Who are Trump's voters? Dumb Folks

In a great piece in USA Today, Ilya Somin, a Professor of Law at George Mason University shed some light on who are the Trump voters.

Personally, it's not a surprise. His supporters are from the same cloth as Kardashian fans... The willfully ignorant. These folks just can't seem to think or learn for themselves. While the truth's out there, they choose the latter. Here's more:

Trump’s success so far is in large part the result of an almost perfect storm of political ignorance. As a longtime celebrity, he had a built-in advantage with voters who don’t know much about politics…

Polls also consistently show that Trump’s support comes disproportionately from those with relatively low levels of education. For instance, a recent ABC/Washington Post survey found that 40% of Republican-leaning voters without college degrees support Trump, compared with only 19% of college graduates. Low education correlates with support for Trump far more than political ideology, or any other demographic variable. Education and political knowledge are not the same thing… Nonetheless, the two are highly correlated.

Political ignorance could also help explain why Trump has won the support of a large share of the generally conservative Republican primary electorate, despite his long history of liberal stances on issues such as health care, taxes, government spending and property rights. Relatively ignorant voters rarely pay close attention to issue positions and are likely unaware of the details of Trump’s record….

And so it begins... Texas is taking advantage of the Voters Rights Change

This is how the foolishness starts

Within two hours of the Supreme Court’s decision on the Voting Rights Act, Greg Abbott, the attorney general for the state of Texas, announced that a voter identification law that was blocked last year by the Justice Department would go into effect.

“With today’s decision, the state’s voter ID law will take effect immediately,” he said in a statement. “Redistricting maps passed by the legislature may also take effect without approval from the federal government.”

In March 2012, the Justice Department objected to Texas’ voter identification law, finding that under certain data sets “Hispanic registered voters are more than twice as likely as non-Hispanic registered voters to lack such identification,” and that the locations and hours of license offices made it difficult for many Hispanics to attain that identification.

Texas also sought clearance through the an appeals court in Washington, which offers a separate track for jurisdictions under the Voting Rights Act. In a unanimous opinion, the three-judge panel ruled that the voter ID law would hinder minority turnout and impose “strict, unforgiving burdens on the poor.”

This is how things fall apart. I hope Holder knocks this down.

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The Top 10 Educated & Uneducated States and How they Voted

Sad Mess

Gay support for the GOP DOUBLED?

A Sad reality, y'all

Republicans made significant inroads among gay and lesbian voters in the midterm elections, with national exit polls for the House races showing that the GOP captured 31 percent of the vote of this group this year, compared to 19 percent in 2008.


The change from the last midterm elections in 2006 was not quite as large but an increase nevertheless. In 2006, 24 percent supported Republicans. Democrats' share of the gay vote rose from 75 percent in 2006 to 80 percent in 2008 and then dropped to 68 percent in 2010. Each year, approximately 3 percent of voters identified as gay, lesbian or bisexual.

"I have been very concerned over these last two years that the connection between the gay rights community and the Democratic Party is in danger of being broken, because I think expectations were set so high as a result of the 2008 election, and people are extremely disappointed," said Richard Socarides, a former assistant to President Clinton and senior White House adviser on gay rights. 

This is not cute. We should be better than this. If this is what happens when the going get tough, I don't know what's in store.

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Gay Voters Angry At Democrats Could Sway Election... It Better NOT!

Please check out this article about how we can sway the vote.

But this article couldn't come out at a worst time. I say this because if the Dems do lose, guess who will get blamed... No, not the Tea Party.

I know we are mad, but it's not that serious. We should know that this will be a long term battle. I hate to say that, but it could be a reality. The Dems are our only chance of getting things done. No 3rd party or the GOP are going to help, that's a fantasy.

We need to vote and vote Dem-O-Crat! We are fooling ourselves if we think sitting out is the best method. It's a dumb method! We need to make our voices heard and we need to do it in an effective way. So we should vote and hold our elected officials accountable once they are in.


But in all seriousness, folks who are super mad. Get over your anger and get to the polls. Think about the possible setbacks and the Bush years. That will put some sugar in your tea.

Roll Call of Votes in the NY Marriage Equality session

Ayes 24, Nays 38. Republicans didn't say a word.

