Dennis G. wrote at Balloon Juice from 2010-14.

Dennis is active with Green America.

Dennis G.

Off to Ohio…

by Dennis G.| November 2, 20125:16 am| 68 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Open Threads, Vote Like Your Country Depends On It

I’ve many loose ends at work and in life that will need to wait until Wednesday to be tied. It is GOTV time and I have an early plane for Columbus, Ohio. I’ll be there through Election Day and I’m pretty damn fired up and ready to go.

Here are the links where you can connect with the Obama Campaign in the swing States:

Iowa • New Hampshire • Colorado • Nevada • Ohio

Virginia • Florida • Wisconsin • North Carolina

And here is the GOTV link for the rest: vote.barackobama.com.

Also, too, Daily Kos and Worker’s Voice have a GOTV effort that you can plug into at this link.

I plan to work as long as there is something to do while I’m in Ohio and I have no idea if I’ll have internet access and if I do, if I’ll have any time to use it. I’ll try to put up an update in a post or as a comment when I can.

Have you voted yet? (I did in Maryland and early voting is pretty damn great). Best thing is that is frees you on Election Day to help with the GOTV effort.

So, what are your GOTV plans?

Cheers

Off to Ohio…Post + Comments (68)

Typical Romney…

by Dennis G.| October 30, 20122:28 pm| 160 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Open Threads, Vote Like Your Country Depends On It, Assholes, Romney of the Uncanny Valley

Following on Kay’s post, I wanted to underscore how disgusting it is that Mitt Romney is using Hurricane Sandy as a campaign prop. He held the exact same rally that he had planned, but pretended it was for “disaster relief”. Such bullshit is typical Romney. He held a full-on campaign rally in Dayton, Ohio–nothing more. We are a week out and he is entitled to campaign how he wants and where he wants, regardless of any other current event.

But Romney is shameless. He wants to use Sandy’s destruction as a media hook, so he re-branded his rally for the stupid and gullible members of the press as a “storm relief’ effort. To underscore the stupid deception, Mitt asked attendees to bring can goods to the rally, as if random truckloads of unsorted can goods flooding a disaster area are useful. The Red Cross is pretty specific that these kinds of efforts produce piles of supplies that cannot be used and cause real problems for relief efforts:

Does the American Red Cross accept donated goods?

Unfortunately, due to logistical constraints the Red Cross does not accept or solicit individual donations or collections of items. Items such as collected food, used clothing and shoes must be sorted, cleaned, repackaged and transported which impedes the valuable resources of money, time, and personnel.

Theatrical can good drives are the kinds of things that people do when they want to pretend they care–as long as the cameras are rolling (and yes, it was only a photo op). It is not a surprise that it is what Mitt is doing. I would bet that everything collected at the rally ends up in a landfill.

If you want to help: send money. Here is the link to the Red Cross disaster relief.

If Mitt was serious about disaster relief he would ask his supporters to only do that, but loading cans on trucks makes for a good “I care” photo op, so he asks for props. That Mitt is asking his supporters to drop off their spare cans of Spotted Dick and jars of Grey Poupon tells you all you need to know.

We have less than a week to GOTV and defeat this weasel. There is something each of us can do to help. I’ve made my plans, what are yours?

Cheers

UPDATE: Meanwhile, President Obama is showing how a leader acts when confronted with a disaster.

ps: I rode out the storm in Baltimore and we had no damage and lost power for only a very short amount of time, but I know that was a bit of luck. It could have just as easily hit us like it did many of our friends and neighbors near and far. The idea of turning this emergency into a Romney Campaign prop fills me with disgust. I am amazed that when it comes to sinking to new lows, Mitt Romney is a bottomless well of shame.

Typical Romney…Post + Comments (160)

GOTV open thread

by Dennis G.| October 28, 20123:11 pm| 27 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Open Threads, Vote Like Your Country Depends On It

Quick reminder: It is GOTV time.

Click the links to connect with the Obama Campaign in the following States:

Iowa • New Hampshire • Colorado • Nevada • Ohio

Virginia • Florida • Wisconsin • North Carolina

Find out how to help with GOTV for other states at vote.barackobama.com.

