It’s Halloween day and I’m already lamenting the results of next Tuesday’s election. I’m on a deadline so I can’t wait for Tuesday night. Besides, I can see which way the wind is blowing. I don’t have to wait for Tuesday night. Anu Solomon isn’t going to throw a Hail Mary touchdown pass for Fred DuVal. For four long years, we’re going to be stuck with Doug Douche-y, whose forced smile makes him look like he’s constipated. He’s probably already writing his victory speech.
The opening line: “If you think I dicked my business partners with that Cold Stone Creamery scam, wait ’til you see what I do to teachers…”
Douche-y was endorsed by the Phoenix daily paper, which isn’t all that surprising. While it shows an occasional flash of reasonable behavior, it all too often reverts back to the right-wing rag it was back in the days of Barry Goldwater. Just last week, they had this incredibly wrong-headed editorial about all the money that the Legislature cheated the schools out of over the past several years.
The gist of it was “C’mon, Schools, we all know that the lawmakers bullied you and stole your lunch money for the past six years, but you should be the more magnanimous party and let them off the hook. They only sorta did it on purpose. Besides, you told them they could do it that one time. You can’t really blame them for thinking that you gave them tacit approval to screw you over in perpetuity.”
Douche-y has already said that he will use taxpayer money to pay for lawyers to keep from having to obey a court order to pay the schools what they are owed. I’m not even sure how such a thought can even enter a person’s mind, let alone take roost.
At press time, the District Two Congressional race was still a toss-up, with some polls even giving incumbent Ron Barber a slight edge over his soft exterior/prickly interior challenger, Martha McSally. Still, this feels like one of those Murphy’s Law elections where everything that can go wrong, will go wrong.
Assuming that the puppy-loving Social Security Slasher McSally does win, I’ll have a new hobby. Starting in January, I’m going to keep track of how many times Martha McSally “votes with Republicans.” Would anybody be surprised if it’s north of 90 percent? Should anybody (including Democrats) be outraged if it’s north of 90 percent? She’s a Republican; I would expect her to vote the same way as other Republicans most of the time. Why get pissy about it?
Please God, don’t let Democrats to be dumb enough to run attack ads next time around that say, “Martha McSally got a bazillion dollars in Dark Money and then she gave her vote to artificially dark John Boehner.”
So, I’ll be keeping track, not to shame McSally, but rather to show the dumb-ass voters who were swayed by those dumb-ass ads against Barber exactly how dumb-ass they are. I hate the way that campaign was run. The Koch Brothers had a casting call for old white people who could either say stupid stuff without giving away the fact that they knew what they were saying was stupid, or just say stupid stuff and not know any better. (Tip for future campaign managers: Start with really stupid people and go from there.)
What’s with the hate for Nancy Pelosi? Do old white people not like women? Do they not like powerful women? Do they not like Italians? Is their idea of an Italian woman a Jersey housewife? What did Nancy Pelosi ever do besides help the duly-elected President of the United States pass a historic law that helps keep poor people from dying unnecessarily? What a demon!
Y’all should also be ashamed of yourselves for invoking the name of Gabrielle Giffords in an attempt to get a Republican elected. You guys HATED Gabby Giffords when she was in Congress. Absolutely despised her. But then she gets shot in the head, miraculously survives but can’t serve any more, and all of a sudden, she’s this independent icon. Invoking her name in cheap Republican advertising is two steps below despicable.
Nate Silver’s my boy, even when he’s picking against my side. In this morning’s Five Thirty-Eight update, he gives the Republicans a nearly 70 percent chance of taking over the United States Senate. This could make for an interesting next two years.
As others have noted, a Congress completely controlled by Republicans could make the final two years of President Obama’s term quite uncomfortable. They could pass things that are generally popular, like the Keystone pipeline, and dare him to veto it. Or they could propose building a 50-foot-high wall along the Mexican border as a prerequisite to immigration reform.
I’m not all that worried about it. As long as the House has all those knuckle-dragging Tea Party people wandering the halls, Speaker Boehner probably won’t be able to muster much of a united front.
Besides, the next two years should whiz by, with all the electioneering and such going on. In 2016, there will be 34 Senators up for re-election, of which only 10 are Democrats. Could be a bloodbath.
(Oh, and if this turns into a “Dewey Defeats Truman” moment for me and I’m wrong…I’ll be a happy guy.).
This article appears in Nov 6-12, 2014.
The best thing that can happen to the Democrat party is to have Republicans elected. Unfortunately, the best thing that can happen to the Republican party is to have Democrats elected.
