Let’s raise some money. I’m working on a House list and something more for North Carolina. Ih the meantime, I got requests for Tina Smith, the Democratic incumbent in Minnesota whose had some tight polling numbers recently, along with fan favorite Theresa Greenfield (Iowa) and Dan Ahlers (South Dakota).
Tina Smith (Minnesota, incumbent)
Dan Ahlers, South Dakota Senate
Theresa Greenfield, Iowa Senate
Mary G
Donated to Tina and Dan. Already giving to Theresa.
Wyatt Salamanca
OT
h/t https://www.yahoo.com/huffpost/wisconsin-ballot-green-party-kanye-200431311.html
opiejeanne
Kim Schrier for U.S. Congressional District 8 for Washington might need some love; I got a notice that she and her R opponent are nearly tied, but I can’t find that email or any polling at all right now. She’s a pediatrician, she’s a Democrat, even if she said impeachment was too divisive. Her opponent is a project manager for Amazon, says she’s too liberal. Duh.
My own Congresswoman is very safe in our district.
LuciaMia
How? The man is so openly mentally challenged. Would he skim that many votes away? Course Im still thinking as if this is normal times
Eolirin
@LuciaMia: If Biden were to do as poorly as Hillary did in WI, it wouldn’t take much. But I don’t think he will, so I’m not sure it’s going to matter that much.
Yutsano
@opiejeanne: We might need some H.E. Wolf action here. Maybe she has some insight although my understanding right now is everything on the wet side except for District 3 is pretty blue.
Geminid
@Eolirin: West might not get many votes, but his candidacy provides a fulcrum to leverage propaganda in social media. In 2016 much of the propaganda out of St. Petersburg was intended not to win votes for trump, but to dissuade potential Democratic voters from voting. And a lot of those voters did stay home.
Jay
opiejeanne
@Jay: OH, FFS!
2liberal
where is tina smith getting tight poll numbers? the latest I’m seeing is 9% lead.
Jay
zhena gogolia
@Jay:
the postcard I got clearly indicated that people should check with their local election authorities.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Geminid:
That may have had a lot to do with Clinton being, rightly or wrongly, unpopular from years of propaganda, though
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Wyatt Salamanca:
Does anybody care to guess what the odds are that West and Hawkins will succeed in their lawsuits? I thought it was pretty clear cut that they (well, West at least) didn’t properly file
zhena gogolia
This is an amazing video.
Teddys Person
@opiejeanne: I live in this district and Schrier is the first Democrat elected to represent the 08th since the district was created in 1980 (it includes a bit of eastside Seattle then goes over the mountains toward Ellensburg).
She won 52% to 48% in 2018. I suspect Republicans see this district as flippable.
James E Powell
@Eolirin:
I am not saying this to be a doom-sayer because I am hoping for the best and feeling like we are winning, but with the latest bullshit from their supreme court, Wisconsin scares me.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@zhena gogolia:
I’m not sure that’s the best framing. It’s pretty much widely understood that the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars were bullshit and didn’t actually do anything to prevent another 9/11 from happening again
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@James E Powell:
I don’t think West and Hawkins have a case, do they? It’s pretty clear cut they didn’t make the deadline
James E Powell
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
It’s not so much that they have a case as the supreme court is dragging it out, making the management of mail-in ballots difficult and confusing.
Wyatt Salamanca
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
@James E Powell:
Because of this bullshit from these assholes West and Hawkins, Biden has to run up the score in Wisconsin. I fear this Election Day will be a motherfucking nightmare.
Chetan Murthy
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Goku, I would ask you to think again. I opposed the Iraq War. And frankly, I agree somewhat with Ward Churchill’s characterization of “little Eichmanns” [where I diverge from him, is that I cannot believe that they deserved to die for that, because that is the belief of Mohammed Atta, but also of Ted Kaczynski; killing people for political beliefs isn’t something we should condone in a functioning, civilized society.] We had to go into Afghanistan and get Bin Laden. We. Had. To.
What followed in Afghanistan, and the Iraq War, were massive own-goals and fuck-ups. The Iraq War was a war crime and the Bush leadership are war criminals. No doubt And we should want to prevent future wars like that. We should do everything we can, to stop sending weapons to kill people in other countries when it isn’t actually in our critical national interest.
But this doesn’t change that we must honor the sacrifices that our soldiers made. Someday, if you’re in a foreign country, and things go sideways, you’re going to want the Navy, the Marines to send a team in to get you and your family. And they’ll do it, because you’re an American, because you hold an American passport, and for no greater reason than that. They’ll put their lives on the line to get you out. And we need to honor those American soldiers, Goku.
