IMG_2777 originally uploaded by Nick Busse
Now that the Minnesota State Fair poll is finished with over 50 responses (our best yet!) I thought I’d post something about the Republican National Convention. I followed the local news and the citizen journalists’ accounts (see some micro-blogging about it here and here and then check out some pictures here) all day yesterday and wondered what you think about the whole ordeal.
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So, head on over to the poll on the right hand side and click away. If what I have selected doesn’t match what you think, believe, or care to report please comment away.
Republican National Convention
- Ignoring (40.0%, 23 Votes)
- Supporting (32.0%, 18 Votes)
- Frightening (21.0%, 12 Votes)
- Rioting (5.0%, 3 Votes)
- Protesting (2.0%, 1 Votes)
Total Voters: 57
Loading ...Also, you can check on all of the previous polls that we have had here at Lazy Lightning in the Polls Archive.
Dakota Complaints Map
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September 2nd, 2008 at 10:01 am
Too bad the lameass democrats haven’t had an original idea since the 60′s. This election is their’s to lose and looks more and more like that could happen.
September 2nd, 2008 at 12:02 pm
Where to start…. ah neve rmind. Nice rhetoric, “lameass” and “original idea’s” aside, the right wing of the republican party really finds it’s self sitting the ashes of all their great ideas. It wasn’t that long ago that their current candidate was considered an outcast for being too liberal.. fact is the conservative agenda has been repudiated by the American people.
In the last 40 years, since the 60′s they have..
Not privatized Social Security. Even Ronald Regan realized that going after SS, a benefit most conservatives hate, backed away. When “W” went after it in 2004, poll numbers were so negative the Republicans in Congress killed the opportunity to vote on Bush’s little privatization deal. Most voters, Dem and Rep alike, like SS.
Not cut Medicare. in fact the opposite. in 2003 a Republican Congress and White House enacted a prescription drug program that was the biggest expansion of socialized medicine in the Johnson admin.
Lost the “culture war” Abortion is still legal and the Supreme Court, in spite of justice packing still is loath to overturn it’s self. It has not struck down a single prayer in school restriction and.. in 2003, over turned all states anti-sodomy laws. (sorry Bill, didn’t mean to say sodomy..) Gay marriage is on the national agenda, and while it may get overturned in California and in many states, 10 years ago, no one was even talking about it.
Censorship campaigns, and Al Gore’s wife was front and center on this, so it crosses party lines, have categorically failed thanks to the explosion of the internet and cable.. To the point the networks are challenging the status quo on content and language..
Falwell’s Moral Majority and Pat Robertson’s Christian Coalition have been shut down due to overinflated membership and lack of support.
W and Cheney and NeoCons stymied by the loss of the domestic agenda turned outward.. and engaged in poor foreign policies.
The Iraq invasion (Different from Afgn) the lack of an exit strategy, the secret American prison system (Gulag?).. .something akin to the bad old days of KGB, the suspension of the constitution, wiretapping, privacy on and on.. fly in contrast to the principal of limited government, the old mantra of the Right.
As a result, last years midterm elections saw a major defeat for Republicans, the Party Leaderhship purged Rumsfeld, Powell quit out of disgust.. and the strategists brought back there more pragmatic conservatives, like Robert Gates, a guy with more in common with Bush 1 and Howard Baker than the current administration.
The great ideas of the far right, denying the reality of evolution, stem cell reserach and global warming and scaring up ideas about “Islamofascism” and “liberal fascism”, they’ve had to resort to paying Fox announcers to keep their ideas going even though the majority of the American people aren’t buying..
I still wouldn’t use the term “dumbass” to describe right wingers, but I would suggest they’re holding on to some very old and very outdated ideas under the guise of ideology.
I think McCain is sign of things to come for the Republicans a far more populist and thus much more formidable conservative party, with real fiscal control and a more global conservative agenda as opposed to what see now. That’s who’s running Germany and France at the moment. They just have to get rid of the last of the neocon Bushite Republicans.. the guys with truly NO NEW IDEAS..
September 2nd, 2008 at 6:27 pm
A couple of my friends who live in downtown SP were barricaded from going into their apartment last night. While K left her husband in the car to argue with the swat team guys and sneak in to rescue the cat, they proceeded to tear gas the husband and several others in the vicinity. Due entirely to the violent protesters active last night, and not the republican’s or the peaceful protesters fault, but a really lousy experience for two people who showed 5 forms of ID and were still denied entrance the the place they legally reside in.
