speaking of ads…

this is the best example of my last post.

its completely famous.

cost: 7 million dollars.

now that you’ve soaked up this freak show gloriousness, let’s talk about it. you know, to sustain the momentum.

fact: elizabeth dole was voted 93rd in effectiveness for the 2008 cycle (that’s out of 100 for you non-political junkies). she has also voted with president bush 92% of the time (and that’s out of 100% for those of you who…don’t do math?).

allusion: elizabeth dole is not 92 years old. she is a chipper 72.

in an interview with katie couric, kay defended the ad by saying that everyone knows kay is not 92/93 (age). elizabeth (rightly) identifies that yeah, that’s what the ad was meant to do, but she responds gracefully and ends up looking more honourable than kay, who denies reality. since honour is a rare sighting in this camaign, it really stands out. overall, however, most people are into this “snarky” ad, and it certainly gets the message out.

plus, old men in rocking chairs are really adorable.

 

 

plus, HAPPY HALLOWEEN.

and if you don’t celebrate for religious/personal/unknown reasons, then please spend tonight thinking about who you’ll vote for.

don’t forget to early vote!!!!!!!!!!

loopholes in the law

surprise surprise, both kay and elizabeth have taken full advantage of the loophole in contribution limits.

under federal election law, individuals can give no more than $4,600 to the campaign of a senatorial candidate. this law was designed to prevent large donors from unfairly influencing the election. after these donors max out on their candidate’s campaign, however, they just turn around and throw money at the national party committees, who, as we have seen throughout “the catfight of carolina,” put that money into attack ads and advertising for the candidate.

let’s check the stats on this years senatorial loopholed contribution fund: (per group of donors)

$200,000 to kay’s campaign + $1.7million to the national democratic senatorial committee

$400,000 to liddy’s campaign + $1.5million to the national republican senatorial committee

this is, obviously, legal. but it does bother those that don’t want the rich (like, billionaires) to have more of an affect on the results than “regular folk”

but where would politics be without the filthy rich?

the quick answer is: without hilarious and muddy attack ads…. think about it.

let’s hear it for positivity!

my last several posts have been pretty negative, and that, combined with the overall stress of the election, could lead to acne or heart failure or a whole host of other unpleasant health conditions.

so, deep breath, put on a happy song, and let’s discuss some of the really super aspects of kay and elizabeth and their spiffy campaigns.

kay: energetic and effective. in the state senate, she worked tirelessly on behalf of her constituents, established spending priorities and helped protect north carolina markets from overpowering competition. confident, moderate, and business friendly.

elizabeth: honourable and well liked. in the senate, pushed for wall street regulation, succeeded in strengthening north carolina’s military position, helped local sheriffs, and negotiated a favourable tobacco-buyout program for her state.

its too bad they spend so much time attacking each other and not enough time talking up their own accomplishments….

but just look at these smiling faces.

do you feel better?

these liberals…

in just a few moments, you will see yet another attack ad released in the north carolina senate race.

this one is unique, however, because it goes after the entire democratic party and tries to frame kay as a washington pawn whose nomination to run for senate was based solely on the desire of “these liberals” to control all branches of government.

well, true. that is the ideal for any party- a president in power and a 60 count filibuster proof majority in the senate. since the democrats actually have a chance of success here, several key senate races are being fought to the death.

because, obviously, on the flip-side, the republicans can’t think of anything worse than a democratically controlled legislative and executive branch. one is bad enough. but two?

enough talk, let’s cut to the newest creation of the nrsc.

first- it appears that national republican senatorial committee is conceding the presidency. well, not condecing, per se, but there is a definite allusion to obama winning the presidency.

second- the democrats are within arms reach of a congressional majority. that is a major cause for concern for any republican or independent who who would like to retain the checks and balances that a more closely tied election offers. although, in a heartbeat, wouldn’t the republicans love this sort of widespread majority?

yeah, well, who wouldn’t.

