At the moment, Illinois progressive voters--better known as liberals--hold Governor Pat Quinn's fate in their hands. If Quinn falls on Tuesday, it won't be the Tea Party types who did him in--it will be progressives.
According to new poll data buried in the cross tabs, 7% of likely liberal voters are still, amazingly, undecided in the contest between Quinn and his ultra-conservative GOP rival State Senator Bill Brady from downstate Bloomington. That's twice the 3% of conservatives who are undecided, according to a October 21 poll by Rasmussen Reports.
Meanwhile, as those 7% of liberal voters are still playing coy another 7% are throwing their lot with steroid-popping, child support-skipping, and knife-wielding Scott Lee Cohen, whose chief claim on progressive sympathies is, apparently, not thrusting that knife into the throat of his ex-prostitute girlfriend, according to his 2005 arrest records.
Finally, 69% of self-identified "liberal" voters were backing Quinn while, staggeringly, 14% of liberals are playing footsie with Brady, favoring him over longtime progressive Quinn.
Huh?
Yep. Perhaps it would be helpful to remind progressive voters of the records and platforms of the two candidates on issues which liberals have long embraced.
On the question of abortion, Brady opposes a woman's right to choose even in cases of rape, incest, and when a woman's health is at risk. Quinn supports a woman's right to choose.
Regarding equal rights for all Illinois taxpayers, including those who happen to be gay or lesbian, Brady has sponsored multiple bills to amend the constitution to ban civil unions and gay marriage and has voted against a law to protect Illinois gay and lesbian taxpayers from hiring discrimination. Quinn supports civil unions and opposes employment discrimination against any Illinois taxpayer.
To help Illinois school children to meet the challenges of the technology revolution in the 21st century, Brady supports teaching creationism in local school districts. Quinn supports teaching evidence-based, scientific methods in schools.
On the issue of climate change, Brady has rejected the findings of the overwhelming body of scientific research that the phenomenon is produced by human activities. "No, I don't accept that premise, and it is wrong," he said at a Tea Party rally on November 9, 2009. Quinn is hailed as the "Green Governor" by the Illinois Sierra Club.
Ok, you get the idea.
To be fair, Brady has not been campaigning on an right-wing social agenda. In fact, he has claimed that his top priorities will be balancing Illinois' wildly unbalanced budget and energizing Illinois' wildly anemic economy.
Additionally, Brady, a 17-year legislative veteran, has pushed back on some of the Illinois Tea Party's harsher and loopier positions. Brady has loudly embraced immigration reform to the Illinois Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, recognizing a growing economy requires a growing work-force.
Moreover, he repudiated the intolerant ravings of a tea party member at an October 2 Illinois Tea Party rally in Springfield.
According to the State Journal-Register, Springfield realtor Stacy Barnett, a rally speaker, said "we are a Christian country," and that the country's problems are "because we took God out of our country. I rebuke socialism in the name of Jesus."
In under-reported remarks, Brady rejected Barnett's line.
The United State was "...founded on God and the principles of God, but we're a nation of multiple religions. One of the reasons this nation was created was to protect ... an individual's right to worship as they see fit," said Brady.
Virtually all Republican politicians have stood idly or have sat silently at endless Tea Party rallies where vapid, virulent, and intolerant rhetoric, the lingua franca of those events, has praised but ignorantly mauled the U.S. Constitution's founding principles into unrecognizable, undemocatic forms.
Brady spoke, on this occasion, constitutional truth to the mob.
Despite Brady's admirable remarks, it is important to note Pat Quinn was not at that rally in the first place. Not his cup of tea.
If progressive voters get their act together and vote for Quinn, they will be guaranteed a 21st century progressive era taking root in Illinois. If they fail to do so, they will be guaranteed that Quinn's term marks a historical footnote.
Follow David Ormsby on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@DavidOrmsby
I voted for Rich Whitney and couldn't feel better about it. If Quinn loses, it's his fault for not attracting progressives.
