Today we continue our Road to 270 series with the Beaver State, Oregon.
CASCADING FROM DESERT TO SEA, Oregon is simultaneously extremely liberal and extremely conservative, with a fair number of independents thrown in the mix for good measure. As much as any state, its overall demographic data can be a little misleading. For example, "gun ownership rate." The gun ownership disparity between liberal Portland and conservative eastern Oregon is wide. Oregon also boasts the smartest and best voting process, as all ballots are mail-in. As a result, Oregon has one of the best voter turnout rates in the country, minus the long lines.
Key Demographics
Note: Factors colored in red can generally be thought to help McCain. Factors in blue can generally be thought to help Obama. Factors in purple have ambiguous effects. Except where otherwise apparent, the numbers next to each variable represent the proportion out of each 100 residents in each state who fall into that category. Fundraising numbers reflect dollars raised in the 2008 campaign cycle per eligible voter in each state. Figures for seniors and youth voters are proportions of all residents aged 18+, rather than all residents of any age. The figure for education reflects the average number of years of completed schooling for all adults aged 25+. The figure for same-sex households reflects the number of same-sex partner households as a proportion of all households in the state. The liberal-conservative index is scaled from 0 (conservative) to 100 (liberal), based on a Likert score of voter self-identification in 2004 exit polls. The turnout rates reflect eligible voters only. Unemployment rates are current as of June 2008.
What McCain Has Going For Him
John McCain will run strong in the eastern 2/3 of the state, what is essentially the 2d congressional district. A high percentage of military vets live in Oregon, and Republicans actually outnumbered Democrats in terms of self-identification in 2004. The state doesn't have a high number of minority voters, but given the looming influence of Portland with its larger population base, Oregon scores out in much of our demographic data as not particularly hopeful for John McCain. The areas that are Republican are really Republican, white evangelical, "American" ancestry, gun-owning areas that probably rabidly oppose Barack Obama. It truly is the Obama v. Nobama election in Oregon.
What Obama Has Going For Him
Same-sex households and Starbucks:Walmart both rank 3d nationally, giving a pretty strong indication of Democratic voting, as well as underscoring that the liberal bastions of Oregon are pretty strongly liberal. Obama enjoys one of his higher fundraising-per-capita locales, as well as a realtively (top-third) education rates. Unemployment is in the top third, making the economic malaise a bit more pronounced in Oregon, and the state went for both Gore and Kerry pretty handily. Barack Obama will win the state of Oregon.
What To Watch For
Oregon's mail-in system allows for the field operations to see well in advance where the turnout seems strongest and where it needs a boost. As a result, if any of the candidates or their running mates show up with a surprise visit in Oregon in the final two weeks, you can probably infer that the internal numbers are telling the campaigns that a big jolt is needed in an underperforming area.
The other thing you might infer, particularly from Barack Obama's campaign, is whether he has a day to boost Jeff Merkley's Senate chances. That's the big race in Orgeon this year, as incumbent Gordon Smith runs away from John McCain and toward Barack Obama, as he has been doing all year. Obama stumping for Merkley might be interpreted as an indication that Obama thinks he's already going to win big nationally, now he wants both as many Democratic Senators as he can get and a Senator who owes him credit for helping him get over the hump by boosting turnout.
Oregon also gives me an opportunity to re-dsiplay for you one of my favorite charts Nate's done this year, one that many of our visitors haven't had a chance to see. It's fascinating, and you can see why the Mountain West is right on the cusp of many Democratic flips (NM, CO, NV).
10.14.2008
Road to 270: Oregon
@ 1:30 PM
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384 comments
First!
I was born in Oregon and I'm happy to see it going blue this year again. It's a great state.
Who Is Sarah Palin???!!!
What's your demographic source? I grew up on the east side of Portland and knew a ton of Mormons. I have an awfully hard time believing Oregon has the second-fewest Mormons in the country...
I find it fun that, according to that final chart, Oregon has both the most liberal AND most conservative voters. Take that, Massachussetts/Arkansas! We beat you both
I'm also amazed by the Mormon stat. I've known a good number of Mormons from Oregon, and while there's no exit poll data, I'm pretty confident to say they're >0.1%. Maybe it's "no data"?
Inviting lots of controversy with that "best system" remark! Some of us like our archaic polling places, thank you.
Benjamin Johnstone-Anderson
More liberal than conservative.
Oh, and I'm going to agree with the Mormon comments. There are tons there. A quick google search backs this up. Looks like we're in the top 10.
Eighth!
Mormon data obviously an oops. There are several large Mormon temples just in the Portland area.
SBUX/WMT ratio is high because we have fewer Wal-Marts than most -- in part because of our terrific, Tom McCall-era land use laws that keep sprawl contained (to some extent) and in part because of our perfectly good local multitudinous one-stop-shopping stores, Fred Meyer (now owned by Kroger though).
Okay, I give. What's the chart mean? What do the numbers on the axes represent? Is each point taken from an exit-survey at the polls 4 years ago, or is it from today?
What's it all mean?
I have a question for Nate... do you have sufficient data from 2004 to run your projections on Bush v. Kerry as they stood on this day four years ago?
That'd be in interesting metric to provide.
Gordon Smith is Mormon. I find it hard to believe he's the only one in the whole state.
Here's one vote for doing GA soon. For the senate, it is key - I'd like to see the demographics. Also, could the states on the left get a link to their respective entries from this series?
Also not to knock everyone else's system, but vote by mail is hugely popular and has increased turnout to something like 85% in presidential elections.
Personally I love it -- especially great in 2004 when we got our ballots in the mail, filled them right out and threw them right back in the mail, then wrote WE VOTED! on a pumpkin with a huge Sharpie to ward off the canvassers. We were getting 1-2 canvassers a day up until that point.
Of course now it's at the point where the parties know whether or not you have voted within, I think, 24 hours. Interestingly, the Hillary campaign did not seem to know this, as we were getting robocalls from Bill for days after we had voted.
Sean or Nate,
Just wondering if percent Asian was ever tested as a variable and how it would affect the model? I believe Oregon has a pretty large Asian population.
Per wikipedia, as of 2005 LDS membership was about 3% of state.
My elderly grandmother lives in Eastern Oregon, in Elgin, where I grew up. She owns a BB gun to shoot stray cats trying to eat her birds.
She is voting for Obama. Can you incorprate that into your model somehow?
I'm wondering about arab-american & muslim voters. Do they normally vote Dem or Republican and by what %? How many of them are there? Are they as turned off by the McCain campaign as I imagine they would be?
I live in Bend, and we are right at the crossroads of the Liberal West/Conservative East of Oregon. Lots of more liberal California yuppies, and lots of more conservative retirees have moved into the area over the past five years, making this a distinctly swing city, but the local Democratic party is better organized than ever, and there is a big push to unseat our Republican state house representative. Obama won in the primary here by 20 points, and Dem registrations have slightly edged over the Republicans lately, so there are decent odds that Deschutes County will go to him come the 4th, and would likely be the only county East of the Cascades to do so. As for Merkely/Smith, Jeff hasn't visited here yet, and Gordo is still pretty popular as a moderate republican, so will probably win here.
elchip,
I believe the graph shows how conservative or liberal Bush's and Kerry's voters were on a 1-10 scale with 1 being most liberal and 10 being most conservative. For example, in Oregon in 2004, Bush's voters scored a 2 and Kerry's voters scored about a 7.2. Thus, Bush voters in Oregon were much more conservative than Bush voters nationally, while Kerry voters were much more liberal than Kerry voters nationally--it's the most idealogically polarized state in the country based on this chart.
I agree. The asian population of Portland is sizable. How does that influence the vote?
Are you going to do WA state next? It's very similar to WA. The westside of the state (Seattle, Olympia, Tacoma, Everett, Bellingham, etc) are very liberal while the eastside of the state is conservative.
Link to suffolk poll..
http://suffolk.edu/31363.html
I'm wondering about arab-american & muslim voters. Do they normally vote Dem or Republican and by what %? How many of them are there? Are they as turned off by the McCain campaign as I imagine they would be?
This is just based on vague memory, but IIRC, Muslim voters were overwhelmingly supporting Obama (and Democrats in general). I wanna say something like 80-20. This is also a big shift from 2000 and before where Muslims were basically 50-50 voters.
But, there are not that many Muslim voters, something like 1-2%. And, the only state where there is a significant concentration in Michigan, which now seems to be off the swing state list. So, there doesn't seem to be much attention directed specifically at this demographic, at least overtly.