(answer: independents)

third- this might not bother all independents, and heres why.

in the minds of the people: divided government —> partisan gridlock—> inefficiency of government

so for those that share liberal views, the one party in power system might be a welcome change from this paradigm of constant political argumentation.

just until, that is, the party in power decides to abuse this position.

lose-lose, but its better than anarhcy.

follow up: atheism

oh, two for two today. am i getting addicted to blogging? no- im addicted to helping the constituents of north carolina make an informed decision on november 4th. time is running out!

as well as a mention in the infamous gay marriage flyers, the atheism issue came up in this ad, sponsored by the national republican senatorial committee:

to further consolidate the point, several flyers have been circulating. i highly recommend checking them out with a discerning eye: here

basically, kay attended a fundraiser co-sponsored by 40 beneficiaries, including woody kaplan, a member of the advisory board for the godless americans pac.

she said, she said—–

liddy’s camp: “either she shares their views, or puts money over her principles,” links the group with kay to abolish christmas as a federal holiday, remove “under god” from the constitution, and remove the “in god we trust” from all currency.

kay’s camp: “desperate” and “pathetic” attempt to save the Republican seat at any and all costs”, kay is an elder member of the first presbyterian church, i don’t support any of that nonsense! (my words not hers)

the atheist camp: we will not tolerate this anti-atheist bigotry! we support kay because the north carolina senator is supposed to represent all north carolinans.

the issues just get more and more interesting……

does this have an affect on you? alter your opinion, if only slightly? please comment, let’s discuss.

whaaaaaat is happening?

a quick little poll update:

kay hagan- 47.1%

elizabeth dole- 42.4%

christopher cole- 4%

and now for the juicy stuff:

the mudslinging reaches jacksonian levels

most recently, the north carolina republican party circulated these pamphlets, presumably as a last ditch effort to generate enough fear (of the breakdown of the sancity of marriage, of the “gays,” however you define this issue) (trying really hard to remain bipartisan here, applaud my efforts at neutral language please) among the n.c. electorate to switch the election in liddy’s favour.

in response, the kay kamp (kute) declared that “kay believes that marriage is between a man and a woman, and this is fundamentally a state issue. she would not support a federal amendment defining marriage. here in north carolina, there is a law that she supports that says marriage is defined as a relationship between a man and a woman, and she sees no reason to change that.”

the federal marriage amendment, which would ban gay marriage on a national level by putting it in the constitution, wasn’t mentioned on the flyer.
what was mentioned, in addition to gay marriage of course, was kay’s alleged ties to an atheistic group, claiming that kay supports a “radical homosexual agenda” that includes removing “under god” from the constitution and forcing the boy scouts to accept gay and atheistic troop leaders. those that criticized these mailers wondered “what, exactly, is the gay interest in removing ‘under god’ from the pledge of allegiance?”

indeed.

this tactic is not likely to have any sort of tangible effect on voters. most dismiss it as slander, and those that fervently believe the hype probably also fervently believe in supporting liddy dole, since the candidates basically hold the same position on the idea of gay marriage. (although well hidden or absent from the candidates websites… hmm)(please comment if you were able to find such information)

sexism. or is it? only time will tell.

what with two women topping the ballot in the north carolina senate race— oh you hadn’t heard? its kay and liddy— people are starting to think that the glass ceiling has shattered. was this a superficial smattering of glass?

let’s see:

1) this senatorial election cycle, north carolina will elect a woman. what, chris? no….. we’re not swinging that way this time.

2) we also might elect a female governor (beverly perdue)

3) and maybe… the first woman vice president (sarah palin)

is this the wave of the future?

nope. these dashing damsels are actually the exception in north carolina. despite the prominence of these positions, women actually only hold 22% of elected office. this includes school board membership, city and town councils, and the state house and senate. i should also mention that in north carolina, the female vote makes up 54% of the electorate. furthermore, women in office are concentrated in cities, while in more rural areas, over one-third of offices have no female leaders involved in the policy process.

so comprehensively, only 16% of women are on the ballot. that means that 84% are men, even though of the voting constituents of north carolina, 46% are men.

on the bright side, in the olden times, there were no women in political life at all. you know, in like the 1800s. this is the new millenium, people.

so… who can we blame?? as it turns out, everyone.

• women express interest in campaigns half as often as men.
• on average, women enter the political arena 12 years later than men. (family, primary caregiver, ect)
• the republicans and democrats don’t often train and recruit women for office.
• society
• culture
• history

the last three, if you’re interested, well, you could read volumes.

