Progress Kentucky vs. Mitch McConnell

The battle for Mitch McConnell's Senate seat has been heating up lately and the election isn't for a year and a half!  There is a lot of talk about Ashley Judd running against him and she could actually have a shot.  Senator McConnell's poll numbers are not the greatest right now.  He has the worst numbers of any serving Senator with only 37% approval and 55% disapproval among Kentucky voters.  A poll was done of potential match ups for the 2014 race and Ashley Judd has the closest race, probably a lot to do with name recognition.

If the candidates for Senate in 2014 were
Republican Mitch McConnell and Democrat
Ashley Judd, who would you vote for?
Mitch McConnell ............................................. 47%
Ashley Judd .................................................... 43%
Not sure .......................................................... 10%

Progress Kentucky, a progressive group, has been hammering Sen. McConnell on outsourcing.  They have dedicated themselves to unseating Sen. McConnell.  

He is married to former Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao who is of Chinese decent.  She was born in Taiwan after her family fled the mainland during the Chinese Civil War.  On February 14th, Progress Kentucky stepped over the line when they released the following tweet suggesting that it is McConnell's wife's fault that jobs have moved overseas.

This woman has the ear of @mcconnellpress — she’s his #wife.May explain why your job moved to #China! rense.com/general77/raci…

— Progress Kentucky (@ProgressKy) February 14, 2013

This is way over the line, not to mention completely ridiculous.  She served as Secretary of Labor for the United States, not China.  I am sure she is not trying to get her husband to move jobs to China.

Progress Kentucky spokesman Curtis Morrison said on the issue: “It’s not an official statement. It’s a Tweet. And we will remove it if it’s wrong.” Almost two weeks went by and it had not been taken down. That's when ThinkProgress got involved.  Pressed to retract their tweet and issue an apology, Progress Kentucky had this to say: “Senator Mitch McConnell has a conflict of interest that many are afraid to talk about, and Progress Kentucky is not.”  His wife's heritage is not a conflict of interest.  It is an interesting anecdote on the American Dream, nothing more.

Progress Kentucky has finally issued an apology, according to ThinkProgress, yesterday.

Progress Kentucky, you're better than this.  You are a progressive group and progressives hate when things like this happen.  If it was American's for Prosperity or any other conservative group that posted something this stupid, you would have been all over them immediately.  You're liberals.  And Liberals should hold themselves to a higher standard on things like this.  Practice what you preach.  I oppose Sen. McConnell too, of course, but there are much better ways to make your point than that.

Congratulations, Secretary Hagel

After a confirmation process marred by petty politics and a historic filibuster, Chuck Hagel has been confirmed by the Senate to be our next Secretary of Defense.

(Photo: The Washington Post)

He will no doubt be busy right away with the potential defense cuts in the sequester.  Also, the drawing down of troops in Afghanistan will present its own challenges.  

I was also glad to see that Senator Mike Johanns (R-NE) voted to confirm Hagel.  Johanns replaced Hagel as senator for Nebraska when Hagel didn't run for re-election.  Johanns was Governor of Nebraska when Hagel was Senator.  I'd guess that gave him a unique perspective on Hagel.

Refighting For the Voting Rights Act of 1965

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was a very important piece of legislation that strengthened voting rights in the South for minorities. It also, was a brilliant sequel to the Civil Rights Act of 1965.

Section 5 of this act forced the states, counties, cities, etc. with a history of disenfranchising minorities to submit any changes to the law to the Justice Department for review. The Act outlawed literacy tests and other obstacles to voting which were common at the time.  The Justice Department would also monitor elections in those areas to ensure everyone had a fair chance to exercise their right to vote.

The areas affected by Section 5 do have a way to get out of this however.  If they show that they have changed their ways and the Justice department approves their request, they can change their laws how they see fit.  

From OurDocuments:

Between 1965 and 1969, the Supreme Court issued several key decisions upholding the constitutionality of Section 5 and affirming the broad range of voting practices for which preclearance was required. [See South Carolina v. Katzenbach, 383 U.S. 301, 327-28 (1966) andAllen v. State Board of Elections, 393 U.S. 544 (1969)]

The law had an immediate impact. By the end of 1965, a quarter of a million new black voters had been registered, one-third by Federal examiners. By the end of 1966, only 4 out of the 13 southern states had fewer than 50 percent of African Americans registered to vote. The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was readopted and strengthened in 1970, 1975, and 1982.

Last year it was announced that the Supreme Court would take up a case that would revisit the constitutionality of Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.  President Obama argued on Friday that the provision should be kept.  

