Nice to find you all... here's something i wrote at dKos in Feburary. Thought it a good companion to priceman's piece.
I used to love to vote. There was something powerful about flexing my civic muscle and flicking a voting lever. I loved the older ladies from the League of Women Voters who'd volunteer and sit for hours at school cafeteria tables with big ledgers and match voters to their names there. I loved signing my name in that big book, and I enjoyed the sense of belonging to this tribe of Americans. And yes, I always felt proud to finally walk into the voting booth, make my voice heard, and perform my civic duty....
That said, I'm not voting in the 2012 national American elections.
Voting has, for me, deteriorated to this: pulling the lever for brand-name candidates who will do the least amount of damage to my country while in office.
That's how if now feels. The lesser of two evils? It's even more dire: it's voting for the saner of two evils.
Please, don't unleash the "no vote is a vote for the other guy." No. It's not.
Nor is it a cop out or giving up.
The reason I am choosing not to vote is based on my decision to stop legitimizing a political system that is, in my perception, corrupt, ineffective, and stupid. There must be some other way (like local and regional politics, but that's for another day).
The whining Democrats are always blaming their ineffectiveness at implementing sane policy on the bat-shit crazy Republicans. And whining Republicans are always blaming bat-shit crazy Democrats of wanting to spend tax dollars on stuff like, I don't know, health care.
Here's where it becomes bizarrely interesting: The Jesus-Rode-a-Dinosaur Republicans can convince my cousin that HillaryCare or ObamaCare is a socialist plot to control her medical decisions. This, from a woman who has depended on socialized medicine (Medicare) since she was diagnosed with MS 15 years ago, not able to work, and has used much more in tax dollars than she has ever paid. But she doesn't want socialized medicine. wOw.
Seriously. I should be voting because??????????
yeah. Maybe teh stupid is the worst thing about the conventional brand of politics.
The Iraq war has cost us 1 or 2 trillion dollars. I've lost count. Of that, billions of those US tax dollars have been lost to mismanagement, overcharges, and literally being um misplaced (seriously, like, hey dude, did you see where I put that 6 billion dollars?)
Yet a majority of the best and brightest (god help us) continue voting to fund war apparently without concern for billions of misspent tax payer dollars. But they get all fiscal conservative over health care, school lunch programs, and food stamps. For crying out loud, they want to convince us that we can't afford health care??? when just the money misplace by the military would cover it for years.
And this isn't just Republicans. The defunding of so many important social programs, like PUBLIC EDUCATION et al, is due to the mismanagement of our government, taxes, the corporate sector... and that responsibility is one all national politicians and bureaucrats must shamefully shoulder (if they have any shame).
Bejesus.
Then there's that world economic collapse thing. When I think of ... gag reflex ... the bloody Democrats as the party pushing for bail outs for bankers and brokers in 2008, I could have spit blood. Really. Maybe stroke out, scream, or just stop voting. Again, with the giving away a trillion of our tax dollars.
Funny, I remember thinking that whole privatizing Social Security was a scam. Now I'm pretty sure it was to cover the 21st Century Crash... a crash far worse than the Great Depression.
Perhaps the most insane thing is the lack of any kind of enforcement of law and accountability on people who ruined the Gulf, or exposed our soldiers to depleted uranium, or committed fraud via bad faith financial products... nobody in high places is being sent to The Hague to face charges regarding torture or the death/injury/loss of innocent civilians in Iraq. Oh wait, I forgot, Lynndie England was held accountable... that should cover it don't you think? Or how about those who lent Greece money and then bet on the country to default. Well, you know, Martha Stewart (another woman, funny huh?) went to jail for $100,000 insider trading... I mean, you know, that was only about 10 years ago... and a clear example of our government's swift action to enforce accountability, right?
I ask you: What has been sane about the last decade? i know, it goes back farther, but it didn't get truly certifiable until BushCo. And forget ethical. It's so beyond that question. No, it's not fucking sane. It's ragingly radical. And yet none of these vampire elites (h/t jess) are facing any consequence as people lose their homes, jobs, and life savings.
Tell me the part again why I should vote? Who's protecting us? Who's representing us?
Then there was President Obama's 2012 State of the Union Address. To my ears, he extolled war, cars, oil and drill baby drill. Oh yes, and let's double down on clean energy and stop tax subsidies to big oil... just like he was gonna close Gitmo and felt really bad about signing NDAA (and tried to sooth us with a signing statement that has no force of law).