Daily Kos and Worker’s Voice have a GOTV effort that you can plug into at this link.

There are many other GOTV efforts underway for Senate, Congress and ballot initiatives that could use your mojo as well (here is a list of the House races Democrats could win and here are three Senate races that GOTV can win).

There are less than 10 days left and early voting has begun. We can’t leave anything on the table.

What are your GOTV plans?

Cheers

GOTV open threadPost + Comments (27)

10 days

by Dennis G.| October 27, 20128:44 pm| 197 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Vote Like Your Country Depends On It

It is GOTV time. Click the links to connect with the Obama Campaign in the following States:

Iowa • New Hampshire • Colorado • Nevada • Ohio

Virginia • Florida • Wisconsin • North Carolina

For all the other states visit vote.barackobama.com to find out how and where to vote and how you can help GOTV.

Over at GOS they’ve teamed up with Worker’s Voice to run a GOTV effort that you can plug into at this link.

There are many other GOTV efforts underway for Senate races, Congressional races and ballot initiatives that could use your mojo as well. Odds are good that you live in a state with at least one of these races. Control of the Senate is on the line and here is a list of the House races Democrats could win if we can GOTV.

Early voting began in Maryland today. I plan to vote Sunday (one step ahead of Sandy) and first thing Friday morning I’m off to Ohio.

We can’t leave anything on the table. We only have ten days.

The fact that Romney even has a 26% chance of victory should motivate you into action. Now is the time to act.

What are your GOTV plans?

Cheers

________

ps: John was spot on about Stoller. We are plagued with self-important white males pretending to speak for progressives even as they work overtime to block and damage any liberal progress. It is hard for me to read Stoller and not wonder if his real problem with Barack Obama is this and not any policy. Assholes like him make the GOTV effort even more important.

10 daysPost + Comments (197)

A Campaign foretold in an 150 year-old cartoon…

by Dennis G.| October 26, 201210:38 pm| 122 Comments

This post is in: Black Jimmy Carter, Election 2012, Fables Of The Reconstruction, Post-racial America, Vote Like Your Country Depends On It

The Romney Campaign and the entire modern Conservative movement is very easy to understand. It is all about race. Full stop. For these people, every election is an attempt to use fear, anger and even hate of brown folks to inspire white folks to vote against their self-interest and support their Galtian overlords.

Call it The Negrophope Strategy.

This cartoon is from 1862.

It effectively distills the relationship between the modern conservative movement and President Obama. It also explains the Romney campaign strategy that white folks should reject everything that President Obama has done to help them–to save our Nation from ruin–over the last four years because he is a Ni-CLANG and that they should vote for Mitt because he is white.

In fact, the entire Romney campaign can be boiled down to just a few words: “Vote for Mitt, he’s white”. There are no policies or specifics, just code-talking and word salads from Mitt and his surrogates. Take away the appeals to white power and Mitt holds an empty hand. They can try and hide it, or whitewash it with weasel words and bullshit, but the Negrophope Strategy is the foundation of their campaign.

Race-based campaigning is a very old American Conservative strategy–especially that part of the conservative movement with its roots in the Confederacy (which is just another way of saying all of it). These folks squeal like a poked pig if you mention their reliance on race-baiting. They will weep, shake with outrage and yell ‘reverse racism’ at anybody who points it out. Sure, it hurts their feelings to be called out, but that doesn’t change the fact that the old Negrophope Strategy is the ONLY trick they have and Mitt’s ONLY possible path to victory.

The Confederacy was defeated on the battlefield almost 150 years ago. It is time to defeat their twisted politics of white fear and white supremacy. It is time to toss the ideas of the Confederacy on the dustbin of history. It is time to defeat Mitt Romney and the GOP everywhere we can.

It is time to re-elect President Barack Obama.

It is time for GOTV.

What are your plans?

Cheers

A Campaign foretold in an 150 year-old cartoon…Post + Comments (122)

And tears will flow from wingnut eyes as they shake with rage…

by Dennis G.| October 25, 201211:15 pm| 68 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Glibertarianism, Open Threads, Going Galt

In an interview with Rolling Stone, President Obama dissed the followers of Ayn Rand:

Have you ever read Ayn Rand?
Sure.

