I took advantage of my state's early voting to get my ballot completed, so my choice is now a matter of record. I am encouraging everyone I know and encounter to get out and vote if they're registered.
I also remind people of Heinlein's Dictum: There may never be anyone or anything you want to vote, but there's always something to vote against.
Both my partner and I voted early (absentee) so we could work the polls on election day. She'll be working in our precint, I pulled a double shift in a neighboring precinct.
If you can vote early, please do so. If you can then take off election day and help out, please do so. Jesse is correct. This is the MOST important election since 1932. We need to win big at EVERY LEVEL. The GOP needs to be utterly crushed to bits. Only then will it begin to contemplate serious reform--if possible.
That's a remarkably good video Jesse. I hope she wins. Up here, just north of the border (Trail, BC),I've been seeing all the adds from Rossi (and Gregoire) and his ads are very disgusting. Very typical GOP character assassination and FEAR FEAR FEAR. The ads for the ones in Idaho are even worse though.
Trivial pursuit observation: The music playing in the background is based on Gregorian Chant--the "Dies Irae" (sp?), which is from the Mass for the Dead ("day of anger, day of wrath" stuff).
It's appropriate. It is a bit of cultural dog whistle from the left, but any church musician (moi--long ago)or someone who was raised Catholic, Espicopalian or Lutheran should be able to spot at in 10 seconds.
It matters not who or how many vote, all that matters is who counts the vote. As long as you allow the vote to be counted in secret; your vote is a placebo.
The USA's political system was designed, quite carefully, to forbid deep and swift change, so I'll believe it when I see it, and not one second earlier.
Also, what CK said. Between the Bradley Effect and the Diebold Effect, Obama still has his work cut out for him getting to the White House--and if he gets there, he'll still have a rough road to a second term, because the real powers in this country won't let him redistribute more than some crumbs and morsels downward. They also won't let him end the wars, because too many of the real powers benefit from the wars. Hence, he won't be able to do the two things that would establish firm popularity for him.
Okay, just so you know, the Bradley Effect is a bunch of bullshit.
It's been quite completely debunked, by the campaign manager for...wait for it...BRADLEY. Who says that the polls were misunderstood, and there was no so-called Bradley Effect. There were just newspapers who did a crappy job of reading the polls and latched on to "blame racism" which was a much easier story than what actually happened.
All this has been reported over the last three to four months. You can look it up.
In the meantime, apparently McNasty seems to think he has the election all sewn up (G-d help us all):
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/14951
-Seitan Worshiper
Flip 1.5% of the votes cast and most elections would go to the other guy.
Flip 3% of the votes cast and you are talking landslide victory. Now how many stories have already been documented this early voting season about votes being flipped ... all in one direction ... from Obama to McCain. I think it is already 7 different states with different "brands" of touch screen and electronic voting machines that are having some "directional glitches."
I voted early on Thursday, and will be volunteering for Obama as much as I can this week (in between that pesky work thing). Can't wait to celebrate an Obama-Biden victory here in FLA!
Okay, just so you know, the Bradley Effect is a bunch of bullshit. It's been quite completely debunked, by the campaign manager for...wait for it...BRADLEY. Who says that the polls were misunderstood, and there was no so-called Bradley Effect. There were just newspapers who did a crappy job of reading the polls and latched on to "blame racism" which was a much easier story than what actually happened.
Exactly. NPR's "On the Media" just did a big story on the so-called Bradley Effect this week (I just listened to the podcast). They talked to the Bradley campaign manager and pollster who said that basically what happened was two things. First, the Republicans ran a far superior absentee ballot GOTV campaign and crushed the Dems with absentee ballots. Second, there was some sort of gun control initiative in the central valley area that drew the gun freaks to the polls in large numbers, most of whom voted R. Neither of these to things were caught by the polls leading up to the election.
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