Now the President talked about economic justice and other things we progressives like to hear, but not in the first half hour. In fact, the first 10 minutes were about war and how returning war heros make booming economies. Really? I couldn't believe it. I'm still having trouble believing it...
Let me clear here: had I known the horrible impact of Bill Clinton's legacy and policy,] I would have probably stopped voting then. Okay, that probably would NOT have been enough to convince the whole system was rotting. I liked and believed in Al Gore and John Kerry. Yet now I'm not so sure. Would they have signed the NDAA as president? Expanded the war? Bailed out bankers and brokers? I'm not sure anymore. I'm no longer confident enough to answer that with any certainty.
I have to say this about George W. Bush. The man made me look. Yes he did. I was so perfectly happy in my little cocktail party world of brave political debate and edgy ideas.
Truthfully, I had no fucking clue. None. nada. And I'm a reasonably educated and intelligent person.
George W. Bush, a disaster for this country and the world, was so arrogant that he exposed what was behind the curtain. It's there... it's not just Republicans. Although, I will agree that Dems are more humane. But they didn't stop him. They didn't draw a line in the sand. Ha... when good democrats do nothing... enablers of evil? the lesser of two evils? I don't know. What I do know is this:
... it's not good enough. Not anymore.
Comments
you make a very good argument
This is a very cogent argument that you have presented. I'm in a Red State so my vote does not really 'matter'. I've voted consistently since I was 18, but the last few years I have really been questioning the point of voting. Emma Goldman said: If voting mattered, it would be illegal. I think that pretty much sums up my thinking on it now.
ha...
i'm sure Emma is right about that.
I voted more against
W than for Kerry and I worked like hell for Obama because I saw the ugly right up close after a McCain/Palin rally 10 minutes from my house. I don't know that I believed what I was selling on those phone lines--but the alternative sure scared that hell out of me. Now? Pffft. I'm told I have to vote because they've disenfranchised enough people in my state through a voter ID law and wouldn't Romney be so much worse?
So, there's my choice--the guy who wants to cut my safety net or they guy who's willing to. Some choice.
welcome to VOTS, pfiore8~
it's maddening, isn't it triv?
i know it's easy to make fun of the teaparty, but really, i'd love to imitate what they've done and the pressure they've applied within and from without the republican party... and make that work to herd brand Dems
absolutely.
It is quite maddening. I might like to see us have the vocal power of the teaparty, but nothing else. They were co-opted and given their marching orders to vote against their own interests from jump and so they do!
Buy a major network
and you too can have a tea party. The tea party was never a grassroots movement. There is nothing for progressives to emulate there and learn from. The tea party are a demonstration of the power of corporate money and propaganda to set the agenda of the country. It has little to do with organization and absolutlely nothing to do with the people expressing their will. I think it's important that we remember that, that we not confuse grassroots movements and what the people want with corporate manipulation of people and perceptions.
Supposing my vote counted in 2004 ...
... (given that I'm from Ohio) ... it would have counted against W. rather than for that bloviating wind bag Hedge Fund Democrat that ran before the most recent Hedge Fund Democrat won.
... (and, yes, if Al Gore had won, it would have been a Hedge Fund Democrat following up the first Hedge Fund Democrat in the White House) ...
... after the Republicans and Democrats swapped wings, with the Republicans getting the Dixiecrats and the Democrats getting the Rockefeller Republicans, so now we get a choice between either a Taft Republican or a Dixiecrat on the one hand, and a Rockefeller Republican on the other hand. woot.
However, I get to vote in November against gerrymandering and against a voter suppression law. I'll be voting for the saner wing of the dual Republican Parties in the Presidential race, but its the anti-gerrymandering and anti-voter suppression that I'm willing to canvass or phonebank for.
it's much better when biking
one place where i can empty my head and not think about the insanity. thanks for pointing out this place, bruce.
The club is gettng bigger
relative to those choosing not to vote. I remember at various times in my life there were movements for term limits, "throw the bums out", of which there still are I suppose but every time those ideas are shouted down as somehow antithetical to democracy with rationale that we have the power to vote them out anyway. There's pro's and con's to about everything but I just don't buy that. It wouldn't solve everything but I hate seeing the same old bastards in there decade after decade.
Actually, I got an email from October2011, the original Occupy movement organization, with this tidbit.
"ow will we shift the power? One way is by not voting for corporate parties. Occupies around the country are organizing to let the Democrats and Republicans know that we are onto their game and we aren’t playing anymore. We hope that you will get involved in some of the following actions!