Some states are passing voter I.D. laws which are designed to suppress voting, despite what their supporters say.  One supporter of the proposed law in Pennsylvania boldly stated that the law would give Mitt Romney Pennsylvania's electoral votes.  Attorney General Eric Holder famously called these laws "poll taxes" for that is what they are.

In many polling places this past November would be voters had to stand in line for hours to cast their ballot.  This was spotlighted at the State of the Union Address a few weeks ago when the President told the story of a woman who was 102 years old that went through that and showed the determination needed to exercise her right.  This should not happen in the United States.  We should be talking about such things in history classrooms, not on the news or certainly not a presidential address.

Now is clearly not the time for this provision to go away.  If anything, it should probably be expanded to include the areas where these types of laws are being passed.

If you cannot win elections through ideas then you should not win.  Changing laws to disenfranchise specific blocs of voters is cheating, pure and simple.  Removing Section 5 would open the floodgates on legislation to disenfranchise more voters.

We will see on Wednesday what will happen to this provision.  I know I will be watching closely.

McCarthy Reincarnate

Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) has been in the news lately because of his opposition to Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense.  Now he is in the news for different reasons.

The New Yorker discovered a past for Cruz that reminds us of a dark period in American politics, where guilt-by-association ruined many careers.

The author of the piece was actually in attendance of the speech Cruz gave to Americans for Prosperity, a Koch brothers group.  And she wrote down his comments.

From The New Yorker:

Cruz greeted the audience jovially, but soon launched an impassioned attack on President Obama, whom he described as “the most radical” President “ever to occupy the Oval Office.” (I was covering the conference and kept the notes.)

He then went on to assert that Obama, who attended Harvard Law School four years ahead of him, “would have made a perfect president of Harvard Law School.” The reason, said Cruz, was that, “There were fewer declared Republicans in the faculty when we were there than Communists! There was one Republican. But there were twelve who would say they were Marxists who believed in the Communists overthrowing the United States government.”

While I'm sure that he believes in what he is saying, he most certainly was playing the room.  The Koch brothers group, Americans for Prosperity, operates in a fantasy land.  They and groups like them attack a President Obama that does not exist, which in my opinion makes it that much harder to combat.

Notice how, like Joe McCarthy sixty years ago, he didn't name names.  Joe McCarthy set up hearings to find out which members of the government and the entertainment industry were members of the Communist Party.  He used many dirty tricks including faked documents and doctored photographs.  Senator Cruz does no know if any members of the Harvard faculty are members of the Communist Party but it doesn't matter if he does.  He says he does and tries to link it to the President and that stirs the Right into a frenzy.  He should really find something better to occupy his time with than trying to link the President to imagined communists.

Friday Shakedown

The Tea Party does seem to be more and more outcast from the Republican party.  It's a little funny to me.
A lot has happened this week and I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed.  The Voting Rights Act of 1965 is under attack, more on that this weekend.  Bills all over the midwest attacking the teaching of science, but that is nothing new, sadly.

I've been slow to post the past several days and when I finally did, it wasn't much.  I'll try to get back on track this weekend.  It was kind of a crazy week.

And now for something completely different:

I so need to do this...

Favorite Story of the Day

I don't really have anything I want to comment on today so here is a sea otter playing basketball.

More Condemnation of Preschool

More attacks from the Right over President Obama's proposal for universal preschool.

Fox Business host Gerri Willis on Sunday called the measure immoral.  I don't think that word means what she thinks it means.  

A child's attendance in preschool has been linked to higher graduation rates, fewer teen pregnancies, and reduced drop out rates.  These are all results that we want so why not give more children the opportunity to start their education in preschool?

Winning the contest for worst excuse to oppose universal preschool ever, Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) said she opposes the measure because it would lead to more paperwork.

Wait, what?

'You know, I had an email from a teacher as [Obama] was giving the speech, someone I’ve known for a long time and it was, ‘Are you kidding me? More paperwork?’

She's talked to teachers she knows and they are upset over the amount of paperwork this would cause.  I was not aware that the amount of paperwork an education proposal could generate should be a reason to oppose it.

She went on to say that education should be handled by the states.  We don't give the power over education to the states because that can't handle it.  Southern schools are some of the worst in the country.  Do you really think they'd get better if the state governments had control?  

Give the power to the states.  It's a bumper sticker.  A silly slogan for her base to latch onto.  People swayed by that have no business being in the conversation.

But those people vote, and elections have consequences.