To have any positive changes in Government – All of these creeps need to get the boot . There is not much difference between Dems and Reps ! the way out is to vote independent . but Americans are to ignorant, uneducated and ill informed to see the writings on the wall .. they deserve everything they have coming as far as I am concerned …
Well, the powers that be have succeeded. They kept us stupid and divided, and got what they wanted. Now, let’s see what they do with it!
Why is it fashionable (and apparently societally OK) all of a sudden to write about “old white people”. Old white people this, old white people that. Do you have parents Tom? I suspect they’re “old white people”. It’s not the racial stereotyping so much, as the word old and the fact that it seems used as an epithet. It’s disrespectful.
Has Arizona lost control of its own elections? Too much outside dark money telling dark lies does make a difference.
I find it interesting that so many, including the soon to be governor, think pubic school spending is adequate while they spend north of $15,000 a year sending their children to really good private schools. And he ran on: Opportunity For All?
Dave Gallagher said “Has Arizona lost control of its own elections?” Of course it has, and in case anyone failed to notice, Americans have lost control of their elections too. They just didn’t have as much money as the folks who bought this one.
Yeah, Arizona has lost it common sense and continue to elect those candidates that really care less about them. All these Republicans will support the agenda of the NRA and the Koch brothers and pass bills created by the ALEC. So Arizona continues the decline in about every way.
Our US Supreme Court has now made the big corporations and big funds the real voters. The majority has lost their voices and votes.
This nation ranks at the bottom now, below Russia, China, India, Syria, Iraq for the most criminal elections. The GOP wins, but it not what the voters want. The GOP is the biggest FRAUD party.
We interupt this moronic column for a word from Governer Doug Ducey.
“Howdy Folks, Gov. Ducey here. Just want to advise you Arizonans to enjoy things while you can. This time next year all public schools will be boarded up. There will be no clean water to drink or clean air to breath. The pigmy owl will be extint and all citizens will be required by law to own an automatic weapon.”
“Y’all be well now”
The Gov.
It really doesn’t matter who you vote for. You still get policies aimed at the wealthiest:
“I’d say that contrary to what decades of political science research might lead you to believe, ordinary citizens have virtually no influence over what their government does in the United States. And economic elites and interest groups, especially those representing business, have a substantial degree of influence. Government policy-making over the last few decades reflects the preferences of those groups — of economic elites and of organized interests.”
It’s exactly the same in our state legislature, possibly more so.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/princeton-…
I think the reference to “old white people” is a bit overstated. I’m an older white male and I certainly didn’t vote for Doug Ducey! The “Old White People” who did are all the Mid-Western in-migration retirees from states like Iowa and Illinois who left their snow shovels behind to move to “Sunny Arizona”, but brought their conservative farm-state voting preferences along with them.
Gee, think I will unsubscribe from this childish “newsletter”. Calling him Douche-y is just too moronic for me. Bye!
Nothing will be different. It takes 60 votes to do anything in the Senate, remember?
I supported Fred and am disappointed that he lost, but get your act together, Daheny; lick your wounds, dust yourself off, and get back on your horse. We need you and all the other alternative media to keep tabs on what our evil overlords in PHX do in our name. Remember AZ is ripe for more ridicule so long as CAP infects Washington Street. Life goes on, and we live to fight another day.
Neither one received my vote. I protested and voted for Barry Hess.
What a bunch of crybabies. You still have your drunken broke Grijalva. How can a man make over $160K in Tucson and be in the red? You lefties elected him. Good job!!
How distasteful to use the phrase “Douche-y”. No wonder this paper can only get sponsors from the porn industry.
The commenter who stated “there’s not much difference between Democrats and Republicans” is not part of the problem – – she IS the problem. This statement is used by Republicans to suppress the vote and to give their loyal base an importance way beyond their numbers. The GOP does this over and over again in mid-tern elections. The polls repeatedly show the Democratic agenda is more popular, a fact admitted by Mitt Romney after ’12. Yet those same ‘voters’ stay home and sulk after they get disappointed a couple times by the realities of politics. We need to grow up and start electing effective leaders who get things done, not lock-step ideologues.
The Republicans and Democrats are no different? I beg to differ. Which party has been infested by the Tea Party? I remember the uneasy feeling I had in 2008, midst the exuberance that Obama beat McCain, that all the moderates of the Arizona Republican party had been defeated by Tea Partiers in the primaries that year. The hard-right (McCain’s own words in 2000) cling so rigidly to “Ideological Purity,” they are incapable of working with anyone else.
