They get buyer’s remorse but keep on buying it
The AZ Democratic Party is sending out an email crowing about Sen. Jeff Flake’s rock bottom approval ratings after his shameful and two-faced vote to obstruct the Manchin-Toomey gun background checks bill. Senator Jeff Flake is the poster boy for a “Lemon Law” in American Politics! In just four short months, the venerable Mr. Flake [...]
End Clean Elections and increase campaign finance limits, get better funded wingnuts
The preferred narrative of the pundit/consultant/business establishment types in Arizona about the root of our current political woes, as I’ve described here numerous times, goes like this: Arizona was long a bastion of bipartisan collegiality and cooperation until just a few years ago, when Clean Elections and hyper-partisan primaries ushered into office a bunch of [...]
Moderate Republican Arizona State Senators voting ever so moderately
I keep being told there are some Republicans in the Arizona legislature who are so gosh darn nice and reasonable and moderate deep down inside. They really, honesty, truly want to do well by the people of Arizona! But they are forced – forced! – to vote badly by the evil menace of Grover Norquist [...]
Researchers have a possible explanation for why GOP lawmakers are so right wing
Dylan Matthews of the Washington Post yesterday had a fascinating little piece about recent research showing a disparity between the actual positions of the voting public vs. what state legislators believe those positions are, leading to a “systemic bias against liberal policies at the state level”. Broockman and Skovron find that all legislators consistently believe [...]
Pick a Side Part 2: VAWA
In furtherance of my project to banish the egregious bogosity that is the “both sides do it” false equivalence to the bowels of hell where it belongs: Last Thursday the House of Representatives finally reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act, or VAWA as it’s commonly known. VAWA, which expanded protections to abuse victims and set [...]
Sometimes there are sides and you gotta pick which one you’re on
In case you missed it, the Supreme Court heard arguments on Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act today. That section requires certain jurisdictions to have changes to their election laws pre-cleared by the US Department of Justice, on account of how said jurisdictions have demonstrated a history of passing laws that deny certain citizens [...]
Extremism is just another word for…losing the debate
So I saw from my Twitter feed that it was an eventful afternoon at the Arizona State Capitol the other day. Lots of bills debated and observers of the Senate Government and Environment Committee were treated a debate over whether sustainability is a communist UN plot or not courtesy of, natch, the Republicans on the [...]
