Elections 2010: Bad Ideas Never Die
Tuesday, October 5, 2010 at 5:33PM [Note: Having a life intruded into my blogging schedule yesterday, and I failed to get out a Monday post. To make up for that, today I will be posting twice.]
While this posting pertains to all Democratic and open-minded independent voters, I would like to dedicate it particularly to Hispanic voters. A Pew Hispanic Center poll shows that Democratic candidates have a considerable edge over Republicans in support from registered Hispanic voters (65% support the Democratic candidate in their local congressional district, while just 22% support the Republican candidate).
Unfortunately, only about half (51%) of registered Hispanic voters say they are “absolutely certain” they vote in the mid-terms as opposed to 70% of all voters.
That’s a bad idea. With the tea party types and regressive conservative voters fired up, not voting is about the same as voting for the Republican candidate.
On Real Time with Bill Maher last Friday, October 1, Bill made one of the more cogent points about the upcoming elections. Speaking to Democrats and progressive independents, Bill noted that in the upcoming elections we “need to realize there is a difference between a disappointing friend [Democratic candidates] and a deadly enemy.”
And with support for Arizona-like immigration laws being one of the talking points for many Republican candidates this fall, Hispanic voters should have no illusions about who their enemies are.
Another anti-immigrant position popular among Republicans is that of changing the 17th Amendment to the US Constitution so that babies born in the United States are not automatically US citizens. This is another bad idea but one that is not new.
Oddly enough, I found a precursor to the current debate in episodes 39 and 40 of the first season,1959, of the Rocky and Bullwinkle show (Broadcast as Rocky and His Friends). In episode 39 Senator Fussmussen tells a news conference, “Right now it’s too easy to become an American. This bill’s gonna make it tougher.”
When the reporter asks, “What do you mean it’s too easy Senator?” Fussmussen replies, “Well, all you got to do is be born here. This large loophole has got to be plugged up!”
In episode 40 Fussmussen tells the Citizenship Committee, “Too many people are claiming to be Americans—Alaskans, Hawaiians, Californians. It’s disgracefull!”
[Note many Republicans would today agree with the sentiment regarding Hawaiians. At the time Alaska and Hawaii had just been admitted at the 49th and 50th states. California, of course, was admitted in 1850.]
Jay Ward made fun of the notion of “Plugging” the citizenship loophole in 1959, but the idea did not die. It resurfaced in the 1990s and again this year. Bad ideas do not die. You can, however, vote them into insignificance.
To all “unenthusiastic” Democrats and progressive/liberal independents I would say, “Voting is like changing your underwear—you don’t need to be enthusiastic about it, you just have to do it if at all possible. Your friends will thank you!”