Motley Moose – Archive

Maybe I’m off base and irritable this morning, but I just received a fundraising email from the dscc that I find despicable and potentially disastrous.  I’m assuming many of you received the same.

Quoting Jason Rosenbaum, info@dscc.org:

The next 24 hours will determine our nation’s political path: We either re-elect President Obama. Or President Gingrich or President Romney destroy working families and hand everything to the top 1%.

I really need you to take a look at this spreadsheet. Our make-or-break FEC deadline is 24 hours from now, and we’re still $255,000 short. This is the first deadline since the GOP presidential contest turned from circus to serious. Whether or not we hit this goal will determine who wins: President Obama, or a radical  Republican.

Reach this goal, and we have a fighting chance to keep President Obama in office and prevent a total GOP takeover. Fall short, and President Gingrich or President Romney will be calling the shots  before a Republican Congress a year from now.

Can you chip in $5 now?

https://dscc.org/give2?

No explanation of what this FEC deadline is, or what it represents.  Just “Republican boogey man! Republican boogey man!  $5 right now or he eats the middle class!  $5 will make him go away!”

Here’s my response:

Can you perhaps explain to us why this, as opposed to any and every other fundraising goal between now and next Nov. will determine the outcome?  Shall I understand that if this goal is not met I shouldn’t bother doing anything else to re-elect the president because the race is lost?  Does this goal REALLY carry the weight of an actual election in which votes are cast and counted?

And should I expect a stream of continuous ‘gun to the head’ appeals from now until Nov.?  “Either give us money RIGHT THIS MINUTE or you are putting the country in the hands of the GOP.”  

I am as strong a supporter of this president as you will meet.  But this appeal is truly offensive and borderline unethical.  I will not contribute today ON PRINCIPLE.  If I validate this tactic, I encourage it.  And I cannot think of a more effective way to discourage and demoralize grass roots participation.  You don’t need to employ hyperbolic, emotionally manipulative, and borderline extortionist rhetoric.  If you continue to do so, YOU will be responsible for putting a Republican in the White House and placing control of both houses of congress in republican hands.

Am I off my rocker, or are they?

As I am doubtful that anyone will actually read my response, and it’s likely that it will just be bounced back to me, if you are reading, jsfox, please pass this along.  I really don’t think we get traction with this kind of crap.

By: inoljt, http://mypolitikal.com/

In American parlance, the word liberal generally carries a left-wing connotation. Liberals favor an philosophy which has some fairly familiar elements: a greater role for  government, lessened inequality, social “liberalism” etc. This contrasts with conservatism, which favors a lesser role for government, places more trust in the workings of the market, and believes in “family values.”

The most extreme element of liberalism is communism; in contrast, the most extreme element of conservatism is monarchy and fascism.

More below.

What — again, you say?  Yet another frivolous diary?  One that advances the deep and nuanced discussion of the world’s woes (and occasional joys) not a whit, let alone a jot and tittle?

Well, of course!  It’s what I do best, right? Other than industriously tapping that “Fierce” button for all of the insightful, incisive, thoughtful, shrewd, well-reasoned, passionate, witty, snarkalicious posts of other Meese whose dust I am not worthy to sweep up after.

But at least this time I’m forgoing the poll, since I can’t think of one worth slaughtering electrons for.  So over the fold we (or at least I) go, for today’s bit of irrelevance:

The campaign for the Republican presidential nomination has entered a new phase and it is beginning to look like support for Romney and Gingrich aligns with the deepening division between “establishment” Republicans and the insurgent Tea Party movement.  We have seen Tea Party support crystallise around Gingrich, even though he is an “imperfect vessel,” largely because they are even more unwilling to support the mainstream candidate.  

The Republican party is experiencing an insurgency among the same disaffected cohorts they had enlisted in their campaigns against Obama and it’s causing a degree of panic within their ranks evident in the sheer volume of negative campaigning they have deployed, most recently in the Florida primary, where their advertising buy is approaching $13.8 million; not to mention the unprecedented, co-ordinated public attacks on Gingrich’s candidacy by former and current legislative Republicans.  Consider the reaction from the self-appointed spokeswoman of the Tea Party movement, Sarah Palin:

What we saw with this ridiculous opposition dump on Newt was nothing short of Stalin-esque rewriting of history. It was Alinsky tactics at their worst.

But this whole thing isn’t really about Newt Gingrich vs. Mitt Romney. It is about the GOP establishment vs. the Tea Party grassroots and independent Americans who are sick of the politics of personal destruction used now by both parties’ operatives with a complicit media egging it on. In fact, the establishment has been just as dismissive of Ron Paul and Rick Santorum. Newt is an imperfect vessel for Tea Party support, but in South Carolina the Tea Party chose to get behind him instead of the old guard’s choice. In response, the GOP establishment voices denounced South Carolinian voters with the same vitriol we usually see from the left when they spew hatred at everyday Americans “bitterly clinging” to their faith and their Second Amendment rights. The Tea Party was once again told to sit down and shut up and listen to the “wisdom” of their betters.

Sarah Palin – Cannibals in GOP Establishment Employ Tactics of the Left Facebook 27 Jan 12

That Palin would identify the GOP establishment as the opposition and characterise their behaviour as “cannibalism” suggests the famous aphorism on the French revolution:

La révolution dévore ses enfants.

Georg Büchner, Danton’s Death, Act I (1835)

The revolution, like Saturn, devours its own children.  And Republicans are setting themselves up for an inevitable banquet on Newt and his supporters; a recipe for a disastrous nomination fight entirely of their own making and a Tea Party cohort even angrier at them than Obama, if such a thing is possible.  The challenge for Democrats is to stand back and let them have it out, for now.  They seem to be making an excellent job of it so far.