According to Gloria Steinman, gender is the “most restricting force in America,” despite the media’s disregard for gender in campaigns.

maybe, if gender became as important as race in the public sphere, america could move forward and crush these societal plagues once and for all.

the secondary moral of the story is, i’m a personalized blogger. you got comments/questions i DEDICATE A BLOG TO IT.

decide, already

statistics are fun:

7% of north carolina voters are undecided.

of the decidedes, 20% are a little unsure that they actually are decided.

based on the analysis of the public policy polling group, the results from the absolutely positively decided voters give kay hagan the lead with 40%, elizabeth dole trailing with 33%, and christopher cole keeping up appearances with a 2%.

with propaganda and mind control, the results of this election could swing any which way. a quarter of the electorate is sway-able. these voters are found predominately in the under-30 set, small towns, and in the african-american community.

this leads us to a question: where are the north carolinans getting the information they need to decide on a candidate?

mostly, they read it off the wall, written in mud.

freedom’s watch recently got involved in the fight for most powerful tv ad with this rant against kay hagan:

this is a rather tired argument in north carolina and, when taken with the incessant phone calls that north carolinans receive every week from this group, bound to be dismissed as annoying.

in contrast, moveon.org has sent out an ad against elizabeth dole, and although it has already premiered on my blog via a link, here is the full kahuna:

so… what the voters have taken away from the barrage of negative tv ads is that hagan= a lying big spender and dole= an absent and ineffective old lady. are you ready to vote now?

if your still a little unsure/dissatisfied/aggravated/ect., you’re not alone: certain studies have shown that negative tv ads decrease turnout and lead to increased rates of cynicism. yeah, that makes sense.

BUT YOU STILL SHOULD VOTE—-THIS IS THE NUMBER ONE MOST IMPORTANT SENATE RACE THIS CYCLE!

the big issues.

and the big issue is…….

the economy!!!!!!!!! who saw that coming?

64% of north carolinans polled the economy as the number one most important issue.

what does this mean in light of the current financial crisis?

a bad economy typically hurts the party in power. in north carolina, this has given a boost to barack obama (d) in the presidential race there, but it has had an even bigger effect on the senate race.

kay has jumped in the polls to 45.8. elizabeth is behind with a 40.9. this is up from a 1 point lead early in september. while correlation does always equal causation, in this case, the ties are strong.

the financial bailout will not immediately fix the recession situation for the majority of the american electorate. these things take time, okay? so this trend of having the challenger in the lead could continue until election day. election projection estimates that kay will take the election, but by a less than 5% margin.

this trend is relevant across the states. the current capitol hill makeup gives the democrats 49 seats, the republicans 49 seats, and the independents 2 seats. in the coming election, this is likely to turn over to give the democrats 7 extra seats, which would give them a majority of 56 in the senate if the independent seats hold.

if this isn’t evidence of the importance of this senatorial election, then i don’t know what is. this is the majority at stake!

furthermore, you should never rely on projections. this is still a very tough seat for the democrats to take, but because of the importance of this seat for a democratic majority of the senate, it is unlikely (or rather, it would be silly) that either party will back off in the campaign.

polls~polls~coles!

the polls are still sooo close, but, wait, where is christopher cole? why isn’t he in this pollster poll? why hasn’t he had a premier in my blog? (actually, if you look carefully, he is there on the rollover screen, with a 6.3%)

so lets discuss christopher quickly, because he’s totally overshadowed and rolled-over and therefore not too important in the world of politics. unless he takes key votes away from one of the candidates, which, as we all know can make or break an election.

christopher (is it okay if i call you chris?) is a libertarian (the party of principle!).

his emphasis is to: end the war in iraq, abolish the personal income tax, establish a free market healthcare reform, and respond to illegal immigration in a ‘radically anti-bueracratic’ manner.

YES! YOU GO CHRIS! i fully believe in him, and, if this is what the voters decide they want, he can probably accomplish all of this singlehandedly.

however, since we as voters would rather get bogged down with realism, let’s discuss how much chris will make a difference this election cycle. because even though he’s not on display in pollster, Survey USA gave chris a 7% in polls recorded on the 12th of august. i would predict this percentage to reach between 0 and 2% by election day. this race is too important to throw away a vote on a 3rd party candidate.

From the public policy polling group, chris still held 6% two weeks later, with 10% of the north carolina electorate undecided. the margin between dole and hagan is also somewhat larger than the Survey USA in this poll, with 38% for elizabeth dole and 46% for kay hagan.

on fivethirtyeight, the three most credible polling stations have kay outranking elizabeth by +8 (public polling place, see above), +2, and +3. two more polls (with the same amount of credibility as poll site #3) put elizabeth ahead, with a +2 and a +8.

we will see, we will see. four(ish) more weeks!