Regardless of the fact that he was never conservative enough for conservatives, and never reliable enough for liberals, Arlen Specter was an icon on Pennsylvania politics. He was diagnosed with late-stage Hodgkin’s lymphoma several years ago, but it seems he recently got a non-Hodgkin’s form of the disease and succumbed to it at 82.
Category: Politics
Debate Impressions
Strictly on content, I thought it was a draw. Biden held his own and managed to get through the debate without saying anything supremely stupid. That’s a big accomplishment for Crazy Joe. I think much of what was debated is beyond the knowledge of low-information voters. But on likability and demeanor, which I think probably matters more to the low-information voters the campaigns are trying to reach now, Ryan came out ahead on that one. Biden was getting boorish, and I don’t think that comes off well to the voters the campaign needs to reach. However, I suspect the Dem base ate up Crazy Joe’s performance, so when it comes to getting morale back on track, I think Biden did a respectable job.
Ready for the Debate
I have pre-mixed some Manhattans and put them in the freezer for the Vice Presidential debate tonight. Gotta crack out the hard stuff for Crazy Joe. This is kind of like watching race car driving. Ordinarily watching a bunch of guys drive cars around in a circle, to me at least, is about as exciting as watch the grass grow. But there might be a wreck, and that is exciting. When Joe Biden is involved, there’s a pretty high likelihood there’s going to be a wreck.
Six Reasons Gun Owners Should Care About This Election
Remember, Barack Obama is the best pro-gun President of all times, according to the media, and these paranoid gun nuts are just a bunch of moronic hicks brainwashed by the NRA. This article in Forbes lays out the case for why that’s as big a lie as virtually anything else they’ve parroted this silly season:
More recently in a move unprecedented in American history, President Obama quietly banned re-importation and sale of 850,000 collectible antique U.S.-manufactured M1 Garand and Carbine rifles that were left in South Korea following the Korean War. Developed in the 1930’s, the venerable M1 Garand carried the U.S. through World War II, seeing action in every major battle.
I had kind of forgotten about this, because Presidents screwing us on importation rules has been a grand bipartisan tradition, but it’s certainly something to count against the President.
An Obama reelection presents an extreme risk of replacing at least one of five Supreme Court justices who have vindicated Second Amendment protections in the precarious Heller and McDonald decisions. If this were to happen, our right to bear arms might become a lost historical memory for future oppressed generations to read about.
This point needs to be pounded on until gun owners start to get it.
Still, the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence continues to wage war on several fronts, most particularly attacking the constitutionally-sanctioned Second Amendment right of law-abiding citizens to carry guns for protection outside their homes, a right the vast majority of state governments acknowledge. According to their director of legal action, Jonathan Lowy, “this battle is far from over.â€
I think the Brady Campaign has largely beclowned itself under Gross, and is sliding further down the slope into irrelevance. Bloomberg and MAIG are the big threat now, and that’s another reality I think gun owners need to be made to understand.
UPDATE: First comment on that article illustrates an attitude you find often among gun owners who are ill informed:
No one…not even the President of the United States…can *legally* impose any restrictions on a citizen’s right to keep and bear arms. Until the Bill is Rights is abolished that right is just as important as any other right in the Bill of Rights. Can you imagine the uproar if some silly woman senator suggested “Common Sense restrictions on the right to free speech? The Second Amendment is the ONLY amendment to specifically state that the “right to KEEP and BEAR arms shall NOT BE INFRINGED.
So…what PART of “Shall NOT be INFRINGED†do these people not understand? No one has the right to tell *anyone* that they cannot only KEEP but also BEAR arms anywhere at anytime. Why? Because the Second Amendment does not have ANY provision for that. It’s really simple. But some law breaking “government officials†believe that they can force people to do what *THEY* deem as right. Well, it AINT gonna happen.
The unfortunate fact is the Second Amendment only means what 9 unelected men and women in robes say it means. Beyond that, it does not protect you. A great many gun owners don’t understand the existence and recognition of this right by the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, doesn’t mean squat unless the courts enforce it. I think this is an understandable, if naive view, that people in the government will act in good faith. They won’t. I think a good reason the Court argument may not be effective among gun owners is that they don’t really understand the magnitude of the threat. “It’s in the Constitution, and I can read,” they likely think, probably also remembering back to civics class about what it takes to amend the document. But while Judges can read too, judges also have agendas.
