Teaboarding the American electorate

The tea partiers are only the end users, writes Zach Carter.

Koch Industries - annual revenue of $100 billion - have spent millions through their tea party 'grass roots' front groups, FreedomWorks and Americans for Prosperity, providing :

"logistical organizing for Glenn Beck’s 9/12 rally, held over 300 rallies against health care reform and hosted “voter education” workshops pushing the glories of deregulation."

And then there's the media connection :

"They even have an unofficial partnership with Fox News, hosting conservative Fox personalities at their rallies, which are, in turn, promoted by Fox programming. Glenn Beck is even featured in advertisements and fundraising pitches for FreedomWorks."

Linda McQuaig :

"Meanwhile, living in splendour befitting kings, the Koch brothers quietly supervise an incoherently angry army that promises to gut what’s left of benefits for the poor while adding to the bonanza of billionaires."

"Today is the first election in American history in which corporations have been allowed to spend their own money to buy political favours."

How'd that work out?
.

Pie-blogging

From Fafblog, via Mandos at BnR :

"Look, up in the sky! Just there over the mountains and under the clouds and behind the pulleys and levers they use to raise and lower the sun there's the shine of a plate and a flaky brown crust and the sweet smell of fresh fruit filling and could it be... could it be pie?"

Cont....

Congratulations, America

You lined up at 5am and waited up to 11 hours in the rain to vote - some of you on walkers, some with kids in tow - but you did it.

Popular vote with 95% of polls reported:

Obama - 52.3%
McCain - 46.4%

Is it over yet?

What PSA said. *applause*

but also what my friend Chris answered in the comments there :

Okay look, this guy is running for PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES.
It's not a job that outsiders ever win. It's not a job he will be allowed to do as a radical left wing organizer. America is inherently conservative, and the political establishment is just that: established. Pretty firmly.

Having said all that, Obama's surge is doing three things worth noting.
One, he is energizing non-white voters who are blinking their eyes in disbelief that a black man will become President on January 20th.
Two, he is galvanizing world opinion positively towards the United States which helps a great deal to make for a more peaceful world.
And three, and perhaps most important, take a look at the progressive political action going on in the US. The Presidential race is just one thing. At the local level there are scores of incredibly radical people about to be elected, and lots of ultra right wing agendas are suffering in the referendum campaigns. Gay marriage will be legalized in Conneticut and Proposition 8 in Calaifornia seems to be going down.

Radical politics will never have a place at the top of the American political food chain, but it lives at the local level and this year it is coming on. In that sense the President doesn't matter, but this year THIS President matters at that level.

With thanks to both of you.