What do you think Paul Ryan’s obsession with her work would mean if he were vice president?
Well, you’d have to ask Paul Ryan what that means to him. Ayn Rand is one of those things that a lot of us, when we were 17 or 18 and feeling misunderstood, we’d pick up. Then, as we get older, we realize that a world in which we’re only thinking about ourselves and not thinking about anybody else, in which we’re considering the entire project of developing ourselves as more important than our relationships to other people and making sure that everybody else has opportunity – that that’s a pretty narrow vision. It’s not one that, I think, describes what’s best in America. Unfortunately, it does seem as if sometimes that vision of a “you’re on your own” society has consumed a big chunk of the Republican Party.

Of course, that’s not the Republican tradition. I made this point in the first debate. You look at Abraham Lincoln: He very much believed in self-sufficiency and self-reliance. He embodied it – that you work hard and you make it, that your efforts should take you as far as your dreams can take you. But he also understood that there’s some things we do better together. That we make investments in our infrastructure and railroads and canals and land-grant colleges and the National Academy of Sciences, because that provides us all with an opportunity to fulfill our potential, and we’ll all be better off as a consequence. He also had a sense of deep, profound empathy, a sense of the intrinsic worth of every individual, which led him to his opposition to slavery and ultimately to signing the Emancipation Proclamation. That view of life – as one in which we’re all connected, as opposed to all isolated and looking out only for ourselves – that’s a view that has made America great and allowed us to stitch together a sense of national identity out of all these different immigrant groups who have come here in waves throughout our history.

I expect these words will throw the usual suspects into fits of rage and showers of bitter tears.

Meanwhile we have 12 days left to win this thing. What are your plans to GOTV?

How about another Open Thread.

Cheers

And tears will flow from wingnut eyes as they shake with rage…Post + Comments (68)

GOTV

by Dennis G.| October 24, 20129:17 am| 185 Comments

This post is in: Election 2012, Vote Like Your Country Depends On It

The long and endless campaign has been real and fun, but not always real fun.

Now we are two weeks out. What we knew two years ago is still true–this will be a close election and it will be won or lost on the ground. What happens next is simple. The Campaign that does the best job Getting Out The Vote: WINS. End of story.

So what are your plans to help GOTV?

Me, I’m off to Ohio.

I’ve made my plane reservations. I’ll fly into Columbus on November 2 and stay through Wednesday. I contacted the campaign at [email protected] and told them that I was coming. Less than a day later, somebody gave me a call, we chatted for a bit and they sent me a housing request form. I’ll get on the ground that Friday morning and spend the next five days doing whatever I can to GOTV in Ohio (which I hear is an important swing state).

There are plenty of other places and ways to GOTV as well. Wisconsin, Iowa, Virginia, North Carolina, Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire and Colorado are all in play and your GOTV help in any of them would make a difference (just click a state’s link to find out how to connect with the campaign).

You don’t have to go somewhere to help GOTV, you can make phone calls from your home. The campaign is set-up to help you do that. You can do something from anywhere and whatever you do will help the ground game.

Go to vote.barackobama.com to find out how and where to vote in your state (or any other state). You can get the details about early voting, absentee voting and more ways that you can help GOTV.

In the non-swing states, there are some Congressional races, Senate races and ballot initiatives that could use some GOTV mojo as well. GOTV efforts will be important for these as well.

If you can join me in Columbus let me know. Perhaps we can have a Balloon Juice meet-up of some kind one evening at an appropriate watering hole.

It is time to get to work. What are your GOTV plans?

Cheers

GOTVPost + Comments (185)

We still have time to mess this up!

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

In my day, never was longer.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

In short, I come down firmly on all sides of the issue.

Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

The words do not have to be perfect.

A last alliance of elves and men. also pet photos.

Consistently wrong since 2002

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

White supremacy is terrorism.

Russian mouthpiece, go fuck yourself.

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

The most dangerous place for a black man in America is in a white man’s imagination.

Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Come on, man.

Off to Ohio…

Typical Romney…

GOTV open thread

10 days

A Campaign foretold in an 150 year-old cartoon…

And tears will flow from wingnut eyes as they shake with rage…

GOTV