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Political Rantings

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Some cool, non-partisan, political websites

Monday, October 27th, 2008

Hat tip to Zach Klitzman for this:

Categories: Political Rantings, Random Acts of Blogging | 1 Comment »

The Argument Against Universal Voting Rights

Thursday, October 23rd, 2008

Colleague Dave Sohmer sends along this gem:

Categories: News and/or Media, Political Rantings, The World Wide Weird | 1 Comment »

Tis the Season for Voter Fraud Accusations…

Monday, October 20th, 2008

As long as we’re discussing seasonal issues, it’s starting to feel like every two years (but especially every four years) since 2000, we’ve been discussing the voter fraud that’s going to allow <insert name of whomever’s winning> to steal the election from <insert name of whomever’s losing>, and to allow <insert name of whomever’slosing> to delegitimize the sweeping mandate indicated by the overwhelming victory of <insert name of whomever’s winning>.

Here’s a pretty good summary of this phenomenon for 2008. The headlines are daunting, but if you dig into just about any of them, you find that they’re not nearly as sinister as they’re made to sound. In most cases, they reflect the push and pull between over-registering (i.e., registering people who might not be eligible to make sure we catch everyone who is eligible) and registration verification (i.e., requiring registrations with known errors to be corrected before allowing the voter to vote).

Here’s one example: Mickey Mouse tries to register in Florida. Now first of all, at least it was Florida. Anywhere else (except maybe California) would have been a clear case of voter fraud. Kidding aside, though, on the surface this smacks of someone preparing to stuff the ballot box in November. It also has the added attraction of the ACORN seal (ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, is an organization that has received money from the Obama campaign, and has been implicated in several instances like this). Digging into the details, though, we see this:

This year, ACORN signed up 1.3-million voters nationwide and about 152,000 in Florida, mostly in Orange, Broward and Miami-Dade counties. ACORN estimates it flagged 2 percent of its Florida registrations as problematic because they were incomplete, duplicates or just plain bogus.

“This is part of a widespread and systemic effort

Categories: Political Rantings | 2 Comments »

OK, who didn’t see THIS coming?

Sunday, October 12th, 2008

And the winner of the most obvious typo award of the year goes to Rensselaer County in upstate New York for their 2008 presidential election absentee ballots:

The absentee ballots sent to voters in Rensselaer County identified the two presidential candidates as “Barack Osama” and “John McCain.” In the United States, the best-known individual named Osama is Osama bin Laden, leader of the al Qaida terrorist group behind the 2001 attacks that destroyed the World Trade Center in New York City.

The typographical terror error was first reported by the Times Union of Albany.

When they discovered the mistake, officials shredded the remaining “Osama” ballots and mailed correct versions to the roughly 300 people who had already received them. McDonough said the “Osama” mistake was made in only one of the 13 ballot versions mailed throughout the county, located east of the state capital of Albany.

Voters who received both versions will be allowed to send in either one and have it counted, McDonough said.

Obama spokesman Blake Zeff said the campaign is “glad officials are working to correct this error and we assume it won’t happen again.”

Yeah, like in 2012?

(Hat tip: Joe Catania)

Categories: Political Rantings, The World Wide Weird | Comments Off on OK, who didn’t see THIS coming?

Getting Along with Everybody

Monday, October 6th, 2008

Well, some of my regular readers (one in particular) will find this fascinating. It seems I’m a left-leaning moderate:

Moderate on political map

Your views call for roughly same amount of goverment and liberty that we have today, for both personal and economic issues.

It appears that you are relatively happy with the status quo. However, this could be wrong if you averaged out to the center by opting for a an equal mix of big and small government positions, vs. opting for mostly moderate positions.

Approximately 6% of the takers of this quiz scored in this area, 36% for all within the centrist circle.

Now, to be fair, I think this quiz paints with very broad brushes, and had it been weighed more heavily on fiscal matters and/or foreign policy, my yellow dot would likely have moved to the right a bit. Nonetheless, at least someone out there thinks I’m a left-leaning & happy with the status quo…

Categories: Political Rantings, Random Acts of Blogging | 4 Comments »

A week of funny images

Sunday, October 5th, 2008

Three funny images in the inbox this week.

Categories: Money Talk, Political Rantings, Random Acts of Blogging | 1 Comment »

My thoughts on the 1st Debate

Saturday, September 27th, 2008

Since I’m sure everyone else will do this, I might as well get it out of the way…

Overview
I thought this was one of the best presidential debates I’ve seen in my lifetime. No one cared about what was on who’s lapel, who had what kind of salad, or whether or not the farm animals were wearing lipstick. Here were two men discussing, in detail, their thoughts on the economy and foreign policy. They drew distinctions between each other without resorting to talking-point “gotcha” phrases, defended their positions, and even admitted to agreeing with each other in several cases. I didn’t necessarily learn anything substantive about either candidates positions, but it was an invaluable opportunity to compare not only what they said, but their demeanor, their thought processes, and the logic that brought them to their conclusions.