There are other movements I know of by libertarians (Lew Rockwell, Gerald Celente) to Just Don't Vote. People need to rock the boat and if we fall out, so be it. It's sinking anway.
hey there Al.
i think that's the point, right? we're sinking anyway. when do we decide to act on what we perceive is the truth?
Don't "not vote"
If you don't vote you are a statistic of the "disinterested," no longer a member of the voting public.
Go to the poll, take your ballot, vote for nobody and then turn in a vote of your displeasure. That way your vote is heard, not the disinterested but "disenfranchised" by choice.
Truth is that we are all disenfranchised, most of us just have a right to either vote against our own interest or to vote against our own interest. So you could also write in "Nobody is worthy of my vote."
Would that be counted?
One argument for the Just Don't Vote idea is to make a mockery of the democratic process. Imagine if the percentage that voted in the Iraq elections was below 40% instead of the estimated 62-70% it was estimated at. The media would have made a big deal out of that, it did make a big deal out of the 62-70% turnout. What if the beacon of democracy, the country that spreads democracy around the world, can't muster even half the population to vote? What would that say and could it spur changes?
Well the way I see it
If you vote you are the least active participant in the "group conscious" of democracy. If you don't vote, your are not even counted as someone for them to ignore.
Politicians can place non voters into a "too lazy to care" category.
But if you register, go to the polls and vote for nobody, while that can still pretend you are not there, you were there. Instead of them being able to claim the vast amount of voter who "don't care" you become one who did care and showed up to register their opinion that both parties suck.
Heads would shake ...
... and tongues would tut at those irresponsible people not doing their civic duty.
But the corporate board rooms would be happy, so there wouldn't be any sustained interest in following up on it in the corporate mess media.
Under the range of anti-democratic anti-3rd party laws passed in the late 1800's when the Republicans didn't want to run against both the Democrats and the Progressives, a vote for a 3rd party is only a protest vote. However, its the protest vote that actually shows up and stays in the record, and under those same laws, it normally does the the 3rd party good.
That's why they are so adamantly opposed to 3rd party voting at Agent Orange, since too much 3rd party voting by people who see no difference on their top two or three areas of interest would start to undermine the legitimacy of the two-party hegemony.
i am intensely interested. that's been my problem.
i think local and regional voting is imperative, as is involvement there. what's cool in The Netherlands? they have an Animal Party. there's no big hoopla or drawn out year long electioneering. it has it's charm
P.S. Relative to Al Gore and John Kerry
Rage Against the Machine can tell you. Remember, anybody that gets that far. Anybody.
Can't see to be able to embed a video.
Anyway, I video of Testify where Gore and Bush are melded together and shown saying the same exact things on the campaign trail.
i tried to embed a video too, but couldn't.
anybody got any tips?
you need to pull
down that drop down next to "Text Format" and the next time you do--you should see the option for Full HTML--then just copy in the code and it should happen, if the comment still looks blank, refresh the page.
love this song and video
and it works fine for me. Hi Big Al, nice to see you here. Nice to be here.
great... you did it. i'll try it later.
well done.
great... you did it. i'll try it later.
well done.
George Carlin was right, again
carlin is ALWAYS right!
ha!
Heh, Yep! Bill Hicks, too!
carlin is ALWAYS right!
ha!
carlin is ALWAYS right!
ha!
withholding my vote also
I plan not to vote for any supposed lesser of two evils, will not vote for the R or the D. If there are other options on the ballot I will consider voting for one of them.
It will be interesting to see voter turnout numbers in November, but what can we even believe in these times.
yes, indeed.
what can we believe these days?
How the American vote counts
How many people do show up to vote?
Well the last time we had an undisputed mandate in this nation, the clock began ticking on January 20, 2009. If you were paying attention to the news Barack Obama had already done quite a bit of backtracking on that mandate by the inauguration but that is to be expected because the 69,498,215 votes he received cost him $10.94 per vote, $11.20 if you calculate from the amount raised instead of the amount spent.
Is it any wonder that before he even took office there was a press release that he had decided to not end the Bush tax cuts for the rich but wait until those cuts sunsetted. Is it any wonder that those Bush tax cuts would wind up becoming the Obama tax cuts. With that sort of cash he needed to accumulate quite a few friends in high places.
But what of that strong mandate? At the election, the U.S. population was about 305 million. Take away approximately 69 million Americans who were not old enough to vote at the time and that leaves around 236 million Americans. I'm not sure if undocumented workers are counted as population and I'm certainly not going to subtract the Americans prisoners and parolees because that is just bullshit from the elected that smacks of Jean Valjean.
