Name:   copperline - Subject:   Rambling............... Date:   11/7/2012 5:55:56 PM

it’s a mixed bag again these days.   Some of the more shrill & divisive conservatives lost and that seems to support the idea that the Tea Party has peaked in its influence, and repelled moderate voters away from the GOP.    it’s amazing that Bachman can win, she must have a good campaign machine going for her.     The House of Representatives, with it’s Gerry-mandered  districts and close-to-hometown politicking seems prone to capture by all kinds of weird  single issue politicians…. Even ones who deny science but sit on the House Science Committee (Paul Broun of Georgia),  or claim that slavery was good for black people.    Maybe we just don’t think the House seats matter as much as the Senate does, so the races aren’t taken seriously enough (except by the Tea Party).   Plus, i guess large scale PAC money can move  votes more easily  in small House districts than large races.

My ramblings:  each candidate spent $1billion on their campaign and this will increase each election cycle unless we do something about it.   Unfettered, secretive SuperPAC’s are a threat  (though we might start seeing them as economic stimulus operations for the media & communication sectors of the economy)…. They are distorting the democratic process.   Corporations are not people.    People should be able to vote easily, not face restrictions that discourage them in the least.   Voter apathy is a much more serious issue than voter fraud.    State Governors need to take their responsibility to carry out elections without partisan considerations as a sacred duty, and be punished if they do not.    We need to eliminate the Electoral College and encourage people to participate in electing the President in as many ways as we can.   White people need to accept we are not the majority ruling class, and quit acting like the world is coming to an end.    Most importantly, i expect Obama to find compromises with the GOP before we land in a ditch.    Entitlements will have to be cut back strategically, like adding a means-test to Social Security benefits.    We’ll still have to raise some tax revenues…. And he’ll have to endure griping with either.  But as a final-term President, he’s in a position to do the right thing without simultaneously running for the next election.

Last, but maybe not least, Mitt Romney accomplished something significant for the country:  He got the Evangelical Right Wing to quit calling Mormonism a cult.