Fuck its silent in here.......

[Tinker to Evers to Chance]

Ex-Senator Lugar brings the heat in his defeat.  I'd quote the whole thing, but it's really worth reading.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/08/in-statement-lugar-defends-campaign-while-criticizing-partisan-environment/

So a guy gets his ass kicked in a primary and whines about it.

Got any Arlen Specter letters to share with us?

When the folks who beat him say essentially the same thing, I suggest it might be more than sour grapes:

The people who’ll probably beat Lugar express no malice about it. Taking out the Republicans who compromise with Democrats is a cold, logical decision, the easiest one they make. Jim Bopp, a lawyer who’s worked on dozens of lawsuits to break up the campaign finance regime, was one of the first notable Indiana Republicans to dump Lugar. His USA Super PAC sent out around $100,000 of mail for Mourdock. It wasn’t personal.

“Lugar is an honest and decent man, but he's voted wrong too many times,” says Bopp. “His approach is just wrong now. When Reagan was president, we could afford someone who approaches these issues in a moderate, bipartisan way. But now we have an administration out to destroy us, and we need a fighter. Here’s another way to say it. We’re in a march to socialism. Obama’s getting us there at 100 mph. If you endorse bipartisanship, you get us there at 50 mph.”

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2012/05/richard_lugar_is_expected_to_lose_his_senate_seat_to_the_tea_party_s_richard_mourdock_.2.html

Lugar's campaign outspent the combined total of Murdoch and the SuperPACs that were backing him.  This race wasn't about money.  And it wasn't just the tea party purists or whatever that kicked his ass.  Murdoch had the backing of 2/3 of the county chairmen and the state committee.  If Lugar had been half as interested in looking out for the interests of his state as he was in making a name for himself, he might have actually had the party machinery on his side to make it a contest.

He stopped pretending to give a shit about Indiana a long time ago.  The guy doesn't even live there anymore.

[Chuck to Chuck]

Lugar's campaign outspent the combined total of Murdoch and the SuperPACs that were backing him.  This race wasn't about money.  And it wasn't just the tea party purists or whatever that kicked his ass.  Murdoch had the backing of 2/3 of the county chairmen and the state committee.  If Lugar had been half as interested in looking out for the interests of his state as he was in making a name for himself, he might have actually had the party machinery on his side to make it a contest.

He stopped pretending to give a shit about Indiana a long time ago.  The guy doesn't even live there anymore.

So, he stopped serving?

Seriously, there are two issues with the Lugar loss.

1) As TEC correctly notes, Lugar was no longer representing Indiana and was repping himself.

2) The Tea Party test for ideological purity (as well as similar lests on the Dem side to be pro-choice) and any deviations lead to disqualifying is a major problem in this country's political process.

The duopoly the parties hold have allowed each of their most base elements to control the elections.  Neither party really represents most of us anymore.

[Fork]

2) The Tea Party test for ideological purity (as well as similar lests on the Dem side to be pro-choice) and any deviations lead to disqualifying is a major problem in this country's political process.

The problem isn't with the Tea Party per se. If any group within a political party has an agenda and "purity test", it still needs to be either validated or invalidated through the electoral process. If the GOP keeps putting TP-approved candidates on ballots and they lose, the party will correct itself.

Just as the Humphrey/McGovern Democrats cost enough elections that the Democratic Leadership Council was born, the Tea Party will eventually give way to a new breed of moderate Republicans. The pendulum can't stay stuck at the end of a swing.

[Chuck to Chuck]

If any group within a political party has an agenda and "purity test", it still needs to be either validated or invalidated through the electoral process. If the GOP keeps putting TP-approved candidates on ballots and they lose, the party will correct itself.

But unless the other side puts up reasonable candidates, the mechanism for self correction is limited.  In fact, since one side goes extreme, the other side can go nearly as extreme and still be more centrist.  Look:

Richard Mourdock: “I have a mindset that says bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view.”

No one has exclusivity on knowing the correct way to do things.  When one side nominates only people who say that they ARE the only ones to do things right, then the other side will counter with the same message.

To me, the obvious solution is primary reform.  There is no way idiots like Joe Walsh, Sharon Angle, Richard Mourdock, and Christine O'Donnell could finish in the top two of an open primary process.  Chicago's electoral (not political) process is the correct model for public (and publicly paid for) elections.

Everyone goes on the same primary ballot with no party ID.  If one person gets 50% of the vote, they win.  If no one does, the top two have a runoff.