What seems clear can be unclear. I can remember being this naive once, back when I was first getting into this issue in a serious way, and someone told me the Second Amendment was ruled not to be an individual right. I couldn’t believe this was the case, so I looked up the Supreme Court cases on it, and couldn’t find anything that lead to that conclusion. But this did lead me to the collective rights work of Saul Cornell, and I was outraged enough by it to seek deeper knowledge, which was part of my transition out of that space. Sometimes I think when ordinary gun owners find out how this really works, they are going to be pissed.
Most Effective Ad of This Season
I’m not sure I’ve seen the equal of this ad during the 2012 election season:
Saw it appear over at Barron’s first, who has been there, and then at Instapundit. Having gone through it myself with just us, I can’t imagine how stressful it would be with kids to support.
Illinois Democrats Beating The Gun Control Drum
Looks like someone in the Illinois Democratic Party has decided that gun control is a hill they are ready to die on.* This time they are taking advantage of the fact that people who don’t own guns, and generally even people who do, don’t know what the gun laws are. Illinois requires licensing for all gun owners, in the form of an FOID card. To sell a gun to someone, they must also possess an FOID card. The system allows for private transfers, because the license is proof you’re eligible. Illinois attempted to pass background checks for private sales on top of the licensing requirement, and now the Democrats are spinning that as a vote against background checks. It might be technically true, but it’s awfully disingenuous in a state where you can’t legally possess a firearm without a license that requires a background check to obtain, and is revoked upon committing a crime.
* Again, the standard disclaimer for those on the other side that this is a metaphor, perhaps one quickly developing, in the standard business buzzword vernacular, into a cliche. I recognize that many professional activists and community organizers in the gun control movement have never held a “real job” for most of their careers, and may not be up on the current business buzzwords, of which “I don’t want to die on that hill,” is certainly one. But literally, no one will be dying on any hills, and if I say we should “touch base later” (definitely a cliche now), it doesn’t mean anything dirty or immoral. In the mean time I encourage you to channel some core competencies to drive a media synergy that leverages new paradigms, rather than thinking you’ve found some kind of insurrectionist gotcha.
How Close is Pennsylvania – Really?
I’ve been pretty vocal about people who are just absolutely convinced that the GOP candidates for Senate & President will win Pennsylvania. Usually this is because everyone they know – who just happens to lean right – is going to vote for candidates on the right. Shocking. It’s a matter of selection bias, and it isn’t based in reality.
However, there are some things I’m seeing that leave me wondering if the polls are actually showing a much wider gap than really exists. One is a graphic Mitt recently posted on Facebook that noted his campaign has made 5 times as many phone calls and knocked on 45 times more doors by this time in the campaign than McCain’s team had in 2008.
Consider that Mitt’s got that much higher turnout of grassroots energy and he hasn’t been spending the money here like McCain did. McCain was spending like Pennsylvania was a seriously competitive state. Both campaigns have largely been ignoring Pennsylvania. Though Mitt did test the waters a bit with a big rally in one of the Philly suburbs recently.
But then I also see tweets like this from the left.
Just spoke to a few hundred excited volunteers from New York all members of SEIU. In Philly to canvass for The President #forward 2012
— Tony Payton Jr. (@TonyPaytonJr) October 6, 2012
Fun times in Hazleton! Thanks @ofa_ny for the good times and hard knocks!#pa2012instagr.am/p/P5R5SEIfTU/ — Jane Slusser (@janeslusser) September 22, 2012
It seems odd to me that the Obama campaign would spend the money to bring in New Yorkers for a state that they are so confident they’ll win – and win big.
One thing that these little signs could reflect is that the polls have poor turnout models. Yes, truly more people may like Obama over Romney in Pennsylvania. But, the Obama voters may not feel very motivated at all to vote. And clearly Romney’s campaign has more energy than expected.
