Eric Scott Matthews

Joe Six-Pack sues

I know, my infrequent posts have been too political lately.  But politics is the subject du jour and I find it more absurd than anything else lately.

Today's is another Joe-related mini-post.  Remember Joe Six-Pack, well he is not made up either.  He's apparently a Crow Indian who actually worked for the Palin's in Alaska.  And he is suing her.  From theDailyBeast:

Joe Six-Pack, 50, Crow Indian, of Wasilla, Alaska. Has done light yard work at Palin residence in recent years, but otherwise no contact with Governor. His tribal council has filed suit against the Alaska Republican Committee and the Palin campaign, charging that his name was obviously passed on to the Palin organization by a Palin family member for political purposes and that said organization has since recklessly held Mr. Six-Pack up to ridicule and racial stereotyping.

haha.  Brilliant.  First Joe the (unlicensed) plumber is revealed to be a biased not-so-secret republican (but probably unregistered to vote) and the kind of guy who will compare the an African American politician to "Sammy Davis, Jr."  and now this.  haha.  Well we do live in a litigious society after all.

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Joe the Plumber

We found him!

http://www.joetheplumber.com/

The non-fight over gays

In the debates last night I liked how the Biden and Palin agreed with each other on several points. It makes for a boring fight, and reminded me of the fight I got into in Jr high with a friend in which he stopped the "fight" every few seconds to make up some new rule "no hitting the face", "no tripping", "no arguing about gay marriage".  But I think a lot of us are sick of all the fighting. We want some real bipartisanship not just the buzzwords. Save the fights for real issues that you disagree on.

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One thing they agreed on was gays and I think that will do some real damage to Palin McCain if it gets picked up in the press. Both Biden and Palin agreed that gays should have similar rights to straights when it comes to marriage, but we should not have the actual rgith to marry. It was bullshit from both of them. I think Biden (and Obama) don’t really care about the gay marriage issue (which is how most straight people should feel), and I think if it were less controversial they would both go for it.  Politically it is not a fight they can win at the moment.

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Palin, on the other hand, is the current champion of the social conservatives and she just told the nation she agrees with the Democrat's party line that gays should have companionship rights (though not full marriage).  Sure I cringed when she said we should be "tolerated", but I also was thrilled to hear her say something that might plant a seed of doubt for all the haters who love her.  Us gays, were used to the compromise.  Most of us understand that this is a slow process.  But those conservatives... well they see thier wall of special rights wearing away and any compromise is a "downward spiral" towards bestiatlity or something like that. We'll see if this becomes an issue with all the nervous social conservatives who are only on-board with McCain because he picked her.

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Political Anecdote: The Cell Phone and Polls

I don’t want to fall into the pundit trap—and everyone seems to be a pundit this year— but I really do think the polls are wrong because of primary cell phone use. And they are getting worse.

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It has been reported before how the lack of cell phone polling doesn’t catch many young voters because polls rely almost entirely on land line phones.  But I don’t think the very scale of this is realized by many of the pundits in Washington-land. It isn’t just the college kids who don’t have landline phones anymore but a lot of us, mostly city dwellers, but a growing number of people.

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I have been voting for 16 years, and I have a hard time thinking of myself as a kid.  I have also never been called for a political poll. It's because I don’t have a land line phone.

Most of the people I know don’t actually seem to have a land line either. If they do, it is for emergency outgoing calls only. Or it’s for their security system. Or so they can connect to the internet. I have watched my 37 year old best friend pick up a ringing phone and slam it right back down simply because no one ever calls his land line (I don’t even have the number). This isn’t just a few college kids we are talking about her.  

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Oh and most of us are voting the same way.

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Sure this might not effect the Electoral College, which is actually skewed very heavily towards rural areas and battleground states (a farmer in Ohio’s vote is worth a lot more than mine since my state always votes in one direction), but it probably will. And what happens McCain wins the Electoral College but Obama wins the popular vote not by a little bit, but by a wide majority?

 

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