In an hour or so the GOP candidates still standing will square off in the last debate before the Florida primary.  With poll position changing hands between Newt and Mitt this week expect to see some strong performances.  If Newt delivers anything like this, as he did yesterday, it will definitely be worth watching live:

“We are not going to beat Barack Obama with some guy who has Swiss bank accounts, Cayman Island accounts, owns shares of Goldman Sachs who have foreclosed on Florida and is himself a stock holder in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, while he tries to think the rest of us are too stupid to put the dots together and understand what this is all about,” Gingrich declared in a preamble to a decidedly angry stump speech.

“In 1992, he gave money to Democrats for Congress,” he added at another point. “He voted in the Democratic primary for Paul Tsongas, the most liberal candidate. This is the man who stood up the other night and questioned my credentials as a Reaganite? This is the kind of gall they have, to think we are so stupid and we are so timid that we will let someone who voted for Paul Tsongas — in 1994 he is running for the U.S. Senate to the left of Teddy Kennedy. Do you know how hard it is to run to the left of Teddy Kennedy? And he says, ‘You know, I don’t want to go back to the Reagan-Bush years, I was an independent then.'”

“He won’t tell you that now, because he is counting on us not having YouTube,” Gingrich said. “That’s how much he thinks we are stupid. And we are not stupid. The message we should give Mitt Romney is: we aren’t that stupid and you aren’t that clever.”

Sam Stein – Mitt Romney ‘Is Counting On Us Not Having YouTube’ Huffington Post 25 Jan 12

Heh, grab some popcorn and join the fun.

One would be forgiven for confusion over the issue of Speaker Gingrich’s ethics investigation given the conflicting claims made in the course of the current GOP nomination.  Out of eighty-four complaints made against Gingrich the Select Committee on Ethics made a case out of three, two were not pursued because he had ceased the offending activity leaving one case against him for improperly claiming tax-exempt status for a partisan college course he taught known as “Renewing American Civilization:”

On December 13, 1996 the Committee issued a [Statement of Alleged Violations] charging Mr. Ginrich with three counts of violations of House Rules. Two counts concerned the failure to seek legal advice in regard to the 501(c)(3) projects, and one count concerned the providing the Committee with information which he knew or should have known was inaccurate.

In the Matter of Representative Newt Gingrich House Committee on Ethics 17 Jan 97

After a year of investigation the bipartisan Committee found as follows:

It was the opinion of the Members of the subcommittee and the Special Counsel, that based on the facts as they are currently known, the appropriate sanction for the conduct described in the original Statement of Alleged Violations is a reprimand and the payment of $300,000 toward the cost of the preliminary investigation.

In the Matter of Representative Newt Gingrich House Committee on Ethics 17 Jan 97

On first principles Gingrich is right that he didn’t pay a fine and it is arguable that the sanction was “narrow and technical,” as he has been suggesting since before the finding was released.  But it is hardly an exoneration, as he has claimed, and the complaints which didn’t make it through the hurdles imposed by a majority Republican House at the time illustrate a pattern of deliberate flaunting of the laws of election finance, the rules of legislative probity and the regulations governing lobbying on a grandiose scale over almost the whole of Gingrich’s congressional career.

Image: J Scott Applewhite/AP

This is part of three posts analyzing the 2010 South Carolina  gubernatorial election, in which Republican Nikki Haley won a  closer-than-expected victory over Democrat Vincent Sheheen. The main  focus of these posts will be to explore whether a racial effect  accounted for Ms. Haley’s unexpected poor performance.

(Note: This is also part of a series of posts analyzing the 2010 midterm elections.)

More below.

In a few hours President Obama will deliver his third State of the Union address.  An incisive thought:

The one thing America does not need to hear tonight is that we are a great people who need only remember all those glorious things we have in common, etc. etc., wha-dee-doo-dah. We are not a great people. Not in the way we treat ourselves in our politics, anyway. We are frightened. We lash out. We kick the country as though it were a lawnmower that won’t start. In 2010, just as the president and his administration managed to lift their heads above the brim of the ditch in which their predeceesors had dumped the country, We, The People elected the most retrograde, brick-stupid, poo-flinging monkeyhouse of a House of Representatives in the history of the Republic.

Charles P Pierce The State of the Union Is Angry Esquire 24 Jan 12

Hard to argue with.  This speech will set the frame for the remainder of Obama’s first term and the posture Democrats adopt for the vital upcoming election.  How’s he doing?

In a few hours President Obama will deliver his third State of the Union address.  An incisive thought:

The one thing America does not need to hear tonight is that we are a great people who need only remember all those glorious things we have in common, etc. etc., wha-dee-doo-dah. We are not a great people. Not in the way we treat ourselves in our politics, anyway. We are frightened. We lash out. We kick the country as though it were a lawnmower that won’t start. In 2010, just as the president and his administration managed to lift their heads above the brim of the ditch in which their predeceesors had dumped the country, We, The People elected the most retrograde, brick-stupid, poo-flinging monkeyhouse of a House of Representatives in the history of the Republic.

Charles P Pierce The State of the Union Is Angry Espuire 24 Jan 12

Hard to argue with.  This speech will set the frame for the remainder of Obama’s first term and the posture Democrats adopt for the vital upcoming election.  How’s he doing?

When I was a kid, our family would gather at my grandmother’s house for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  All manner of cousins, aunts, uncles and sundry relatives would descend on a little house in Batavia, IL.  She had a bar in the basement with a pool table, a long dining room table made longer by adding some folding card tables and folding chairs.  In the living room, she had a big color TV – one of those tube jobs with the old remote that clicked loudly when you pressed a button.

(Posted at SexGenderBody)