It’s unfortunate I’ve been reduced to having to explain for the umpteenth time to FReepers who have been noticeably absent from endless discussions on the political realities of a given state. I don’t know where you’ve been during all this, but since we must go over this again, let’s take it from the top:
Point #1: Handing the job to Alexi.
First of all, we KNOW Alexi is a crook. We know he will likely be indicted and convicted before long. If he goes to the Senate, his affiliations will cause harm to the Democrats. A Governor Brady will appoint someone who is NOT a member of the Combine. Mark Kirk, his like-minded liberal “opponent” in the November run-off (please, calling it a general is an insult) is ALSO a member of that SAME political machine. He is another damnable Combiner. The November election is a Combiner run-off. If we’re going to have a liberal, better it be the one who is HONEST about being a Democrat. We don’t need another Chafee, Specter or Judas Jim Jeffords. So, yes, electing Kirk would be WORSE than sending Alexi to DC. Alexi is a crook, Kirk is trying to pretend he isn’t, even though he is chin-deep in Combiner chicanery. Why rubber stamp the Combine’s phony, fixed election ? We have Eric Wallace on the ballot who gives the PEOPLE the choice of someone who isn’t a filthy Combiner liberal.
#2 Kirk represents one of the “most liberal districts” in IL.
Untrue. The 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 7th, 9th, 12th and 17th districts are more liberal. It is right in the middle, it is not a liberal district.
#3 Kirk has “to vote RINO or he’d be thrown out of office.”
Also untrue. This is a media and party establishment/Combiner falsehood. Kirk doesn’t vote liberal to stay in office, he votes liberal because he WANTS to vote liberal. He enjoys sticking it to Conservatives, he enjoys being on the wrong side, and he ENJOYS being a member of the Combine with all its perks and benefits. This district could elect a Conservative. Take a look at the heavily Republican 8th district. It elects Melissa Bean, a Democrat. By your reasoning, she MUST vote like a DINO, a Conservative, to hold it. She doesn’t. She votes like a liberal Democrat. You never hear warnings from the media to liberal Democrats like her that she must vote Conservative or risk losing her seat, because that warning is a one-way street made exclusively to Republicans to cajole them into voting the way they want them to.
So with just your one post, you’ve already repeated the myths and media talking points like a pro. After 8+ years on Free Republic, if you had participated in our umpteen discussion threads, many of which occur on a daily basis, and have throughout this cycle, you’d have been disavowed of those claims.
I won’t vote for Kirk period. I’ve been castigated before for that remark and I don’t give a rat’s ass. I do not vote for liberals and Kirk is as liberal as they come.
Here are some other pro-Kirk talking points that I frequently see posted online. Many of them are even started by the Kirk campaign itself and then picked by gullible conservatives and repeated in GOP circles. Let's set the record straight here:
FACT: This “connection” was started by Kirk himself to cash in on a Republican winning in Mass. In reality, the ONLY thing Kirk and Brown have in common is they both run as “moderate Republicans” and they've both military vets. But Kirk has far more in common with Martha Coakley than he does with Scott Brown. Let's compare their records. Both are running statewide in Obama states and represented local districts that voted for Obama. Brown has an A rating from the NRA, Kirk has an F. Brown votes against NARAL 50% of the time and they strongly opposed his candidacy, Kirk was the ONLY Republican who voted with NARAL 100% of the time in 2008 and 2006, they actually endorsed him over a liberal Democrat. Brown opposes ending the Defense of Marriage Act and voted in favor of a state amendment that declared marriage between one man one woman, Kirk says he's against gay marriage but voted AGAINST legislation protecting traditional marriage. Brown supported the interests of the Citizens for Limited Taxation and Government 93% in 2007-2008, Kirk voted with Taxpayers for Common Sense only 33% of the time and voted with Citizens for Tax Justice a mere 17% of the time. And so on. Kirk is endorsed by many of the same liberal special interest groups and media elites that were supporting Coakley, NOT Brown. The bottom is that Brown is a right-of-center politician running in the most Democrat state in the nation, whereas Kirk is a left-of-center politician running in a state with a lot more Republicans. Kirk's election would be a victory for liberalism, not liberty.
FACT: The whole “military expert” thing also originated by Kirk and was spread by the mainstream media, who duly repeats Kirk campaign talking points verbatim. Yes, Kirk's military service is “honorable” but the idea he's a genius on military affairs was proven wrong in 2007 when Kirk loudly OPPOSED the Iraq Surge and lead a group of 11 “moderate” Republicans to the White House to tell Bush it was doomed to failure. Yes, Kirk ended up on the wrong side of history in THE most important turning point in the war on terror — and right after he had been re-elected by telling gullible Republicans how he strongly “supported the war on terror, unlike the Democrats”. Kirk has also flip-flopped on closing down Guantanamo Bay about 4 or 5 times now. First he said he was absolutely against it, then he voted YES on a homeland security bill that contained a provision authorizing the transferring of prisoners out of Guantanamo Bay, then he spoke against Obama moving them to an Illinois prison, and so on. It's hard to be an “expert” on millitary when you play politics with national security and base your position on whatever group you're pandering to on that particular day.
