If You Cast Only Two Votes...

The title of this blog entry is also the title of the Chicago Tribune's lead editorial this morning. In it the editorial board urges voters here in Illinois (and specifically in Cook County) to cast ballots for Judy Baar Topinka and Tony Peraica. As several of my fellow progressives have mentioned, there is little love in this blog for Rod Blagojevich and Todd Stroger, and it would not be the end of the world if Topinka and Peraica won their races for the chief executive offices in the state of Illinois and Cook County respectively. Topinka is a social moderate and a fiscal conservative, and while she is a member of the Rethugs, and was the head of the IL GOP two years ago, she lobbied hard against Alan Keyes being placed on the ballot, and conspicuously DIDN'T campaign with or for him against Barack Obama. Tony Peraica is a much less socially moderate candidate than Topinka, but he has little-to-no power to change social policy. However, he figures to have enough authority to cleanse county government of the pathological corruption engendered and enabled by Cook County democrats. In this way, he runs closest to Forrest Claypool, the man who SHOULD have won the primary last Spring, and who should have been cruising to victory tomorrow.
So I have no real argument with either of these votes.

But I do have an argument with the hypocritical way in which the Tribune reaches this conclusion. At the local level, they tell voters to ask themselves who will most efficiently care for those most vulnerable. Then they ask who will best use tax dollars to serve the public trust instead of handing out rewards to crooks and cronies. But at the national level, they led the cheers for the McLiar/Vader junta, stating that the phony War on Turr (tm) trumps every other consideration - including trampling the constitution, turning the USA into an international pariah, needlessly putting our nation's armed forces in the line of fire, spending our children's inheritance, rewarding incompetent politically connected individuals with positions of power, and enriching a select few companies and cronies with billions of unearned (and unaccounted for) dollars. As venial as the Blagojevichs and the Strogers of the political world are, they don't have the blood of thousands of soldiers on their hands, nor have they irresponsibly published the plans for building an atomic weapon in Arabic, making it easier for well-financed nut cases in the jihadist camp to attack us and our interests.

So, I have a different request of those of you and those two votes. Please cast your first ballot for the Democrat running for the House of Representatives in your district. The House is where all appropriations bills begin, and we have six years of experience to tell us that a GOP-controlled congress will NEVER rein in spending, a GOP controlled congress will never investigate corruption, malfeasance, or incompetence within the executive branch, a GOP controlled congress will not stand up and stop funding the Iraq debacle.
With your second vote, if you live in a state with an open senate seat, please vote for the Democrat. Please help to restore a measure of sanity to an insane administration. Please look at what the next two years figures to bring under GOP control. Is staying the course an appetizing option?

Repudiate the politics of fear-mongering, hate and callous disregard for America's international standing. Help vote the GOP out of power in the congress and let's begin to shine a light on the political process NATIONALLY.