It is said that all politics are local. If so, where is this nation headed? It’s frightening but not surprising that all Republican candidates in SLO County have corrupted the system of representative democracy from representing the public to representing the Republican Party. Ironically, the bane of the Republican Party is state socialism where all government activity runs subordinate to the party and state media. Yet, this is exactly the blueprint for what our local Republican candidates advocate.
Lynn Compton recently participated in a debate sponsored by the League of Women Voters. Each and every question was answered by her through a script. It takes little imagination to know who scripted those responses. Now it seems that the “Party” has its own media outlet, CalCoastNews, whereby all interviews and questions will be filtered through this source.
Lynn Compton, Stacy Korsgaden, and Bruce Jones could very well be elected to represent the “Party” in SLO County. And then what? Or, we can send a message to Washington and the Republican Party by electing Jimmy Paulding, Bruce Gibson, and Dawn Ortiz-Legg returning SLO County to representative democracy of the people, by the people, and for the people. Please vote wisely.
Steve Lacki
Nipomo
This article appears in Best of SLO County 2022.
There is quite a bit of unintentional irony here. After attacking all the conservatives as Republican loyalists who are only interested in automatically supporting their party, the writer goes on to endorse a straight Democratic ticket whose candidates will unfailingly support the Democratic party. Once again, Democrats unintentionally reveal their own hypocrisy.
Stalin brutally enforced State Capitalism, and the Koch Brothers, et al have brought us to the Capitalist State. ALEC is our version of the Politburo, and lobbyists are our apparatchiks.
And Mr. Donegan your response shows an unintentional legitimization for the Democratic candidates and the party. If you agree we live under a representative democracy and not a direct democracy then Jimmy Paulding, Bruce Gibson and Dawn Ortiz Legg are doing the will of the people.
Polling of the American public:
Voting Rights = 54% in favor
Medicare for All = 69% in favor
Abortion Rights = 63% in favor
Tax the Rich = 64% in favor
Student Debt Forgiveness = 64% in favor
etc. etc. etc
Steve, Steve, now please don’t confuse Mr. Donegan with the facts.
Most of us recognize that polls are imprecise and easy to manipulate to get the desired result. For example, 54% in favor of “voting rights”? Sure, who doesn’t think that people should be allowed to vote. But, include specifics like voter ID, which a substantial majority of people approve of, even if Democrats oppose, and you get a different response. Forgiving student debt? Add “including paying the debt of upper middle class kids incurred for overseas study in Europe, and for Spring Break in Cancun, while studying for a degree in Mesopotamian musical instruments”, and, well, the result will be a LOT different. Medicare for all? “Including coverage for those who never paid into the system”, and, again, the result will be a lot different. You can not distill complicated issue into a quick question you can ask over the phone.
First of all, What debate? Where? Will there be one I find out about so I can attend?
Second, it is the democrats designing new districts despite the fact that the previous districts were matched in numbers, if not party control. Without a disparity in the number of voters in each district, no change to district lines needed to be made. However, the Democrats used the opportunity to move the lines to benefit Democrats running for office.
Next time it may be the Republicans.
May I suggest the lines be drawn by the American Independent, Green, Libertarian and Peace and Freedom Party Chairs instead of either Party in Power!
This thread is devolving deep into the weeds. “Most of us recognize” Who is “most of us”. Polls are conducted by many different companies asking many different questions. A composite is then generated from those results and published. Big business relies on these polls to conduct economic business in this country to sell you things or to oppose trends that aren’t good for business. Politically the polls predicted Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton and Al Gore would win the popular vote and they did.
My point was that imprecise questions of generalities seldom accurately reflect the true opinions of the voters when they go to the polls.