Soon-to-be Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell sounded words of reconciliation shortly after the midterm elections ended. He said that the American people want their elected leaders to govern and this is what both Parties should do.  He said that just because there is a divided government …”I don’t think it means [the American people] don’t want us to do anything.”

How ironic it is that the senator who, when he was Senate Minority Leader, said that his number one priority was to make President Obama a one-term president had an epiphany and now believes that Democrats and Republicans should work together and govern. Was this sudden awakening brought on by the realization that he will soon be the Senate Majority Leader?  Was the ordinary but striking occurrence that took place the realization that he is the one who must now seek common ground between the Democratic and Republican senators and not just block or obstruct and engage in finger-pointing if he harbors any hope of a meaningful legacy as Senate Majority Leader?

It is also worth noting that these supposed words of conciliation did not come without a rider. There was a warning attached that said if you take steps to unilaterally do anything to move forward on trying to correct the immigration problem it will poison the well and be like waving a red flag in front of a bull.  That meant that any potential cooperation from Republicans would be lost.

It appears that the well has been poison for the past six years because the Republicans certainly haven’t cooperated with President Obama on any initiatives that he put forward. On the contrary, they have balked at supporting him on things that they regularly supported in the past and even withdrawn their support for bills they themselves initiated once he decided to support them.

Senator McConnell said that he would fix the Senate so that it operates again. What a curious thing to say when he worked so hard to break it.  He was not alone in those efforts but there is no getting around the fact that he was the minority leader when he said that his number one priority was to make President Obama a one-term president.

But some would say that what Senator McConnell said is behind us and the American people have spoken and given the Republicans a mandate, which was indicated by way of their resounding victory in the midterm elections. Wait a minute.  Doesn’t it still matter what percentage of the American people actually voted in the midterm elections?  Doesn’t it matter that there were new voter ID laws put into place in some states and some people who had been able to vote since the day that they became eligible voters were unable to vote in this midterm election?  Doesn’t it matter that voting days were reduced in some states, voting hours were cut back and there were fewer polling places available?

There is no doubt that fewer people vote in midterm elections than in presidential elections. And there is no doubt that a cross-section of those who vote in the midterm elections is less representative of America as a whole than a cross-section of those who vote in the presidential elections.  This is by no means an excuse for those who fail to exercise their right to vote during midterm elections; nor is it meant to in any way demean the voice of those who did vote; but to claim a mandate from the American people based on the results of the 2014 midterm elections without a caveat is quite a stretch.

Eulus Dennis

The 2014 midterm elections are over. Although ballots are still being counted in some of the close races and there will be at least one state that will hold a run-off in December because neither candidate for the US senate received at least 50% of the votes cast, the damage has been done, or the repair has been made – depending on whether your choice of color is red or blue.  Red was the color of choice for the majority of those who actually took the time to vote.

Speaker Boehner said that, and I paraphrase here, by electing so many Republicans to office and kicking out the Democrats who supported President Obama, Americans sent a clear message that Obamacare is a failure and they want it repealed. What?  Most Republicans did not talk specifically about the Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare) during their campaign.

What they talked about was Ebola, ISIS, people entering the country illegally, the beheading of innocent Americans and any other negative things that were occurring leading up to the midterm elections and laid the blame for what they called the poor handling of those situations squarely at President Obama’s feet. Then they tied any Democrat who was up for reelection to the President and what they labeled as his failures and implied that these candidates too were just as responsible because they had voted in favor of many of the issues that President Obama supported.

That sounds more like fear mongering to me. And it has nothing at all to do with Obamacare, which is a law that helped many Americans who had no health insurance because they could not afford it to finally be able to get health coverage.  It is still helping them and offers hope to those who are still without coverage.

It could have offered hope and help to even more people if Republican controlled states had not refused to expand their Medicaid programs and had it not been for all of the negative messaging and predictions of failure by Republican lawmakers before and after Obamacare became law. Good news though for all of those Americans who Speaker Boehner says want this law repealed; he has vowed to continue his efforts to repeal or destroy it.

The US Supreme Court has recently agreed to hear the case regarding Obamacare and for some of us that is a scary proposition. The Court did not have to agree to hear this case but the fact that they did means that at least four of the Justices agreed to hear it.  Even if they rule against the administration in a way that does not strike down the entire law, they can still gut it by ruling against vital parts of it.  Remember the voting rights ruling?

There are those groups who have key unresolved issues at stake who turned out in very low numbers. Many of the eligible voters who turned out in low numbers or did not vote at all were among those who heavily criticized President Obama as the midterms approached and made inflammatory statements like ‘the President has thrown us under the bus.’  Did those same voters throw the President under the bus?  Where were they during the midterm elections?

