Does anyone really believe that the majority of this country is without common sense?

[pacalo]

I don't.  But the Republicans want us to think that the majority of people believe the earth is flat.  It's all about manipulating public perception in order to gain the upperhand.  With their manipulation of the news & elections, they have given the morally-bankrupt minority the false security of believing they've got a mandate as to what direction this country should be taken, emboldening them to stoke the fires of hatred.  Divisiveness is necessary for the charade to continue.

Do you really think Alan Grayson & Russ Feingold were rejected by voters? That the voters would soberly make the choice to silence those who spoke out the most for their interests?  I think these two very-honorable men were silenced by those who would benefit the most by their absence.

Do you think the Republicans are above election chicanery to win by hook or crook?  That they have been the luckiest politicians since the 2000 SCOTUS selection to have "won" each time it was most convenient -- such as last November's election when a number of Republican extremists won governorships & proceeded to follow the same pattern of attacking state union workers & those most vulnerable? Such as Wisconsin's state SC election, in which a Republican county clerk conveniently "discovered" 7,000 votes in Prosser's favor?

The perception that the Republicans want us to have is a sham.  Up is not down, & I believe the majority of this country doesn't agree with the modern brand of Republican extremists.  The majority does not want this country to be turned inside-out & driven to failure.

I hope Wisconsin Democrats fight tooth & nail to ensure that this election is not stolen from them.

[FiveGoodMen]

1. Well, how did those Wisconsin numbers come out so close?

Shouldn't it have been a no-brainer?

[Old and In the Way]

3. That's what I don't get.

This election shouldn't have been close enough to steal. I really can't blame the republican Party - it's not like they aren't open (for the most part) with their agenda or who interests they represent. It's not been a recent divergence, either. Their objectives and agenda has been known for decades. I blame the voter who can't seem to comprehend the obvious and willfully chooses to vote against his best economic interests. It may be the typical Republican voter is a 1 issue voter - be it anti- abortion, minorities, gays, immigrants who is willing to sink him- or herself economically to have lip service paid for their own personal bigot hot-button issue.

[PeaceNikki]

5. Are you fucking kidding? Prosser won his last election w/99.5%.

He got 547,000 votes. We tripled turnout and he only increased his votes by 35%.

Kloppenburg was a virtual unknown and Prosser has been in WI politics for 2 decades. He was polling THIRTY POINTS UP 8 weeks ago.

Jesus Christ, people.

[Name removed]

8. Deleted message

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[Control-Z]

10. No. It's more like

everyone who votes against unions is evil, greedy, or stupid. Now do you understand?

[Name removed]

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[walldude]

15. It's not... and

I too have had problems with unions in the past. However, those are tiny tiny problems compared to what we will have if workers have no protection whatsoever.


Let me ask you a question. If your boss decides he only wants to pay you a dollar a day what recourse do you have?

[Name removed]

18. Deleted message

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[walldude]

22. I'm not talking about union employees... I'm talking non-union

Union employees are protected. You are the one that came in complaining about the unions. So again I'll ask you, as a non-union employee. Say you are making 20 bucks an hour, and your boss decides he needs gold faucets for his yacht so he's gong to drop your pay by 13 bucks an hour, and cut off your health insurance, what recourse do you have?

[leftstreet]

6. Because the people with common sense don't vote anymore?

:shrug:

(And no I'm not advocating not voting)

[pacalo]

11. That's the point. When an election that should have been a slam dunk against

Walker's obdurate mentality has been won by a Democratic candidate one day & the next day a magical revelation appears -- that 7,000 votes have been conveniently "found" by a Republican county clerk whose modem is conveniently not hooked into the state system -- there's something fishy going on.

Remember Walker's public statement that a majority of e-mails he'd recieved were favorable to his way of business? The AP had to get a FOIA court order to be able to see them, subsequently learning that Walker was lying about the support he claimed to have.

It's all about manipulating public perception to stay on top in the minds of voters. It serves to embolden the morally-challenged, while attempting to smash the spirits of the masses who are protesting against him.

Walker has shown us time & again that he does not like to lose..

[PeaceNikki]

14. Bull. Shit.

Prosser won his last election w/99.5%.

He got 547,000 votes. We tripled turnout and he only increased his votes by 35%.

Kloppenburg was a virtual unknown and Prosser has been in WI politics for 2 decades. He was polling THIRTY POINTS UP 8 weeks ago. Getting it to 50/50 is a fucking miracle.

Jesus Christ, people.

[FiveGoodMen]

16. I would expect there to be a much bigger gap to begin with.

This election was only held because people were threatened and angry.

Why did so many come out to defend the indefensible?

It shouldn't have been close.

[PeaceNikki]

24. What are you talking about... "election was only held because people were threatened and angry"?!?

This was not a special election or a recall election, this was a non-partisan spring election with ONE statewide race. We brought Klopp up from a THIRTY POINT DEFICIT she held 8 weeks ago. To get it CLOSE to 50/50 is a fucking miracle.