Upcoming LA Times/Bloomberg Poll Good News for Obama
Release @ 5 ET
I think Asian Americans are often excluded in these numbers because they're less homogenous than most ethnic groups. Not just in terms of place of origin, but in ideology too. It's kind of like how the Hispanic stats don't mean so much in Florida because the Cubans tend to swing differently than the rest - except even Asian American subgroups can't be counted on to go one way or another, except on a few specific issues.
We were in Pendleton over the weekend. Saw maybe a dozen bumper stickers in 3 days (unlike Portland where it's not unusual to see a dozen bumper stickers on one car). Two Obama stickers seen, but this was at the casino, so not necessarily locals. However no one keyed the cars or anything that we saw.
Either people are trying to keep from making waves, or something. I mean, Pendleton is Smith's home town. They have a big bell tower dedicated to Smith Frozen Foods.
OT: It seems to me people with "Coexist" bumper stickers are often bad drivers. No idea why.
SelenesMom,
I’ve heard about Oregon’s vote-by-mail system and it sounds very interesting to me. I’m a big believer in making voting easier and more attractive (I’m in favor of a national holiday for election days; national popular vote or some sort of proportional EV system, so non-swing states voters have greater incentive to vote, etc.). So the vote-by-mail system seems like a good idea. But I’m sure the concerns of missing votes was discussed when Oregon was switching over, right? It seems fairly easy to make some votes go missing if one were so inclined as well as the post-office’s normal error rate in transmitting mail. I take it these were determined to be less than standard voting error rates? Stolen votes from the mail less than voter purges, missing ballot boxes, etc?
RCP is still trying to figure out how to deal with Gallup results
today maybe a better idea; they are listing BOTH of the LV results separately rather than a combined averaging
Gallup Tracking (Traditional)* 10/11 - 10/13 2140 LV 51 45 Obama +6
Gallup Tracking (Expanded)* 10/11 - 10/13 2289 LV 53 43 Obama +
-------------------------------------
I can buy that... even though I agree more with Nate's rationalization to only post LVII
BUT once again RCP has managed to find room in their poll of polls for the new IDB-TIPP tracker as well as Zogby's while ignoring R2000
and they listed the DCorps results from the 12th - but dropped it down below the much older FAUX poll... far enough down the list that the #'s drop off from the polls in the 'averaging sample' [shaded in gray]
- only the top 12 polls are currently included for averaging @ RCP with DCorps at #13...
hhhmmm
Nicholas,
I don't know the details on how the looked at those issues but I will point out you don't have to mail the ballot - if you prefer, you can go drop it off by hand.
I'm in San Francisco but I visit Portland fairly regularly to see friends. I'm always shocked at how few people of color I see in Portland. It's depressing that there isn't more diversity there.
>> It seems to me people with "Coexist" bumper stickers are often bad drivers. No idea why.>>
Because "Coexist" is code for "Let's be polite to each other and agree to do it my way." People who promote the slogan (as opposed to living the underlying idea) drive like that, too -- everyone should be nice and polite and accommodate them, and they'll be nice and polite and accommodate themselves.
Oregonian here - I can attest to the fact that we have pockets of extreme conservatism. A lot of the original industry up here was lumber; when that collapsed, it plunged tons of areas toward the poverty line. When Obama said that poor people in small towns cling to guns and religion, he might as well have been talking about my hometown. We're only about 45 minutes outside of Portland, the "cesspool of libbies," but we have VERY conservatives folks living here. I would hesitate to even call them conservative; these guys are just plain crazy. My cook (I work in a pub) turned to me the other night and said with complete seriousness: "Have you read Revelations? I believe Obama is the Anti-Christ."
Ooooooooookay then.
It seems fairly easy to make some votes go missing if one were so inclined as well as the post-office’s normal error rate in transmitting mail.
There are a couple of things in place to prevent this sort of thing: 1) If your ballot doesn't come when it should, you can go to the county clerk's office and get a replacement, and they will invalidate the missing one.
2) You don't have to mail your ballot back. The state provides drop boxes nearly everywhere, so you can simply drop your ballot off in a secure box.
3) You can call the county clerk to verify they received your ballot, if they haven't, you can proceed to item one and file a replacement ballot, the missing one invalidated.
Also, to be clear, it isn't the ballot itself that gets invalidated, but rather, the identity envelope that the ballot gets sent & returned in. The ballot itself has no identifying information, and get sealed into a "privacy" envelope that doesn't get opened until election day when the ballots are counted.
The introduction of a postal voting option in the UK also introduced the first voter fraud case in generations. But the USA has voter fraud issues whatever happens, so I guess it's less of an issue there.
How can you know that the postal ballots are returned by the people whose names are on them? Can you really eliminate thefts from mailboxes, or one coercive family member filling them in for the whole household?
Very nice chart: Idaho's positioning seems exceedingly strange, I might add.
I have to agree about the Mormon comments, though. I grew up with a fair number of them (the mayor of my hometown was one for a while) and I know there's a big church downtown.
Correction: Gore did not win Oregon easily--in fact it was not called for Oregon for a couple of days, a fact lost in the midst of the mess in Florida.
I hate to complain, love this site, but you typically don't do a good job of explaining what a chart means. (e.g. what are the numbers here?) I know you have some explanations buried in the FAQ, but it would be nice if there were a link on the charts that went to a specific description. The visuals and the analysis are great, but finding a description is tough.
Kevin--You have it backwards, Gore was the one who barely won 47-46; Kerry won 52-48.
Desidirius,
I've lived in Oregon my whole life, mostly in Eugene, but I've lived in Portland too, and have family there.
Yes, there is a small but noticable mormon population mostly in Portland, including members of my family. The fact that their major temple is right on I-5 (and bathed 24/7 is floodlights) might make their presence over-stated.
Religion in general is not strong in Oregon. Church attendance is very very low. Religionists like to pretend that most Oregonians "believe in God" because they will say they think there is "something... larger" but when you try to pin them down, you discover two typical aspects of that: they don't claim to know what it would be that is "larger," and they are pretty sure it's not what any of the major religions claim.
Also I can say, the mormons in my family that lived in Portland lived in SE. So you were even in the right part of town.
Also there is a lot of tolerance toward differing religious views here, so members of minority religions often move here, and make a basic logical error. Having been discouraged from pushing their views in other places, they misinterpret the change of location as an ascendance of their beliefs, and become more fervent. Then they run around telling us how so many people are coming to their views and how great it is, blah blah. They do this even while church attendance is going down, trusting always their own subjective experience over the demographic data.
Oh yeah, and the main post is spot-on. Very very liberal in western Oregon, particularly in all the population centers, and very conservative in the eastern regions. (Which lack any population centers. Bend, the only "city" in Eastern Oregon, is fairly liberal)
This leads to a similiar effect as with religion; people often feel that Oregon is almost totally liberal, or almost totally conservative.
One demographic data point not mentioned, Portland has been the major permenant destination of "young professionals" for a decade or more. I'm 32, and Portland is to us what San Francisco was to my dad's generation. The center of progressive, green, fiscally conservative "fair trade" young people. Which pretty much is the face of the modern Democratic Party. The depth of Love for Obama should not be understated. These are people who had minimally favorable feelings toward Clinton. People who are generally cynical. People who have volunteered in the community their whole lives, but never or rarely voted. And for the first time, they feel there is a candidate who Gets It, and is Real.
A big reason for lag in calling Oregon is that it is 100% mail in, and it is the postmark date, not receipt date, that determines acceptance.
Thus, what would be an insurmountable lead in same-day counting (1% usually is more than enough) in Oregon jumps up to 3-4%.
Chris Buckley's been forced to quit The National Review now, as a result of his Obama endorsement.
Buckley
Marx: "I'm in San Francisco but I visit Portland fairly regularly to see friends. I'm always shocked at how few people of color I see in Portland. It's depressing that there isn't more diversity there."
Well, there is a reason for that. Oregon passed a law in 1844 to try to get rid of all free blacks in Oregon, by canning them every year with 20 stripes and then being hired out at auction against their will as long as the employer promised to remove them from the state. They also refused to ratify the 15th amendment until 1959. While Portland today is uber-liberal, ORegon has a long history to deal with.
http://www.salemhistory.net/people/african_americans.htm
Ah, Oregon! My favirote state! Where, as the terrain changes from Green to Brown, the politics change from Blue to Red.
If Mercy and Sanity Prevail
It staggers me that folks can read the description that follows and not quail before this horror that has come to mark our soceity.
Some day all will bow before the power of the righteous and these polls will be like a leaf on the wind, blown away, forgotten and of no consequence.
