The Grand Election Thread

[CountDeMoney]

I wonder if it is like what California did:

The bill, dubbed the California Dream Act, passed the state Legislature earlier this month and aims at helping illegal immigrants who earned a diploma after attending at least three years of high school in the state.

But yeah I wonder how many actually take advantage of this.

Yeah, it's the same thing;  graduate in three years, or attend at least 3 and graduate, or earn 60 credits at a community college, and the illegals get in-state tuition rates.  There were also caveats as well, like Selective Service registration, as well as the illegal's parents having to have filed tax returns during the time they muchachitos attended high school.

[CountDeMoney]

I don't know that anyone took Dole's candidacy seriously, even though I thought him a great man and patriot and someone who would have been a fine President.

He was a much better candidate, and would've been a much better President, in '88.  He had the lead going into New Hampshire, and similar to McCain in 2000, he had a large chunk of the liberal media on his side.

Poppy fucked him hardcore.  Imagine that.  The Bush-A-Matic Smear Machine.  Go fig.

[mongers]

Apparently there was a clusterfuck in Madison, Wisconsin.  My sis went to her polling place, and they told her she wasn't registered.  Fortunately they had same day voter registration.  She said the whole place was filled with people filling out the paperwork for that because the polling places didn't have accurate lists.

Wasn't very convenient voting for me today either. I think there probably isn't a lot of malfeasance going on or anything, but the simple truth is all the large scale changes to voter registration procedures, identification requirements etc have added a layer of bureaucracy to the process. As a long time bureaucrat I'll tell you bureaucracy muddles things and introduces many points of failure. I think a lot more people than usual will be inconvenienced at the polls today, not through maliciousness at the polling place level or even higher up, but just because the new regulations are creating a clusterfuck. Now, that's most likely what the highest levels of State government that pushed these regulations wanted, but I don't think they're taking a direct hand. I think they basically knew they were going to make things messy.

Thanks for that, interesting.

And I agree with what you, Money and others sad in the other thread about having national standard for what are federal elections after all.
Why states get to meddle in the conduct of polls for national elections, whether presidential or congressional seems very odd and anti-common sense.

[garbon]

Apparently there was a clusterfuck in Madison, Wisconsin.  My sis went to her polling place, and they told her she wasn't registered.  Fortunately they had same day voter registration.  She said the whole place was filled with people filling out the paperwork for that because the polling places didn't have accurate lists.

Wasn't very convenient voting for me today either. I think there probably isn't a lot of malfeasance going on or anything, but the simple truth is all the large scale changes to voter registration procedures, identification requirements etc have added a layer of bureaucracy to the process. As a long time bureaucrat I'll tell you bureaucracy muddles things and introduces many points of failure. I think a lot more people than usual will be inconvenienced at the polls today, not through maliciousness at the polling place level or even higher up, but just because the new regulations are creating a clusterfuck. Now, that's most likely what the highest levels of State government that pushed these regulations wanted, but I don't think they're taking a direct hand. I think they basically knew they were going to make things messy.

Thanks for that, interesting.

And I agree with what you, Money and others sad in the other thread about having national standard for what are federal elections after all.
Why states get to meddle in the conduct of polls for national elections, whether presidential or congressional seems very odd and anti-common sense.

Well congressional still kind of makes sense as in the case of the senate, that's representing the state. I'd guess then that after you concede so much to the state - it'd be a little weak to then put in regulations just for presidency.

[OttoVonBismarck]

The thing that would shock me is if Mittens won.  Has there ever been a candidate that no one really liked who won the Presidency.

In Canada we had the phenomenon occur once (Joe Clarke) but that is the only time I can recall it happening.

There is some parallel with George H.W. Bush, he wasn't really the most likable guy. Too stiff and patrician. I really liked him though, probably the last Republican other than 2000 McCain where I could basically unabashedly support him. I supported a lot of the W. Bush stuff through the rough years because I felt the Democratic alternatives were not any better. (Cut and run in Iraq, for example.) But there was a range of issues where I think it was hard for me to support W. Bush, specifically some of his gluttonous spending practices.

To me I kind of think it was to the long term harm of the country and the Republican party that Clinton beat Bush in '92, because it convinced the GOP upper leadership that the way you beat folksy Democrats like Clinton was to go full bore hardcore Christian, totally embrace what up til then had been a relatively fringe element of the party and basically cast all opponents as gay or un-American to get ignorant voters angry enough to vote for you.

[Ed Anger]

I don't know that anyone took Dole's candidacy seriously, even though I thought him a great man and patriot and someone who would have been a fine President.

He was a much better candidate, and would've been a much better President, in '88.  He had the lead going into New Hampshire, and similar to McCain in 2000, he had a large chunk of the liberal media on his side.

