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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #200 on: November 22, 2020, 01:59:09 AM »

[On a visit to the New Orleans area, Representative Cao joined a limited-seating event in Gretna at the request of an old family acquaintance and candidate for the state House. The opening speech he gave, which was livestreamed on the Louisiana Federalist Party's website and social media, is provided below.]

Well, it’s been a minute since I last had the opportunity to speak to a community that’s supported me and which I’m proud to support today. Thank you for having me here, Gretna! And my thanks as well for coming here masked up and continuing to socially distance. Let me emphasize once again that the generally favorable trend we’ve seen in recent months is not an excuse to let up on these measures – it can easily come back if we relax our guard. Keep washing your hands and keep wearing your masks!

Now my office has received a few complaints about the speeches I made a couple of days back. If anyone wants to know just why I “talk the big talk,” as my colleague from Oregon puts it, it is because I understand the importance of letting our citizens know exactly what forms the foundation of the policies they have heard from our candidates and our party. We want to make clear that we see government and governance as something more than just waving magic wands and fixing every problem ailing our citizens and communities without anything bad ever happening ever again. Absent the constraints imposed by our constitution that state governments must recognize, which our candidates acknowledge and try to work within policy-wise, we would have little more than a feel-good government that does as it sees fit. A government that empowers its politicians to do whatever they think is best; a government that really isn’t so different from prior administrations in our history that empowered some deeply corrupt people to line their pockets. If Louisiana were to choose between a government that puts its power in the hands of the people and a people that puts its power in the hands of the government, I think that they would recognize the latter for what it was and would enthusiastically choose the former.

Furthermore, if anyone wants to imply that I am not interested or that the Federalist Party is not interested in fighting for the common men and women of Louisiana, let me tell you about a house here in Gretna, just down the street from where we are now. Like many others at the time, like many still here today, my house was flooded out in 2005 and virtually all of my possessions were lost. Our working-class community was devastated by the flooding and by the incompetence of our government’s response in its aftermath. You know something? I am personally acutely aware of what happens when a government turns a blind eye to its citizens. My fellow citizens in this community know very well, from their experience, what it means to be on the wrong end of the stick in life, in education, and in economic standing. And our community here in Gretna was and is immensely proud of those among us who stepped up in the following years to run for office – under a variety of affiliations, mind you, including the Federalist one – and bring to our state legislature and local governments a dedication to a better form of governance: one that puts our citizens first.

My friends across the aisle will be pleased to know, I’m sure, that the community my friends and family call home is quite clear in its dedication to better governance. After all, they come from the sort of working-class community that’s been brutalized by policies some erroneously seem to think spring directly from the minds of evil plotting Federalist operatives. I think our candidate for the state House here would have something to say about that, and you’ll be hearing from her shortly about the work she’s doing to preserve and improve our coastal communities. So if you are looking for a party that looks out for the people of Gretna; a candidate who, by virtue of their lived experience, understands the needs of their community wherever it may be in Louisiana; a form of governance that knows what it’s doing and doesn’t feel the need to bring up irrelevant bogeymen and poorly aimed scare tactics – I urge you to vote Federalist next weekend. Dave bless you all, and please stay safe!
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #201 on: November 23, 2020, 01:35:05 AM »

[Yesterday, the Federalist mayoral candidate hosted a virtual town hall with Chicago's voters from her campaign headquarters in the South Side, during which the bulk of the questions asked were in relation to economic and environmental concerns. A small livestreamed rally in full compliance with  COVID guidelines was scheduled that evening in Bessemer Park to allow the candidate and speakers (Representative Cao among them) to expand on those themes. The Representative's speech may be found below.]

Folks, it’s great to be back here in the South Side, and especially lovely to have spent a pleasant afternoon in the company of you fine folks. Obviously we spent it all six feet apart, before anyone watching this online thinks of asking. COVID is still a very real threat, people! But since the good folks gathered here today all know this and are staying masked up and standing well apart from each other, I have a little more confidence that we will put this threat beyond us. It falls to each of us to make the little decisions to keep our friends and family and the people we meet safe, and those are the decisions that will collectively put us back to normality.

