Hyperpartisan Me

Building 19 Politics (4.00 / 8)

"These policies were developed in a major political party - you would recognize the name! But their fussy quality assurance team decided the proposals didn't quite meet their standards, and they tore the label off !  We bought the whole lot and we can offer these No Label proposals to you at low low prices !

"All sales final."

---

by: elwood @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 03:41:45 AM UTC

Side note (4.00 / 2)

Man, I miss walking down the creaky floors with the rows of fluorescent lights running the length of  the old Building 19 in the old Mammoth Mills in Manchester as a kid.  I had forgotten all about it until now.  Excellent reworking of No Labels.

---

by: FrankLloydMike @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 12:59:12 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

No Labels=No Backbone (4.00 / 3)

So obviously limited to self-serving, vertebrae-challenged electoral-wannabes.

No Labelsis is all about Democrats shutting up and embracing 21st century Republicanism.

No Labels, no thanks.  

No'm Sayn?

---

by: BurtCohen @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 03:51:55 AM UTC

I Think You're Right On, Burt (4.00 / 4)

As I read about "No Labels," I'm reminded that it's also tough to figure out exactly who the "Tea Partiers" are, since that's also a group with no real definition.

With candidates jumping all over the place depending on the latest polls or political fads, it's necessary to have some labeling.  On food, that's a way to tell what the indegredients are. On cars, it's a way to determine the price.  In all cases, a little more research is needed, of course.

What we really need are brave, proud Democrats AND Republicans willing to work together in bi-partisan, not "non-partisan," ways.  Political party philosophy DOES matter.  The two-party and even multi-party system is good in democracy.  But working together, when necessary and when right, is a necessary component.  

---

by: Rep. Jim Splaine @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 10:28:54 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Bi-partisanship is the handmaiden of those who (0.00 / 0)

perceive the world as made up of opposites engaged in a contest in which one is destroyed and the other ends up with a monopoly.

On the other hand, partisanship is related to ownership in that both are strategies designed to remove the natural person and individual human rights from the contest.  The effect of political machinations on real people is disguised by focusing on ideology and theory.  The focus on the nation and "national security" instead of the security and integrity of the person is another manifestation of the denigration of the person.

---

by: hannah @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 16:39:10 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Good Points... (4.00 / 3)

...but I'd suggest that democracy does not work well without bipartisanship -- political parties coming together from time to time on those things about which they can agree.

In fact, one thing about the NH Legislature I learned on my first few days there -- and yes, I can still remember them -- is that most issues are not partisan.  Of the roughly 1,500 core votes during a two-year Legislative Session (not including all those thousands of minor votes on process, etc.), perhaps 1,300 are clearly bipartisan.  Some are even "nonpartisan," which is a somewhat different animal.  

But not having any labels means that you haven't figured out, or you don't want others to know, your own core beliefs and principles.  If a candidate says that he/she doesn't want to wear labels, that tells me something about that candidate that perhaps doesn't pass the sniff test.  

---

by: Rep. Jim Splaine @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 16:47:36 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Several of my local Democrats (4.00 / 1)

are concerned that I don't seem to accept the results of the recent election, from which some of my neighbors chose 5 Republicans to "represent" us.  One is not bad, but the rest don't need No Labels because they have no problem with their party's platform.  

I am supposed to support our electoral system as we used to know it, but my problem is that I don't think it is working as it was supposed to, and the reason is $$$.  So I am not feeling very represented right now.  

---

by: Lucy Edwards @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 10:21:35 AM UTC

Here's a link for you, Dean- (0.00 / 0)

poll on Social Security:

The bottom line is that Social Security is about making sure we are our brother's keeper. Social Security is about who we are as a people. Are we going to be a people that turns the vulnerable into the street? The vast majority of non-retired people reject this idea and stand strongly behind the purpose, structure, and application of Social Security. Beware of those who use attempt to use generational warfare to undermine it. Not only are they liars and charlatans, but they couldn't care less about the young and their future. They have but one goal in using this tactic: to destroy the last remaining hope of the middle class.

---

by: Lucy Edwards @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 10:48:57 AM UTC

Follow the money. (4.00 / 5)

The war of lies on Social Security is easily explainable by the big pot of money at stake. If all those FICA contributions go into 401-K's managed by big financial institutions instead, Wall Street can continue living in the style to which it is accustomed.

That's the crowd funding these political front organizations, I suspect.

---

by: elwood @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 11:15:45 AM UTC

This "no labels" (4.00 / 7)

nonsense is another way to delegitimize the Democratic party and Democratic values. Notice how while the other side screams, blockades, pouts, points fingers, cries, rewrites history, calls names, accuses, that is somehow okay. When our side assertively presents our views, WE are somehow "hyperpartisan" over-reaching, etc.