This year may be the year of quiet campaigning in Pennsylvania. We’re seeing far fewer yard signs out this year than any other year – even non-presidential races. In fact, where there were previously dozens, now there are none. Yet, we still hear from most people on the right that they are more motivated to vote than they were before. We also have more gun owners interested in helping campaigns than we have had in the past. It’s all kinda weird. I think the final numbers have a potential to be far more interesting than the polls show. I won’t go so far as to say that Mitt will win Pennsylvania, but it could be a closer race than people expected based off polling.
Tweets Candidates Learn to Regret
When you’re a candidate running against an incumbent, there are usually qualities that people want to see in you – like the ability to identify and properly handle problems in a calm and reasonable manner. Because, let’s face it, if you’re elected, you’re going to be helping constituents with a lot of red tape and general bureaucratic messes. It would seem that Mike Starr, running for election to Minnesota’s 31st Senate seat, might not be the most qualified for handling problems in a calm and reasonable manner.
This is his very public response to getting a bad grade from NRA on his questionnaire:
It seems he has since tried to send the tweet down the memory hole, so I guess he learned that acceptable political rhetoric from a candidate rarely involves demands to “kiss [one’s] ass” directed at a major interest group for a key demographic.
Now, I’ve been involved with a campaign whose opponent was unfairly given an inflated grade and ignored in the endorsement process when it was a clear choice for gun owners in a winnable seat. You know how they handled it? Ask around and contacted NRA about the grades. Guess how NRA handled it? They reconsidered the race, acknowledged the need to revise the grade, and sent out postcards noting the correction. Don’t get me wrong, the internal folks were initially very upset with the situation. But, they didn’t react by cursing at NRA publicly.
On Starr’s website, he indicates he has previous grades of A & B from NRA. I went searching and found that he has run for office before, and his grade was already on the decline due to his answers on his questionnaires. More importantly, his grades were from years ago, not the most recent election cycle. The issue has fundamentally changed since he first answered a questionnaire. Heller, McDonald, the expiration of a federal gun ban – all monumental game changers that happened since he first answered NRA and his grade has fallen since those things started happening.
Now, I’m not arguing that NRA got it 100% right in this case because, clearly, I haven’t seen his responses. On the other hand, I can say that this type of outburst on behalf of his campaign account doesn’t exactly bode well for any gun owners who might want to talk to him about concerns about his positions. It looks like he would just tell them all to “kiss [his] ass” and walk away.
UPDATE: To Starr’s credit, his demand for gun owners to kiss his ass still stands. Twitter was just acting up and telling me the tweet was no longer there when I gathered the information for this post. Here’s the Twitter embed version:
@nrapvf As a 25 yr mil service member a gun owner, a coach for the HS Trap Tm spt C&C spt 2nd Amendment to get an “F” you can “KISS MY ASS”
— Mike Starr (@StarrforSenate) October 5, 2012
NRA TV Ads for 2012
I noticed that someone in a volunteer group was asking about NRA advertisements, so I went to check out the PVF site to see if any were posted yet. It looks like they just started posting some this week. For those of you not in swing states, I thought you might like to see some of the ads.
In Virginia:
In Ohio:
In Florida:
Down Ticket Races to Watch in Pennsylvania
Bitter has a summary of the down ticket races to watch in Pennsylvania in regards to gun rights. Despite turning a number of the Philadelphia suburban ring county districts back to red in the 2010 election, I’m still very concerned about how long term trends look for the GOP. Gerlach has always been in tight races. It’s one of those things that just feels like it’s a matter of time. I am quite pleased that Kathy Boockvar, the Democratic Challenger of Mike Fitzpatrick, scored an A on her NRA questionnaire. While Fitzpatrick will undoubtedly carry an endorsement per NRA’s incumbent friendly policy, it is a sign that perhaps the Democrats don’t think running anti-gun candidates is a wise choice, even very close to Philadelphia. The worst thing that could happen to us would be for the Democratic Party in this area to become reflexively pro-gun-control. Not only does that run the risk that a good seat goes bad, it makes it easier for the Republicans to get away with just not being as bad as the other guy.