The reason Pat Quinn is governor is because his opponent cam in with only 20.26% of the primary votes.  If the November election had been only between Quinn and Hines (the second highest vote getter) and not Brady, does anyone doubt Hines would have won more of the right side of the electorate?  Brady scared too many people off.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

Everyone goes on the same primary ballot with no party ID.

I don't think you understand the point of a "primary" election.

[Chuck to Chuck]

Everyone goes on the same primary ballot with no party ID.

I don't think you understand the point of a "primary" election.

It's to preserve the political duopoly at public expense, right?

[Fork]

If any group within a political party has an agenda and "purity test", it still needs to be either validated or invalidated through the electoral process. If the GOP keeps putting TP-approved candidates on ballots and they lose, the party will correct itself.

But unless the other side puts up reasonable candidates, the mechanism for self correction is limited.  In fact, since one side goes extreme, the other side can go nearly as extreme and still be more centrist.  Look:

The mechanism for self-correction is very organic. Lose enough elections, and you change the way you do things. Because minority parties don't get as much lobby money as majority parties do.

[CT III]

He stopped pretending to give a shit about Indiana a long time ago.  The guy doesn't even live there anymore.

This is why I always referred to him as "The Apex Candidate".

[J. Walter Weatherman]

Everyone goes on the same primary ballot with no party ID.

I don't think you understand the point of a "primary" election.

It's to preserve the political duopoly at public expense, right?

No, Chuck.

[Internet Apex]

He stopped pretending to give a shit about Indiana a long time ago.  The guy doesn't even live there anymore.

This is why I always referred to him as "The Apex Candidate".

Go Heat.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/obama-sex-marriage-legal-16312904
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/05/obama-comes-out-i-think-same-sex-couples-should-be-able-to-get-married/

President Obama today announced that he now supports same-sex marriage, reversing his longstanding opposition amid growing pressure from the Democratic base and even his own vice president.

In an interview with ABC News’ Robin Roberts, the president described his thought process as an “evolution” that led him to this decision, based on conversations with his staff members, openly gay and lesbian service members, and his wife and daughters.

“I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors, when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together; when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married,” Obama told Roberts in an interview to appear on ABC’s “Good Morning America” Thursday.

Excerpts of the interview will air tonight on ABC’s “World News With Diane Sawyer.”

The president stressed that this is a personal position, and that he still supports the concept of states’ deciding the issue on their own. But he said he’s confident that more Americans will grow comfortable with gays and lesbians getting married, citing his own daughters’ comfort with the concept.

“It’s interesting, some of this is also generational,” the president continued. “You know when I go to college campuses, sometimes I talk to college Republicans who think that I have terrible policies on the economy, on foreign policy, but are very clear that when it comes to same-sex equality or, you know, sexual orientation, that they believe in equality. They are much more comfortable with it. You know, Malia and Sasha, they have friends whose parents are same-sex couples. There have been times where Michelle and I have been sitting around the dinner table and we’re talking about their friends and their parents and Malia and Sasha, it wouldn’t dawn on them that somehow their friends’ parents would be treated differently. It doesn’t make sense to them and, frankly, that’s the kind of thing that prompts a change in perspective.”

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304070304577394332545729926.html

Mr. Obama was against same-sex marriage as a candidate in 2008, but supported civil unions. In the fall of 2010, he said his views on gay marriage were "evolving," a stance that had widely been interpreted as moving toward an endorsement. The president had been asked numerous times afterward whether his position had changed. Each time he deflected the question and pointed to his record on other gay rights issues.

On Wednesday, he said, "I had hesitated on gay marriage in part because I thought civil unions would be sufficient."

"And I was sensitive to the fact that for a lot of people the word 'marriage' was something that invokes very powerful traditions, religious beliefs and so forth," he said.

Mr. Obama's politically cautious stance had become untenable in recent days, in no small part because of the pro-gay marriage positions taken by Vice President Joe Biden and members of Mr. Obama's own cabinet.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

Via Huey...

http://nation.foxnews.com/president-obama/2012/05/09/obama-reverses-position-same-sex-marriage

[powen01]

Via Huey...

http://nation.foxnews.com/president-obama/2012/05/09/obama-reverses-position-same-sex-marriage

I'm in.  Where do I sign up for the army to destroy marriage?

[Internet Apex]

That headline's not real? They say enough stupid shit at Fox that it sort of defeats the comedy to put words in their mouth. I mean, you don't have to really try.


EDIT: It was real and they changed it? Fucking clown college.

[J. Walter Weatherman]

EDIT: It was real and they changed it?

Yes.

I wouldn't have posted it with the link to the actual post itself if the headlinedidn't say what it says in the screenshot.