I have been listening to and watching all the news and punditry about the mid term elections, and I guess something has finally kicked in. We CANNOT give back the gains we have made. WE JUST CAN'T. So I decided to make a short, simple "choice doc" to give to every one I know to try and explain why we gotta still vote for the change we believed in. Only its turning out to be be not so short, and I think substantively incomplete. So I turn to you for help Kossacks. Any suggestions on how to shorten this or other points to include (I tried tried to make distinctions as generic as possible)
Also, I still don't get this tag thing, so feel free to fix them.
Over the fold
I have been listening to and watching all the news and punditry about the mid term elections, and I guess something has finally kicked in. We CANNOT give back the gains we have made. WE JUST CAN'T. So I decided to make a short, simple "choice doc" to give to every one I know to try and explain why we gotta still vote for the change we believed in. Only its turning out to be be not so short, and I think substantively incomplete. So I turn to you for help Kossacks. Any suggestions on how to shorten this or other points to include (I tried tried to make distinctions as generic as possible)
Also, I still don't get this tag thing, so feel free to fix them.
Also (OMG, I sound like Palin) if you have more appropriate example links, lemme know.
Republicans are flirting with shutting down the government again – a la Newt ’94 (which means no Medicrae/Medicaid/Social Security because no government=no services!)
Likely Senate candidate Joe Miller (R) in Alaska told Fox News last week that GOP lawmakers must have the "courage to shut down the government" in order to eliminate government programs he doesn't like. Right-wing CNN personality Erick Erickson said with child-like excitement yesterday, "I'm almost giddy thinking about a government shutdown next year. I cannot wait!"
And GOP consultant Dick Morris told activists late last week that Republicans should do exactly as Gingrich/Dole did 15 years ago, but this time it'll work out better.
Republicans have no economic plans for the future of this country. Rep. John Boener (R)
Boehner doesn’t seem to have any positive ideas for how to address the our economic crisis. His whole argument seems to be that we would be better off we had simply continued doing we what we were doing under Bush.-- http://bigthink.com/...
The net effect of Boehner's plan would be to increase the deficit by more than $300 billion. Nor would his plan be likely to create jobs -Congressional Budget Office
Republican potential plan for Congress going forward- "Nothing but subpoenas"
And that's according to Politico, not some blogger or liberal columnist.
Everything from the microscopic — the New Black Panther party All three of them — to the massive –- think bailouts — is on the GOP to-do liast, according to a half-dozen Republican aides interviewed by POLITICO.
Republican staffers say there won’t be any self-destructive witch hunts, but they clearly are relishing the prospect of extracting information from an administration that touts transparency.
And a handful of aggressive would-be committee chairmen — led by Reps. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Lamar Smith (R-Texas) — are quietly gearing up for a possible season of subpoenas not seen since the Clinton wars of the late 1990s.
ummm, no jobs? no trying to fix the ecomony? no trying to get our regulatory structure back in order? (bads eggs anyone? hamburger? spinach? tomatoes? chilies? lead in toys? car recalls? drug recalls? oil drilling deaths? mine deaths?) Really?
Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) has a plan for what the Republicans should do if they win control of the House of Representatives: Spend all their time investigating the Obama administration.
The Republican goal is simple Obstruction.
This: http://www.flickr.com/...
is a chart of filibuster use in the US Senate. For those unfamiliar with the procedures, a senator can stop progress on any bill by speaking on and on and on on any topic they choose, unless 60 Senators vote to invoke cloture, there by ending the endless ramble. Basically majority no longer rules and this is why nothing gets done in the Senate.
Obstruction examples:
372 Bills That Have Been Passed by the House & Not Yet
Acted Upon By the Senate
(as of 8/23/10) http://thehill.com/...
Critical Bills filibustered:
Jobs bill; Unemployment extension bill; Small business bill;
Would be funny, if it weren’t so sad. http://www.aolnews.com/...
Listen, I know you may not agree with everything Pres. Obama has done, or how, or agree with every Demacrat or democratic stance, but this election season is a choice.
This: http://www.flickr.com/...
is the "bikini graph": and yes it has been criticized for not including this or that, counting this wrong, etc. but the overall point of the graph remains: the picture visibly shows a change in direction. The choice is do you want this path to continue, or do you wish to go back to how it was under the Bush Congress?
This is what this Administration has done: http://obamaachievements.com/
Republican Hypocrisy
Obama is pushing a bill that might actually help small businesses, which have laid off a disproportionately large share of workers during this recession and are bouncing back much more slowly than big companies. Senate Republicans, meanwhile, have been blocking the bill for a month now.
Documented hypocrisy from Republican lawmakers who rail against the stimulus while promoting to local voters how much bacon they bring back to their district.
128 House Republicans Take Credit for the Economic Bills They Opposed
Health Care Reform Hypocrisy: States Suing Government Willing To Claim Subsidies From Law
GOP touts preventive care it opposed.
Several Republican governors that opposed the FMAP bill (which also provided states with education funding) say they plan to ask Sebelius for the Medicaid money.
Republicans Reveal Their Hypocrisy On Health Care, Refuse To Support Bill To Kill Government-Run Medicare
THIS SITUATION IS WAY TOO SERIOUS FOR THESE KINDS OF GAMES. THE CHOICE IS YOURS.
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