Poppy fucked him hardcore.  Imagine that.  The Bush-A-Matic Smear Machine.  Go fig.

You don't fuck with Poppy. Dude is CIA.

[Barrister]

The thing that would shock me is if Mittens won.  Has there ever been a candidate that no one really liked who won the Presidency.

In Canada we had the phenomenon occur once (Joe Clarke) but that is the only time I can recall it happening.

There is some parallel with George H.W. Bush, he wasn't really the most likable guy. Too stiff and patrician. I really liked him though, probably the last Republican other than 2000 McCain where I could basically unabashedly support him. I supported a lot of the W. Bush stuff through the rough years because I felt the Democratic alternatives were not any better. (Cut and run in Iraq, for example.) But there was a range of issues where I think it was hard for me to support W. Bush, specifically some of his gluttonous spending practices.

To me I kind of think it was to the long term harm of the country and the Republican party that Clinton beat Bush in '92, because it convinced the GOP upper leadership that the way you beat folksy Democrats like Clinton was to go full bore hardcore Christian, totally embrace what up til then had been a relatively fringe element of the party and basically cast all opponents as gay or un-American to get ignorant voters angry enough to vote for you.

I don't know if there have been any candidates on either ticket that are generally considered to be unpleasant human beings in the last several decades.  With the sole exception of John Edwards.

[CountDeMoney]

Why states get to meddle in the conduct of polls for national elections, whether presidential or congressional seems very odd and anti-common sense.

Which is why, in such a close and narrow election, I am calling a Romney victory. 

There are far too many shenanigans going on in swing states whose electoral processes are run by Republican-led state leaders in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, Colorado: just enough shenanigans and intended bureaucratic fuck-ups to make the difference in a razor-thin election.

Voters being challenged at the polls in Florida to such an incredible degree that the polls get hung up, and people leave after waiting for hours upon hours.
Thousands of absentee ballot requests in Ohio ignored and not mailed out two weeks ago due to a "glitch", though they had no problem mailing out the notifications of election required by law with the wrong date of the election.
Last minute changing of the rules in Florida on absentee ballots to match signatures on voter registration cards, some decades old, turning poll workers into subjective handwriting experts.

And so on.  And so on.  There's more, but why bother at this point.  It's all bullshit anyway.

[CountDeMoney]

You don't fuck with Poppy. Dude is CIA.

And you don't speaketh ill of a fellow Republican in the '88 primaries, sayeth the Gipper.  POPPY BROKE HIS LAW

Bob Dole was nothing less than a war hero, a stellar member of the United States Senate and the salt of the earth, the last of the Good Republicans(tm).  Fucking Bushes.

[Ed Anger]

You don't fuck with Poppy. Dude is CIA.

And you don't speaketh ill of a fellow Republican in the '88 primaries, sayeth the Gipper.  POPPY BROKE HIS LAW

Bob Dole was nothing less than a war hero, a stellar member of the United States Senate and the salt of the earth, the last of the Good Republicans(tm).  Fucking Bushes.

IT WAS POPPY'S TURN.

[CountDeMoney]

IT WAS POPPY'S TURN.

Poppy's turn, my black ass.  He lost his fucking turn for selling out in '80.

[FunkMonk]

I'll be watching the election returns tonight with a bottle of beer in hand, awaiting the thousand-years of darkness that will begin with a Republican-controlled congress and a Republican President meekly obeying the shouting and yelping of their Tea Part constituents.

Good night, sweet ladies. Good night, good night.

[Ed Anger]

I'll be watching the election returns tonight with a bottle of beer in hand, awaiting the thousand-years of darkness that will begin with a Republican-controlled congress and a Republican President meekly obeying the shouting and yelping of their Tea Part constituents.

Good night, sweet ladies. Good night, good night.

I have my brown shirt ready for just such an occasion. 

[FunkMonk]

I'll be watching the election returns tonight with a bottle of beer in hand, awaiting the thousand-years of darkness that will begin with a Republican-controlled congress and a Republican President meekly obeying the shouting and yelping of their Tea Part constituents.

Good night, sweet ladies. Good night, good night.

I have my brown shirt ready for just such an occasion. 

The first thing I'll do is denounce my bozo Facebook friends who kept posting political screeds for three months.

[Razgovory]

I don't know if there have been any candidates on either ticket that are generally considered to be unpleasant human beings in the last several decades.  With the sole exception of John Edwards.

Romney is a fairly unpleasant human being.  I remember back in 2008 he was detested by the other Republican candidates.  I remember reading that some of the other candidates didn't care who won the primary so long as Romney lost.  They seemed to think he was a slimy, dishonest backstabber.