No matter your political affiliation, if you fail to vote, it does not matter in the least! My message and admonition to all eligible voters is that we need to make a commitment to ourselves right now to always vote; and not just during the Presidential election cycle.  And because I am a Democrat and believe that the Democratic Party has the winning message that will bring our country together, lead us forward and help it and all Americans to prosper; I admonish all Democrats – especially those who did not vote during the 2014 midterm elections, to resolve to always vote from now on.

Democrats are in a deep hole that it will probably take more than a decade to dig ourselves out of because Republicans now totally control at least 29 states. That gives them a massive amount of power to control things at the state level and, make no mistake; this is not a small thing.  That is why Democratic voters must gear-up now for 2016.  Winning then will be the best way to stop the Republican onslaught and reverse the ill-advised direction in which they are steering America.

Eulus Dennis

I was cautiously optimistic when the polls opened on November 4, 2014 but I became more depressed as the day progressed. By the time the polls began to close in state after state, I found myself staring blankly at the television screen and wondering why so many people fail to vote.

The percentage of eligible voters who actually vote in the Presidential elections is bad enough but the percentage that vote during the midterm elections is even worse. To be frank, the percentage in both election cycles is abysmal.  How can we be so nonchalant about such a prized right and toss it into the trash – that’s exactly what we do when we do not vote – the same way we would toss out a useless scrap of paper?

People in other countries who are not allowed to vote for the leaders of their choice would love to have the privilege of deciding who will lead their country. America regularly advocates on behalf of those in foreign countries who are fighting for democracy, which includes the right to vote.  There have been times when, in addition to applying political pressure, we have even put Americans in harm’s way to assist those who were struggling to establish a democratic society.

We have insisted that elections in these countries be fair and above board and that there be no election tampering during the election process. Yet, we struggle with keeping our own elections process fair and above board; if we do not, it certainly appears that we do.

There are a number of situations that occurred during these 2014 midterm elections that didn’t pass the smell test but it is very unlikely that anyone can really prove that there was a skunk in the woodpile. In other words, although there were some very curious occurrences in some of the states and it looked like someone was cheating, the likelihood of actually proving that they were is miniscule.  Time and again Florida has been a perfect example of these occurrences.

Pundits express a number of reasons as to why the Democrats took such a shellacking on November 4th. They said things like; it was President Obama’s low poll numbers, the economy didn’t improve, the economy was improving too slowly, although the economy improved – it improved too slowly and most of the American people did not feel its impact upon their daily lives, President Obama has been a weak and ineffective leader and blah blah blah blah blah.

The Republican Party defined all of these things and Democrats throughout the country swallowed it hook, line, and sinker. Instead of campaigning on all of the positive things that the Democrats and President Obama had achieved – he honored the will of the American people, they ran away from him and their accomplishments!  Politicians; what can you say about them?  Or perhaps the question should be what can’t you say about them?

The fact of the matter is that by deserting the President and refusing to have him campaign on their behalf did much more harm than good.

As eligible voters, we played a key part in this shellacking too. Maybe things still would have gone in favor of the Republicans in a big way but, at least, we could feel comfortable in knowing that this was what the majority of the American people wanted and that it did not reflect mostly what the extreme right-wing or left-wing of that party wanted.  I say this with a reasonable degree of confidence that I do not appear to avid Republicans as just another sore loser because of the abysmal percentage of eligible voters who actually vote in the midterm elections.

Those of us who did not take the time to exercise our privilege to vote do not have a legitimate reason to complain about whatever comes next as our newly elected officials unite with their incumbents and begin to exercise their power. The right to vote might be treated like a trivial thing now by some of us as long as we know that we have that right, but let someone even try to take it away from us and I have no doubt that our attitude regarding the franchise would change real fast!  The frightening thing about that is that by reacting instead of being proactive we could find ourselves in a harrowing situation.

Eulus Dennis

Verizon, AT&T tracking their users with ‘supercookies’ – The Washington Post.

Click on the title to read the article in The Washington Post.

At a time when all of our elected – and former elected – officials should be circling the wagons, around the leader of the most powerful country in the world as they have regularly done in the past, they have deserted him. Why do these leaders hate President Obama so much?

This is the wrong thing for our leaders to do even if they feel that their reasons for loathing him are valid. Unfortunately, if you asked those who feel this way to explain why they harbor such visceral feelings for this President, most of them probably could not even begin to tell you why.  The saddest thing about the situation is that those statesmen in the Republican Party, who once commanded everyone’s respect whether they were friend or adversary, have become political puppets.

These difficult and divisive times surrounding our current situation with the Ebola crisis are challenging enough without any additional pressure; especially pressure that is manufactured by those who should be assisting in circling the wagons. What has happened to what used to be a proud Party with so much to offer to make our country better?  Where are all of the statesmen?  For too long already we have been losing legitimate meaningful conservative ideas to foolish politicians who want to do nothing more than obstruct or shut down the federal government.