This has been happening for over 20 years and quite frankly, I am sick of it. Every time there has been a move "toward the center", the center itself has moved rightward. This is evidenced by the health care reform that passed. Less than 20 years ago, it was a REPUBLICAN proposal. REPUBLICAN Mitt Romney put a similar one in place in MA. Now it is SOCIALISM.

Aside from which, there is no such thing as "no labels", everyone comes from a certain perspective, no matter what the claim.I'd rather deal with the above described Republican than a so-called "no label" Democrat. At least I know what I'm dealing with.

---

by: Jennifer Daler @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 11:25:56 AM UTC

Yesterday (4.00 / 2)

I was watching "Meet the Press" for the first time in quite awhile, and I couldn't help but notice the unintended irony of introducing someone representing No Labels as "GOP strategist, and advisor to President George W. Bush and John McCain, Mark McKinnon."  Talk about a long list of labels.

---

by: FrankLloydMike @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 13:04:26 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I think what we have here is a misunderstanding. (0.00 / 0)

The people who are concerned about "socialism" are really fearful of the totalitarian aspects of "national socialism," but, perhaps because the foreshortened terminology for that movement disguised the "national" component and then "nation" was hailed as a positive, as in "national interest" and "national security," the totalitarianism people reject got stuck onto "socialism," even though the social welfare aspect was never problematic.

Now, it was clearly the nationwide aspect of health care which some of the states were definitely against, in large part, I suspect, because they perceived that their regulatory relationship with health insurers would be curtailed.  So, it was a local control issue and, in some cases, with good reason.  It turns out, for example, that Georgia, whose Governor proclaimed an intent to have nothing to do with a national program, can well afford to do that because Georgia has 99 counties and everyone of those counties has a functioning health department which delivers routine inoculations and other preventive services.  In other words, Georgia is a very socialistic state and doesn't want to be nationalized.

So, the real problem is nationalism, the idea of the super state to which all individual rights and interest have to be subordinate.

Of course, authoritarians are actually in favor of the monopolistic opportunities inherent in the "sovereign nation" concept.  GWB, for example, seemed somewhat jealous of the "sovereign Indian nations," if only because his buddies in the energy industries were eager to do business with entities that are exempt from the federal environmental standards. Conservatives favor whichever system lets them be as irresponsible as they want.  So they play off the feds against the states, and vice versa.

---

by: hannah @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 17:13:29 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Save Social Security and conquer Alzheimers at the same time! Where do I sign up for my Pie in the Sky? (4.00 / 2)

Such magical thinking is inspiring!

"But, in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope." Si se puede. Yes we can.  

---

by: Paul Twomey @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 12:45:21 PM UTC

Moose turd pie! (4.00 / 1)

Good, though.

They. Don't. Care.
We do.
Rinse, repeat.

---

by: GreyMike @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 13:19:19 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Right. Obedience to the Law is Freedom. (0.00 / 0)

That's why conservatives are enamored of the "rule of law."  The law is an impersonal entity, more implacable than any flesh and blood ruler, whose head can't be offed.

The law, when it is employed as an instrument of subordination, is not unlike a wrathful deity whose earthly acolytes inflict punishment on the spot.

---

by: hannah @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 17:23:38 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Inaccuracy (4.00 / 5)

There is one inaccuracy - at least one - in this piece by Maggie:

We will advocate for "open" primaries - New Hampshire already has them - allowing a broader cross section of voters to help choose party nominees.

   

NH lets undecareds vote in either the Demcoratic or the Republican primary.  We do not let declared Republicans vote in Democratic primaries, or vice versa.  That would be an open primary.

http://archive.fairvote.org/?p...

 



"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on."  Franklin D. Roosevelt    

---

by: Kathy Sullivan 2 @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 13:16:46 PM UTC

Democrats And Republicans Working Together! (0.00 / 0)

And on that, the idea of "open primaries," Democrats and Republicans in Concord have for years worked together to defeat legislation whenever it's been proposed.  Open primaries can create mischief, game-playing and havoc in our process.  

There is a valuable purpose for having primaries by political parties -- an alternative would be to have party caucuses or conventions choosing nominees for statewide higher offices, but I doubt we'd want to do that in New Hampshire.  

---

by: Rep. Jim Splaine @ Mon Dec 20, 2010 at 13:54:42 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I like the way New Hampshire does it now. (0.00 / 0)

(Of course, Kathy's right about what it is we currently do.)

--
Hope > Anarch-tea
Twitter: @DougLindner

---

by: Douglas E. Lindner @ Tue Dec 21, 2010 at 00:17:08 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Just another name for attention mongering Independents (0.00 / 0)

In the current political landscape, anyone who thinks there is common ground to be found is simply a tool of the right wing.  I am so tired of self proclaimed Independents who are sure that both sides are too extreme and that they alone know that there is a mushy middle to be found.  As we see day after day, the left and the right are in no way equivalent.

---

by: ruthcserr @ Tue Dec 21, 2010 at 16:12:44 PM UTC