So leaving it at 236,000,000 Americans over the age of 18, if my math is correct, that 69,498,215 vote mandate came from 29% of the adult population. Americans are so fed up with the politicians that mandates come from less that a third of the population.
And in the coming election since fewer American will be willing to bother with voting and far more money will be spent, I'm thinking that Obama's mandate is going to cost more like $20.00 a vote. If you include all of the grey money in this election, I don't expect much coming out of the $3.00 contribution I made.
i think voting is important.
and a lovely thing to do. and i absolutely agree with many that voting "d" is a stop gap measure. perhaps voting 3rd party is better than no vote. i will think about that.
to follow your point, we have lost big when 400 people decide on school board elections in townships with 100s of thousands of people... of course, those elections are in April and who has time to get to a polling place?
Yes, the organizing of positive solutions ...
... could well have to proceed from the ground up, and has to proceed from not following the bright shining lights from the corporate mess media but chasing local school boards, township commissions, town councils, and building up from there.
At the state / national level, its mostly playing defense, with the exception of throwing weight behind some particular positive policies that have intra-corporate party support on their side.
OTOH, there is always the option of supporting the greater evil:
that's either hysterically funny or sadly funny
the logo makes it work.
They are equal opportunity satirists ...
I'm voting
for Jill Stein whose on the ballot in 45 states. She's a Green. Never thought I'd vote for a Green . I really didn't like Nadar, he struck me as an icky cult like meglomaniac who I couldn't imagine in any position of power. The Greens never really moved me and he was the final straw. Kind of revolted me on a gut level.
I've come full circle and won't vote for any Third Way Machine Democrat. They are not the lesser evil they are just as evil, they are as Jill Stein says here, wolves in sheep's clothing. They are not Democrat's and in a way they are worse then the R's as they are much more effective at implementing their any-democratic, NWO, neocon, bankster agenda and convincing people that they are the only option and that they are moderate or centrist. Their freaking extreme look at what their doing to our rule of law and international law. Civil rights? human rights?
I was going to not fill in the top of the ticket or write in Dean or Bernie Saunders or maybe Johnny Depp. I am voting as there is a great progressive liberal running for mayor here. There are also ballot measures I'm for or against that will affect my city and state.Local city and state is where you can have your vote count. I came across an interview of Jill Stein on RT news and was really impressed with what she had to say. The polar opposite of Hillary, the Hun.and she's sane. So I think I will vote for her.
Here's the interview from RT..
Here a written interview from Raw Story
http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/10685-interview-with-jill-stein-candid...
I really like the fact you can edit your comments here.
Oh and good to read and see you here pfiore8. I'm glad to be here.
Excellent video
Thank you.
welcome!
I have been seriously admiring that person who wrote lizard people all over the ballot. Somebody, due to the recount, had to try to figure out intent. And that person was ,ore enfranchised than I was because of it.
hello.
lizard people are good...
I for one welcome our lizard overlords
.
You don't even mention stolen elections
In addition to these excellent arguments, there is that matter that almost surely both of Bush's elections were stolen. We live in a country that, when exit polls and other odd circumstances pointed to election fraud, we were easily convinced that it was the exit polls that lied and that we should abandon them--all the better to make stealing elections easy. Voting machines--how gullible are we? Answer: very fucking gullible.
This question of what to do in the face of marginalization and a rigged system is a general one. Does one participate on dkos when it is clear that, on every major issue, dkos will fail to bring progressive results? Does one simply place one's energy elsewhere? Does one hang around as a marginalized voice of conscience with little influence? Does one hold one's cards close to the vest and play a strategic game of remaining viable and approachable while making what points one can? Each of these strategies sounds reasonable to me.
I think it is important not to participate in the sham of democracy. How that non-participation looks is the open question. My bottom line on these issues is that, when it is obvious that we on the left are powerless in the face of obscene concentrations of wealth and the most sophisticated and extensive propaganda in history, then none of us has a place of certainty to stand. No one has THE ANSWER of how we all should behave because, quite frankly, we are getting our asses kicked year after year and there is no clear road to restoring democracy.
Given this, at the very least we can avoid the natural human response of pointing a finger of blame at one another. We all do what we can, we discuss but in the end we each follow our best conscience. Those who vote for Dems with eyes wide open are not the enemy. Those who stay home out of informed disgust are not the enemy. Those who write in nonsense or vote 3rd candidates as an educated protest are not the enemy. We each search for an answer in very dark times with few promising options.
