Why would anyone vote Republican? Well, here are 10 reasons.

1. You are a bigot

It's true that not all Republicans are bigots. But if you ARE a bigot, the Republican party will be much more your group than the Democratic party. Remember that there are lots of ways to be a bigot: You could be a racist, a homophobe, an Islamophobe, or lots of other things.

2. You like eating, drinking and breathing poison.

Many Republicans are calling for or voting for shrinking or eliminating agencies that protect us against poison. They seem to think that the corporations will do the right thing, without any pressure from the government. Uh huh. Read The Jungle.  Look at the way Monsanto is hiding facts about Round Up. Look at food safety and outbreaks of E. Coli.  

Corporations exist to make money. They will do so any way they can. The government needs to stop them from doing so in ways that hurt people.

3. You think the rich don't have enough money

The idea that giving more money to rich people (via tax breaks) will help poor people is nonsensical and has been shown wrong time and again in history. Huge tax breaks for the rich (a la George Bush) don't work.

4. You don't support our veterans

The Iraq and Afghanistan Veteran's Association (IAVA) rates every member of congress on how well they support our veterans.  In the Senate, 9 people got A or A+: All were Democrats. 30 got D or F: 29 Republicans and one Democrat.  More on this

5. You like big deficits

Since the end of WW II the ratio of debt to GDP for the nation has gone down in 9 administrations (3 Republican and 6 Democratic) and up in 7 administrations (6 Republican and 1 Democratic).  The largest increases by this measure were GW Bush's 2nd term; GHW Bush, and Reagan's first term. The largest decreases were the three terms right after the end of WWII (Truman and Eisenhower). The last decrease under a Republican was in Eisenhower's 2nd term

source

6. You don't believe in free speech.

The American Civil Liberties Union is the premier defender of our civil liberties, including the right to free speech.  That's free speech for EVERYONE; from Nazis to Marxists to Fred Phelps to anyone else. They rate politicians, including governors, senators and representatives.  12 people got a 100 rating: All were Democrats. 65 people got a score of less than 10: All were Republicans. Only 6 Democrats got a score under 50 (Joe Donnelly,  Michael Ross, Collin Peterson, Joseph Shuler, Mark Critz and David Boren). Only 2 Republicans got scores over 50 (Olympia Snowe and Mark Kirk)  Full list

7. You like big government

The Republicans like to claim they are against big government. It's a lie. They only object when government helps people. But they are supporters of the Patriot Act; they want the government to say who you can marry; they want the government to forbid abortion; they want the government to be able to spy on you without restraint. Unfortunately, many Democrats agree with them on some of these, but to find opposition to these big government ideas, you have to look to the Democrats.

8. You want government to hurt people, but not help them

This is really just a summation of some other points.

9. You are greedy, short sighted and rich

You really have to be all three for this to work.

If you're rich but not short-sighted, you know that, in the long run, when there is huge income inequality, it leads to things like stock market crashes and revolution, and everyone loses.  In a revolution, it is often the rich who lose most.

If you're rich but not greedy, you recognize that helping others is a good thing, and that the government assuring that people have a safety net is a good thing as well.

10. You like torture

The Democrats don't exactly shine here, but the Republicans are much worse.  It was, after all, Dick Cheney who bragged in his memoir about being a war criminal. It was Don Rumsfeld who opined that a problem in Abu Ghraib was that they weren't torturing prisoners enough.  And it is mostly Democrats who have objected to torture.

Torture is wrong.  It's also stupid. It doesn't work. People who are tortured will say ANYTHING (true or not) that they thing their torturers want to hear.

The middle class is at a tipping point, and it won't last another generation if we don't boldly change course now.

The surest path to the middle class for American workers is with unions. The security and strength of a union job means that workers can have good pay, health care, and a voice at work.

Today our country celebrates Labor Day in honor of the working people who fought for our rights to regular hours, fair pay, and a decent living. For decades, the labor movement propped up the middle class in America by ensuring a level playing field for workers.

There are many reasons for the growing inequality in our economy, but perhaps the most significant reason for the disappearing middle class is that the rights of workers to join together and collectively bargain for better wages, benefits, and working conditions have been severely undermined.

That is why this fall I will introduce a bill in Congress whose sole purpose is to restore and encourage workers' rights to bargain for better wages, benefits, and working conditions. It's called the Workplace Democracy Act, and if it is made law, it will help rebuild the middle class.

Click here to celebrate Labor Day by signing the petition to support the Workplace Democracy Act.

Workers need unions because there are people working for minimum wage, barely able to afford to put food on the table — if even that. There are people whose jobs are dangerous, or even life-threatening, who can't speak up for workplace safety for fear of being fired. And there are countless people working without sick days or even health insurance.

Unions change that equation. When workers have unions, they are no longer afraid to speak up. They have a clear path to getting health care, sick days, basic safety precautions, and better pay. They don't have to live in fear of their employers, and they can work to provide for their families.

