INDEPENDENT VOTERS

Chafee On Ballot Would Complicate Rhode Island Race (By Emma Dumain, CQ Politics)
Why Indie Voters Don’t Make California Purple (Jerry Roberts, Huffington Post) Others, like Dave Lesher and Mark Baldassare of the Public Policy Institute of California, have made the case more subtly, arguing that because California’s independents combine strains of social liberals and [...]

Hey everybody! It’s time for the comments of the week.
It’s been a busy one – some terrific posts and even more great comments. What follows is just a small sampling of Donklephant goodness. Please follow the links attached to the names to read more or to get involved in the [...]

INDEPENDENT VOTERS
Coverage of independent voters and health care reform from a more progressive viewpoint:

Wisconsin: Health Care Vital Issue (By Cecily Wu, CQ Politics) Thus, enactment of health care legislation that can draw solid public support could enable Kagen to maintain the backing of independent voters, who Scattergood said comprise upwards of 20 percent of the [...]

About 10 years ago I did work exchange at the beautiful Hostel in the Forest in Georgia. The agreement was room and board in exchange for various tasks required to keep the community functioning. I built a floating raft for the lake, removed the snakes from the chicken coop in the morning, [...]

INDEPENDENT VOTERS
More from Quinnipiac and Field polls on independent voters’ views

Deficit a Growing Concern for Public — and White House (By GERALD F. SEIB, Wall Street Journal) When Mr. Hart, the Democratic pollster, conducted a focus-group discussion with a dozen independent voters in Maryland a few days ago, he drew this conclusion: “These independents’ biggest [...]

INDEPENDENT VOTERS

Wherever independents fall on the supposed political “spectrum”, if they ARE on the political “spectrum”, (i.e. they do exist!) Many MSM publishers seek increasing irrelevance if they don’t see the direction that the American people are headed…. While it’s clear that independents are “all over the map” on social issues, they increasingly come together [...]

… equals JObama? The Jaracker?
If you haven’t seen these posters yet, they are apparently sprouting-up in and around Los Angeles as a type of street art, a la Shepard Fairey.
But here’s where the ‘joke’ falls flat: Obama is nothing like the Joker.
[and this is where you discover my nerdliness]
Anyone who is a fan of [...]

INDEPENDENT VOTERS
If you want to call it “fickle” to leave the two-party system behind in favor creating a new political culture, call me fickle!

2010: Fight for fickle kids (By: Eamon Javers, Politico) Stanford University political science professor Morris Fiorina is convinced that both political parties haven’t yet grasped the scale of the change that’s happening [...]

I wanted to follow up the health care redux post from the other day with a similar post on the status of energy reform legislation and developments along the leading edge of energy technology, but this is a totally different can of beans. While the health care legislation seems to be crystallizing into something [...]

INDEPENDENT VOTERS
Continued look at who independent voters are/are not and Obama’s poll numbers…

A reminder: Most ‘independent’ voters aren’t (LA Times/Top of the Ticket)
Sick and Tired of Republicans and Democrats? New Parties Say They Offer Alternatives (By James King, Phoenix News Times)
Pa.’s Sestak plans Tuesday announcement (USA Today)
Poll: Pennsylvania ranks 20th most Democratic state in the [...]

Hello Donklephanters!
Thanks to Justin Gardner, one of my first and favorite “blogger buddies”, I want to welcome you to “News Headlines for Independents”, an as-needed post of news from, for and about the fastest growing electoral sector in America today: independent voters.
Justin and I got to know each other a little bit  in the “heady [...]

Is it just me or did the Palestinians hire a PR firm?

Now that the House has left for summer recess, with the Senate leaving in a week, it’s a perfect time to look back and see what may have gone wrong in the Democrats’ plan to pass a major health care reform package before this week had passed. Most people tend to focus on the policy [...]

I’m going to take on the role of devil’s advocate here.

I understand how you would want to deride this young woman for her pretty abysmal ability to communicate what she cares about, but some people just don’t know much. But unlike most…  at least she’s trying. She cares enough about this to stand in front [...]

Not a whole lot of good has come the way to the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) these days. The only organization I can think of that gets more right wing scorn has been ACORN, who I think mostly get picked on because they don’t fight back. Another ally, Health Care for America Now (HCAN), [...]

My plan is to post these roundups on the weekends. This week was a little tough as I live in NJ and my Rabbi got into some trouble with the law. I was in charge of Hebrew School all weekend.
Actually, that’s not true. I was visiting friends and swimming in the Hudson [...]

Over at the Volokh Conspiracy, Ilya Somin has an interesting statistic: a majority of criminals serving time in federal prisons are non-violent drug offenders, while “72% of state prisoners have committed either violent offenses (53%) or property crimes (19%).”
This ties into an important national discussion: the criminalization and potential abuse of the federal code and [...]

There’s a classic scene in the West Wing where gay rights activist Ted Marcus denounces President Bartlett for refusing to publicly condemn an anti-gay measure being considered by the House.
MARCUS
Why won’t you say that publicly?
BARTLET
[yells] Because I know what I’m doing, Ted! Because I live in the world of professional politics, and you live in [...]

I stumbled across an interesting article on eggs yesterday while sitting in Borders reading up on something I’m going to be doing an in depth series of posts on. Apparently a study at the USDA has shown that factory farm eggs are far less nutritious than pastured eggs. I don’t know what causes this… although [...]

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