I'll vote for a 3rd party candidate and I'll try to choose wisely in local and state elections. In doing so, I will be lending legitimacy to a claim that I expressed my will, that I am in the extreme minority, and therefore, having voted and lost, I now am obligated to rally behind the eventual winner as representative of all of we the people. So, by voting, I will be participating in fake democracy and lending legitimacy to a rigged system. Still, this is my current decision on the basis of an outlandish hope that one day they system can be re-claimed and utilized legitimately to elect representatives of we the people.
I'll vote for Mayor etc.
Here in Portland we can choose an actual progressive candidate, Jefferson Smith, or a crass ex-Republican, Charlie Hales. It's a pretty stark choice so I'll vote. And Jeff better not let me down by going Obama on me!
I think my State House district is something like 67% registered Democratic, 8% Republican, 25% Independent. Our rep is the son of an old friend of ours. I'll vote for him even though, with that kind of registration, there's no need to.
Local is where it's at, if I'm going to vote at all.
On the one hand ...
... not voting will also be taken as legitimization of the current system. It fits "complacent person equally happy with both options" as much as it fits "person who believes the entire system is corrupt".
The exception to that, in my view, is when there is a well-organized, highly publicized vote boycott. They normally have the most effect if a popularly perceived potential election winner is being denied the chance to win because of a rigged system, and we have a lot of work ahead of us to get that popular perception in place. So maybe one year, but not this year.
Voting 3rd party gets tallied as a protest vote ~ it cannot be otherwise. It will be minimized by poo-pooing the numbers and name-calling the 3rd party voters, but it still gets taken as a protest vote.
And over the long haul, the only way to convince one of the major parties to support reductions in obstacles to the anti-democratic 3rd party suppression laws is to convince them that there is an electoral opportunity in doing so. We have a long history in this country of expansions of the franchise in pursuit of electoral gain ~ until we reached the point in the 1970's when the Democrats said, "yeah, that's enough" while the Republicans saw disenfranchising voters as their path to victory, and so have receded from that high water mark.
But the trends of the past forty years are not irreversible, otherwise the trends of the previous forty years would never have been reversed and we wouldn't have had the great U-Turn away from the New Deal in the 1970's ... and indeed, otherwise the trends of the forty years from 1875-1905 would never have been reversed to yield the Square Deal and New Deal.
Voting for a 3rd party puts the vote cookies in a jar on a high shelf, and if enough cookies get put into that jar, one or the other of the major parties will get it into their heads to try for reforms that will allow them to get their hands into that cookie jar.
And on the other hand:
... doesn't, from my perspective, have to be a big chance to make it worthwhile. Given the corporate dominance in establishing conventional wisdom, no matter what you do they are going to do their best to cast it as a support for the status quo.
Which leaves the question at what best provides material support for the small, rag-tag forces opposing the status quo. And voting 3rd party does more in that direction than abstaining.
If enough people voting 3rd party increases the prospects for reversing the current rising tide of corporate sponsored fascism from 1 in 100 to 2 in 100, that is no great "hope" for "change" ... but surely worthwhile participating in.
I'm going to live my life...might include voting...don't know
the saying went "tune in, turn on, drop out" and I emphasize the "drop out" bit.
How shall I phrase this? I might take the long way around on it, so bear with me. The conventional world is a cesspool. If we can't stop it then we can, theoretically, walk away from it, although it might be harder in 2012 than it was in 1966, with debit cards and credit checks and all that.
But it's possible to live our lives without letting the $^#^ get to us. If we live full lives, doing what's meaningful to ourselves every day, then we can have the so-called "real world" pass over our heads. Let those who want to wallow in it do so. Voting is, in my opinion, pointless, unless you want to vote for a 3rd party candidate so you can feel a bit better, in a "free speech zone" kind of way.
I haven't started my gbcw diary at dkos yet, the one entitled "How Barack Obama Destroyed the Democratic Party". I've thought about it plenty, especially about adding "...with the help of the Obamabots at the dailyKos Web Log Site" to the title. That would probably get some HRs, is my guess.
I recently saw this said: "Paul Ryan is the ultimate wolf in sheep's clothing". Yes, I saw that. No, it's not true. We're already wary of Ryan. The "ultimate wolf" would look like a Democrat, say things like a Democrat would, and then, once elected, would go after all things real Democrats like. You know the rest.
