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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Tom Clarke who wrote (486425)

5/9/2012 1:24:54 PM

From: Tom Clarke

1 Recommendation Read Replies (4) | Respond to of 793797

Why didn’t all the people who signed the Walker recall petitions bother to vote yesterday?

There were over 900,000 signatures (supposedly valid signatures) on the petitions. That's over 200,000 people who forced this expensive procedure on the state and then didn't care enough to participate.

Who are those people?
	They don't exist. The petitions had that many fake names.
	They changed their minds and support Walker now.
	They signed the petitions because they were afraid of what union thugs and others might do to them.
	They were just weak people succumbing to social pressure.
	They're lazy. It's easier to sign than not sign, but a bit of trouble to vote.

pollcode.com free polls

(Just pick the best answer. Your desire to vote "all of the above" or 2 or 3 of the above can go in the comments. Those answers make boring results in a poll like this. Deal with it. This isn't pollster science I'm doing here.)

althouse.blogspot.com

To: Tom Clarke who wrote (486425)	5/9/2012 1:42:07 PM
From: D. Long	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 793797

Jonathan Chait sees "frightening outlines of a future systemic crisis" in Richard Lugar's defeat And hooray for the systemic crisis he fears! A faction in Congress that won't take it anymore and is willing to say "no" with principle, and stick to it. Governing is about compromise, but when you're debating whether to take a step over a cliff, or back from it, you don't compromise!

To: Tom Clarke who wrote (486425)	5/9/2012 1:51:32 PM
From: Brian Sullivan	1 Recommendation Respond to of 793797

From the Jonathan Chait article: The most important and alarming facet of Lugar’s defeat, and a factor whose importance is being overlooked at the moment, is one of the things Mourdock cited against him: Lugar voted to confirm two of Obama’s Supreme Court nominees. Obviously, Lugar would not have chosen to nominate an Elena Kagan or a Sonia Sotomayor. But he was following a longstanding practice of extending presidents wide ideological latitude on their Supreme Court picks. However he conveniently omits that fact that President Obama vote against both of President Bush's nominations: Chief Justice Roberts: senate.gov and Justice Alito senate.gov In fact the only Democratic Senator that voted for Alito who isn't retired or retiring is Senator Johnson of South Dakota: en.wikipedia.org From THe NY Times in2006: nytimes.com The vote on the nomination was unusually close and partisan. In the last 100 years of Supreme Court confirmations, only one vote was closer: the 52-to-48 decision to confirm Justice Clarence Thomas in 1991. In this confirmation, 54 Republicans voted for Judge Alito, and just one, Senator Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, voted against him. Only four Democrats — Senators Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Tim Johnson of South Dakota and Robert C. Byrd of West Virginia — voted for confirmation, while the other 40 Democrats and the one independent voted against it. The senators sat at their desks as the roll was called to reflect the solemnity of the occasion, and Mr. Byrd, 88, the oldest and longest-serving member of the Senate, made his way to his desk with canes in each hand to cast the last vote with a thumbs-up gesture. Although only four Democrats crossed party lines, the vote reflected a deep divide within the party over how hard to fight Judge Alito's confirmation. An effort by a handful of Democrats to stage a filibuster over the objection of party leaders failed on Monday, when only 25 senators voted against closing debate. The 42 senators who voted against confirmation would have been enough to block the nomination if they had voted against closing the debate. But many Democrats were unwilling to do so because it would have drawn charges of obstructionism from Republicans, who have threatened to change Senate rules to bar filibusters on judicial nominees.