Yea Eric Adams (D)

Nay Joe Addabbo (D)

Nay Jim Alesi (R)

Nay Darrel Aubertine (D)

Nay John Bonacic (R)

Yea Neil Breslin (D)

Nay John DeFrancisco (D)

Nay Ruben Diaz Sr. (D)

Yea Martin Malave Dilan (D)

Yea Tom Duane (D)

Yea Pedro Esapda Jr. (D)

Nay Hugh Farley (R)

John Flanagan (R)

Yes Brian Foley (D)

No Chuck Fuschillo (R)

No Marty Golden (R)

No Joe Griffo (R)

No Kemp Hannon (R)

Yes Ruth Hassell-Thompson (D)

No Shirley Huntley (D)

Yes Craig Johnson (D)

No Owen Johnson (R)

Yes Jeff Klein (D)

Yes Liz Krueger (D)

No Carl Kruger (D)

No Andrew Lanza (R)

No Bill Larkin (R)

No Ken LaValle (R)

No Vincent Leibell (R)

No Tom Libous (R)

No Betty Little (R)

No Carl Marcellino (R)

No George Maziarz (R)

No Roy McDonald (R)

No Hiram Monserrate (D)

Yes Velmanette Montgomery (D)

No Tom Morahan (R)

No Mike Nozzolio (R)

No George Onorato (D)

Yes Suzi Oppenheimer (D)

No Frank Padavan (R)

Yes Kevin Parker (D)

Yes Bill Perkins (D)

No Mike Ranzenhofer (R)

No Joe Robach

No Saland

Yes John Sampson

Yes Diane Savino

Yes Eric Schneiderman

Yes Jose M. Serrano

No Jim Seward

No Dan Skelos

Yes Malcolm Smith

Yes Daniel Squadron

No Bill Stachowski

Yes Toby Ann Stavisky

Yes Andrea Stewart-Cousins

No Young

Source

New Prop 8 Info!

A new study from National Gay and Lesbian Task Force reveals that the whole 70% Black vote for Prop 8 wasn't that high.

An deeper look into the exit polls from 5 key California counties found that between 57% and 59% of Black people voted for Prop 8, which is a huge difference from the numbers reported days after the ballot passed. Religion, age, political party, and ideology played a much bigger role in the Prop. 8 vote.

In fact, this piece here gets into the ideology part a little bit more:

About two-thirds of the state’s self-identified conservatives knew someone who was gay and about 4 out of five of them voted for the measure – the same exact ratio of conservatives who voted for Prop. 8 but didn’t know an openly LGBT person. Republicans demonstrated a similar pattern, with about four out of five of them voting to pass the ban regardless of whether they knew anyone who was out or not.

Interesting...very interesting.

More info in here

Prop 8 Breakdown

Finally we have a deeper look at the numbers by a writer from FiveThirtyEight blog, Nate Silver.

He says that the Obama turnout did not send Prop 8 to soaring heights. However more experienced or older voters came out to support Prop 8.

Silver also said Latinos aged 18-29 (not strictly the same as 'new' voters, but the closest available proxy) voted against Prop 8 by a 59-41 margin. These figures are not available for young black voters, but it would surprise me if their votes weren't fairly close to the 50-50 mark.

At the end of the day, Prop 8's passage was more a generational matter than a racial one. If nobody over the age of 65 had voted, Prop 8 would have failed by a point or two. It appears that the generational splits may be larger within minority communities than among whites, although the data on this is sketchy.

This is very interesting and probably something to focus on the next time around.

Bill O'Reilly says Attack the Blacks

Now Bill O'Ridiculous is talking smack. Watch is clip


He just loves to stir up some mess

Are We to Blame for the Passing of Prop 8

During a conversation, a friend wondered if we are at fault about Prop 8. I asked him to elaborate and he did. He wondered if our "shallow" priorities got in the way of the real ones.

I thought it could be possible, but I also start thinking about other ways we may have contribute to this. I know I'm bringing up issues that may be tough to swallow; but I hope it will get us thinking about this more.

