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Really. Unless you can show me that Indiana voted with paper ballots hand-counted at the precinct level, or with electronics run on open source code with paper ballot backup and strong security and auditing controls, you have no basis for determining how the state voted. One LTE, or even a host of anecdotal items on how ignorant Indianans are--which may well be influenced by your fear of, and consequence focus on, incidents of ignorance, stupidity and other pro-Bush behavior--does not make a "red" state. Only COUNTED votes, in a TRANSPARENT election, can do that.
Keep in mind, also, that wingers may be emboldened by the impression that the war profiteering corporate news monopolies have created that they are, somehow, a majority. Thus, you may see more winger bumper stickers, or you may hear what seem like a lot of wingers on the radio. Question these impressions and illusions. Know that the corporate news monopolies are giving the rightwing a BIG TRUMPET, way out proportion to their numbers. I am speaking generally, of the nation. I know this to be true in general terms. (Issue polls, over the last two years, for instance, show a great progressive majority, opposed to every Bush policy, foreign and domestic, way up in the 60% to 70% range.) You may have a particular winger problem in Indiana. I don't know. But I wouldn't assume it to be true. And I would be wary of fear in making this determination--and of the demoralization and disempowerment that many progressives feel because they don't realize that they are the majority.
Dealing with wingers and other stupid or ill-informed people, if they are truly in the majority, is one thing. But dealing with the ILLUSION that they are in the majority is quite a different political and educational problem. The first problem is a matter of educating THEM. But the second problem requires educating US--on election reform, on connecting with and organizing other progressives, and on resisting the illusions of the corporate news monopolies.
I think it's critically important that we diagnose the problem correctly, and strategize on the basis of reality and truth--not on what the news monopoliies want us to believe about what other Americans think.
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