They live next door to Wellstone Elementary, I bet today was a great first day of school for the little ones.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:07 am
In response to sank… I won’t go into each and every stretch of the facts you mention. But I will point out that no matter how bad Bush is, he’s still rated higher than our currently Democratic controlled Congress. And rest assured that BUSH does NOT correlate to ALL Republicans and especially Conservatives.
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:08 am
Do I need to add that I am coming from the perspective of a more open minded lefty???
September 3rd, 2008 at 9:15 am
And rest assured that BUSH does NOT correlate to ALL Republicans and especially Conservatives.
They need to rename the Republican party, as it exists under Bush, to something else so that the rest of us don’t get a bad name. I typically refer to them as the “New Aged GOP” but unfortunately that doesn’t go far enough.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:51 am
Does anyone else see something slighly perverse in the fact that in the not so distant future Dan Quail requested that Murphy Brown be taken off the air because it promoted a single/unwed mother and or having babies out of wedlock and our newest prospective republican VP has every on air republican wonk on every station shouting from the rooftops about how her family is off limits and she should be praised for being so firmly pro life.
Hypocrites drive me nuts, and for the record I am a registered republican.
September 3rd, 2008 at 11:52 am
post above meant not so distant past, NOT future.
September 4th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
I took my son down to the RNC last night. As someone who has voted independant in the last elections- I am very excited by this year. This is the first year I don’t feel like I have to choose between the lesser of two evils, and I can find redeeming qualities in all of the candidates running for Pres and VP.
That being said- I am also a huge history buff, and have been known to pull over for any “historic site” on country roads. I couldn’t let this opportunity for my son go by without him seeing all of these people involved in the “political process.”
I took him downtown last night, and at first it was really cool- we saw alot of limos and really dressed up people. And, contrary to popular belief- alot of the Republican women were BEAUTIFUL! It was fantastic people watching, and a great experience.
I wanted him to see all of the media – so we kept driving around the same circle to find a parking spot. We finally got one across the street from CAndyland- which is next to the area that reminds me of Nicollet Mall ( sorry, I don’t know what it is called.) My son was scared to get out of the car because of the heavy police presence- honestly, there was 20 or so police and SWAT around us( which made me thankful that it isn’t always like this in the United States) but, honestly, I was feeling pretty safe. I told him these people would protect us. As we were getting out of the car, there was a loud explosion from inside that area. It sounded like a bomb went off, or someone had shot someone. Needless to say, my son and I were both terrified, and I felt horrible. We got back in the car, and I tried to get out of there, but the traffic was moving at a snails pace, and kept pushing me back in to the same circle. WE ended up driving by the same spot, and it was surrounded by media, and they had the bomb dogs out sniffing and even more cops than before. I figured if something like that could happen with 20 cops around, things weren’t safe, so I just waned to get out of there.
Then it got worse, my son suddenly said, “mom, those pictures on that truck are really weird.” I wasn’t sure what he was talking about due to my search for an escape. I looked up, and in front of us- plastered to all sides of a semi, were pictures of late term aborted fetuses. The pictures were HUGE, and probably the most offensive thing I have ever seen. The worst part about it was- I couldn’t move!!! My son had to stare at this nutjobs idea of a good way to get around the protest rules. I had to sit behind this for 15 minutes at least, until I finally pulled over into a no parking thing and sat there until a few trucks went in front of me, and we didn’t have to see it anymore. These pictures were seered into my brain- and the brain of my innocent 7 year old son, who I was trying to get interested in politics.
So, this was his first experience with something that he has a right to do and see, but because of a few stupid asses who ironically were probably at both extremes of the spectrum- he was terrified. Me too!
I am pissed, and have noone I can complain to, crazies don’t have a customer service website.
These people are assholes. I am all for protesting, but it isn’t fair that moms of soldiers- who have their heart seriously involved in what they are doing- follow the rules. Yet, some Jesse Sparkles idiot, who is mad because someone beat them up in school- or had god talk to them and choose them to end abortion (which if they knew anything, would know 3rd trimester abortions are illegal anyway!) decided to get on the news.
The problem with anarchists and extreme right wing is that they generally aren’t the smartest on the block, or they are so smart they have no social skills. Even if you are a follower of an anarchist group- you are not an anarchist! You are a follower- just like the rest of us!