That I can *condemn* the Bush administration’s conduct and their illegal wars, doesn’t change that we still honor our war dead, injured, and veterans. And tbeir families.
Chetan Murthy
@Chetan Murthy: A little more: I think it’s relevant that, unlike civilian life, the military is very much a command organization: disobeying orders comes with a heavy price, and recruits are chosen for their propensity to obey orders, molded into people who will do so. When such fellow Americans make sacrifices on our behalf, we have to honor those sacrifices, even when we excoriate and hold in contempt the people who gave the orders that led to those sacrifices. The two things are separate, and we need to keep them separate, in way that we do not in civilian life.
In war, the fact that “the Cossacks work for the Czar” is less of a reason to hold the Cossacks culpable, than in civilian life. Because in war, *in practice*, the Cossacks don’t have the same level of moral agency — even if *in theory* they ought to. This is just the way it is.
raven
@Chetan Murthy: “recruits are chosen for their propensity to obey orders,”
That’s a stretch
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Chetan Murthy:
I meant in the sense that I don’t think it’s smart politics. Then again, I guess the anti-war emo left would’ve found another reason to not vote for “neoliberal warmonger Joe Biden”
debbie
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
You’re looking at it from nearly 20 years later. Put yourself in their shoes, at that time, and then argue against their motivation.
Chetan Murthy
@raven: It’s part of why they’re chosen young, no? The older you get, the less you’re willing to obey orders b/c they’re screamed at you, no? That’s all I meant, really. That they get ’em young, for many reasons, not only b/c young == healthy and strong.
Geminid
@Chetan Murthy: Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld certainly screwed up the Afghan and Iraq wars, and the general “war on terror.” But they were warned about Bin Laden by the outgoing administration, and their biggest screw up was to let the 9-11 attack to happen in the first place.
raven
@Chetan Murthy: When they don’t need bodies they are much more choosy but, when the shit comes down and people start getting killed, they can’t be nearly as particular. After Vietnam they did “attrition” studies trying to determine effective recruitment criteria and found that regular HS grad were more likely to complete their tours that GED grads. They then tightened requirements and only took GED grads with a year of undergrad. When the shit started up in the ME they had to lower those criteria to fill their quotas. That’s also when they started using the Guard as a “backdoor draft” and instituted “stop loss” to make people stay in. Young people are certainly more malleable but as far as “following orders” I’d say sometimes. Take a look at “Project 100,000” fondly known as MacNamara’s Moron Corps. I was in that outfit.
Chetan Murthy
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Actually, I think it’s very, very smart politics. This is a “Flight 93” election: for all the marbles. All of them. There are lots of Americans who honor our soldiers’ sacrifices, and those Americans would be turned-off by any politician who did *anything* to denigrate their sacrifice. I’m one of those Americans, btw. It’s a red line for lots of people, and for good reason.
I remember going to the American Embassy to vote in 1992 in Paris. Presenting my passport to the Marine (I think?) guard, so I could enter. It was solemn, and full of great emotional power. He was a symbol of American, of American power, here to protect me. And I felt it.
That video was -very- nuanced, and I thought it hit exactly the right note. There comes an age, when respect for people who put their lives at risk, who give them up, to protect ours, is an inexcusable fault.
Fair Economist
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
I think it’s moot. The intent of the
crookedRepublican majority is to delay the decision until after the absentee deadline has passed, and then say it’s impossible to send out absentee ballots. They’ll probably approve at least one because that would require reprinting the already-printed ballots and further delay things.Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Fair Economist:
But how could they possibly justify that? It’s black and white. They didn’t file in time. End of story
raven
@Chetan Murthy: All Embassy Guards are Marines.
Geminid
@Geminid: Retired Marine Corps General Bernard Trainer and NYT chief military correspondent Michael Gordon recount warnings about Bin Laden given to the incoming Bush administration in the first chapter of Cobra II (2006), their account of the planning and execution of the Iraq invasion.
