Nevada Tea Partier’s Memory Hole

Courtesy of <a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_MiGzkgtdfmw/SsTwm6B8DVI/AAAAAAAAAWs/x-UNlHABjlo/s1600-h/Sharron+Angle+Senate.JPG">Dullard Mush</a>

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[UPDATE: A version of Sharron Angle’s “issues” page has been revived, misplaced commas and all. How long will it last??]

That Internet thing is mighty tricky for Republicans to master. Sharron Angle—Tea Partier, Oath Keepers supporter, anti-fluoride crusader, and new GOP candidate for Senate from Nevada—is already demonstrating her solidarity with party luminaries like Ted Stevens, George W. Bush, and the entire House Republican caucus by staging an epic Web fail of her own. In a possible bid to play down her more right-leaning, less mainstream views—which are bound to be a liability in a general election fight with Democratic Senate majority leader Harry Reid—Angle’s campaign website was scrubbed of its spiciest material. Previously, her site featured an “issues” page, where Angle champions nuclear waste while deriding the UN, the Department of Education, “Obamacare,” “illegals,” and “an unscientific hysteria over the man-caused global warming hoax.” That web page became inaccessible.

Unless, that is, you search for the cached page.

So, here, saved for posterity with annotations, are 11 top “issues” statements by Sharron Angle that should be remembered…or at least fact-checked…between now and November:

  • “Like a soldier going to war, Sharron Angle has the training and is battle tested.  Sharron Angle is fighting for her country, the Constitution of the United States and a free society.  Sharron Angle has a proven record that Nevadans and Americans can trust.  It is not what Sharron Angle says Sharron Angle will do, but what Sharron Angle has done and will continue to do.” [Sharron Angle is a lot like Chuck Norris that way.]
  • “Sharron Angle does not accept money from casinos and unions. Sharron Angle does not oppose casinos and unions but wants to avoid the perception, by voters, that these groups might put undue pressure on her, as a legislator. All of Sharron Angle’s U.S. Senate contributions come from individuals, and seventy-five percent of those contributions come from small donors.” [Sharron Angle apparently counts contributors like the Minuteman PAC, Citizens United, Republican Majority Campaign, and Gun Owners of America as “individuals.” Sharron Angle also decries any campaign finance reform as a limitation of “free political speech.”]
  • “Sharron Angle will work toward making a basket of commodities (metals, oil etc.) as a basis for maintaining the value of the U.S. currency.” [A novel twist on the populism of William Jennings Bryan: Putting the dollar on a gold, crude, porkbelly, and frozen-concentrated-orange-juice standard.]
  • “Every child has the right to read and reading should be taught using scientifically-based reading research which emphasizes alphabetic principles (phonics).” [No word yet on whether Sharron Angle also favors “scientifically-based” research to teach children science. Also, every child has the right to be taught to recognize a runon sentence.]
  • “Cap and Trade, which is based on an unscientific hysteria over the man-caused global warming hoax, steps over the constitutional boundaries of the federal government and is merely another way to tax the people.” [Sharron Angle must be sore at the Nixon and Ford administrations, whose EPA regulations laid the groundwork for cap-and-trade. Also, Sharron Angle probably doesn’t read MoJo‘s contributions at ClimateDesk.org.]
  • “Sharron Angle would legislate to repeal regulations that prohibit off shore drilling, drilling in ANWR and development of American owned petroleum resources…Sharron Angle would: Promote Nevada, as the nuclear energy capital of reprocessing spent fuels for the United States…[and] educate Nevadans and Americans, on the safe transportation of nuclear spent fuels since 1954 over 400 million miles without an accident.” [Sharron Angle will also educate herself on the safe transportation of offshore crude oil from the Gulf of Mexico, as well as the proper use of the comma.]
  • “Defunding ObamaCare is essential to the economic survival of the United States. The federal healthcare takeover offers no solutions to the cost issues or quality of care issues…Rationing healthcare will put huge segments of America’s population at risk.” [Sharron Angle may not realize that rationing isn’t mentioned in the health care legislation.]
  • “The U.N. has been captured by the far left and has become ineffective and costly.  The U.N. continually threatens U.S. sovereignty, with endless rhetoric and treaties and it has now become the ‘umpire’ on fraudulent science, such as global warming. The United State needs to withdraw from the United Nations and work solely with America’s willing allies.” [No word yet on what Sharron Angle would do with actual fraudulent umpires.]
  • “Sharron Angle supports an intensive physical presence on borders, including military assistance to help the Border Patrol do its job effectively…Sharron Angle opposes amnesty proposals, which send a ruinous signal that breaking the law is acceptable in the United States. “Illegals” must be discouraged from living comfortably within the U.S. borders. [Presumably, Sharron Angle will continue to permit “illegals” to live in the US uncomfortably. Which is good, since encountering an “intensive physical presence” on the border sounds painful.]
  • “Sharron Angle believes that the Federal Department of Education should be eliminated. The Department of Education is unconstitutional and should not be involved in education, at any level.” [Sharron Angle is proud to be endorsed by the Nevada Home School Network.]
  • “Sharron Angle is qualified for a concealed weapons permit.” [Translation: Sharron Angle is a Nevada state resident with no felony convictions. Phew!]

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

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