Now, as I’m sure you all know, Bessemer Park and the neighborhoods surrounding it have had a long and distinguished history as one of the largest steelworks in the Midwest. I was honored to have had a meeting earlier with Phil Malloy, formerly the head of the local steelworkers’ union, who got his start in the industry decades ago and is an invaluable fount of experience where these are concerned. Like many others throughout the century of progress that this part of Chicago has seen, he’s immensely grateful for the job security and the opportunity that it afforded him. Over its history, the industry has created a demand for jobs and an influx of immigrants that’s played a central role in turning this corner of our great city into what it is today. It’s workers like Mr. Malloy who have helped to build up our nation, whose expertise and experience formed the engine of Atlasia’s development; and yet it is also workers like Mr. Malloy who are now in increasingly precarious positions as their local jobs offer less and less security, less benefits, and as it becomes harder for them to support themselves and their families off of the wages they get paid.

So I want to talk for a bit about the changes we’re seeing here in South Chicago. This neighborhood is undergoing a massive revitalization on a scale seen almost nowhere else in the nation, as we attempt to find out what we are capable of with the tools and the resources afforded to us in a community and nation threatened on various sides by a changing economy, a worsening climate, a move away from the simple blue-and-white-collar dichotomy, and now a pandemic that has strained the net of Atlasia’s economy and society. It would be inaccurate to call it redevelopment, I think, because part of the endeavor is in rediscovering what South Chicago had and has; what it could do and can still do. Right here in Bessemer Park we’ve got the Nature and Wildlife Gardens, a reminder of the natural habitat our region takes pride in. Take note of that, folks: this park owes much, including its name, to the history of development and sacrifice that precluded it, and is home to a habitat which proclaims the promise held by its future. More than that, the community leaders of South Chicago have a plan for revitalizing this neighborhood that reflects the dual orientation of this park towards the past and towards the future. We Federalists take pains to discuss solutions to problems with those most impacted by the problems; and our mayoral candidate, if elected, would be more than willing to propose a sustainable plan in service of that goal. We are, most of all, focused on ensuring that these plans benefit the citizens of Chicago: those on the downswing alongside those on the up, the working men and women of all areas and sectors, the children and the children’s children to whom we want to leave a better and greener Chicago in the future.

South Chicago has had an industrial past that it can be proud of, but many of its workers today are looking for new opportunities. Now we want to make sure communities like yours are able to move into a future that all Chicagoans of whatever stripe can take pride in. Let’s make sure, as we move towards that future, that nobody gets left behind; let the expertise and experience of every single citizen of this city get a chance to push our city and our state and our region and our nation onward and upward. The opportunity that marked the economy of our past can mark the economy and sustainability of our future. And if the Federalist Party will fight for anything, it’s the empowerment of the individual and the community to build a future that works for them. Let’s bring the communities and our fellow-citizens back to the dance at City Hall. Let’s do that this weekend and choose to mark the coming mayoral term as a time to build – to build each other up, and to build up Chicago. Please give your warmest welcome to Chicago’s next Mayor!
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Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee
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« Reply #202 on: November 24, 2020, 10:33:47 PM »

Hialeah, Florida
This speech was made both to commence the campaign for Senator NC Yankee's reelection efforts and to also rally support for South Florida's Federalist state level candidates in the November election cycle. Covid precautions were taken, masks were required and provided and temperatures were checked at the door. Crowd size was limited with video monitors displaying the remarks in various crowd sized rooms

Whenever I start these campaigns, I always have to fight the urge to talk about everything at once and instead focus on a few things each speech, lest these be as painful to read as they can sometimes be to write. I must say though that I really enjoy it otherwise I would certainly not do them otherwise. One thing that I most certainly do enjoy is getting out to see the great people of our various states and certainly, Florida has a great deal to offer.

South Florida is known for its strong and vibrant communities, built on welcoming in and cherishing people of diverse backgrounds, from difficult and tyrannical regimes, from hardship and famine. It is a living demonstration of what opportunity, education, hard work and entrepreneurship can accomplish and the strides that can and have been made here as a result.

