whopping 78% of those polled knew little or nothing about Casey. How much confidence do you put into these early polls now? Why are the establishment Democrats (and their online toadies) force feeding us these polls as evidence that an uncontested Democratic primary is in the best interests of the citizens of Pennsylvania?
Are you, like Kimberly C. Oxholm and Schumer sold on the early polls? Really? I’ve got something for you right here … lemme see, where did I put it? Oh yeah,
Right here.
Thanks for posting that…
I read polls and, when I can, I read the inner guts of polls. I take them in as a part of manufacturing consent.
I’d be stupid not to… unfortunately the Party has done all it can to shoe horn a religious freak into office. He has stated he supports legal protection of the fetus from conception (in his run for Treasurer he filled out a questionaire)
And judging from the New Yorker article (sadly not online, not yet atleast) too many PA Democrats, even activists for choice, are snookered.
I foresee California as being a strange refuge. I’d feel better if the coast would break off and become a separate state.
We are not a nation. Between Religion, fealty to hard line right wing war addicted Israel and a screwed-to-death-with-money press, we are lost.
Oh and Blogging is a soggy mirage. Won’t assist democracy. The Dem party is running it hard, at this end.
Not a good view forward. I feel sorry for the voters of Dover PA, they tried hard to do the right thing with the school board. They stood up for their children.
I would ask that of the nation and of the once great Democratic Party. But I won’t waste my breath.
This race (NJ) confirmed the speculation that embryonic stem cell research is an important, emerging Democratic wedge issue. For some voters, it’s an issue of healthcare. For others, it’s a matter of economics. As other states start to provide funding for research and development in the field, large employers will seek the best environment possible and no state will want to lag behind on the issue.
I hope PA voters are satisfied w/ out-of-state Democrats ensuring that they remain in the economic Dark Ages. If there’s one thing the New Yorker made clear, it’s that Casey Jr will not budge on this issue.
Like NJ, PA is home to a substantial portion of the pharmaceutical industry. Like you, I’m not sure anti-stem cell will play well in PA. And people here are more aware of Santorum’s extremism than they were in 2000. I can understand why the Dems are trying to hide who the real Bob Casey, Jr is from the voters.
Of course, the big boys tell me that I’m supposed to believe that the middle of the state voters are the key to every election, even though we’ve gone blue in the last several presidential elections.
You know, if the Republican party wanted to, they could hand the Democrats a massive defeat in PA.
Simply switch out Santorum for someone who looks more moderate and is willing to say the right things about his predecessor’s mistakes.
Of course, they aren’t going to do this. Casey gives them everything they want in a Senator without Santorum’s baggage. They have no reason to seriously oppose him, especially since the PA state party will ensure that he gets massive amounts of funding to “ensure” his election, causing serious damage to Democratic efforts elsewhere in the country.
Casey gives them everything they want in a Senator without Santorum’s baggage.
Casey will be a great deal more useful to them than Zell Miller or Lieberman are.
Imagine the glorious vision of Bob Casey speaking for the Democratic party on Meet the Press. It’s enough to make me vote for John McCain or Olympia Snowe. The good news is that Bernie Saunders is going to replace Jeffords. Oh, I forgot, Saunders isn’t a Democrat.
I’m in the middle and looking at both sides of this issue. Is there any chance I can get some honest opinions on this op-ed piece I found?
I can tell you that over 13 years that writer is pushing the Republican talking points, the Catholic talking points and the pro-life talking points about the ’92 Democratic convention….
Casey did not endorse Clinton for the presidency. that is always left out of the Republican/Catholic/pro life version.
I am nto a Democrat anymore, but I surely DO agree that to speak at the party’s national nominating convention and be seated in what politicans vie for, a place of pride, you do need to endorse your party’s nominee.
Thanks for the reply. Could you elaborate on what you see the GOP talking points to be that you referred to?…the Catholic talking points?…..and the pro-life TP?
I’m mostly interested in how you see them then and now, as in what changed to help stop winning elections.
The issue is that the rendition you offer is replete with the idea that Casey was denied speaking and being seated in a prominent place due to his pro life issues.
That is very clear when the reality of Casey not supporting the party candidate is left out.
”Big Catholics” such as Donoghue of the Catholic League and Flynn, former mayor of Boston and Amb (under Reagan iirc) to the Vatican have pushed that stuff for years.
Screamed it actually.
There are divergent views on what has ahppened to the Democrats in term of losing elections. IMO, They think that by casting off choice (and thus women) and casting off minorities and the poor that they can find some ever elusive middle. Or they can attract some ever migrating moderate R. I disagree… I think they avoid looking at themselves and their quadrennial and biannual elections ssytems and have lost touch with the voter, the base. I consider that critical. Also Democrats have practised soft KITV for a long time. NOt the hard election day illegal (or borferline) taht the Repubs do, but the Dems do not work to register new voters. NOT REALLY.
And one place they are not working is in the south with black voters (43% of eleigible blacks are registered in MS… that breaks my heart, I remember the days Chaney Schwerner and Goodman bodies were found). Deadly to neglect registration… Must build popular vote in the south. The always pushed illusion of the West and SW being pro Dem is not enough. Anyway Kerry only carried OR by 75K votes. A lot of danger. Democrats need to shore up in a lot of places.
Also a decade of both parties colluding (not always, but too often) to redraw districts, gerry mandered “safe” House seats is going to run deadly for the Democrats. The sweep of 94 for the Repubs predates a lot of redrawing of districts. There have recently been good recaps of this issue in the MSM and the political writers are looking at the 06 08 elections in light of redistricting. I wish them luck… very hard times still to come in my view…
Too often Democrats think that the R will implode, are imploding and thus we will get what I call “the boomerang vote”. Votes wil mysteriously turn around ing mid air and ‘come back”. Won’t be that easy.
Votes have to be fouhgt for on the ground, not just around elections.
The article I linked was chosen at random from ones that addressed those issues in some way. I’m trying to learn more about how this issue affects the voter’s decision rather than presenting a side.
I’m having some trouble figuring out exactly what the goal is on this issue. My understanding of the article and it’s relation here is that the Democrats previously assumed a strong pro-choice stand that somehow evolved to a pro-abortion stand instead. It seems like the issue is more of framing the argument by the GOP and the Democrats assuming the role the GOP defined.
I think that affected the elections but it would be second to vote fraud through computer system manipulation. That’s why Democrats lost the past couple.
Republicans really do run on god guns gays and abortion. Democrats run on a lot of defense. The electorate smells being on the defensive. It is deadly.
We’re stuck between an offensive defense and one that’s just plain offensive.