Thanks for ruining what could have been a good learning experience for my kid. I am the one who ended up learning something. I am still excited to watch what goes on with the candidates though, and have loved watching everyones speeches- just will be on tv from now on.
September 4th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Chad,
I’m not an authority on politics at all, but I think most everyone, including a majority of the “right”/social conservatives/etc. thought Dan Quayle was being an idiot at the time. It’s not hypocrisy, just an isolated case of someone being a moron.
Kris,
It sounds like it WAS a “good learning experience” for your kid, just a more difficult one to explain. He now understands the bittersweet nature of “freedom of speech”. That bad people exist. Different ideas on settling divergent viewpoints. The sacrifice that men and women in uniform make, putting themselves in harm’s way to protect the public and the rights of those people to conduct their “speech”. Welcome out of the shelter son.
And not to be rude to you but do you not watch the news or pay attention to a newspaper? How could you have gone down there NOT knowing that these things were happening down there?
Yes, on a personal level I agree these “anarchists” and extremists are assholes, but if I went down there right now, I would do so knowing there is a good chance I (a non-asshole) could get caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. There’s no way in hell I would trot my kids down there right now. I’m not into putting them in harm’s way of being “collateral damage” to a poorly aimed molotov cocktail, teargas, flash-bang device, exploding water balloon filled with urine, or who knows what.
If you want to have your son “witness history” in a more controlled environment, I would recommend bringing him to a session of the state legislature, watching the convention proceedings on CSpan or planning a family trip to Washington D.C.
September 4th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
My husband felt the same way. I knew something could happen, but I originally had planned to just drive through. Once we were down there- the excitement just took over. I was by no means totally comfortable. I was on edge, but I also felt it was an important event.
I also took him to see the bridge last year. Maybe it is wrong, but I feel strongly that seeing and experiencing them make a stronger impact than just seeing them on tv. Obviously, last night proved that. :) I by no means want him to think life is all rainbows… the convention offered such a paradox. On one side you had military trucks and cement blockades- on the other – beautiful, rich people…
I guess my real frustration was and remains with that truck. It was just such a cheap shot – a way to get around the rules. Not to mention- it had to have come from somewhere- which means it was on a freeway. None of those parents or kids would have been expecting it.
September 4th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
The truck was in Minneapolis this morning. I saw it when I went to coffee. Disgusting.
September 4th, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Absolutely Kris, seeing and experiencing things live and firsthand do make a stronger impact. You just have to be aware of the environment and realize that the impact can be shocking. I have vivid memories going to my dad’s office as a boy and having to pass through crowds of shouting, venomous anti-nuke protesters, some of whom covered themselves in very real-looking fake blood and guts and were lying on the steps to his office building (which happened to be the Pentagon). Later in adulthood, I drove up to that same building and saw a gaping hole where a plane had gone through my dad’s old office window. I learned early on, and continue to witness that those with extreme ideologies have no sensitivity nor regard for anyone or anything around them including themselves.
September 4th, 2008 at 5:21 pm
MSPD,
Its a fair point on Quail, although I really have a hard time believing if the tables were turned (Bidens we would not be hearing Newt Gingrich and every talking head (Gibson, Hannity, Etc) talk about the poor moral values being displayed by the liberal left. This thought and/or frustration is really what fueled my hypocrite comment, and I still believe it of most of the figureheads and/or “news reporters” of the party. To be fair, I think the same can be said for the democratic party.
For some reason however, I dont find myself thinking that Obama or McCain are hypocrites. Which might be scarier. Obama might really believe he can do all the things he claims he is going to do. Mccain is a man I deeply respect, and while I think his life experiences are nothing short of humbling, I am not sure he is in touch with the current state of our country to be the next president.
That brings us to Sarah Palin. I listened to the speech last night, hoping to be either impressed or let down. I really did not get either one from it. She appeared comfortable with the crowd, had no qualms attacking the left, and seems well spoken. All that said, I would like to hear what SHE thinks. Not what one of the writers thinks. I had hoped that this might come through in the speech, but she pretty much stayed right with the teleprompter. I hope it was more a case of nerves and wanting to stay on message and not our first glimpse of her not having anything of her own to say.
I am axiously awaiting her first interview with someone who will ask some hard questions, and/or the VEEP debate. Hopefully there is real substance there that will show through.
September 8th, 2008 at 9:12 am
[...] the successful Republican National Convention Poll is finished up with 57 votes coming in! I needed a new poll and decided to throw together something [...]