Democrats are running on fear of Republicans. They have nothing else to offer.
I'm voting for Rich Whitney.
"It is better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it."
Quinn has been ineffective and panders as much as any machine politician in the past. If Brady wins he won't be able to change much, but at least he may stand up to the Machine Democrats who are as bad as the Republicans.
I couldn't vote for Quinn or Brady. Rich Whitney got my vote, and the press he received for the typo on early voting machines may have helped him more than hurt him across the region.
Liberal voters are intelligent, so they are well aware of the fact that Brady's freakishly rightwing social views/beliefs are TOTALLY MEANINGLESS, given our state political system.
They are well aware that he would be a lone fundienuttbag in a staggeringly unsurmountable Democratic political system, so he will be 100% impotent in his ability to actually DO anything that could create & further legislation pertaining to abortion, gay/gender equality and/or religion in schools.
We/they KNOW this...we know that Brady KNOWS this, so they can (and ARE ) shove these issues aside & base their decisions solely on the other issues.
Of course, that boils down to "proven, ineffective leader & member of corrupt Blago regime & general hatred of our State government" (akin to the way the nation felt in 2008 re. the GOP) vs. "vague, unqualified loser with no plan or specifics on how he'll bail us out...but at least he's not an 'Illinois Democrat' & maybe he'll actually achieve SOMETHING"
Based on those descriptions alone, you can & should also be able to argue to liberals that Quinn is the better option.
But in trying to frame (and alter) their puzzling support of Brady in terms of his social beliefs, you (and the Quinn campaign) are really just insulting the intelligence of liberal & independent voters who know those beliefs mean squat.
puzzling.
The other paragraphs reflect an inability to play nice with people who see things differently. It's the equivalent of grabbing them by the shoulders and giving them a good shake in an effort to jar their brains loose. Which tends to make people defensive rather than getting them to listen.
Whatever happens in the election today, I hope that we can look for ways to get the winners to work together tomorrow. There's too much at stake.
But in paragraphs #1 & 7, I was speaking directly & solely to David Ormsby, who, given his bio, is/should be EXTREMELY astute in political discussion & analysis.
Instead, we got a progressive chiding other progressives with the condescending...and thus rather rude: "Perhaps it would be helpful to remind progressive voters of the records and platforms of the two candidates on issues which liberals have long embraced."
It's not that he didn't know and/or consider that progressives not firmly ensconced in Quinn's camp are aware of EVERY FACET of Brady's extremism & are choosing to ignore it (because they KNOW he can't act on his beliefs)...David is trying to hide this rationale from his readers & chalk it up to those voters simply being uninformed.
So, speaking on behalf of myself and the voters David's addressing...that I KNOW are well-informed...I found/find this piece rather disingenuous & insulting.
Quinn isn't a bad guy, by any means. He has had ideas that he wanted to put in place, but Madigan wasn't in favor of those particular changes, so Quinn got overruled. That made Quinn look incompetent from the beginning. Quinn got set up when Madigan and Cullerton decided to have Quinn make the budget cuts instead of the legislature passing a budget that included the cuts to human services.
In a back room, I think that Madigan and Cullerton decided that it was better to let Quinn get nailed by the voters than the legislators. As long as the legislature remains in the control of the Democrats, Brady can be one of the great do-nothing governors in Illinois history. Brady won't get his social agenda and he'll only get legislation that Madigan and Cullerton agree to. It will be obvious to the public that Brady has a nice office, makes speeches, and not much else.
In 2014, Lisa runs for governor and when she wins, Madigan retires.
Quinn is the sacrificial goat. He isn't particularly competent and has run an amateurish campaign. He'll be a footnote.
I like your article and I think you've hit it right on the head, at least from my point of view.
But your missing two things:
1) Promoting Quinn is useless. Most progressives aren't swayed by endorsements.
2) It's not Brady that's the problem, Whitney will be Quinn's downfall. And I assume that's why you've left him out of this article.