ewagner
ewagner's JournalSurprise Visit by Barrett and Feingold
Pat Krietlow (running against Sean (say anything) Duffy), Russ Feingold and Tom Barratt made a campaign stop in Marshfield earlier this afternoon.
Pat introduced everybody and Russ gave a pretty "fired up" speech before Tom spoke and urged us to keep working up until the last possible minute.
The announcement was spread only by email, facebook messages and word-of-mouth but a crowd I'd estimate at ~100 people packed into the Daily Grind Coffee Shop....
It was a very energetic, committed group that turned out...I have confidence...Tom said that Walker is "banking on the Koch brothers." but that he is "banking on you!" The hard-working volunteers cheered!!!!
Some reason for hope...
Stopped by the local Dem Office yesterday afternoon. Saw a couple of old friends but also saw some new faces...saw people stopping in to buy bumper stickers, pick up yard signs and tee shirts (Walker: You don't remember us but we RECALL you!). Saw four or five people on the phones...listened to the office manager tell a caller where and how to get an absentee ballot.
They were busy. They weren't caught up in any kind of drama at all...the Office manager said she isn't paying attention to anything but the task at hand...as she put it " I just put my head down and keep working".
This is the kind of "ground game" that pays off....
I'm a lot more hopeful.
Why the Lies keep coming...
I posted this as a reply to another thread but I think it deserves its own thread and hopefully some creative and thoughtful suggestions. Here's the post:
I finished reading "The Republican Brain" and although I found the book incredibly shallow, it did capsulize all the current studies on how conservatives and progressives process information...and it's both frightening and disheartening...and explains why "say anything" and outrageous lies are prominent features of right wing advertising.
Repubs hold onto their beliefs in a defensive posture like they hold onto survival itself...in fact, their beliefs are their survival..sooooo...when confronted by facts, data, science etc., the engage in motivated reasoning and grasp onto anything to protect their beliefs...the "say anything" quotes and downright lies justify their beliefs and allow them to grasp more tightly to their positions.
What Walker is doing is giving them a proverbial "fig leaf" to cover their wrongness of their positions and it will work.
What Mooney's book failed miserably with was giving us a means to counter "the big lie"..just a cursory suggestion or two.
AFP Rally in Madison???
Just read that AMERICANS FOR PROSPERITY* is holding a rally in Madison today. The article says that Failin' Palin is invited to speak. Any "representations" going on?
* that's PROSPERITY for the 1%
Walker to sign bills in Marshfield
News-Herald just ran this headline on the on-line version
http://www.marshfieldnewsherald.com/article/20120328/MNH0101/120328027/Gov-Walker-visit-city-today?odyssey=tab|topnews|text|FRONTPAGE
Two interesting tidbits:
1. The event IS NOT OPEN TO THE PUBLIC; and
2. The location of the bill-signing is UNDISCLOSED!
That's a real MAN OF THE PEOPLE!!!
Some Reflections on GAME CHANGE
I personally enjoyed the movie enough to watch (most) of the replay. Seeing the cuts of the actual events played against the reported behind-the-scenes narrative from the book was absolutely spell-binding to this political junkie. I offer a few other reflections:
1. Even in '08 the Republican Party had a problem with their conservative base. The first AND ONLY reason that Palin was offered up as an alternative was to neutralize the growing dissatisfaction with the the hard-core conservative base because without it, McCain had no chance of winning. The Republican Party had a choice here and they made the wrong one...no...it wasn't choosing Palin, it was choosing to cater to the anti-intellectual, radical, racist wing of the party instead of shuffling them off into obscurity. Palin was his sacrifice to them.
2. I've heard interviews that claim that the dialogue of the behind-the-scenes conversations are 99% accurate. They may well be accurate but I'm sure they were dramatized to a large degree. So....as dramatic and compelling as they were, I still take them with the proverbial grain of salt.
3. McCain comes off looking like a saint...like a good-hearted person who first refused to "go negative"; eventually relenting; and finally pulling back because he was horrified at the ugliness that it unleashed (chants of Kill Him! Socialist! etc) That may have been true in 2008 but look where McCain is now....he's right should-to-shoulder with Mitch McConnel and the rest of the crazy-assed Repubs that would rather destroy the Country than let Obama get re-elected. If he was a patriot at one time, he has long since abandoned that position
4. Re: McCain's warning to Sarah not to let the "radicals like Limbaugh and the rest" take over the party....by the time he uttered that, (if in fact, he did?) it was already too late. He had in fact unleashed the hounds of hell that became the Tea Party and installed Sarah as the Grand Matriarch.....I think the McCain line came right out of the book and I think it was Schmidt and Wallace's attempt to absolve themselves of the havoc they imposed on the country in their desire to win at all costs..
5. And finally....you can't put toothpaste back in the tube. The Republicans had the chance in 2008 to marginalize and reject the radical wing of the party and they didn't do it. Now, they're trying to nominate a "centrist" like Mitt Romney and they are learning they can't do it....he has to jump on the clown car and out-crazy the rest of them for the nomination. I think 2008 will go down as the real watershed moment in our country's history because it was the first scratch that festered into the wound of fetid politics we suffered through in 2010 and will face again in 2012..
Just My Humble Opinion ..
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