• The NO campaign (in LA) preached to the choir, throwing events in WeHo, having mostly gay galas, advertising in gay areas or popular non-gay areas. We should've been in our embattled areas. We needed to win folks over, I thought.
• We should have presented a more diverse LGBT community. Believe it or not, some folks still think of the gay community as a white-only club. We still need to defeat this issue within the LGBT family.
• Look at our priorities. This is tricky because we should be free to be you and me. But we need to ask ourselves so tough questions. Like...Do we need to be sexual in very gay ad? Do we need to over-hype Folsom Street? Are we truly a community or a community of convenience? Are we diverse enough within our community? Are we promoting the party, sex, drugs image? These are questions similar to the ones most minorities ask themselves as well. I think it's time to critically process what we are actually doing as a community and a people.
• Did we talk to our opponents, not shout, but talk with them about who we are? I know that's far-fetched, but who knows.
• Did we reach out to other people besides our famous allies?
• Did we take our liberal freedoms for granted?

We should be aware that some of this is our fault. And once we do, we could get it together and come back stronger. We lost a battle but not war. Next time we have to dot the i's and cross the t's. If we make the same mistakes again, it's over. And we will have no one to blame but ourselves.

Reality 2

This map shows the change in the country. Dems are growing (I think) while Repubs are shrinking.

Only 22% voted Republican

Obama won 9 states Kerry lost

Hispanics and Black were the change agents in this game.

A change is coming

One Word

Race + Voting = MADNESS

Well, the voting mess has started. And sad part is, it could be racially tinted. There are some reports that fliers in neighborhoods of Philadelphia are warning voters they could be arrested at the polls if they hadn't paid their parking tickets or if they had criminal past.

Then they are fliers telling people to vote on the 5th or linking Obama to the Holocaust. Saying "Jewish Americans cannot afford to make the wrong decision on Tuesday, Nov. 4," and this is paid for by the Republican Federal Committee.

Then this story I read today an issue in New Mexico. Two Hispanic women claimed they were harassed by a somewhat private investigator working for a Republican lawyer who came to their homes and threatened to call immigration authorities even though they are U.S. citizens. The women filed a lawsuit last week this guy.

These actions are far from being American or Patriotic. It's sad and dangerous to our spirit. Let the chips fall as the may, but no cheating. If they can catch these jerks, I hope they can put them in jail or publicly ruin their lives. This election is way to important to play stupid tricks. But on the other hand, because it is important, people are doing whatever they can.

Days of Future Past?

Is this the future? I hope not, but the website CNNBC, has an alternative look about what could happen if you don't vote.

Looks like Cord is the new Senator Kelly (X-Men fans will get it).
And the sponsors are MoveOn.org

Sister is doing it for Obama

Inspiring news, y'all.

Sister Cecilia Gaudette, who last voted for President Eisenhower in 1952, has registered to vote and says she will vote for Democrat Barack Obama.

Although hard of hearing, she keeps herself informed by reading newspapers and watching TV at the convent.

"I'm encouraged by Senator Obama," she says.

"I've never met him, but he seems to be a good man with a good private life. That's the first thing. Then he must be able to govern," she adds.

She is 106 years-old and amazing. Go on Sister!

Source

To the grumbling Clinton supporters...I'll tell you this

I promised myself to limit my political blogging to twice a week. So today is number one.

Comic Book fans may remember in Uncanny X-men 200, when Professor Xavier left the planet to heal and left Magneto to run the school and look after his dream.

You may also remember, Storm winning the title of leader of the X-Men, after beating Scott in a one-on-one battle. And while some of the X-Men had their opinions on who should lead. They respected the decision.

I'm blogging about this because I'm sick of these grumbling Clinton supporters. I know they feel cheated, I supported Clinton at first, but things changed. Someone wins, someone loses. Remember, if Hill-Hill didn't raise a big stink over Florida and Michigan, things could have been different (not likely). She played the game well, but she hit Obama's boardwalk too many times.

What bothers me is this "voting for McCain business". That's the dumbest thing you could do to our party. You are willing to vote for someone who doesn't stand for your policies or beliefs. You're willing to stay in another mess for 4 more years because you couldn't get your way. That's selfish, foolish, and poor thinking.

If you are upset, then be upset, but use that energy to hold Obama accountable for his actions. Remember pt. 2, that Hill-Hill's and Obama's policies and ideas are very similar. Take everything you loved about Hill-Hill and make sure Obama stays on it. That's the best thing you can do, fight for a reason, not for a empty cause. No one will benefit from your foolish actions. You will be upset and crying again, complaining about the nation, but this time you can blame yourself for the madness. So please, think about what's best for the country.