Posted on 06/05/2012 1:53:06 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
America’s Democratic Party lost its enthusiasm for democracy a long time ago.
Today’s gubernatorial recall vote in Wisconsin a short time after the most recent general election is just another reminder of how far the party of Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson has strayed from its honorable roots. Founded as a reaction against the elitist ways of the we-know-what’s-best-for-you Federalists of the early Republic, the modern Democratic Party can’t stop telling Americans what to do.
Democrats are acutely mindful of Joseph Stalin’s aphorism that “The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.”
Democrats did everything but orchestrate a coup d’etat in 2000 after Democratic presidential ticket Al Gore and Joe Lieberman won the (unimportant) popular vote but narrowly lost the (all-important) Electoral College vote to Republicans George W. Bush and Dick Cheney. While sales of “Sore Loserman 2000” tee-shirts surged, the nation held its breath for five weeks after Election Day as Democrat thugs and their allies in local governments across Florida tried to overturn the will of the people. During the selective recount the self-described champions of equality argued with a straight face that votes from some counties in Florida had to be treated differently than votes from other counties.
The relentless barrage of partisan propaganda continued until the process was mercifully shut down on equal protection grounds by a 7 to 2 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Although Democrats continue to gripe about the Bush v. Gore decision to the present day (a belief in the decision’s wrongheadedness is virtually a required article of faith on the Left) they don’t allow bitterness to detract from their democracy-denying ways.
In the Democratic stronghold of California, the land of the ballot initiative, Democrats have worked tirelessly to undermine laws approved by electoral majorities in plebiscites when they contradict leftist dogma. Here follow just three examples. Long after the official votes took place Democrats took aim in courts, the state legislature, and municipal councils at proposition number 13 (1978, limits property taxes), number 209 (1996, state must be color-blind) and number 8 (2008, protects traditional marriage) all of which became law after being approved by the people of California.
Democrats love to count perhaps even more than a familiar “Sesame Street” character known for his fangs, monocle, and cape. If they don’t like the results, Democrats keep counting the votes over and over again until they get the result they want. They tally, calculate, and enumerate their way to victory whenever their candidate is within what columnist John Fund calls the “margin of ACORN.” (See U.S. Sen. Al Franken, Washington Gov. Christine Gregoire, to name just two recent examples.) With the help of radical financier George Soros they even created the Secretary of State Project to install state officers who would help rig elections for Democrats.
Democrats want the votes of everyone to count, from U.S. citizens to illegal aliens and lawfully disenfranchised felons. Corrupt Democratic election officials routinely expand the electorate, accepting votes from the under-aged and the dead. That’s why they collectively freak out when the topic of voter photo ID comes up, advancing the most ridiculous arguments against ID requirements. The poor, minorities, and the old are too dumb and frail to acquire voter ID – even though getting by without it is impossible in modern society.
The Democratic Party of today does not believe in democracy in the way the term is used in America. If Democrats win, it’s a fine example of democracy in action. If they lose, they claim that democracy has been undermined and usually some cabal of corporate villains in a smoke-filled backroom is to blame for the injustice. Democracy isn’t a fixed concept in the minds of Democrats: it’s whatever they say it is.
In Wisconsin, union goons and paid protesters from Obama-backed groups such as Organizing for America have been periodically wreaking havoc over the past year and a half. They subscribe wholeheartedly to the subjective radical left-wing conception of democracy.
They don’t care that Americans were disgusted last year by the absconding Wisconsin state senators (Democrats) who fled in order to deprive the duly elected Republican majority of the quorum needed for passing legislation. The backlash against this anti-democratic stunt and against the government unions’ lavish compensation packages continues to build. Wisconsinites want their elected officials to balance the books, but the spendthrift unions won’t allow that to happen.
And so leading up to today’s vote, which is the second-most important election in America this year, the labor movement has been drowning Wisconsin in an ocean of out-of-state money aimed at getting Republican Scott Walker replaced by Tom Barrett. Barrett, now the Democratic mayor of Milwaukee, is a longtime ally of government unions and radical groups like ACORN.
In a repudiation of the previous (Democratic) administration’s spendthrift ways, Walker was elected governor in 2010 on an extensively publicized, popular austerity platform. To help Walker rescue the state from a sea of red ink, voters made sure Republicans received clear majorities in both chambers of the deep blue state’s legislature.
Last year Gov. Walker enforced his electoral mandate after asking state lawmakers to vote on his proposals, which included curbing the power of government employee unions and making their members contribute a little more to their health plans.
