Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Wow! Happy #79!!


19 comments:

  1. Three cheers for Howard Dean, who blazed the trail!

    To start your day off right, here's a bit of news:

    Bernie pulls ahead of HRC in New Hampster! [Click]

    "A poll released by Franklin Pierce University and the Boston Herald shows Sanders leading former secretary of state Hillary Clinton by 44% to 37% in New Hampshire among Democratic primary voters. This marks the first time Sanders has taken a lead in any poll. By contrast, in a poll conducted by Franklin Pierce University eight years ago, in September 2007, Clinton led Barack Obama by 36% to 18%."

    --Alan

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  2. Bernie the social media leader [Click] Put me down for a fossil, but I don’t do Facebook and such things; nevertheless, this looks very significant.

    Bernie reminds me of another Vermonter--Calvin Coolidge, in his insistence on not waging a negative campaign. It was one of the things that people really liked about Coolidge. Coolidge was also careful not to take firm positions on things until he knew they would correspond to the public mood.

    Bernie may be a socialist, but I think he is the only candidate who stands a chance of saving capitalism from itself in the US.

    --Alan

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    1. I saw the NH stats this morning too and cheered! :-) Slow and steady wins the race!

      Bernie takes strong positions on things and articulates them well. And it's coming from him…he really can converse about all of these things. It's not just talking points.

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  3. I saw a deer walking past our back fence as I was having breakfast this morning.

    --alan

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  4. WOW! Thanks for the wishes.

    Yes, my birthday was yesterday. It was still yesterday (real = central time) when I posted.

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    1. Oh good! Then when I posted the front page photo, it may have still been yesterday where you are. :-) Are you one hour or two behind Eastern?

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    2. One hour behind. Where I am, the blog day changes precisely at midnight.

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  5. I love that there's (almost always) a week or five days in August that feels like fall. Just to remind us to hold on, then August resumes for another six weeks.

    Today was gorgeous!! It's 70ยบ right now. LOVE IT!!!

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  6. Yah, puddle, it was nice here too, today. We had some rain, but for once it's wasn't hot and no thunderstorms, and we did get some sun as well, into the bargain. :-)

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  7. Today I went to Bernie's Senate office in Burlington to ask that he cosponsor the National Nurse Act. He cosponsored it so long ago that he was in the House then. It has 20 R and 19 D sponsors in the House now, and 2 D and 1 R in the Senate so far. This bill has been around for 11 years and is still waiting for passage. It's bipartisan and requires NO appropriation. It has the support of nurses organisations all across the country, including the ANA. Why is this still waiting?

    The Vermont office is really more about Advocacy than legislation. All the staffers were in a meeting, but one assistant came out and gave me 20 seconds or so. The intern at the desk was nice, and let me walk him through the packet I'd brought. They said they'd get it "into the right hands." We'll see.

    Bernie has to be about the busiest person on the planet right now. So I brought a whole packet of info, from a copy of the bill to lists of the cosponsors, to information about the Vermont Legislature passing two Joint Resolutions in support of the National Nurse Act (2008 and 2014), to a list of the nursing organisations in favour, to a one-pager describing the bill, a letter from the Senate sponsor, and a 6-page letter from the National Nurse team to legislators.

    Do we also need to go stand in their places and vote for them, or what?

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    1. Nah, we just need to replace them with undocumented immigrants--they do work no one else will.

      --Alan

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  8. Having heard that Bernie and HRC will both be at the Iowa State Fair this coming Saturday, I decided to look up the details. From Bernie's web site I found that he is scheduled on the Des Moines Register "Soapbox" (evidently a venue for setting forth one's policies/opinions and answering questions from the audience) at 2:00 PM. I checked the Fair web site and the Register web site, at which latter I found confirmation. They also said that HRC has been invited but has not responded. Then I visited (for the first time) HRC's campaign web site--it was amazing! Whereas Bernie's is not fancy but is intuitive and functional, HRC's will repel many people simply looking for information about the candidate. It starts off trying to force people to give their names and contact information and register (surely so they can be propagandized and hit up for money); there is a way past that first page, but it is not obvious. Once past that the poor, uncommunicative design continues. It seems to be aimed at folks who are influenced by bright colors rather than substance--very irritating to me. But a lot of people won't bother going past the first page, I think. If Bernie goes before and interacts with an audience and HRC doesn't (maybe there will be a photo op with her eating a corn dog?) I don't have to think hard about who is likely to make a better impression on Iowans. Well, we shall see.

    --Alan

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    1. Wow, good sleuthing, Alan! One can only hope that Iowans will recognise Bernie as REAL. So far, HRC is polling better there. But then, look at NH!

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  9. Re polling stats, at Real Clear Politics I sound polls from Iowa for the Democratic contenders. Although she is still leading in the polls by a good bit, during recent months HRC is down about 15% and Bernie is up about 20%. Others are low and not changing much.

    --Alan

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    1. "sit" = site, but you knew that...

      Alan

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  10. Register "Soapbox" schedule [Click] HRC is not in evidence. There is a link to a live streaming sit for the politicos' appearances.

    --Alan

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  11. Thanks for the link, Alan!

    I love how Joe Biden is polling 3rd.
    Has he even entered the race?

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