Barack Obama has stated that his highest priority and first act will be to sign the "Freedom of Choice Act", a bill he co-sponsored, which bill would invalidate virtually all state and federal limitations on pre-birth murder, including this procedure (partial birth abortion):
"Dr. Haskell went in with forceps and grabbed the baby's legs and pulled them down into the birth canal. Then he delivered the baby's body and the arms; everything but the head. The doctor kept the head right inside the uterus. The baby's little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby's arms jerked out, like a startle reaction, like a flinch, like a baby does when he thinks he is going to fall....The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby's brains out. Now the baby went completely limp. He cut the umbilical cord and delivered the placenta. He threw the baby in a pan, along with the placenta and the instruments he had just used."
Imagine then that you were alive and voting in 1860 or 1864. For those of us committed to the cause of the innocents we see the truth for what it is and will never rationalize or excuse the murder of human life.
Human society is perfectible and inexorably heals itself. From the vantage point of a happier future, we will look back on this “modern” world and shudder just a little bit about the ignorance selfishness that would turn the womb, the cradle of life, into a slaughterhouse.
Some will be punished and some will be pardoned.
As you revel in the inevitability of an Obama victory, ask yourself: Have you done your part to rescue the babies?
1. Ditto the Mormon comment. Even Senator Gorden Smith is one!
2. Can someone explain the chart? I'm usually pretty up on these sort of things, but it's not clicking for me!
Thanks!
ummm...
Fuck you Peterkent.
How can you know that the postal ballots are returned by the people whose names are on them?
The primary way to verify the authenticity of the voter is by signature matching. As the ballots come in, the barcodes are scanned and the signature from the original registration is recalled. Once the sig is verified, the privacy envelope comes out and is moved along the process.
The whole process is very high-tech, I'm trying to find a report that the Sec. of State in Washington did on vote by mail systems, for a process-geek like me its very interesting.
How can you know that the postal ballots are returned by the people whose names are on them?
The nominal way this is done is with signature verification. The outer identifying envelope must be signed in order for the ballot enclosed to be valid. Computerized signature verification is then done to compare the signature with the one on the original registration card. Supposedly they manually review the ballots that the computerized system flags, and if there is a blatantly wrong signature, they contact the voter for confirmation. While this won't stop a dedicated forger of a few ballots, it can prevent bulk wholesale fraud. As for household pressure/lack of privacy, such a thing is a problem, but if one has such fears, one can have his/her ballot not mailed out and held at the clerks office to be filled out in privacy.
HAHAHAHAHHAH @ PeteKent. Goddd. He's a fucking crack-up. I'm glad to have him around because it always gives me a good laugh when he posts something.
Its nice to see my state on here. My 69 year old, Repulican all her life, mother decided months ago she was voting for Obama.
I'm confused by the claim that the graph shows CO, NM etc to be 'on the cusp' of a flip - wouldn't it show them to be more stratified? I would think the ones that would imply a possible change of heart would be the voters who were already moderate in their thinking, ie, the ones who are as far to the lower right as possible (where not much is happening) - I guess RI or ME or maybe ND.
But probably the flip states are based less on people changing their minds and more on who does or doesn't bother voting.
It is a sad to watch McCain and Palin lose their grip on reality as they head to almost certain defeat.
It is disturbing to watch Pete Kent sink further into the depths of psychosis. I hope he is not a neighbor of mine.
Pete kent,
Get a life and stop reading your viral emails sent by RepubbliCons even dumber than you. Btw, there is no such procedure as partail birth abortion, it's a political term created to incite the ignorant as yourself.
PeteKent - nobody gives a shit about abortion. shut the fuck up.
Ah, Oregon! My favirote state! Where, as the terrain changes from Green to Brown, the politics change from Blue to Red.
Washington is divided pretty much exactly the same way. There's an old joke (and maybe even a political movement, I'm not sure) about taking the East-West border between WA and OR and making it N-S along the Cascades. You'd have an uber-liberal state to the west, and a conservative state to the east. 80% of the population would probably think this is a good idea.
... Until us libs in the west realize we just gave away our vineyards, hop fields, and half the breweries. :)
After reading PeteKent's posts, I sure wish I had gone to school to become an abortionist.
Adrian, thanks for that piece of history. Even the state capitol is 80% white?!? That's shocking.
My friends up there cashed in all their San Francisco equity a couple of years ago and now of course are living like kings given the discrepancy in housing prices. But they can't stand the lack of diversity, and they didn't really check it out, just assumed because Portland was the largest city in OR that it would be diverse in its makeup. They are considering moving back to the Bay Area because of it.
Personally, I wouldn't be comfortable living in a place where 80% of the population was white. I just need to be around lots of diversity and different cultural groups. But I'm glad I discovered this about Portland, because I too considered cashing in my house and going up there. :(
Will no one stop for a moment and reflect on the children?
Are you all so craven?
(Repost follows)
If Mercy and Sanity Prevail
It staggers me that folks can read the description that follows and not quail before this horror that has come to mark our soceity.
Some day all will bow before the power of the righteous and these polls will be like a leaf on the wind, blown away, forgotten and of no consequence.
Barack Obama has stated that his highest priority and first act will be to sign the "Freedom of Choice Act", a bill he co-sponsored, which bill would invalidate virtually all state and federal limitations on pre-birth murder, including this procedure (partial birth abortion):
"Dr. Haskell went in with forceps and grabbed the baby's legs and pulled them down into the birth canal. Then he delivered the baby's body and the arms; everything but the head. The doctor kept the head right inside the uterus. The baby's little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby's arms jerked out, like a startle reaction, like a flinch, like a baby does when he thinks he is going to fall....The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby's brains out. Now the baby went completely limp. He cut the umbilical cord and delivered the placenta. He threw the baby in a pan, along with the placenta and the instruments he had just used."
Imagine then that you were alive and voting in 1860 or 1864. For those of us committed to the cause of the innocents we see the truth for what it is and will never rationalize or excuse the murder of human life.
Human society is perfectible and inexorably heals itself. From the vantage point of a happier future, we will look back on this “modern” world and shudder just a little bit about the ignorance selfishness that would turn the womb, the cradle of life, into a slaughterhouse.
Some will be punished and some will be pardoned.
As you revel in the inevitability of an Obama victory, ask yourself: Have you done your part to rescue the babies?
The vote-by-mail system really is fantastic. Voters get a detailed pamphlet in the mail about a month before your ballot arrives with "pro" and "con" arguments for ballot measures, descriptions of ballot measures, statements from candidates, etc. I wasn't paying attention and accidentally marked my vote for Clinton in the primaries and was able to get a new ballot, vote for the right person, and submit it with no problem. None of this hanging chad mess in Oregon.
Actually, I give a shit about abortion. :) If Obama actually plans on signing such a law making abortion more accessible, it would be fantastic. I look forward to the day when abortion is accessible and free to anybody who wants one - adult or minor.
petekent:
STFU, you are an annoying troll. Every time you post that makes me think we need to legalize post birth abortions for trolls like you
We still have predominantly independent coffeehouses in Portland. We don't drink Starbucks!
If you have a family member who is so coercive as to fill out your ballot for you, then you have a lot worse and more immediate problems on your hands than how to get your vote out.
Also, no system is perfect. The cost of ours is that some abused spouses probably don't get to vote, or to vote the way they want. The benefits I think outweigh that.
Another Oregonian checking in. I live in Eugene, and it's sometimes easy to forget how there are huge pockets of strong conservatism everywhere in this state. I really haven't heard that much misinformation about Obama here, and if anything you'll find that the people who support Obama do so so with enthusiasm that's about as close as possible to the oft-mocked "Messiah" syndrome that I've yet seen. If you want my honest opinion, I really do think a lot the hardcore liberals here view supporting Obama partially as a way of advertising their tolerance, and it certainly is reminiscent of the "white guilt" phenomenon that I believe to be a legitimate factor in some educated people's original interest in Obama. Still, for the moment, I don't really care how Obama does it here, as long as he does do it, and I'm glad to see that Oregon continues to trends towards being solidly blue in this election.
Ahh! Found it, if you're looking for more geeky details on accountability in vote-by-mail systems, this is a great place to start:
Ballot tracking systems report
Jesus said, "Suffer the little children to come unto me."
Have your fun at the expense of the innocent, God will redeem them in Heaven.
He forgives you as well as you have been mislead by Satantic forces that would condone the destruction of human life, a baby's life, provided it is done in secret away from prying eyes, the womb serving as a screen for a holocaust such as we have never seen.
