Politics The Elephant in the room...The GOP today

I wish. Bill Maher had John Cleese on last night and they discussed the fact the electorate is so uninformed politicians can basically say anything and the average voter (pick a side) will simply nod in a agreement. Add in the gerrymandering Street Pattern mentioned and it's a up hill battle for the Dems for years to come.

 

I'll be interested to see if the GOP sends forth a champion for their causes, or finds a whipping boy to blame all their failures on

 

It's hard to have someone step up as a champion for either party's causes with the way our system works. There's a set of causes for the bases that have to be displayed first, openly and prominently, for the primaries. Then once the nominations are selected a sudden shift to center is nearly a certainty. I think right now we're still in the "send in the clowns" mode.

And I'd say each party has no problem finding a "whipping boy" for their failures... it's almost always the other party. Or the latest person to get their hand stuck in the Cookie Jar. Often Cookie Jar is the working name for their favorite working girl or boy.

 

The only issue I see that the GOP might have is if the Tea Party conservatives get pissed off enough that they split apart and run as a separate party. Maybe they will get greedy enough to want to run on a different platform then the GOP. And maybe there are more moderate republicans that aren't afraid to be called rational conservatives and won't vote for the Tea Party candidate. It might not happen in the Presidential election, and they are doing a good job primaring moderate Republicans in districts where they have 51% of the Republican vote.

I don't think it is so much that the electorate is uninformed, it is just that they have their "big" issue that they care about, and would never vote against it. Some won't vote for an abortion supporter, while I would never vote for an anti-environment candidate. It doesn't matter what the rest of their answers are to debate questions.

 

This made me laugh

 

Seriously small font and seriously small minded people.

 

"Benghazi is hilarious... unless it's your dead husband and a huge cover-up."

 

The three previous comprehensive bi-partisan Congressional investigations did a pretty good job of focusing on what happened and what can be done to better protect US embassies (and other US facilities) in the future.

This one is a farce.

 

Unfortunately, they didnt get a chance to explain their tax policies, which according to the conservative Tax Foundation would cost between $768 billion - 10 trillion (using conservative "dynamic" analysis that relies on supply side assumptions).

http://taxfoundation.org/sites/taxfoundation.org/files/docs/Online%20Charts%20%28combined%29_0.pdf
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Carson, whose flat tax is not included, bases his tax policy on the Bible .

Bases on his plan, everyone pays 10% of total income, whether making $50K or $50M. A highly regressive tax that would be up in that $10 trillion range in the cost that he would offset by spending cuts that hit that $50K family...a double whammy!

 

Closing remarks by the conference organizer at the National Religious Freedom Conference attended by several of the Republican candidates last week.

Scary stuff.

 

If you see a guy covered in cow shit at a gay wedding, you will know who it is.



Elephant dung would be more appropriate.

 

The thing is that the GOP/TP does the conference thing very well and effectively. It allows them to get their message out, generate news, come up with talking points, and figure out policy positions. I have been keeping a list of the conservative conferences over the past few months and here is the list:

Iowa Freedom Summit
Iowa Agriculture Summit
Southern Republican Leadership Conference
#FITN New Hampshire Republican Leadership Summit
Americans for Prosperity Retreat
CPAC
NRA Convention
South Carolina Freedom Summit
Republican Jewish Coalition Venetian Hotel Conference
The Council for National Policy organization meeting
The Conservative Action Project summit
Conservative Leadership Project
Iowa’s Legendary Lincoln Dinner
Iowa Straw Poll
National Prayer Breakfast
Coal & Investment Leadership Forum
Mitt Romney’s E2 Summit 

American Bridge 21st Century

Faith and Freedom Conference
Family Freedom Leadership Conference
Austrian Scholars Conference
RedState Conference
Freedom Fest

North Texas Presidential Forum
First in the South Republican Primary Presidential Town Hall Series
National Religious Liberties Conference
Ricardo Rosselló Event - Ben Carson
Cannabis Business Summit and Expo - Rand Paul
and the Republican National Convention in 10 months.

Here is what I have for the Democrats:
League of Conservation Voters annual dinner
Netroots Nation
La Raza
Jefferson Jackson Dinner in Iowa

MSNBC South Carolina Forum

& the Democratic National Convention

 

The problem is that the fiscal conservatives need the social conservatives to win. If either of them break apart to form a third party, they will lose against the Democrats. Well, until the Democrats also break apart into the democratic socialist wing and the moderate wing.

I think that changing the Senate into a parliament where instead of every state getting 2 senators, there are a proportional number of 100 senators based on the platform of the party you support would be more representative and better. It would make voting mean something even in the deep red and deep blue areas.