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" Democrats in Virginia are going to go to the polls tomorrow to elect a new governor. Many of them are going to affix socket wrenches to their nostrils in order to vote for career corporate &amp;#039;ho Terry McAuliffe because...holy crap, THE COOCH!!!! This is not a position with which to argue seriously. This country cannot allow one-fiftieth of itself to fall under the control of a bizarre vaginophobe who spends his entire life being concerned that someone, somewhere is having an orgasm of which he doesn&amp;#039;t approve. But this doesn&amp;#039;t make McAuliffe&amp;#039;s a progressive triumph, nor should it be treated as such. In related news, Charlie Crist has decided to run for governor of Florida as a Democratic politician. And then there&amp;#039;s this guy, who&amp;#039;s full of big talk about how the Republican party left him, poor soul, and he&amp;#039;s not having it any more. &amp;quot;Enough is enough,&amp;quot; says Jason R. Thigpen - formerly a Republican candidate seeking election to the U.S. House in North Carolina&amp;#039;s 3rd Congressional District. &amp;quot;After discussing it with my wife and family, I&amp;#039;ve decided to run as a Democrat rather than a Republican. I simply cannot stand with a Party where its most extreme element promote hate and division amongst people. Nothing about my platform has, nor will it change. The government shutdown was simply the straw that broke the camels back. I guess being an American just isn&amp;#039;t good enough anymore and I refuse to be part of an extremist movement in the GOP that only appears to thrive on fear and hate mongering of anyone and everyone who doesn&amp;#039;t walk their line. Nope. Sorry, dude. It isn&amp;#039;t that easy. A lot about your &amp;quot;platform&amp;quot; has to change because, allowing it to remain the same, is to argue implausibly that the current Republican insanity began in 2010 when, in fact, the current state of conservatism is the inevitable end of the prion disease that Republicanism contracted when it ate the supply-side locoweed in one gulp and washed it down with fundamentalist religious Sterno. For example, this has to change: A strong country that so many of us helped build and protect is being squandered by our representatives in Washington. Government deficits and an increasing national debt have been emblematic of our Congress and White House. Our economic standing as a leading world country is in peril and so is the future well-being of our children and grandchildren. The federal government must reduce spending, work to balance its budget and reduce the national debt. Government does not create jobs. Businesses, especially small businesses, create jobs. Economic growth can only be achieved by reducing the tax burden on businesses and individuals, reigning in out-of-control federal spending, and support policies promoting innovation and entrepreneurship. The federal government does not have to reduce spending and the deficit is under control. These are Democratic positions. Want to be in the party? Got to take the antidote to the damaging policies you swallowed for your whole career. And this part? An ever expanding government is not what our forefathers intended. The restoration of individual and state rights is paramount in the spirit and form of a federal system as prescribed by our Constitution. Democrats do not prattle in such a way as to look as though they are auditioning for a speaker&amp;#039;s slot at a League of the South smoker. You want to be a Democrat? Then you don&amp;#039;t just have to stop saying stuff like this. You have to actively repudiate it. It is not enough to say that &amp;quot;...the vast majority of Republicans are wonderful, hard-working people that don&amp;#039;t agree with those radical nut-jobs either but unfortunately the extremists in the party, with their &amp;#039;burn it all down&amp;#039; philosophy, appear to be the ones turning out the majority of voters in the primaries and mid-term elections. And I want the people to know there is a choice.&amp;quot; You believe that? That&amp;#039;s all this is about? Then run as a Republican and rely on those wonderful, hard-working Republicans to carry you through. You want to be a Democrat? It should take more than that. Abandoning the philosophy of states rights should be fundamental to that, especially if you&amp;#039;re as vexed about voter-suppression as you claim to be. The rise of modern Jim Crowism in the form of voter-suppression is based fundamentally on a states rights philosophy. Can&amp;#039;t take both positions. Sorry. I fear that we&amp;#039;re going to see more of this, and that the Democratic party will be so happy to have &amp;quot;competitive&amp;quot; candidates in certain unlikely geographic areas. The Democrats have enough trouble with its Joe Manchins already. There should be some vetting being done here, and some re-education, if necessary. It isn&amp;#039;t enough to do the paperwork. You have to swallow the antidote, too. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a25713/democratic-party-competitive-candidates-110413/>