Pity the eye that cannot see, the ear that cannot hear.
Marx, maybe your friends should check out North Portland. That's a historically African-American area but a lot of other people have moved in in the last 5-10 years.
PeteK
You do remember Palin's statement on Bristols pregnancy?
“proud of Bristol’s decision to have her baby and even prouder to become grandparents”
Deciding = freedom of choice. Your ticket is pro choice as well, live with it.
I don't know if someone else already posted this, but some of you were asking about Palin's appearance at the Flyers game last week:
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081027/zirin_denvir
PeteKent:
"Partial birth abortion" is a misleading phrase that almost suggests it involves the abortion of a baby that's in the process of being delivered normally.
That's simply not the case. It's almost always done in situations where the fetus has a condition that would prevent its head from fitting through the cervix. In many cases it's done because the fetus won't survive outside the womb, and the parents want an intact body to grieve over.
The more common late-term abortion is the perhaps more-brutal practice of dismembering the fetus while it's in the uterus. That's the procedure used for the vast, vast majority of late-term abortions.
marx was right said...
Adrian, thanks for that piece of history. Even the state capitol is 80% white?!? That's shocking.
My friends up there cashed in all their San Francisco equity a couple of years ago and now of course are living like kings given the discrepancy in housing prices. But they can't stand the lack of diversity, and they didn't really check it out, just assumed because Portland was the largest city in OR that it would be diverse in its makeup. They are considering moving back to the Bay Area because of it.
Personally, I wouldn't be comfortable living in a place where 80% of the population was white. I just need to be around lots of diversity and different cultural groups. But I'm glad I discovered this about Portland, because I too considered cashing in my house and going up there.
you want more diversity ?
move to east la
hahahahaha
It seems like being able to go to an independent polling place can mitigate some of the problems of spousal abuse and exercising your right to privacy in voting. Any polling volunteer is going to insure that a voter is alone in a voting booth if that voter chooses to be alone.
Per this site:
http://www.adherents.com/largecom/com_lds.html
Oregon ranks 8th in the percentage of Mormons.
7th in overall number.
In 1990
Like I said before. If Pete Kent or someone like him were my neighbor, I'd be a bit scared for the safety of my family.
I wonder how many "about to blow" neocons are out there right now. Far too many, for sure. Try to confine your family's travels to major "cosmopolitan" areas for the next 6-8 weeks.
And may God protect Barack Obama and his family.
Quinnipiac:
Colorado - O 52 / M 43
Michigan - O 54 / M 38
Minnesota - O 51 / M 40
Wisconsin - O 51 / M 43
Also, PeteKent, if abortion is murder, do you support giving women who have abortions life in prison?
I mean, if a woman hired a hitman to off her one-year old, that's the sentence she'd likely receive. And many on the right say that there's no difference between that and an abortion.
Or do you think the death penalty would be more appropriate?
As others have suggested, Oregon has a much more substantial Mormon population than is suggested by the chart above. It is the second largest religion in the state, according to the Oregonian newspaper.
Source: http://blog.oregonlive.com/oregonianextra/2008/01/mormons_roots_influence_run_de.html
Portland is Paradise.
PK ---
Let God do his job then and you stay the hell out of it. If in the end it's all fundie yahoos in heaven, then I'll be high fivin all my friends in hell. "Who'd like a beer?"
Let us be clear on what partial birth abortion is (excerted from my earlier post):
"Dr. Haskell went in with forceps and grabbed the baby's legs and pulled them down into the birth canal. Then he delivered the baby's body and the arms; everything but the head. The doctor kept the head right inside the uterus. The baby's little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby's arms jerked out, like a startle reaction, like a flinch, like a baby does when he thinks he is going to fall....The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby's brains out. Now the baby went completely limp. He cut the umbilical cord and delivered the placenta. He threw the baby in a pan, along with the placenta and the instruments he had just used."
I'm an expat born in Portland. As a kid I heard other kids on the playground say "from each according to their ability, to each according to their need."
I'm a little disappointed that my political eccentricity makes me just a statistic in Oregon!
Rather remarkable all these people like Pete Kent claiming to know the mind of G-d. Looking at the "Old Testament", that in itself is a sin.
YOU all need to ignore PK.
Any way, the Dow is heading south again down 260 points. I'm losing a lot of money but I take solace that I'm gaining Obama
Here's another vote for vote-by-mail. When we started doing it I wasn't very enthusiastic because I actually liked the process of going to a polling place, waiting in line and voting in a booth but after seeing how successful it has been and how drastically it has increased participation I'm all for it. Now if we could just do something about our ballot measure process Oregon would be the perfect state. :)
2. Can someone explain the chart? I'm usually pretty up on these sort of things, but it's not clicking for me!
-----------------------
I believe the chart shows how conservative or liberal Bush's and Kerry's voters were on a 1-10 scale with 1 being most liberal and 10 being most conservative. For example, in Oregon in 2004, Bush's voters scored a 2 and Kerry's voters scored about a 7.2. Thus, Bush voters in Oregon were much more conservative than Bush voters nationally, while Kerry voters were much more liberal than Kerry voters nationally--it's the most idealogically polarized state in the country based on this chart.
Is there any way Nate and Sean can ban OT thread-hijakers like PeteKent?
I come here for discussion about poll stats. If I want to join an abortion debate there are plenty of other places for that.
PeteKent said...
blah blah abortion blah blah
==
PK, are you *still* mad that all those middle school girls that you raped haven't produced one viable offspring to carry on your unique genetic heritage?
Let it go, man. Let it go.
Pete kent,
Partial birth abortion is a fictitious term medically, it a political term created by wingnuts as yourself. There is no such thing as partial birth abortion. Yu might want to try and look it up in a single medical text, ofcourse you can;t b/c it doesn't exist. Get a life and stop showing your utter ignorance by reading the viral republicon emails and cutting and pasting this factless garbage that preys on only dim minds, such as yourself.
As someone who lived in both western and eastern Oregon, I found your analysis is astute (In fact, I left eastern Oregon five years ago because I simply found it too conservative for my taste.). It's a very polarized state geographically and politically, with very little middle ground. In fact, in eastern Oregon, they talk about western Oregon as if it's a entirely separate state.
Interestingly, having lived in western Montana for five years, I've noticed that Montana is somewhat similar to Oregon ... politics are kind of geographically split and there's very little middle ground politically. I would say the Democrats in Montana are not as liberal as the Democrats in Oregon (Most of them hunt, for one.), but the Republicans in Montana seem to be every bit as extreme as the Republicans in Oregon -- at least the ones who get elected into the State Legislature. There doesn't seem to be anything such as a moderate Republican here (In fact, you have Montana Republicans turning against their own for not being Republican enough more than they are attacking Democrats.).
We NEED to ignore pricks like PeKnt
Oregon also boasts the smartest and best voting process, as all ballots are mail-in.
Is that where we came down on that one? Obviously mail-in ballots have their advantages, but there are also serious disadvantages. It encourages fraud, for one thing; it also pretty much destroys the whole "secret ballot" idea - husband can intimidate wives into voting the way they want with mail-in ballots, for instance.
I'm far from convinced of the wisdom of the "all mail-in ballot" system.
Peter Kent,
Shame your mom didn't have a coat hanger around before she squatted you out. What a fucking wingnut moron.
I had no idea this existed, but the scholastic kids poll is in. They've been right for 40 years.
http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/article.jsp?id=3750501
Interesting to see key state percentages. Biggest response they've ever had. Internet influence? Or parental?
7 of 10 say Obama understands America's problems, and he gets high marks on the question of who has the better plan to solve America's problems
http://www.gallup.com/poll/111148/Seven-Say-Obama-Understands-Americans-Problems.aspx
To me this seems like the child was partially born and then murdered (euphemistically aborted).
"Dr. Haskell went in with forceps and grabbed the baby's legs and pulled them down into the birth canal. Then he delivered the baby's body and the arms; everything but the head. The doctor kept the head right inside the uterus. The baby's little fingers were clasping and unclasping, and his little feet were kicking. Then the doctor stuck the scissors in the back of his head, and the baby's arms jerked out, like a startle reaction, like a flinch, like a baby does when he thinks he is going to fall....The doctor opened up the scissors, stuck a high-powered suction tube into the opening, and sucked the baby's brains out. Now the baby went completely limp. He cut the umbilical cord and delivered the placenta. He threw the baby in a pan, along with the placenta and the instruments he had just used."