The Candidates
I was impressed by John McCain’s command of the subject matter. The man has been to just about every nation on earth, is familiar with the geography, the relevant world leaders, and can confidently offer insight into what he thinks is happening next. Here, in my opinion, is the kind of insight that only comes with McCain’s experience:

Now, on this issue of aiding Pakistan, if you’re going to aim a gun at somebody, George Shultz, our great secretary of state, told me once, you’d better be prepared to pull the trigger. I’m not prepared at this time to cut off aid to Pakistan. So I’m not prepared to threaten it, as Senator Obama apparently wants to do, as he has said that he would announce military strikes into Pakistan.

We’ve got to get the support of the people of Pakistan. He said that he would launch military strikes into Pakistan. Now, you don’t do that. You don’t say that out loud. If you have to do things, you have to do things, and you work with the Pakistani government.

I was also impressed by Barack Obama. He displays an ability to break problems down into component parts and reason through them that I, quite frankly, haven’t seen since Bill Clinton. He also made the argument that good judgement is more important than experience. Of course, both would be ideal, but neither candidate is mentioning that these days. Here’s my favorite Obama quote, referring to McCain’s suggestion that we pay for the financial bailout with a freeze on all non-essential spending:

The problem with a spending freeze is you’re using a hatchet where you need a scalpel. There are some programs that are very important that are under funded. I want to increase early childhood education and the notion that we should freeze that when there may be, for example, this Medicare subsidy doesn’t make sense.

The Winner?
As is usually the case, I don’t think I could pick a clear winner (other than the viewing public, of course, but that’s a cop out answer).

My Debate Summary
Basically, here’s what I felt while watching the debate:
[McCain speaks]
Me: Wow, that guy is so impressive. I hope he wins the election.
[Obama replies]
Me: Oh, man, he’s good too! I hope he wins the election.
[Repeat as above until debate is finished]
Me: I don’t agree 100% with either of them, but I think we’re in pretty good hands for the next four years…

Now, the Biden-Palin debate on Thursday – that could generate some fireworks…

Categories: Political Rantings | 2 Comments »

McCain Can’t Catch a Break

Friday, September 26th, 2008

Check out the sponsored links in this article about John McCain deciding to attend tonight’s debate in Mississippi:


Yellow teeth? poor credit? Wrinkle Cream? Yikes…when it rains, it pours, huh?

As long as I have your attention, a quick thought on the last couple of days: Everything I’ve read and heard about the current financial situation says to me that we need the federal government to step in and help. I thought George W. Bush’s speech the other night was one of the best of his presidency – accurate, non-partisan, simple enough that “Joe Main Street” could understand it without being condescending. The key line was this one:

The government is the one institution with the patience and resources to buy these assets at their current low prices and hold them until markets return to normal. And when that happens, money will flow back to the Treasury as these assets are sold. And we expect that much, if not all, of the tax dollars we invest will be paid back.

So while responsible citizens who pay their bills on time should not be burdened with bailing out wealthy bankers who made bad decisions, it also holds that responsible citizens who pay their bills on time should not be left unable to borrow money, keep their businesses open or send their kids to college because wealthy bankers made bad decisions.

Unfortunately, President Bush has spent more than 100% of his credibility and political capital at this point, so what he says about the bailout and the economy comes under almost automatic scrutiny and skepticism. Adding fuel to the fire is Congress, who appear more interested in posturing than in getting something done. The Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) of the mid-90s is an obvious template here (in that case, by the way, all of the tax dollars invested were paid back, plus a small profit), and yet the parties bicker amongst themselves while the world waits and banks continue to fail. In his statement today, John McCain said it best: “much of yesterday was spent fighting over who would get the credit for a deal and who would get the blame for failure.”

These folks are not doing themselves any favors. Again.

Categories: Money Talk, Political Rantings | 2 Comments »

Crossing the Bridge to Nowhere

Friday, September 19th, 2008

As you are no doubt aware, we have moved into that phase of the campaign where anything either candidate says is a “bald faced lie” and the “a new low in presidential campaigning.” I ignore most of these stories because they usually turn out to be just as untruthful (if not moreso) than the incident they’re describing, and both campaigns have figured out that no one ever gets eviscerated for lying about their opponent’s lying.

The one story that caught my eye, though, was the “Bridge to Nowhere” story. Each side has their talking point slogan (Democrats: “She was for it before she was against it,” Republicans: “I told Congress ‘Thanks, but no thanks’ on that Bridge to Nowhere’), and of course, each side is shocked…SHOCKED!! at how untruthful and negative the other side has become. But isn’t this an easy thing to check out? After all, we’re not talking about some abstract position on an issue that someone changed their mind about, we’re talking about the allocation of dollars from party to party and how/when it was spent. What a strange thing to lie about then, no?

Anyway, I checked it out. What follows is, in my humble opinion, an excellent case study in how politicians (on both sides of the aisle) lie.

Read the rest of this entry »

Categories: News and/or Media, Political Rantings | Comments Off on Crossing the Bridge to Nowhere

Tina Fey as Sarah Palin on Saturday Night Live – 9/13/08

Monday, September 15th, 2008

We all knew it was coming. Saw it a mile away. Predictable as hell. And STILL, it’s fall-down-on-the-floor hysterical!

Categories: Political Rantings, Primetime TV | 1 Comment »

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