Proposition Mail Call

Received some interesting material in the mail box over the last few days...

...a nice little card (6X11?) from the people in favor of Prop 101. It would limit property taxes to a level based on 2005 tax rates.

It's got a nice picture of a smiling family, and another of a happy older couple. It's got nice list of reasonable-sounding bullet points highlighting the benefits of the proposition.

Too bad they quoted Sen. Dean Martin as supporting the measure. See page 6 of the arguments submitted for the ballot publicity pamphlet.

Asking Dean Martin about finance is like asking Russell Pearce about race relations.

'Nuff said about Prop 101.

...A full page card opposed to Prop 202, the minimum wage increase. They don't bother to state an actual objection to raising the minimum wage, they just don't like that it has an enforcement mechanism. The primary funding for this effort comes from some restaurant and farm owner associations and other specialists in providing low wage employment.

...Then were duelling pieces on Props 105 and 106.

The anti-105/pro-106 card is pretty straightforward. They state how 106 is better than 105, and lists a number of quotes from a bipartisan group of politicians supporting it.

The other one, the anti-Prop 106 flier, was easily the class of the entire group. Though that sentence will be the only time I use the word 'class' to describe it. :)

It's a sheet of thick, glossy paper (I'm sure there's a trade name for it, but I'm just as sure that I'm not in the printing business and don't know the name :) ) that unfolds to a 10X14 page headline by a faux news article. The "article" implies that the AZ Supreme Court has found something illegal with the proposition.

This is misleading, because it hasn't.

Below that is a list of "educators, ranchers, taxpayers and concerned citizens" as well as some organizations that oppose Prop 106. It's a fun list, with moderate luminaries such as Sen. Jack Harper, Rep. Laura Knaperek, Rep. Russell Pierce [sic - like misspelling his name will make people think that there's another Rep named 'Russell' that supports garbage like this. LOL], Jean McGrath and others.

And then, the capper.

The whole thing unfolds into a 20X28 poster showing the text of the proposition with sections highlighted and lines running to apocryphal comments in the margins. Comments with copious quantities of 'hot-button' words and phrases like "lawyer", "land grab", and "special interests."

All in all, a very professionally done if thoroughly misleading piece of propaganda.

Today's mail, however, had the piece de resistance.

A letter from JD.

Whooo hoooo!!

My Congressman has sent me a personal letter!

OK, so the envelope was addressed to my full name, which is used only on voter registration rolls, and it opens with "Dear Friend". And the signature is printed, not handwritten.

Hey - at least the sig is in blue. :)

In his letter, he talks about his "record" after 12 years in Congress, he talks about illegal immigration (a lot!), he talks about tax cuts, and he even mentions alternative sources of energy in the last paragraph.

Funny, but for all of his talk about his record, he doesn't talk about his record of ethical missteps.

Funny, but for all of his talk about what he will do in the future, he doesn't mention stem cell research even once.

He also reiterates the lie that Harry Mitchell ("my opponent" in the letter) supports giving Social Security benefits to illegal aliens that has already been refuted. (JD's campaign website has a refutation of the refutation up today, but I'll cover that later.)

Later!