Whether you belive in God or not or the hereafter, that we make it legal to do this to a child speaks volumes about the corruption in our society.
Speak for the innocent!
Yep, Oregon's got the best voting system in the Country.
Obama isn't going to win the 2nd Congressional dist. where I live. But I'm still heading out to Starbucks in a bit for a chai on my way over to the Jackson County Obama headquarters.
OTF is right. The correct term is late stage D&E. Partial birth abortion is not a medical term recognized by the AMA or by ACOG. Fewer than 1% of all abortions in the U.S. are late stage D&Es. Why do men who don't know the millions of pregnant women out there feel the need to make decisions about those womens' bodies?
We all know the abortion "issue" isn't about "the babies." It's about controlling a woman's sexuality. And the people who are vociferously anti-choice are, at some level, perverted in this respect. Stop sniffing around in other womens' bedrooms and mind your own business.
Nate/Sean - please throw PeteKent overboard. I have no problem with him posting his drivel once, but this spamming crap is ridiculous.
Abortion is another non-issue issue. First things first, the GOP have been running this line of attack for what? 30 years now, and we are still no closer to getting rid of Roe v Wade. Secondly, other than those who want a Constitutional Amendment on Abortion, most GOPers say that they would favor overturning Roe v Wade then sending it back to the states. Presumabley some states will allow abortion, some won't. States are legally bound to respect each others laws, but what happens when someone goes across state boundaries for an abortion? Is the state they are travelling to bound to not grant the abortion, or is it the state where the individual has travelled from that is bound to respect the other states right to give an abortion? The whole thing would become a political mess very quickly. Roe v Wade may be a moral anathema to many people, but it makes sense and makes the decision an individual decision. Save from outlawing Abortion totally it is the only sensible way.
But anyway the constitution infers that judges are interpretive anyway.
@petekent,
Laave me alone already about the babies, I'm busy trying to kill another 250,000 Iraqis.
Sincerely,
George W. Bush
Off topic but just read article by Christopher Buckley about the reaction to his endorsement of Obama and being pressured to resign from National Review. Here's the quote that nicely sums up my feelings about today's Republican Party: "While I regret this development [resignation from NR], I am not in mourning, for I no longer have any clear idea what, exactly, the modern conservative movement stands for. Eight years of “conservative” government has brought us a doubled national debt, ruinous expansion of entitlement programs, bridges to nowhere, poster boy Jack Abramoff and an ill-premised, ill-waged war conducted by politicians of breathtaking arrogance. As a sideshow, it brought us a truly obscene attempt at federal intervention in the Terry Schiavo case."
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2008-10-14/sorry-dad-i-was-fired
The LAST thing the GOP wants is Roe overturned. It is their cash cow. Without Roe to use as chum for all the fundy suckers the party'd be broke. Harsh but true.
@ sfergus483
Actually, postmarks DON'T count. The ballot must be taken to a drop box to count if there are not enough days left for it to get there in the mail.
Local newspapers and radio/tv stations are really good about 'reminding' everyone about this point.
PeteKent -
Please kill yourself.
Signed,
The World
So in PeteKent's mythology:
Every abortion is a murder.
Murdered children go directly to heaven.
Children allowed to live may or may not go to heaven; they may end up dying as sinners and be damned to hell.
Conclusion: Abortion provides a direct pass to heaven without the possibility of spending eternity in torture.
Sounds like a good reason to support abortion rights! Thanks for piping up, PeteKent!
Once again, reality has a liberal bias.
Ethics debates are too impoverished in this US to even mess with. Exhibit A: PeteKent. "God this, God that, everyone who disagrees with me can go to Hell, blah blah blah."
Soooo tedious.
Yes I red the article from Chris Buckley that he had to resign from his dad's magazine because he endorsed Obama
Chris displayed intellectual courage in endorsing Obama, it just shows that logic will always prevail even among conservatives.
Send a note of encouragement to Chris he deserves it.
Does anybody know if CNN/Time is releasing polls today? They have been switching between tuesday and wednesday as their big release day the last few weeks.
What is the "ruinous expansion of entitlement programs" that Buckley is referring to? Welfare for the wealthy like the bailout? No-bid contracts for Halliburton and Bechtel? I think most people can agree that it wasn't social "entitlements" that have "endured" ruinous expansion.
He does sum up the track record really well, though, and at least acknowledges they are in a complete flail.
I often thought Schiavo was the first "turning" in the public's mind that the GOOPers were truly not about "small government."
I live in Seattle and have a bunch of family connections in OR, and know the place pretty well. The Mormon stat is definitely wrong, as others have pointed out. Beaverton, OR, a suburb of Portland, is Mormon Central.
Both WA and OR are polarized between east and west, although its slightly attenuated in WA by (an increasingly distant) history of Democratic strength in Spokane. In OR, it's a little more complicated. Coastal counties in southern OR are also conservative. In WA, there are pockets of conservatism in the Puget Sound.
The big story in the Pacific Northwest is the long-term decline of the timber industry. This has hit Oregon particularly hard. Whenever I see stories portraying the Pacific NW as an affluent region of latte-sippers, I know that whoever wrote it spent 100% of their time in Portland and Seattle. Once you get out of those cities, it gets really poor, really fast.
Guys you really need to ignore PeKnt, hes poisonous writing is contaminating you.
Presumabley some states will allow abortion, some won't. States are legally bound to respect each others laws, but what happens when someone goes across state boundaries for an abortion? Is the state they are travelling to bound to not grant the abortion, or is it the state where the individual has travelled from that is bound to respect the other states right to give an abortion?
------------------------------
States cannot legislate what is and is not legal in another state. For example, gambling is illegal in my state, but it's not illegal for me to travel to Vegas and gamble there. If Roe were overturned, women living in states where abortion was outlawed could travel to states where abortion was legal.
moondancer,
I think you are right in some ways about at least a part of the GOP, specifically the religious right. But Christopher Buckley, as quoted by another Mike, really gets at the modern problem of conservatism. Even a decent, honourable conservative like John McCain, (ok a little less decent and honourable than he used to!) can't run without doing homage to the Religious Right. I'd love to know what Barry Goldwater would make of it all? I'd hope he would be ashamed of his protege.
@marx - "ruinous expansion of entitlement programs"
He was probably referring to the Medicare Drug plan.
... and please stop feeding the troll people!
I'll start 'worrying about the babies' the moment every single person who claims to be pro-life takes to the streets protesting the Iraq War and the death penalty.
Until people learn to ignore the trolls, this will be a very useless thread.
Selenesmom - I was thinking of bying a coexist bumper sticker, which is perfect, because I'm ALREADY a bad driver.
Oregon and Washington are so heterogenous that it's silly to even call them states. They are big blue cities surrounded by red, red, red rural areas. Eastern WA = Eastern OR = Idaho = Wyoming.
John - Studies of spousal pressure in voting in Oregon have shown that husbands feel they were pushed by wives to vote a certain way more often than the other way around. Anyone who feels they were intimidated to vote can and should immediately call the county clerk to have a hold placed on it. They can then re-vote their ballot if they choose at the county clerk's office.
another Mike,
Then there is no point over turning Roe v Wade, unless you plan a federal outlawing of abortion.
I'm in San Francisco but I visit Portland fairly regularly to see friends. I'm always shocked at how few people of color I see in Portland. It's depressing that there isn't more diversity there.
I lived in Portland for a year in 1997 and I was gobsmacked by the casual racism and anti-Semitism I encountered. Statements like Mexicans ruin the environment and illegals are overunning the city and Jews are all rich, etc. Things you would never hear in other progressive cities. I don't know if things have gotten better (ten years is a long time), but it was awful at the time. That was one of the main reasons I left after just a year.
What is the "ruinous expansion of entitlement programs" that Buckley is referring to?
---------------------
Not a mind reader, but from reading conservative blogs occasionally (a perverse pleasure), I'd guess he's talking about the prescription drug program. Or, perhaps he's just talking about the natural increase in social security (aging population) and medicare and medicaid (rapidly rising health care costs).
As I said:
If you have a family member who is so coercive as to fill out your ballot for you, then you have a lot worse and more immediate problems on your hands than how to get your vote out.
System-wide solutions might include more safe houses, improve economy so everyone has more options, more social services for abused spouses, etc. I don't see how giving up a good, proven, safe system because of the small incidence of spousal coercion really helps.
Plus, with polling places, you still have the problem of abused spouses being kept from the polls, given two black eyes so they are ashamed to go to polls, etc. etc. This is a red herring.