It’s time for someone – anyone, who is a true statesman in the Republican Party to step up and at least make an effort to prevent those on the fringes from stealing the Party from true conservatives. Instead of going along with those who are fear mongering and openly using the Ebola crisis for political gain, accusing our President of providing poor leadership and bungling the handling of this critical situation, why won’t any Republican statesman step up and do the right thing?  Why won’t any of them lead by example instead of just pointing out what they say is a lack of leadership on his part and try to help calm the fears of the American people?  The fact that the 2014 midterm elections is just three days away is not a legitimate excuse to remain silent; it only serves to make those making these accusations look like hypocrites.

I refuse to believe or accept that all Republicans condone what is happening in their Party right now. But their silence is all but unbearable.  Allowing this to happen, unchallenged, in their Party around the country only provides fodder for the situation to eventually spiral completely out of control.  This problem demands the attention of courageous Republican statesmen.  If it is not addressed soon irreparable damage might be done and ultimately bring about a one Party political system which would be detrimental to all Americans.

Eulus Dennis

Our country’s political system still is not functioning equitably for all participants yet its landscape has not changed in many years because too many of us have failed in our responsibility as American citizens. We can, and must be the catalyst that brings about a tectonic shift in politics that will include a shift in its primary driver.  Young Americans must be the foundation of this catalyst because they are our future.

Hopefully, this change will cause us to refocus on those things that made America great in the first place.  Once this is accomplished, it should help catapult America back to the number one position that we held in the world in all of those areas in which we were once dominant.

Money has long been the primary driver in our political system but, since the US Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, it has all but morphed into the personification of the god of reelection.  As a result, politicians are relegated to all but non-stop fund raising in their effort to be elected or reelected.  And as voters, we are just as responsible for this circumstance as they are.  We allowed money to become king of politics by shunning our responsibility as citizens.

Because of the many roadblocks that have been constructed to either prevent or obstruct us from voting, we decided that rather than confront those inconveniences we would just stay at home and not vote.  What a copout!  Many of us long ago decided, “my vote won’t count anyway so, why should I waste my time?”

How sad it is that so many of us have come to this conclusion.  There is no doubt that the top one percent of Americans loves this.  Ironically, because of their greed, they fail to realize that many of the potential bills that have been stifled and prevented from becoming law because of this “prevent or obstruct” tactic will ultimately have a negative impact on them and, potentially, bring about their ruin.

At the same time that I accuse many among the one percent of being so greedy that they fail to realize that their unwillingness to share the wealth is charting a path to their own ruin, I must also say that I can understand why some of them are defiant.  They don’t want to write another check because they genuinely feel that they are already doing their fair share.

Although they are rich they feel that they worked hard to get where they are – justifiably so, and deserve to be there.  They don’t want to be forced to give some portion of that wealth away simply because they can afford to do so.  This is exactly why we need dialogue in Washington instead of gridlock.  Dialogue at least provides the potential to hammer out a solution.

Still, the 99% must step up and live up to our responsibility.  Rather than crying in our morning cup of coffee and complaining about our situation and what politicians and the government should be doing to assure that we can prosper if we work hard, we must resolve ourselves to fulfill our responsibility as American citizens.

Something must be done to take big money out of politics; and election reform can play a big part in making this happen.  Let’s not conduct ourselves as lambs being led to the slaughter.  Why should one percent of the country be allowed to bully the other 99%?

The one percent should no doubt have their say and get their fair share of tax breaks in order to stimulate the creation of jobs to help improve America’s economic recovery and sustain it.   But we must be aware that they are not the only ones who impact on the potential recovery and America’s ability to sustain it.  We must convince them that it is in our mutual best interest for them to more equitably share the wealth.  If we cannot convince them to do this then we must force them to do it by pressuring our elected officials to do the right thing through our vote.

We have to realize that the highly publicized rhetoric of politicians is the reason why the media’s main focus is on the impact that the one percent can have on the recovery.  It is also important to realize that the one percent, which is virtually synonymous with big money, plays a major role in determining whether or not politicians are elected or reelected and this is why the 99% is quietly pushed aside, especially during election cycles, and temporarily ignored.  It is under these circumstances that self-preservation, driven by the god of reelection, takes precedence.

Let us first step up to our responsibility as voters instead of just complaining and crying in our morning cup of coffee.  After that, perhaps we will be able to figure out a way to force our elected officials to come up with election reform that will take big money out of the election process and thereby eliminate their need to constantly rely on fundraising.

Eulus Dennis – author, Operation Rubik’s Cube and Living Between The Line