My greatest outrage is reserved for those who voted for Diane “no Common Core” Douglas. David Garcia is hands down the better, more competent candidate for AZ Superintendent of Public Instruction, but he does not have an “R” next to his name.
Like I have written before, in 2008 our President promised America he would be a President for the people. He lied. He was given the House and the Senate or absolute power and we all know that absolute power corrupts absolutely. He didn’t need to be bipartisan so he locked out 50% of Americans political voices and went on this “Mr. Toads Wild Ride” of liberalism.
President Obama didn’t fix Black problems in America, he didn’t even try, he didn’t fix our immigration problem, and again he didn’t even try. What did we get? A Health Care Tax that was unread and passed by the Democrats without one Republican vote, not one Republican was even allowed to take part in the discussion and design of the tax! Those locked out Republican voices represented 50% of America and they were locked out by the Democrats in such important debate, our voices were unheard, the absolute power the Democrats had was corrupting them. Could this “absolute” power be used for good? Of course but undeniably it was not used for such by the Democrats.
2010 is when I personally started to awaken, until then I was irate that Bush had been maligned so badly by our media, who seemed to be in the pocket of those Democrats who wielded absolute power, gosh it seemed like the media was handed what to say about the Republicans directly by the Democrats! News that just simply was designed to brainwash America with lies and distortions for political reasons. What was reported often just simply was false and no one seemed to care. I did care and I started getting ugly because it seemed no one else was doing anything, I have NO apologies for my tone and because of it and millions like me the Republicans won the House back in 2010. That victory gave those 50% of America’s locked out voices some representation, yet the Obama Democrats refused to recognize their absolute power days were over and continued to behave like they still had absolute power, this created gridlock in our Government. The Democrats didn’t control the House but they controlled the media, so they stayed the course of their far left agenda, refusing still to listen to 50% of America’s voices. The House did what it could while the media portrayed them as obstructionist and the Party of NO. They dug in, they gave the Senate an immigration Bill, Energy Bills, you name it, but the Democrat controlled Senate headed by Harry Reid simply put those 50% of Americas voices represented by those Bills under a rock on his desk NEVER to reach the Senate floor for discussion, all while the media reported that the Republican House was doing nothing! Shame! Ironically the Democrats claimed that this vote of the People in 2010 that stripped the Democrats of absolute power was not a mandate, it was a mistake by confused voters they told themselves, so they instead of becoming bipartisan, the Obama Democrats stayed the corrupt course they were on and began blaming the Republicans using their media minions, as being obstructionist.
2012 America was under the influence of a Media who was telling them that the reason things were still bad in the USA was because of the Republican House and what little power they actually had was to blame. America then reelected a proven loser President Obama, a man who had an obvious disability when it came to leadership, he could see this “big picture” but he had no clue that a leader needs to lead to reach it, not just rule and HOPE for CHANGE. A man who should have been a one term President was given four more years by a public that was being lied to by our media. There was only HOPE for CHANGE no plan, no vision, no leadership to get there, HOPE and HOPE makes for some pretty thin soup to feed a population hungry for opportunity! With 97% of the Black vote and 76% of the Hispanic vote, a smattering of White votes bamboozled by a misleading media and the traditional mark the D Democrats, President Obama got a second chance!
2014 by now most living and breathing American voters have seen through the media lies, so much so the media itself had begun to be less supportive of the President. They began to tell the truth, selectively that is but the truth was starting to be seen and heard. We witnessed the failures of this Administration in the Middle East, with the Russians, the environment, energy. As a note I have at this point since 2010 been very actively ugly, screaming the truth asking for America to awaken out of this apathetic trance we seemed to be in, wake up was my theme! As I shouted the race baiters have divided America into groups, all who are supposed to put skin color and personal needs before being an American, shame on anyone for doing so. We are a ship coming apart at the seams, my America; our America is being dismantled by the most corrupt group of politicians in my lifetime. Cronyism rampant, cronies don’t care about party they just want to line their pockets. Alternative fuel scams, environmental scams, took the place of America being a producer of goods and services, picks and shovels replaced with pencils making up numbers and selling them. A producer of goods and services replaced by hot air and card tricks, to be honest this has always gone on but not as our mainstay economy. Cronyism, lies, media manipulation has never in my lifetime had such a large influence on an Administration and to be honest I just might have been like the others and turned a blind eye to what was going on if I had been invited to the party but 50% of America was not and we suffered and I spoke out because it was in my best interest to do so, I am not making claim that I did so because I am a Patriot.