That is unfortunately far from the reality that exists today. Under the current law, it is incredibly easy for corporations to prevent workers from joining unions. One in five workers who try to form a union today will be fired for doing so. And half of all employers threaten to close or relocate their businesses if workers elect to form a union.

But there's effectively no deterrence for when companies do break the law. The penalties are far too weak, and there is no incentive to stop corporations from dragging their feet when workers want to negotiate contracts.

The Workplace Democracy Act changes that equation. Our bill would:

1. Ensure companies can’t prevent workers from getting a first contract.
2. Make it easier for workers to form unions through a majority sign up process.
3. Strengthen the enforcement when corporations break the law.

This is a commonsense idea that will help our economy and rebuild the middle class. Can you say you support it?

For Labor Day, join me in standing with working people. Click here to say you support the Workplace Democracy Act.

Thank you for your support.

In solidarity,

Bernie Sanders

Paid for by Bernie 2016

PO Box 905 - Burlington VT 05402 United States - (855) 4-BERNIE

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Sixty elected members of the federal government have now reported having made the decision not to run in the upcoming next election! 

Besides all the tear jerking that politicians have been giving about retiring, here is something else to consider. Amazing! It's a very high number compared to previous elections. Some of them tell us that it's for family reasons, others for their desire to serve their fellow citizens in other fields and many other great stories to make us cry.

Politics is the art of looking good !

We suggest that these stories do not weigh heavily in the face of the following explanation: 

Coming at the end of 2015 a change in the pension for MP's ensures that the age of full retirement for an MP having served at least 6 years, will no longer be 55 years but 65 years. Thus any MP not yet 65 and who wants to benefit from the present pension scheme need only not run in the next election and thus live 10 years longer with government pensions of over 100,000/year.

For an elected MP approaching 55 and who is not running , that means about $1 million that he/she would not receive should he/she run and win again. One should also add the severance premium (between 80,000 and $ 125,000) upon his/her departure.

We understand better now these sudden family emergencies, appreciate the desire to advance his/her career in a government job or a committee of some sort and have two or three salaries, and possibly two or three pensions.

Not bad as a justification not to run, don't you think?

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For most people, an attack from the fourth-richest (and perhaps most politically conniving) men in America would slow them down. But instead Greenwald, who became interested in the powerful duo when he read Jane Mayer's 2010 New Yorker profile, decided to double down, and began work on "The Koch Brothers Exposed: 2014 Edition." The update, which is now available free online, is centered on their influence in (and outpouring of money since) the Citizens UnitedSupreme Court decision. While researching and producing it with his small staff at Brave New Films, Greenwald says he was "surprised by not just the sheer numbers, but the extraordinary lengths they go to legally to hide the amounts they're giving." Here, three of the fights to which these undocumented millions flow:

Suppressing the Minimum Wage 

Not only do the Koch brothers not want to raise the minimum wage – now a federal $7.25 – they say it creates a "culture of dependency" and would like to see it abolished altogether. "One of the facts I've been most struck by is that it would take a full-time minimum-wage earner 76 years to make $1.8 million," says Greenwald. "Or, about what each Koch brother earns in an hour." But bottom lines are more important than bottom workers for the Kochs – since the early 1990s, they've given at least $23.3 million to think tanks that have published over 4,000 articles, papers, studies, and media projects targeting the minimum wage. "They want to abolish the concept of minimum wage," Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) said at the film's D.C. premiere. "So people can work for free."

Breaking Unions

"Really, what we would like to see is to take the unions out at the knees, so they don't have the resources to fight," says Scott Hagerstrom, the Michigan director of Americans for Prosperity – a group heavily funded by the Kochs – in a damning clip from the film. And it seems to sum up the Kochs' approach to unions: Americans for Prosperity were integral to the 2011 union-busting fight in Wisconsin, and American Legislative Exchange Council (or ALEC, which works closely with the brothers) has drafted the model anti-union legislation used to slash collective bargaining rights for workers in 36 states. "They do not want to have safety regulations," says Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, in the film. "They do not want workers to be able to negotiate wages and benefits."

Read Rolling Stone's feature on the GOP war on voting

Disenfranchising Voters

During the 2012 election, an organization called True the Vote called itself a "citizen-led effort to ensure free and fair elections." Their tactic? Placing mostly white "poll-watchers" in polling places, many of them in minority areas, which led to complaints of voter intimidation. The funding came from Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity. What's worse, ALEC, which counts roughly 20 percent of all state legislators as members, also drafted a model Voter ID bill and used its ranks to disseminate it across the country. Now, 41 states have introduced more than 180 such bills, which could mean that over 21 million people could be denied their most basic right as a citizen. "The reason that you target somebody's voting rights," Ben Jealous, the former head of the NAACP, says in the film, "is it makes it easier to take away the rest of their rights. You come for that first, and the whole house of cards starts to fall."