[Old and In the Way]

28. I understand it was an amazing showing, considering her starting point. I get that.

But my point is, after the exposure of the real Walker agenda (I take it he didn't run on the platform that he seems intent on executing), why would 50% of Wisconsin vote for the guy who will likely rubber stamp the agenda when it comes before the Court? I know this is frustrating as hell for you and you rightfully should be proud that this election is now a dead-heat (hopefully). But I still don't get the thinking of the Republican voter. Do they realize they will also be impacted by the Republican plan? They may not be in a public union, but their salaries/benefits will be next....can they not figure this out?

What gets me is, 100's of thousands turn out, on their own volition, to protest Walker. Yet Republicans can't turn out a few thousand with plenty of astroturf help. And yet these people show up in huge numbers to support this guy who is obviously having his strings pulled by David Koch. What motivates the typical republican voter to want to support Walker by voting this guy onto the Supreme Court?

In no way do I think Wisconsin is unique. My own State (Maine) put a teabageer in the Governors office (albeit he won 38% of the vote because the Democrat and Indies split the rest)...but both houses also turned Republican and I can't understand the thinking of the Maine republican either. It's like they've lived a decade in a vacuum without connecting the dots...

[movonne]

2. I sure hope so...and if I lived in WI I would be so livid that this is

being pulled on us...I do not trust the crook running that election in that county, I do not trust the Dem who said it is o.k. because these people can be bought by the kochroaches and probably were..the people in WI worked so hard and this stuff happens...

[cali]

4. yes. I believe this country is chock-a-block full of ignorant

idiots. sorry.

[dhill926]

13. sadly.......+1.........

[Codeine]

7. There's zero evidence of fraud here.

WI voters elected a ton of Repukes not that long ago.

[themadstork]

9. Reason needs materials.

And the GOPers have poisoned the well of public knowledge. You could be the most cognitively gifted person in the world, but if your personal knowledge-base is faulty, you will never achieve an accurate or even semi-accurate description of the world.

The reactionaries attack common sense by tainting the fuel it runs on.

[On the Road]

23. That is an Admirably Succinct Description

of what's going on. People are operating with two different sets of facts, and two different evaluations of the importance of those facts.

[Cleita]

17. My stepdaughter, who is really not political, and often

repeats RW talking points that she heard from her friends until I correct her, opined just yesterday that most Americans are ignorant, don't want to learn the facts, are sometimes downright stupid and probably will deserve what happens to them. I answered that we don't deserve what will happen to us because of them.

[4bucksagallon]

19. Perhaps a new law...

Not voting in State, Local or Federal elections would double your taxes, if state and local election your property taxes, etc., and if Federal, your income taxes etc., also you should lose any and all exemptions. LOL, I would love to see this law on the books . Maybe that would get peoples attention that voting is more than a privilege, it is EXPECTED........
It won't happen but one can dream can't one.

[upi402]

20. Choicepoint + Supreme Court showed we have lost our democracy

This poster is not surprised. This country fails the facade test to any who've paid mild attention.

[CrownPrinceBandar]

21. Ignorant, lazy, disconnected, unconcerned.......

Take your pick.

[Spider Jerusalem]

25. Honest answer? Yes.

They’re the sort of scores that drive high-school history teachers to drink. When NEWSWEEK recently asked 1,000 U.S. citizens to take America’s official citizenship test, 29 percent couldn’t name the vice president. Seventy-three percent couldn’t correctly say why we fought the Cold War. Forty-four percent were unable to define the Bill of Rights. And 6 percent couldn’t even circle Independence Day on a calendar.

Don’t get us wrong: civic ignorance is nothing new. For as long as they’ve existed, Americans have been misunderstanding checks and balances and misidentifying their senators. And they’ve been lamenting the philistinism of their peers ever since pollsters started publishing these dispiriting surveys back in Harry Truman’s day. (He was a president, by the way.) According to a study by Michael X. Delli Carpini, dean of the Annenberg School for Communication, the yearly shifts in civic knowledge since World War II have averaged out to “slightly under 1 percent.”

But the world has changed. And unfortunately, it’s becoming more and more inhospitable to incurious know-nothings—like us.

To appreciate the risks involved, it’s important to understand where American ignorance comes from. In March 2009, the European Journal of Communication asked citizens of Britain, Denmark, Finland, and the U.S. to answer questions on international affairs. The Europeans clobbered us. Sixty-eight percent of Danes, 75 percent of Brits, and 76 percent of Finns could, for example, identify the Taliban, but only 58 percent of Americans managed to do the same—even though we’ve led the charge in Afghanistan. It was only the latest in a series of polls that have shown us lagging behind our First World peers.

more

[lunasun]

26. to answer the question yes....... look at this poll from late 2010 for 1 example IMO

A new Gallup poll, released Dec. 17, reveals that 40 percent of Americans still believe that humans were created by God within the last 10,000 years. This number is slightly down from a previous high of 47 percent in 1993 and 1999.

Another 38 percent of respondents believe that humans have evolved from more basic organisms but with God playing a role in the process.

A mere 16 percent of respondents subscribed to the belief of "secular evolution": that humans have evolved with no divine guidance. However, this number has nearly doubled from nine percent of respondents in a poll from 1982.

100 minus 16 = a majority
Besides wasnt that Einstein dude a non christian????

[david13]

27. Uh? Yeah. dc