In closing the election results we see today like in 2010, IS A MANDATE! A message to the Democrats who have to date refused to negotiate, to be bipartisan, in favor of a United America, not a divided America. You hear Biden now talking like we are all good buddies, let’s let bygones be bygones! I say OK let us watch what our President does with the 350+ Bills written by the House that the Presidents man Harry Reid has on his desk under a rock, shovel ready Bill’s, the work of the Republican House Mitch McConnell will bring to the President. Let us watch President Obama and see if he will listen to the voice of America and get some things done. God knows we need to get busy and clean up this mess our President and the Democrats have built!
William Robert Heath Sr.
Tucson, AZ
I used “old white people” because all of the people in the McSally ads were old white people. Simple as that.
Well with the Republican Clown show firmly planted in the AZ legislature and the Ice Cream Man in the governors office we can count on another 2 years of unconstitutional legislation to get cranked out instead of laws that will move the state forward. When people ask me about Arizona I tell them it is a great place to die but if you have children then you should consider another state. A state where the legislature doesn’t steal money that has been mandated for the schools by the people. To the schools: “to hell with cutting a deal with these turkeys” get back every cent that they stole” let them dump the tax breaks that they keep shoving in the face of the businesses that don’t come. Oh about race-read the sound off column in “Loving Life After 50” and count the number of times these dimwits use the derogatory name “Obummer ” when referring to the President. Perhaps the Ice Cream Man can teach the folks at the DMV a dog and pony show like the folks at Cold Stone give to entertain us while work. Oh when you poor souls complain about your tax dollars going to Washington and getting nothing for them check the facts Arizona gets back $1.60 for every $1 dollar it sends.
A) I’m not a dimwit.
B)Obummer, if the shoe fits…..
C)He may be your president, Henry but he sure ain’t mine.
Bill Heath: This is not journalism 101. Can you trim 90% of the word salad and resubmit before Friday as I have other papers to grade over the weekend
Thanx
Your teacher.
Some people don’t understand short and sweet.
Every so often, decade after decade, they try to give the legislature a pay raise. I vote for it every time. It never passes because certain voters in this state are myopic and stupid. You are asking people to do a difficult, and obviously thankless, job without giving credit for its importance. So, it is left up to the corporate lobbyist whores to buy up, own and control our legislators. People say, oh, they are stupid venal bastards so why should we give them a decent wage. Why, because, otherwise they become, lickspittle, bootlicking, scab poltroons such as the AZ republican legislators of which we have become cursed. They irony of people who disparage government and all who work in it scrambling over each other to get their share of all their worst criticisms of that selfsame organization is not lost on the rest of us. All of you who voted for Douchey remember that you deserve what you get , unlike the rest of us. I scream, you scream, none of us deserve the Doucheabags cream.
The only thing that I take exception to in this article is that Ducey is going to hurt the teachers. The teachers in southern AZ have lost so much, what can he do? We are 180 teachers short… classrooms that have subs. We make very little money. I am sure he could come up with something besides wasting money on the appeals however we don’t even really have unions. We can’t fill positions as it is and I do assume he wants teachers for the kids? My heart is sick and I am just trying to find something that doesn’t scare me about this election and this governor. How could people in Arizona vote for him? I am dumbstruck that the people in Arizona are supporting a governor who vows to not pay back the money the voters voted for in education. I am just sick.
Take 2 asprins and call me in the morning.
A lot of people don’t have attention spans that go for more than three lines or 60 seconds. Their memories are just as short. They often confuse John Wayne and Ronald Reagan and think W was a great president. They do not remember the state of America when Obama was elected. And I’m not defending Obama, who continued W’s wars, lies, illegal detentions and personnel. I just want to note that I don’t know why people want to take out their anger at Obama on the state of Arizona. Haven’t we suffered enough with the current legislature and governor?
You’ll get over it. Life goes on. Let’s all hope and pray it’s not the Queen of Mean, and Ron stays, shall we, otherwise, Rhymes with Witch will ditch the dress and fly outta here on a broom stick Day #2.
Beautiful timing Tommy. Defend Pelosi a few days before she is exposed as a liar again.
She didn’t know Gruber the Obama care architect…………oops, there’s that damn video of Nancy quoting him.
We don’t like her because she’s a powerful woman? An Italian? Really Tom?
What has happened to you Tom? You used to have a sense of humor when doing the Franzi radio show.
Lately you sound like another name calling “party hack”. Hey what about that new “civility” that you guys on the left side called for after the Tucson shootings?. Bye the way, you’ve worn out the Douche joke.
It wasn’t funny the first time.