If you describe yourself as an “independent” voter, please state three ways in which your political beliefs differ strongly from the published platform of both the Democratic and Republican party, at either the state (your state, that is) or national level. (Award yourself a gold star if you can do this without having to look up the platforms in order to do so.)
Stipulation: you must actually use the term “independent” as your
primary political self-designation. For the purposes of this question,
neither libertarian, green, communist, socialist, fascist noranarchist is considered to be a synonym for “independent.”
Extra credit question: are you actually registered as independent/unaffiliated, or are you registered with a party and if so which one and why?
Now that it’s all over but the recriminations, allow me to lead with a recrimination:
Martha Coakley is a despicable human being and was a terrible candidate. (She remains the former now that she is no longer the latter.) Any political party who’s all-over success hinges on elevating a contemptible hack like her to higher office deserves every bit of failure it receives.
It’s been a major irritant to me for years now that my former home of New York has lagged behind places like Massachusetts, New Hampshire, (temporarily) California and (for fuck’s sake) Iowa in extending marriage rights to same-sex couples. I mean really… if anyone holds the American patent on sin and depravity it’s New York Fuckin’ City, and getting lapped by Massachusetts first on gay marriage and then on marijuana law reform was… well, I think I now know how my friends who are Yankee fans feel these days.
But at long last, that seems to be about to change: marriage equality is, weirdly, the only popular initiative being pushed by the deeply unpopular Governor Patterson, it just cleared the state house handily, and looks poised to win a close but clear victory in the state senate.
And just to add some sweet, sweet schadenfreudian icing on top of the already tasty cake of victory, it looks like it’s going to pass, as much as any other reason, because the Archdiocese of New York was too busy with other things to rally the troops over the marriage thing. What other things? Ladies and gentlemen, the New York Times:
The state’s Roman Catholic bishops have been somewhat distracted, too, having focused their lobbying energies this session on defeating a bill that would extend the statute of limitations for victims of sexual abuse to bring civil claims, and have appeared unprepared for the battle over marriage.
Yes, you read that right: the Catholic Church of New York has been too busy fighting an attempt to tighten anti-pedophilia laws to lobby against gay marriage. Oh my lord, the awesome.
(More here. Disgustingly, the Archdiocese is being joined in their fight by a group of Haredi Rabbis. I have no words. Well, actually I do, they’re just unrelentingly foul.)
On the occasion of his farewell address, I can say this at least about George W. Bush: he has managed to bring together every one of my friends, no matter what their political leanings are, in loathing. Socialist, libertarian, anarchist, liberal/progressive, communist, conservative and royalist alike: they are as one in abhorring the man and his legacy.
He campaigned to be “a uniter, not a divider.” He succeeded beyond his wildest expectations.
This simply has to be seen to be believed. Behold, ladies and gentlemen, as Fox News — fucking Fox News — takes a big wooden stake and does their level best to drive it through the heart of Sarah Palin’s future national political ambitions:
We aren’t even twenty-four hours after the election, and the knives are already out. The next few months are going to be hilarious and awesome..
So to review: passing a state budget in California requires a 60% supermajority, but you get to decide who your next-door neighbor can marry (or how he runs his farm, or whether he can sell sex for money) on a straight up-or-down 50-percent-plus-one vote. I have always believed this system to be awe-inspiringly stupid, and today just reconfirms that belief.
I am immediately going to begin gathering signatures for a ballot initiative declaring that Angelina Jolie is not allowed to date Brad Pitt. I believe that the constituency of Californian men and women who deeply believe that Angelina would be really, really into them if only that Pitt guy wasn’t distracting her with his gorgeous eyes and rock-hard abs and stuff will easily hit the magic 50%-plus-one mark.
52% of my fellow Californians are invited to go fuck themselves. It’s a standing invitation, but why not get started now?
And speaking of people who can go fuck themselves: Where in hell was David Geffen on this?! Per sfgate.com’s handy donation-searcher, he tossed $150,000 at the no-on-8 campaign. Which sounds impressive until you remember that girlfriend is worth four and a half billion-with-a-B dollars. With the entire goddamn mormon church pumping millions of dollars a day into this campaign, the richest faggot on the planet couldn’t dig a little deeper than that? Pathetic.
— The Bradley Effect is real, and that the problems of Democrats over-polling in 2000 and 2004 have not been fixed; so Obama is over-polling by some statistically significant amount, let’s say at least 2 percentage points.
— That “undecided” voters will break strongly Republican, just like they did in 2000 and 2004.
Based on ev.com‘s current polling data, that means that the actual electoral map we’re facing down right now looks something like this:
…which is McCain 284, Obama 254. (It’s also basically 2004’s results, except with the Democrats picking up New Mexico and Iowa, while the Republicans pick up Minnesota.) Consider that my “hope I’m wrong” prediction.
T-minus 6 days. This nonsense can’t be over fast enough.
If you happen to be reading this on sunday evening, now would be an awesome time to throw some money at the “No On Prop 8” campaign. A gentleman by the name of Steve Bing is running a $1 Million challenge grant, and if you donate before midnight tonight, he’ll match your entire donation, so your dollars are doubled. Click here to donate. (Edit: fixed the link, sorry!)
If the challenge is over by the time you read this, you can and should should still donate at the main site. $5, $20, anything: this is going to be nail-bitingly close, and every little bit helps.