PeteKent, If Jesus had been against abortion He would've said "Suffer the unborn fetuses to come unto me." No one is talking about aborting children. No one likes abortion; but it's a woman's choice of bodily autonomy. You can bet that if men were the gender to give birth, there would be quick stop abotion shops on ever corner. Because women give birth, opposing abortion is just another way for men to exert domination over women.
First time I have emailed Nate and Sean but I had to - to ask them to ban PeteKent. His rubbish is intolerable on a polling website.
Whoa @ Buckley... The last one was good. Gonna read this now.
Thanks!
Pete Kent get a life. When a late term abortion is performed it is usually to save the mothers life or because of severe fetal abnormality.
You right to lifers don`t give a crap about these babies once they are born, hell the GOp won`t even give them all medical coverage.
Don`t you realize the GOp plays you guys for fools. What have you gotten for all your blind support for them, nothing.
They know abortion is a good wedge issue and if it was ever outlawed the party would never win another election. You want to stop abortion teach people about birth control.
Pete Kent brain like brian trusts are running the McCain campaign. The moronic blatherings of Pete are the same logic and strategy coming from the McCain campaign. These morons spent 2 days campaigning in IA last week where they have been double digits down for weeks and where Obama has enormous ground support. IA ground game and support was his launching pad for the nomination in January. Then they are spending today and part of last wekeend in PA where they have been double diigts down in every poll since 9/28 Ras poll which was O+8. They pulled out of MI when the PA numbers were worse than MI, atleast at the initial pullout point. Are we sure Pete Kent is running the campaign the logic is about at his level.
I hope you find a way to include the kid's poll: Obama 57%, McCain 39%.
(yes, I'm just kidding. but it makes me smile that Obama won the kid's poll by so much. seems like a good sign.)
My wife is on the pill. Does that make her a serial abortionist?
No.
The Republican Party and the conservative movement may come to a loggerhead on the abortion issue/non-issue when they are forced to go in exile for a few years.
The conservative movement, the intellectuals like Buckley, want TRUE conservatism. True conservatism is anathema to the "conservatism" of the cultural warrior, southern-centric leadership of the GOP.
The northeastern, effete, cocktail party conservatives were in the fold for the past few decades because of Reagan and the promise of Reagan to keep the party more Libertarian than culturally conservative.
The GOP is no more a TRULY conservative party. They want inside your womb and are the biggest spenders in the room. They create huge bureaucracies at the federal level and no longer have room for deficit hawks.
The GOP after Nov. 4 may be reduced to culture warriors. Find a palatable Ron Paul in 2012 and a slate of Libertarians brought to you by the National Review Magazine and the GOP may lose a big constituency of their party coalition.
grinder's right about the relative lack of prosperity of the NW outside of the major cities. I grew up in Medford (in southern Oregon, 30 miles from the CA border) during the Clinton boom, and it was relatively prosperous then, although there was still a lot of poverty. Now I hear it's rather bad... Jackson County had to close their libraries for a significant amount of time because they ran out of timber subsidies. Also, southern Oregon also has a strong history of libertarianism. Look up the "State of Jefferson" sometime, it's pretty wacky.
The Northwest in general is a pretty strange place.
The problem with defining the morality of abortion siomply using the teachings of the Bible or Jesus or any other religious account, is that abortion wasn't even thought of until reasonably recent times.
As a Catholic, I am morally against abortion. BUT as a political and judicial pragmatist, I believe that that should remain an individual moral decision to make.
Abortions for all! (BOOOOOO!!!)
Abortions for none! (BOOOOOO!!!!)
Abortions for some, miniature flags for others! (YAAAAAYYYY!!!)
ANOTHER MIKE: "If Roe were overturned, women living in states where abortion was outlawed could travel to states where abortion was legal."
But the likeliest states to outlaw abortion are the ones with the highest percentage of poor women who can't afford to travel. And other states might require a 24-hour waiting period and some can't afford to stay overnight. What about pregnant girls, victims of incest, etc., who can't travel? Then the laws once again favor those with more money.
On another note, wow, thanks for the Chris Buckley story about his termination from NRO. Who needs government censorship when the press is doing it to itself!
Rich
I really wish we would quit assuming that only wingnuts own guns. I'm a liberal with a shotgun, a woman and a hunter. And I'm not even the only one I know -- at least four friends are the same, all gun-owners, hunters, Obama voters, mothers and wives.
Most -- but not all -- of us are rural/small town. A couple of us live in the BIG BLUE CITIES!
Rich Merritt, Sorry but I disagree. I LIKE abortion. It was always baffling to me that supposedly pro-choice people would say "nobody supports (or likes) abortion." Or something to that effect.
I guess I could say I "like" abortion in the same way I like a vasectomy or a cardiac catheterization or a thyroid fine needle aspirate. It's simply a MEDICAL PROCEDURE (and a safe one, at that).
Turning the actual procedure of abortion into some kind of bogeyman makes no sense.
Calling yourself pro-choice and then saying you "don't like" abortion rings really hollow. It's like a backpedal to soften up and put fuzzy gauze around your view. Of course, I've only seen this remark made in response to an anti-choice winger, so maybe that is the only context in which it is used.
In my opinion, if you are pro choice, you "support" abortion. You have to, by definition.
As far as diversity goes, at least we have public schools that teaches us that racism is an idea from the past and soon as the last few old racists die it will be gone.
It doesn't sound like the people complaining about it are doing anything to help; instead they're just running off.
It's true that this was one of the most racist states 100 years ago, but it's not now. Diversity is steadily increasing, and with very little conflict.
We had some problems with racist gangs in the early `90s (they came here from Idaho mostly) but we ran them out of town.
Oh, and Portland lacks diversity partly because a lot of the black people choose to self-segregate by living in NE. It's typically the whites who are complaining about this form of segregation! A lot of the black families in Portland moved here during WWII to work in the shipyards. This very patriotic happening did a lot to change the attitudes here, and most of those families stayed. And are still living in the same neighborhoods as the WWII shipyards.
So come to Oregon, please don't be so racist and whine about what color our skins are.
We've come a long ways... the racists are still usually white, but now they can't stand too many white people. Go figure.
I'm in San Francisco but I visit Portland fairly regularly to see friends. I'm always shocked at how few people of color I see in Portland. It's depressing that there isn't more diversity there.
Your friends should have moved to NE Portland. Pick any nabe north of Lloyd Center and south of the airport, and you'll get a ton of "diversity," as I did when I moved there.
Everyone knows west and SE Portland are the rich white zones, and NE is where the diversity hangs out.
Another threat to Obama at a Palin rally today.
Did anyone see the clip of Obama yesterday? Some people in the crowd started booing when he mentioned McCain. He quietened them and said "We don't need that. We need you to go out and vote".
That's statemanship.
markymark said...
"The problem with defining the morality of abortion siomply using the teachings of the Bible or Jesus or any other religious account, is that abortion wasn't even thought of until reasonably recent times."
Not true. The idea that abortion should be ILLEGAL is a relatively recent development. In many ancient cultures, it was the father's decision whether the baby was allowed to live or not.
markymark,
It probably wouldn't have much impact on most women, but it would be an significant extra burden on the poor to have to travel to another state. The pro-life movement is already adopting a similar strategy of putting up as many hurdles as possible to discourage abortion and make it more expensive and time consuming (e.g., waiting periods, requiring abortion clinics to have expensive medical equipment and staff, mandatory sonograms, etc.).
MARX:
"In my opinion, if you are pro choice, you "support" abortion. You have to, by definition."
I don't like the agony that some women are forced to endure about this decision, that's why I don't like abotion. But as Hillary said, I do think abortion should be safe, legal and rare. If we could get the fundies out of the equation, we could make the morning after pill readily available and the point would become almost moot.
PeteKent:
Now would be a good time to explain your party's views on contraception. If you are for making it hard to obtain, then you are far more morally responsible for any abortions taking place.
Also, no-one reads anything you write beyond the first sentence. You should save yourself some time and just post:
"[insert rambling anti-abortion screed here]".
We've heard it all before, and your christofascist "appeals to morality" are approaching the level of parody.
"Speak for the innocent!" (PeteKent)
How much time do you spend in Texas working for the Innocence Project? You do know that a conservative estimate of 25% of prisoners on Death Row in Texas are likely innocent or already found not directly responsible for the crime that got them on Death Row?
If one man on Death Row is innocent, then the system is flawed. You know that, right Pete?
A man was put to death this morning in Ohio. He committed the crime. But isn't it funny how conservatives say they want less government, but they want to empower government to kill people and (in the same breath) want that same government to interject itself into the most sensative decision between a woman and a doctor that a person can make.
