The return of the Romney Stench

I was a little concerned going into last night’s presidential debate. Not because I was worried that the President Obama that I know and trust wouldn’t show up. I was confident about that. I was concerned that the town hall debate format wouldn’t allow him to be as effective as he needed to be at pushing back against Mitt Romney’s incessant lying. We all wanted him to, and I predicted that he would, go on the attack much in the same way Vice President Biden did against Paul Ryan last week. But town hall debates are notorious for penalizing aggressive, attack-style approaches. Just ask Al Gore or George H. W. Bush about that.

I needn’t have worried. Just like Joe Biden invented a new way to debate liars last week, President Obama figured out a way to go on the attack in a way that seemed compassionate and strong at the same time without coming across as too aggressive. How did he do this? By being angry, and helping the audience to be angry, that his opponents wasn’t compassionate.

Zoinks!

You knew (or at least HOPED) that, eventually, someone in the mainstream media would look into Mitt Romney’s claim that his “plan” would create 12 million new jobs. Well, someone, i.e. the Washington Post, finally did.

It ain’t pretty.

Details after the jump.

Keep following the money, folks

Second in a series on the ballot proposals on Michigan’s November 6, 2012 ballot. Read them all HERE.

Proposal 4 — the Keep Home Care a Safe Choice ballot initiative — is all but a no-brainer for me. It will protect both patients and those who care for them. It goes without saying that our home health care providers are doing yeoman’s work caring for our most vulnerable citizens. These unsung heroes do the hard and indescribably valuable and necessary work to keep patients receiving home care comfortable and able to stay in their own homes. Not only that, they do it for a relative pittance while saving our health care system an enormous amount of money.

Details on why you should VOTE YES! ON PROPOSAL 4 ON THE NON-PARTISAN SECTION OF THE NOVEMBER BALLOT after the jump.

Finally, a website where you can learn about the Romney Tax Plan

This is big. There is finally a website where you can click through to learn details about the Romney/Ryan tax plan and how they have figured out how to cut taxes by $5 trillion without raising taxes on the middle class or worsening our national debt. It’s called RomneyTaxPlan.com.

Click the image below to visit this excellent new site:

Follow the money

Changing energy policy in our country is very, very difficult. There are many things that make it so hard but the main impediment is the staggering amount of money that Big Oil companies and utility companies spend to fight any change from the status quo.

Nowhere is this more true at the moment than the fight against Proposal 3 – a ballot proposal to increase Michigan’s use of renewable energy to 25% by 2025. When you vote on November 6th, you should turn the ballot over to vote in the nonpartisan section and VOTE YES ON PROPOSAL 3.

All the details after the jump.

The last of the truly reasonable Michigan Republicans…

When I was just a lad and an aspiring activist, I volunteered for a group called “The Three O’Clock Lobby”. It was a youth-run, youth advocacy group and we endeavored to make sure the voice of young people was represented in policy-making, law-making, and government in general.

It was during my time there that I first met Governor William Milliken when I and another young person asked him to wear a button saying “I support youth participation” at a celebration of the International Year of the Child (this event is actually mentioned in the Wikipedia article.) Milliken was not only a really nice and sweet man, he was a listener and he was reasonable. Considered a moderate, a man with his approach to leadership and governance would have no home in the Republican Party today, especially not in Michigan. William Milliken was willing to compromise and there’s no compromising in today’s Republican Party.

Today, Professor Bridget McCormack, candidate for the Michigan Supreme Court, announced that she has received the endorsement of William Milliken. It’s a clear sign of where things are in Michigan today, politically-speaking.

More after the jump.

An excellent candidate interviewed by an excellent blogger

Ypsilanti blogger (and my good friend) Mark Maynard of the most-excellent MarkMaynard.com recently interviewed Dr. Syed Taj, candidate for Michigan’s 11th Congressional District. After Thaddeus McCotter resigned his seat in disgrace after his campaign staff engaged in egregious election fraud, Dr. Taj found himself in a race against Tea Party activist Kerry Bentivolio and white supremacist Daniel Johnson. Dr. Taj is an excellent Democrat and, with some good fortune and good Democratic turnout, is likely to be the next Congressman from MI-11.

After the jump, you’ll find Part 1 of Mark’s interview with Dr. Taj with a link to Parts 2 & 3.

Last chance!!!

Today is the last day of our fourth quarter fundraiser and your last chance to enter the drawing for a set of two signed photomosaic posters of President Obama. We’ve spent the week making the case for your financial support. Now it’s up to you to decide if you’re willing to be part of supporting what we do here.

Details about the drawing and how you can contribute after the jump.

Another superb candidate for the State Supreme Court in Michigan

Connie Marie Kelley is currently a judge in the Wayne County Circuit Court. She was endorsed and nominated by the Michigan Democratic Party for the Michigan Supreme Court along with Bridget Mary McCormack (interview HERE) and Shelia Johnson (interview HERE.)

Like the other two MDP-endorsed candidates for the state’s highest court, Judge Kelley comes from a background that makes her unique suited and qualified to be a state Supreme Court justice. She has spent her career advocating for clients as an attorney and making the justice system more accessible for those who use it as a judge. She has represented a wide variety of clients including victims of domestic violence, those who have experienced discrimination, and workers who have been treated unfairly by their employers. In her personal life, she has seen the impact that drug abuse can have on families and has used that experience to help young people find other paths, serving as a mentor and teacher to young people from urban areas.

The full interview is after the jump.

This is hard work – your support helps make it possible

With Election Day right around the corner, things are in full swing at Eclectablog. In addition to our daily drumbeat to re-elect President Obama and to do everything in our power to keep Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan as far from the reins of power as possible, we’re also bringing you information about the candidates and ballot initiatives that will appear on the ballot. These are rehashes of articles others have written — these are interviews done by us and analysis by us — the type of original content you’ve come to expect from Eclectablog.

Some of the exciting things coming up this week and information on how to make a contribution to help us keep things going after the jump.

We’ve seen this type of thing before..

Reader Greg S. sent me a link to this astonishingly creepy video from a group that calls themselves “im2moro” (“I’m tomorrow”, get it?) It has a bunch of teenagers imploring adult voters to vote to preserve conservative values by electing conservative politicians. But it goes way beyond that. It’s so over the top that it reminds me of the type of propaganda you’d expect from the Third Reich Nazis, brainwashing children into a passionate and unquestioning nationalism.

The video and commentary after the jump.