Jan
There was a time when merely stating the ideas Obama put forth would have gotten you killed. And we still live in a time where people gladly tell you that the Civil War was not whether we’d be “half-slave and half-free” but about whether we’d be “half-agrarian or half-industrial.” Or some such. I don’t think most Americans really understand the significance of say Seneca Falls or Stonewall. And I don’t know that any president has actually lauded either of these publicly.
As surely as it has always mattered to homophobes, white supremacists, and chauvinists what was and wasn’t said in the public, it should matter to those of who seek to repel them. What ideas do and don’t get exposed in the public square has to matter to any activist, because movements begin by exposing people to ideas.
Nov
It’ll be interesting to see how the Republican party evolves when these whipper snappers are all grown up.
Nov
Jim Messina, Obama campaign manager
Hint: Jon Huntsman is your man for 2016, Republicans. Or you can lose again with Sarah Palin.
Nov
This is not a final tally, but Gary Johnson earned roughly 1 percent of the popular vote, which may seem unremarkable, but it’s the best performance by a libertarian Presidential candidate in decades.
Nov
Let’s talk about how awesome that election was
Washington and Colorado voted to legalize marijuana, Maine and Maryland voted for same sex marriage, Elizabeth Warren won, and of course POTUS won.
We did this together, America.
Nov
lolz
Jul
A man holds up his ink-stained finger and the new national Libyan flag after voting last Saturday in Benghazi, Libya. Turnout was more than 60 percent.
Apr
Handicapping Romney’s potential running mates
An interesting article. Mitt Romeny himself has admitted that women voters don’t particularly like him (he blames it on the Democrats, of course), so it’s surprising that Nikki Haley is the only woman on the list. However, since Republicans decided to shame users of contraception, they may never recover those votes even with a female voice on the ticket.
Paul Ryan would probably be the best choice. Republicans won’t get a large slice of independent voters so they might as well go all in and drag the Evangelicals and Tea Party people to the polls.
Mar
Young Obama Supporters Becoming Apathetic
Obama enjoyed a wave of youth support in his run to the presidency, winning 66 percent of voters aged 18-to-29 in the race against Republican Senator John McCain. Twenty-two million young voters cast ballots, making up about 18 percent of the electorate — two million more than in 2004, according to exit polls and the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement. Today that passion has cooled amid gridlock and partisanship in Washington and a surge in unemployment that is souring young voters.
The turnout will not be great,” Curtis Gans, director of the Center for the Study of the American Electorate in Washington, said in a phone interview. The war in Afghanistan, a lack of progress on closing Guantanamo Bay and a dismal job picture taint Obama’s prospects, he said. The unemployment rate among 18- to 24-year-olds was 16.3 percent at the end of last year, the highest since record-keeping began in 1948, according to a February Pew Research Center report.
“There’s not the sense that four more years of Obama will change the world for the better,” Gans said. Still, Obama stands a “reasonably good chance” of winning, he said.
Mar
Mar
Former Disney CEO Michael Eisner Endorses 'Americans Elect': "It's time for the nominating process to join the Internet age"
The primary system we use today borders on the absurd. It starts off in Iowa, a state with less than 1% of the nation’s population. The caucuses there are nonbinding and, in the case of the Democrats, don’t even use secret ballots. One week later, the attention shifts to New Hampshire, a state with less than one-half of 1% of all Americans, where the first primary is held.
The months-long process, in which votes are held in state after state, promotes one thing above all others: fundraising. And in their quest for campaign dollars, candidates end up catering to supporters with the most extreme views in that particular party and those with the biggest pocketbooks.
There is painful irony in all of this because it is taking place in an age when digital technology is making everything else in our lives more efficient, more accessible, more competitive and even more democratic.