If there were 20 million Christopher Buckleys, they'd know they had the chance for their own party with the Libertarians for the taking in 2012...and the GOP would be the Southern People's Party thereafter.
All you guys who are so irritated with PK etc prob won't have much happen. Nate has enough shit to do keeping up with everyone's need for freakin polls 24/7.
If you don't like it, ignore it. Now, I'm not even sure that PK etc reads as much as copy/pastes posts.. so responding is a waste of time.
Everyone's said this endless times now. Scroll past it. Nate's not going to moderate. If your panties are really bunched then just hop over to VaCon's messageboard. I believe it's moderated but can't be sure.
He cannot get rid of his ties to lobbyists who lobby for foreign governments, can he!
First it was his foreign policy advisor, now it is his transition chief.
"McCain's Transition Chief Aided Saddam In Lobbying Effort"
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/14/mccain-transition-chief-a_n_134595.html
In my opinion, if you are pro choice, you "support" abortion. You have to, by definition.
----------------------------
I understand your position on abortion. But, there's a logically consistent position of not liking abortion but still believing it should be legal. for example, I don't like smoking, but think it should be legal. It's just not my business to tell someone else what decision they should make on some issues.
What happened to all of those people who thought the economy was fixed yesterday? I haven't seen them around today...
I'd just like to make a point that it's a bunch of men in here debating about abortion.
What else is new.
I'd just like to make a point that it's a bunch of men in here debating about abortion
I'm a woman. :)
Incidentally, how many people have known anyone who has had an abortion? I have known a few, and in my experience the abortion is always a source of guilt, or at least regret. Abortion isn't a good thing, BUT in my opinion should be dealt with by understanding and maturity.
Markymark, I've had an abortion. It was an incredible relief. I was also fortunate that I live in a state where women have a constitutional right to abortion.
Alyssa said...
"I'd just like to make a point that it's a bunch of men in here debating about abortion."
I thought the same thing, Marx, I did not know you are a woman. Most don't realize I am, either.
I had a friend in college who had 3. She was a very smart woman so I never understood why she had such issues with contraception...
New Rasmussen state #s
Deleware
O-56
M-41
Uninteresting.
Polls scheduled to be released later today
Mussouruh - PPP TBD)
National - LATimes/Bloomberg (5 PM)
National - CBS/NYTimes (6:30 PM)
Any others?
I stand corrected :)
I'd just like to make a point that it's a bunch of men and 1 WOMAN in here debating about abortion.
haha Ok fixed.
Bloody hell I wish we had a new post (And no, I'm not British or talking about abortions)
I am a Bob Casey Jr type of Democrat from PA. Although I am against abortion, with limited exceptions. It is not the defining issue for me in this election. After all, we are electing a President to run the country not the Pope to run the Roman Catholic Church. I am comfortable with Barack Obama's position... that abortion is a woman's choice, but that we do have a responsibility to see that there are significant options to avoid the need for such a decision in the first place.
Which one of these guys is PateKent? The hate of these people is palpable. God said do not judge right? I guess that means they can judge constantly. It is the thought process of the evangelical.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/14/mccain-palin-rallies-the_n_134474.html
I am opposed to the death penalty as well.
Men are not allowed to have opinions about abortion?
George McCain ran against George W. Bush in 2000. George W. Bush is the son of George H.W. Bush. John McCain calls himself a "famous friend" of the former President.
George H.W. Bush was Ambassador to China...Communist China.
My friends, do we really KNOW John McCain? I call him honorable, but does he have the JUDGMENT to be President. After all, he is a Communist sympathizer. He lived with known Vietnamese Communists for five years. It wasn't the good food that kept him there. No way! He was under their spell, a true believer. He even had a known communist sympathizer (Bush) in his living room in his first political campaign in the 1980s for a fundraiser.
Can this man be trusted, my friends?
(The above is as logical as the Ayers connection to Obama. Heck, I was in the same tent at the Printer's Row Book Fair with Bill Ayers and White Sox great Billy Pierce. Does that make me a terrorist with a deadly curveball?)
Way back in this thread, some people asked about Asian American voting trends. Here is a link from a 2004 voting analysis:
http://www.aaldef.org/article.php?article_id=107
"By a 3 to 1 margin, Asian Americans favored Senator John Kerry over President George W. Bush, 74% to 24%, with 2% voting for other candidates. Among first-time Asian American voters, 78% voted for Kerry, 20% voted for Bush, and 2% voted for other candidates."
Ok I'm wrong again.
I'd just like to make a point that we have...
Ehh fuck it. New MO Poll today!!!!!!!!!!
Dear Poll Gods/Goddesses/Whatevers,
I'm really interested in an AR poll please.
Thanks.
Your friend,
Aly
"I'd just like to make a point that it's a bunch of men in here debating about abortion.
What else is new."
I may be a man, but I can see women from my house, making me, also, highly experienced in women's issues as well as, also, a viable candidate for an OB/GYN position, also, at the nation's top and most maverick hospitals, such as.
PPP Missouri:
O: 48
M: 46
I'm really interested in an AR poll please.
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And Texas too (ARG is crap).
"I am opposed to the death penalty as well." (PeteKent)
I hear this every time from the righties when I challenge them on abortion. To a tee, every one of them says they are against the death penalty. They shrug their shoulders and say "I don't know why some members of my party are that way".
If this many Republicans are anti-death penalty and consistent, then why is it still a practice in this country?
Therein lies the fault line of the modern GOP: a group of distinctly different special interest groups with very tenuous similarities whose cement between these weak bricks is fear.
Dunno if anyone's mentioned it yet, but the place where that large Mormon temple is located near I-5 used to be the best field around (before they built the temple) for picking 'shrooms. [Feel free to insert joke about how that may not be a coincidence.]
Uh, not that I'd know anything about that personally. As an LC alum, we NEVER were involved in such things. :-)
Alyssa:
I'd just like to make a point that it's a bunch of men in here debating about abortion.
What else is new.
Why is this point germane to the discussion? Freedom from government intrusion into the sexual lives of its citizens is a universal concern (or should be).
Should I feel in any way inhibited from supporting civil rights laws because I am not the direct beneficiary? Should I not raise my voice in defense of economic rights for the poor, or the homeless, because I am not one of them?
We're talking about the fundamental ideals under which our civilization operates. I have just much right to express my opinion about that as does any woman.
(And, incidentally, I know several women who have had abortions. They were all very difficult decisions, but thankfully the risk of death or jailing didn't have to enter into the process.)
slim PPP lead for O
was hoping for something more sizable
voice of the midwest,
I think the whole Ayers thing smacks of desperation. Clinton used it as a last trick, now McCain is doing the same. McCain has tapped away at it all the time, raising the name every now and again, but never with any conviction really. And why would you when G Gordon Liddy is your mate, and you have done far more 'palling around' with him than Obama has ever done with Ayers.
Usually PPP has a slight D lean, but their last MO poll was M+10 when everyone else had the race in the mid single digits for McCain. So, this new one is not bad.
Slight lead in a state that would be cherry on the cake, thats not so bad really.
PeteKent, the USA is not the theological Iran.
In the USA the religion is separate of the State.
"slim PPP lead for O
was hoping for something more sizable"
That was my first reaction, too. But you do realize that Missouri is like Obama's Plan G or so to win this election (CO, VA, FL, NV, NC, OH being A - F). And Obama's leading there consistently across several pollsters. We Obama supporters may be getting greedy here.
48-46 in Mizzou? I'll take it.
Last PPP poll had M+10 so O+2 is a nice shift.
---"Incidentally, how many people have known anyone who has had an abortion?"
During medical school on my OB/Gyn rotation I had many as patients. Some had abortions long ago and we saw it in their charts or found out during the H&P. Some were very recent. We also were taught how to council pre and post procdure and in presenting all options if asked about unwanted pregancies. We also saw them performed. Seeing them performed was by choice and some students deferred out for their own religious beliefs.
MarkyMark:
I know. But my question is this: am I an All-Star pitcher because I was in the room with White Sox great Billy Pierce?
No. Nor am I a terrorist because I was in the same tent with Bill Ayers who gave a wonderful analysis on modern newspaper use of the English language.
I guess my 8 year old nephew is tainted now.
"PeteKent, the USA is not the theological Iran.
In the USA the religion is separate of the State." (Dario)
But baseball is exempt from anti-trust language because it is damn near the national religion!
VOTM
People are complaining that he's not leading MISSOURI by enough?!?