FACT: Kirk is yet another RINO who calls himself a “fiscal conservative” to deflect attention away from his horrible record on social issues. But his record on fiscal issues is nothing to write home about. Again, let's look at the facts. Kirk supported cap n’ trade, the largest tax increase in U.S. history. Kirk now claims that he opposes all congressional earmarks, but his record in office shows he earmarked at least $5 million, each, in his limousine liberal district for HUD, Head Start, local police departments, and commuter trains. Kirk voted to approve nearly $200 million for the Air Force to purchase three luxury aircraft for ferrying top government office and Members of Congress. Kirk voted YES on Democrat Charlie Rangel’s 90 percent bonus tax (H.R. 1586) Shall I go on? Needless to say, actual “fiscal conservative” watchdog groups say Kirk is mediocre at best. Yet another Fiscal Conservative In Name Only.
Myth #7 (closely related to Myth #2 & #3) Kirk's past record is because he represented a Chicago area district that gave Obama 61% of the vote. He will vote MUCH more conservatively when he represents “all of Illinois”
FACT: Illinois as a whole is actually MORE liberal than Kirk's district, not more conservative. Again, let's look at the facts. Yes, Kirk's district voted for Obama for President, which unfortunately was very common throughout America in Nov. 2008. Virginia voted for Obama too, that doesn't make them a “liberal state”. About half of the elected officials in Kirk's district are Republicans, and it is the wealthiest congressional district in Illinois. Kirk's district voted 60% Obama - 38% McCain, compared to Illinois statewide voting 61% Obama - 36% McCain. That's because Chicago votes OVERWHEMINGLY Democrat, and their votes are factored into the statewide totals but no portion of Kirk's district is in Chicago. So if the excuse is that Kirk “has to” be a socialist to win in his district, he would “have to” move leftward as a statewide official to “represent” the 3 million Chicagoans who blindly vote marxist (yes, they're not going to support Kirk regardless of how much he panders to them, but the same can be said of the minority of voters in Kirk's district who support partial birth abortion)
FACT: Simply untrue. I debunked this one a few months ago. There are lifelong, card-carrying, elected Democrat officials in Illinois who are pro-life, pro-gun, pro-traditional marriage, anti-illegal immigration, and anti-cap n’ trade. In fact, I located over a dozen such Democrats in the Illinois General Assembly when I researched the matter about a month ago. Kirk's “lifetime” ACU rating is 55%, but he has veered far leftward even since Pelosi took power in the House and voted “conservative” a pathetic 40% of the time last year. There are suburban and downstate Democrats from southern Illinois who earned “conservative” ratings of 60-70% in 2008, making them far more reliable on “our issues” than Kirk has ever been. In fact, Kirk is so liberal than one of the Democrat state Senators (Assistant Majority Leader Jeffrey M. Schoenberg) who shares a large chunk of Kirk's district got a 52% “conservative” rating from the URF in 2007, compared to Kirk's 48%, and a 50% “conservative” rating to Kirk's 40% in 2008. So Kirk is not only to the left of virtually every Illinois Republican, he's more liberal than many prominent Illinois Democrats.
FACT: Kirk was all for ACORN until he entered the Republican primary for U.S. Senate and had to put on a dog-and-pony show telling GOP voters he was “leading the fight” against them. In fact, just months before he announced his candidacy for the Senate, Mark Kirk voted to approve a $140,000 earmark for ACORN’s New York office. Kirk's later faux “outrage” against ACORN’s involvement in the census was to get gullible Republicans to fill his campaign coffers for a Senate race and it was enormously successful at accomplishing that goal. Furthermore, if anyone thinks “only a Republican like Mark Kirk” would denounce ACORN, please note that every Democrat candidate in the primary for that Senate seat (except for Cherlyn Jackson, who base was the black community) also indicated they “support” severing all federal funding for ACORN. Liberals may be commies, but they're not stupid. They know associating with ACORN is toxic in the current political environment.
Myth #10 Kirk is running for OBAMA’s Senate Seat. A reliable conservative WILL NEVER WIN a U.S. Senate seat in a state like that.
FACT: Scott Brown said it best — that U.S. senate race is for the people's seat, not “Obama’s” seat. The seat is currently is being vacated by Roland Burris and it's been held by both Republicans and Democrats, and a variety of political ideologies — conservatives, moderates, liberal, etc. over the last few decades. (Everett Dirksen, Adlai Stevenson, Alan J. Dixon, Carol Moseley Braun, Peter Fitzgerald, etc.) Only five years ago, it was held by a conservative Republican, Peter Fitzgerald. Is he really that forgettable? It's ridiculous to say we will benefit long-term by electing a DIABLO to a Senate seat Obama briefly used for 143 days. It would be far more “devastating” to the left if we elect a conservative Republican Governor in “Obama’s home state”