In the end Walker got most of what he wanted even though Democratic lawmakers went into hiding and union militants tried to shut down the state capitol and prevent the legislature from conducting business. These are tactics one might expect to see from the Italian squadristi or German Sturmabteilung, both of which used physical coercion and intimidation to halt the democratic process.
In the weeks leading up to the recall vote today, Democrats and their thug allies have been trying to get in the faces of their opponents, including Gov. Walker himself.
As Commentary reports, “Walker revealed that his family has been subjected to various forms of intimidation tactics during the past year with his children and elderly parents being harassed at a supermarket. His children were also targeted on Facebook.”
It is all so nasty and unnecessary.
In a rare moment of candor Time magazine’s Joe Klein, usually a reliable member of the leftist echo chamber, pointed an accusing finger at his own side last year during the legislative showdown over Walker’s reforms:
Revolutions are everywhere–in the Middle East, in the middle west. But there is a difference: in the Middle East, the protesters are marching for democracy; in the Midwest, they’re protesting against it. I mean, isn’t it, well, a bit ironic that the protesters in Madison, blocking the state senate chamber, are chanting “Freedom, Democracy, Union” while trying to prevent a vote? Isn’t it ironic that the Democratic Senators have fled the democratic process? Isn’t it interesting that some of those who–rightly–protest the assorted Republican efforts to stymie majority rule in the U.S. Senate are celebrating the Democratic efforts to stymie the same in the Wisconsin Senate?
But the Left can’t accept the results of the 2010 election in Wisconsin and so voters in America’s Dairyland will head to the polls today for the second time in 19 months.
Will Democrats and their confederates riot in the streets if Walker beats back the recall?
We’ll see.
I will say this...there is such negativity now around the state, and even the small towns in the state....that bad blood will exist for decades to come. Brother versus sister, neighbor versus neighbor, husband versus wife. And it may eventually arrive to all forty-nine other states. It’s 1859, all over again.
In my UAW shop I have begun to ask some of the democrats if this policy sounds good: every rich person should pay as much tax as they can afford, the poor and middle class should receive that which they need from the government. All say that is a great idea. Karl Marx has many useful idiots in this nation.
Why bother having elections if you can just say “we dont like you so we’ll have a do over” You would never get anything done if all states behaved like this.
Thats what voting them out at the end of their term is about.
“It’s 1859, all over again.”
More like 1860, but close enough. But I agree with you: Some bad times are on the way for the United States, and I doubt it will resolve peacefully; the polarization is so thick one can cut it with a knife.
“Karl Marx has many useful idiots in this nation.”
Yup. Marx is alive in well in the Democrat Party and its camp followers.
A Soros owned company will count the November votes that will be done on machines provided by a Pelosi. The count will be done in Spain. There will be no record of the votes other than the official final count.
Wisconsin is probably in for years of this sort of thing. If the Democrats don’t manage to invent enough votes to overcome the majority they will do the recall again. And again. And then there will be felony charges from the radical Democrat Wisconsin AG. If they can’t turn him out they can tie him up so he cant accomplish anything. Wisconsin is set to be a model for other states.
Lenin is in his sealed car and on his way to the Finland Station.
Spot on.
Well the voting machine part is interesting. I thought the Stalin quote needed updating given Holder's fight against voter ID for the dead, ineligible and the illegal, but obviously this is a full frontal assault.
I know which side will win... the side that embraces small government, Liberty and Freedom.
LLS
Yes... another reason that romeny probably can’t win... you can’t drag a marxist over the finish line if more powerful marxists keep moving that finish line to suit their needs.
LLS
The emotion is right but our AG is a do-not-very-much Republican.
There is no way a petition totaling 25% of those who voted in a previous election should lead to an actual new election. It should take at least 51% of THOSE WHO ACTUALLY VOTED.
I don’t really favor recalls except for criminality or demonstrated gross incompetence.
I would then settle for a 2 step process:
1. 25% petition to get a recall issue on a ballot. If that wins by 50%+, THEN the process goes forward to an actual election.
2. A recall election in which an opposition candidate must win with at least the voting percentage earned by the current office holder in the election in question.
“Why bother having elections if you can just say “we dont like you so we’ll have a do over” You would never get anything done if all states behaved like this.”
That is EXACTLY the point.
Expect to see the recall process hijacked for more of this nonsense in the future - MUCH more.
The idea is to force Republicans and conservatives to keep fighting just to hold the seats to which they’re elected, and also to put a damper on reforms.
I wouldn’t be surprised to see yet another attempt to get Walker recalled AGAIN, after the requisite time limits have expired...
After Walker wins, and hopefully all four Senate seats stay Republican, modify the law so that recalls can only be for malfeasance or criminal actions.
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