Geez, that and Indiana are EV's 354-375! (I'm still agnostic about WVa) Might as well start complaining that the last Georgia poll didn't have him within Margin of Error.
Bloomberg, today:
Daimler will shut Sterling's St. Thomas, Ontario, factory in March and one in Portland, Oregon, in 2010, when labor deals expire.
It will then send more of its manufacturing to Mexico.
I think that if there was any hope for John McCain in Oregon, it may have just died.
"Might as well start complaining that the last Georgia poll didn't have him within Margin of Error."
Well, I'm a little bummed that Obama couldn't get within 30 points in yesterday's Oklahoma poll.
Voice of the Mid west,
I do agree, and I think McCain does as well (indeed anyone with a brain would). Its a sign of how desperate McCain has become though that he is relying on an argument that he so obviously is uncomfortable with,
PeteKent shares the same concerns as Mrs. Lovejoy. The two of you are kindred spirits!
"Geez, that and Indiana are EV's 354-375! (I'm still agnostic about WVa) Might as well start complaining that the last Georgia poll didn't have him within Margin of Error."
If MO and IN fall for Obama, WV goes too.
You wrote that "Oregon also boasts the smartest and best voting process, as all ballots are mail-in."
To me, the mail-in system completely undermines the secret ballot. What is to prevent a domineering right wing patriarch from having the whole family fill out ballots together for him to take down to the post office? Or to prevent businesses from pressuring their employees to do the same? Or for that matter to prevent people from buying votes? I don't like it one bit. The fact that there may not have been any such violations discovered so far is no guarantee it won't happen in the future. People learn how to find the cracks in any system, and there are canyons in this one. I find it amazing that people who worry (legitimately) about touch screen voting seem to like Oregon's setup.
Given Smith's campaign, what are the chances he might pull a Jeffords and caucus with Democrats?
Reason #4,657 why McCain runs a terrible campaign: He hired a lobbyist to head his transition team who previously lobbied for SADDAM HUSSEIN and MANUEL NOREIGA. Wow. He really can't be that boneheaded can he? Woah.
Incidentally, just noticed, Nate's projection gives Obama a 6 point win now. (as well as 360 EVs). Looking very very good at the moment.
That's three straight MO polls now.
"was hoping for something more sizeable
That's what my wife said last night.
Speaking of Hussein:
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2008/10/14/mccain_transition_chief_aided_saddam_lobbying_effort.html
Murray Waas: "William Timmons, the Washington lobbyist who John McCain has named to head his presidential transition team, aided an influence effort on behalf of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein to ease international sanctions against his regime."
"The two lobbyists who Timmons worked closely with over a five year period on the lobbying campaign later either pleaded guilty to or were convicted of federal criminal charges that they had acted as unregistered agents of Saddam Hussein's government."
"Democrats are so naive. That is how Republicans can keep them talking about what they want to talk forever. An obvious idiot, Petekent, who should be ignored comes here and says irrational stuff about abortion and all of the Democrats start talking about it. Ask Petekent what he/she thinks about Palin's ethical corruption, McCain's judgment in choosing an obvious airhead as VP, Palin's judgment in dragging a Down syndrome baby aroud the country on the campaign trail, on plane rides (10 hours of plane ride equals 1 x-ray in radiation)... nothing. He/she won't talk about it. That is how they control the narrative. They couldn't do it this time because of the economic downturn. But if they could they would, if they can, they still will."
But the funny thing is old PeteSpent is a PUMA (tm) and not a repug seemingly.
Perverse really how one goes from supporting Hillary to P*lin, yeah kinda like saying meh no thanks to a free meal at Ruth Chris's Steakhouse and yummo mmmm! to a undercooked Walmart Hotdog!
I do agree, and I think McCain does as well (indeed anyone with a brain would). Its a sign of how desperate McCain has become though that he is relying on an argument that he so obviously is uncomfortable with (MarkyMark)
Yep...true dat.
I know Palin is as dumb and corrupt as Spiro Agnew. The new "house with no mortgage" is rolled into the material for the $1.3 million over-run on the budget for the Wasilla Community Center.
There is no bank title or note on the mortgage with the local taxing authority that covers Wasilla. A $552,000 home purchased on a public servant's salary and, at the time, a part-time welder who fished on the side?
This is the next issue to surface to the negative for the ticket and likely could sink the entire campaign for good. This is why Rezko is not being used any more.
As for McCain, I was aghast when he went for the Clinton/Ayers tact. At one point, I asked my wife when the once honorable John McCain became just another Joe McCarthy.
Greatest state in the union.
Anyway, it's been noted before, but that Mormon number is completely screwy. There are Mormons in high concentrations in Portland, the southern Wilamette Valley, and (especially) sparsely-populated SE Oregon. I mean, in Central Oregon (where my family operates the largest newspaper), they call poplars Mormon trees. Come on!
Anyway. Bend is coming to be a lot like the mountainous areas of Colorado. For many moons it was a center of hard-right, gun-toting libertarians, ranchers and loggers and alfalfa farmers. It's quadrupled in size since I first lived there, in the early 80s, largely with house-rich Californians and Valley retirees. Land values skyrocketed, driving out a great number of the redneck-and-proud crowd, many of whom bolted for places like La Grande. But they're still there. It's a very strange dynamic, with well-to-do yuppies touring around in gigantic SUVs and poorer people with deeper roots still hanging around as a sort of underbelly that the new people don't like to think about. It's also been absolutely slaughtered in the credit crisis, because almost all of its economic growth was based on housing starts. (Oops. I kept trying to convince people that was going to happen, and nobody wanted to listen.)
Smith is himself from eastern Oregon (distinct culturally and geographically from Central Oregon, these days), and as the Republican gets automatic votes from the ranch country out there. He also plays well in Bend and Medford (the other population of the fifth district, southern valley) because as a matter of record he's what passes for a moderate in today's Republican Party -- he doesn't harp on about religion, he's strong on the environment (which can alienate the rural old guard but plays wel pretty much everywhere anybody in the state lives), and he generally avoids the culture wars.
For years, Oregon had two Republican Senators: Mark O. Hatfield and Bob Packwood. These men were, in many respects, fossils, remnants of an age when the Republican Party had room for fiscal and social moderates. In most respects, both men were more liberal than a great number of today's Democrats, and almost certainly would have represented the far left wing of the party had they lasted into the Bush era. Smith lost a special election for Packwood's seat to Wyden in 1994, and then won Hatfield's pretty handily, and he presents himself as in the Hatfield mold. He's not, precisely, but it's been good enough for most of the people in the state. Oregon still likes a moderate Republican, if it can find one.
The problem for Smith, however, is deeper than anti-incumbent sentiment in a time of upheaval. He probably would have beaten Merkley, all things being equal, because Merkley's a lightweight -- Democrats nominated the weaker candidate because of his experience (what I'd call the "Kerry Blunder"). But Smith is currently the only Republican who holds statewide office. Has been for some time. The blue areas of Oregon are growing, and the red ones are either A) rapidly turning purple or B) not growing at all. We've seen a large influx of Hispanics, and a large influx of Californians from liberal areas like the Peninsula and Los Angeles, fleeing the expense and the sprawl. It's becoming a toxic atmosphere for Republicans in what was once a stronghold for them.
If Democrats are going to hold their strengths going forward, the narrative of their doing it is going to be called "How the West Was Won". For decades, Republicans had a death grip on everything west of the Mississippi. I suspect that they've lost the West in their attempt to hold the South. Oregon and Washington have some of the lowest rates of church attendance in the country, and the culture wars won't win you elections out here.
I'm a born-and-bred Portlander. Nice to see 538 profile my state. I think you've got it pretty spot-on except for neglecting to mention the influence of libertarianism here.
Even a good deal of liberals in Portland have libertarian tendencies; I know multiple people from the Portland area who identify as "liberal", "social democrat", or even "socialist" who either supported Ron Paul during the primary season or at least profess agreement with him on a lot of key issues.
There's just not a lot of support for big-government authoritarianism in Oregon. I mean, I remember watching on the news anti-war rioters duking it out with mounted police on city bridges a few years back on the first or second anniversary of the invasion of Iraq. Peace and individual liberties are taken pretty seriously in Oregon.
Given Smith's campaign, what are the chances he might pull a Jeffords and caucus with Democrats?
Zero. He's a loyal Republican and his campaign is about winning. He carried Bush's water on the Iraq war until his re-election neared. I don't think he's as conservative as most R senators, but he's more conservative than his campaign suggests--just compare his voting in nonelection years to election years.
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