URLs du Silver Lining

Or as the punchline to the old joke has it, "there must be a pony in here somewhere."

  • Don't know the joke? It was allegedly President Reagan's favorite, so check it out.

  • For one thing, as Michelle (ma belle) points out: we won't be hearing about Diebold voting machines stealing elections. Not for a couple years, anyway.

  • At Cato, Jim Harper notes with glee the electoral demise of many New Hampshire Republicans who favored "REAL ID", a foot in the door for a national ID card. (Previous Pun Salad posts on REAL ID here, here, and here.)

    I'm not as convinced as Jim that REAL ID issues played a major part in the local campaigns. But still …

  • Not only did defeated NH Congressman Charlie Bass like REAL ID, he also cosponsored the dreadful Unlawful Internet Gaming Act. Radley Balko gloats here.

    Also, as near as I can tell, not an actual major issue in the campaign. But still …

  • Also at Cato, Andrew Coulson detects signs that Democrats could become the party of educational liberty, noting that "several prominent Democrats" have come out in favor of education tax credits. It would be a classic move to steal a putatively Republican issue—not that the Republicans have done much with it.

    I'm also skeptical here, given the joined-at-the-hip relationship between the Democrats and teacher unions; Andrew kind of handwaves past that issue. But still …

  • It seems that opposition to Affirmative Action is an issue that neither major party wants to steal; nobody likes it, except, well, actual voters. As you might expect, John Rosenberg at Discriminations is prolific about the 58%-42% victory of the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative. Most notable for our theme today is this post, where he points out
    In Michigan, the Republican nominee for governor, Dick DeVos, and the Republican nominee for the Senate, Mike Bouchard, both opposed the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative (MCRI). Presumably they were afraid of being called racist, or something.

    Well, I'll call them something: stupid. They both lost, 56% to 42%, and the Republicans lost control the state House for the first time in 8 years and almost lost the Senate …. Meanwhile, MCRI, with which Republicans were afraid to be affiliated, won with 58% of the vote.

Official Notice

Pun Salad has lost patience with Speaker Pelosi.