Frankensteinbeck
@LuciaMia:
Kanye would skim more votes from Trump than Biden, but Republicans don’t grasp that because they’re obsessed with identity politics. ‘Black rapper’ is all they assume blacks care about, not ‘heavily conservative’ black rapper.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Frankensteinbeck:
Perhaps that’s why they’re also trying to help the Green Party get on the ballot? I’m sure the delay to the mailing of absentee ballots is what they’re aiming for, as others have pointed out above
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Chetan Murthy:
Unfortunately not for Trump’s voters. Though it remains to be seen if it will have an effect or not
Chetan Murthy
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
It’s funny thing. You might be right. But I’m not so sure. I remember, going to grad school in Ithaca, NY, that during the Gulf War, the yellow ribbons started at the town line and continued out into Tompkins County. [ETA: by which I mean, the town-dwellers were typically associated with the university; “townies” couldn’t afford to live in town, hence would live outside of town.] Those voters are all Trump voters now. But there’s a long tradition of military service there: I met a guy who worked in the towel/basket room at the gym, who’s father had served, he’d served, and his son was serving. I dunno, it’s possible that this particular thing is a bridge too far. I guess we’ll have to see.
Jay
Omnes Omnibus
We already know that the Trumpers are a lost cause. There is also no point in trying to reach voters like those at Balloon Juice. Ads should be aimed at shoring up soft Biden voters, persuading the seven people who are actually undecided, and demoralizing soft Trump voters. If ads don’t seem persuasive to you, that’s fine. Just show up and vote.
raven
@Omnes Omnibus: ding
Ian
Setting aside from the possibility of getting the Taliban from handing over bin Laden in 2001 (which they seemed willing to do), anything from economic and political sanctions to covert operations to hell, even just doing nothing, would have been better in the long run for the United States than our full force twenty year occupation of Afghanistan.
Did the public pressure at home following 9/11 mean the Bush Administration had to invade, or was the simply the only option they decided upon that we are still paying the consequences of now?
PsiFighter37
@Wyatt Salamanca: No doubt that the WI Supreme Court will do whatever they feel is most favorable to the GOP. That said, given how well Dems did on that screwed-up primary day, I feel a bit more confident about the state party navigating the skulduggery that may occur.
Jay
zhena gogolia
I didn’t mean to start a fight. I thought the man’s testimony was effective. I look at everything from the viewpoint of the squishy voters we need to get.
Chetan Murthy
@Ian:
Oh, I think we shouldn’t have stayed. And we also screwed-up getting Bin Laden (as has been thoroughly documented). We should have gone in, gotten him, and gotten out. Also, at least at the time, it wasn’t at all clear that the Taliban were going to cooperate and hand him over. Maybe in hindsight it’s clear they would have, but back then? Not so much. I could be wrong about this, but that’s my recollection.
I think, yeah, we had to invade. We didn’t have to invade and fuck it up by immediately turning our attention to Iraq, nor did we have to establish yet another outpost of our Empire in Af-Pak.
Chetan Murthy
@zhena gogolia:
I don’t think you did. It’s a friendly discussion over the strawberry-rhubarb pie, is all.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@zhena gogolia:
You didn’t. Chetan Murthy has convinced me
Geminid
@zhena gogolia: Every vote counts like another, whether it is cast by someone who hates trump with the heat of a thousand suns, or is cast by someone just got off the fence. trump has to be defeated, but a landslide would be the most consequential way to defeat trump, as well as bring in a sizable Democratic Senate majority.
zhena gogolia
@Chetan Murthy:
My recollections coincide with yours.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Omnes Omnibus:
Good advice. What do you think about the clusterfuck in Wisconsin involving West, Hawkins, and the WI Supreme Court?
Omnes Omnibus
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): I think people in WI need to show up and vote.
Chetan Murthy
[oops, wrong thread]
Jay
J R in WV
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
Yes, that’s so, because both Cheney and Bush picked idjits to run both wars. That doesn’t mean that the many thousands of people who volunteered for combat didn’t intend to prevent a subsequent al Queda attack.
Of course, this time the attack was more carefully planned and executed, and currently they hold the White House!
J R in WV
@Ian:
I will always believe that Cheney thought we could confiscate Iraqi oil forever more, and that his former company, Halliburton, could make billions of dollars by stealing a whole chunk of middle eastern oil fields. Which meant money for Cheney, himself.
But he was too incompetent to manage Iraq after the war — because they didn’t guard the Iraqi armories after our forces passed them on their way to Bagdad, and for many other ineffectual reasons. So that was never really in the cards.
But all those contractors were in line to take some of the money from the C-130s loaded with pallets of shrink-wrapped hundred dollar bills, which were never accounted for… Plus the museums and ancient sites which were plundered for artifacts worth millions.
RaflW
Very much appreciate the Tina Smith ask. I think she’ll do OK, but the race is competitive, which makes me anxious.
I just chipped in to Rita Hart’s race, to be neighborly!