I wonder what would happen if Romney actually won. I don't expect him to. He's a terrible candidate who's still playing to the crazy Republican base. That's a losing strategy. I expect Obama to win. Some deluded people think that when he does win he'll be free to pursue a more liberal agenda, not having to run again. But it'll be more of the same, won't it? More bankers, more "tough choices" and then the Democrats will be forced to pretend that we/they liked it in 2016 when the next nominee is chosen.
Who has eight years to wait before getting on with life? I'm going to play some music, take walks with my wife, tell her how good she looks and what a genius she is, do some work and make enough moolah to provide a nice life, see my friends and have good times with them. I think that will do a lot more good than canvassing for and voting for some power-happy, money-hungry Reagan-quoting faux-Democratic figurehead.
I actually LOL'd
when that sarcasm you laid down in priceman's post the other day wasn't smelled a mile away. It's good to laugh.
I know! You'd think there were things that gave it away
I thoroughly enjoyed using the phrase "super-lefty Erskine Bowles". And "the progressive dream of gutting Social Security and Medicare". When that happens I know plenty will accept it as something that, unfortunately, had to be done. No, it doesn't have to be done!!! But they'll like it if the greatest President of All Time endorses it.
And here's another thing, speaking of apologists....Rachel Maddow drives me nuts. Luckily for my blood pressure we got rid of cable so I don't watch MSNBC any more but I've heard she's still there and I remember all too well what her schtick is. It's to give the Democrats a pass and here's how she does it (I'm making up this example but you'll get the idea): "President Obama today locked up 5,000 more hippies....but that's not good enough for Republicans!" and then she'll talk about how Republicans are crazy and want those hippies killed, ignoring that Obama locked them up in the first place. Or whatever the issue is. I exaggerated (for the time being?) for effect but that's what she'll do when the Social Security age is changed to 67 or 70. She'll criticize the Republicans.
And speaking of MSNBC, I guess a lot of people haven't yet figured out that it's a corporation, supporting the corporatocracy, and exists solely as a way for some people to make money. It's not there to push a liberal line. It's there to sucker liberals into watching, thus creating more ad money.
I think I'm either more cynical than I've ever been or seeing more clearly than I ever have.
We stopped watching Rachel et al in 2008
My wife said, "All they do is talk about Republicans." Not long after, we stopped bothering. This was during the intermittent stun/phase portion of Obama's presidency. I have been supporting the notion that Obama is worse than Bush, but just now I'm thinking that it is important that those of us with eyes to see get the lay of the land. I fell for Clinton, with enthusiasm, for 8 years. Now I finally can see that Bacevich was right when he said that it is foolish to parse everything the candidates say and do as though it will have an effect on the road we are on. Painful as it is, it is a good thing to see matters clearly.
I wasn't surprised by Maddow. I used to hear her radio program in Northampton, MA. She was impossible to listen to for more than a few minutes--shrilly radical, unyielding defender of all things liberal, especially of gay rights. When I saw her on MSNBC, completely remade, it was clear that she is an actress above all. Still, I enjoyed her intelligence and ability to explain complex issues. Until she became unbearable again.
Today, most political conversations I hear strike me as hopelessly naive. Hard to know what to do. I like your prescription. I'm moving that same direction. It is primarily the pleasure of connecting with like-minded people I have come to care about that has me in these on-line discussions at all.
I expect my wife will be showing up soon
She's spent a lot of time in the last 6 years at that other place, watching good people leave. Now she's participating more in the social aspects, the Saturday gardening blog and that sort of thing.
This place is much more her style. I know she likes the immediate feedback from the higher traffic dKos. My little plan, though, is to mention what we're talking about here, until she starts checking it out several times a day.
you both have
full HTML now--that means the ability to embed video in your comments or posts. In your "text format" box there will be an option for Full HTML choose that and put the code in the comment box. Oh, and come to Friday night party sometime, okay?
How Barack Obama Destroyed the Democratic Party
I vote for you once you post that at kos. Epic. :D
it's easy to understand, isn't it?
The 'bots love their list of Obama's wonderful accomplishments, many of which are pretty bad, many of which are much weaker than they could be, many of which he didn't do, many of which he had to be dragged to.
But they like to trot out that list, with its 150 examples. And they like to compare Obama and Romney, so I figure the best way to present my thesis (and I say "my" but it's really all of ours) is with a list of what the Democratic Party stood for as recently as the 2008 Party Platform, and a corresponding list of current positions.
I'd go into more detail but shaharazade is in the background, going on an anti-Hilary Clinton rant and I'm losing my train of thought!
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