We cherish this legacy and we value the principles and culture of respect and cooperation that makes it all possible. At the same time we have to recognize that there is a lot of hard work that goes into these communities succeeding. A lot of this hard work has to be done at the local level and state level, that is why I urge you to get out and vote for your local main street Federalist candidates for state level office.

However, of great importance is the role of the Federal Government and what actions it takes, and whether it helps our harms these local communities. I believe that the Federal Government's role should be one of respectful support, not overbearing dictation to local communities. For many years I have been a fierce and impassioned advocate for the checks and balances and restraint that will keep government honest, and keep government from overreaching. Government must also be responsible in how it operates, and function with sense enough to minimize accumulation of debt and fund those responsibilities that it must maintain.

I am running for reelection to continue to be a reasonable voice, sometimes alone in inquiring about the real down to home impacts of legislation. I am running for reelection to continue to champion causes of region rights, local control, and fiscal responsibility. I will always remember the importance our diverse communities and keep in mind what their needs are, and will not hesitate to work with anyone regardless of party in order to achieve results for them.

I therefore ask for your vote in December and once again ask that you come out and vote for your local main street Federalists for state Government this weekend.

Thanks and have a blessed evening!!!
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #203 on: November 25, 2020, 12:25:30 AM »

[The Florida Federalist Party's GOTV efforts over the past several days were focused on northeast and central Florida, including the communities on the Space Coast. As part of these efforts, Representative Cao joined the state senator for the region and several other state legislative candidates at a masked and socially distanced rally in Cape Canaveral which was also streamed online on local Federalist websites and social media; a transcript of his speech may be found below.]

Well, thank you for that excellent speech. Hello, Cape Canaveral, and thanks to all of you for joining us this afternoon! It is good to see you all still maintaining your social distancing and wearing your masks, and I can only encourage you to continue doing so – to not let up or relax your guard – until we get a vaccine, get vaccinated, and can finally put ourselves out of the woods. While we wait for the technology, it is down to the simple things we can do, the washing of our hands regularly and the staying six feet apart and all the other simple decisions we make, that will get our country through this crisis.

Kind of a metaphor for the role of technology in politics and in our lives, really. The people of Cape Canaveral are of course no strangers to the way in which technology can upend the national consciousness – in your case, by bringing humanity across the final frontier and helping to inaugurate a new milestone for our species. We in the political sphere also owe much to the digital and technological revolution that has overtaken our world; it’s brought us the tools to stay in tune with our constituents and our constituents with us, it’s given all of us a platform to project thoughts and ideas into the national consciousness, and most happily of all it’s enabled us to continue representing you all without a hitch despite circumstances that have isolated us physically. The technology of spaceflight was considered revolutionary for the effect it had in raising the prestige of our nation. Today, we are all possessors and partakers of a similarly cutting-edge development in the history of human communication.

Did I say they were similar? Oops. They both unquestionably exerted a massive pull on the national conversation, but technologically they couldn’t be more different. The computer or TV screen or cell phone on which many of you are watching this carries orders of magnitude more computing power than the most technologically advanced machine used on Cape Canaveral’s launchpad in its early days. Whether or not my image on your screen is jumping around or dissolving into static I cannot say, though I would be sorry to hear that, but it is still a massive step up from what was available at the time. And this is commercially available! We all hold or have access to a device that dwarfs the massive room-filling clunkers NASA once used, one that fits in our pockets or sits on our desks and lets us access worldwide digital platforms and news and information galore and updates from family and friends and long-winded speeches innumerable. We hold an immense amount of power. What are we doing with it?

It is regrettable that this unprecedented access to information has also brought about a precipitous decline in our national conversation and amplified the deficiencies in our individual critical thinking skills. I don’t need to remind you that this is bad. It’s bad. In the midst of an ocean of information, we persist in lacking the discernment necessary to fully utilize its usefulness and avoid its pitfalls; we don’t check our news sources, we gather news from memes and headlines and sketchy links, and we attach ourselves to the online presences of parties and personalities and teams that determine whole swathes of our lives extending way beyond simply which box we check in the voting booth. I’ve forgotten which thinker it was who said that many of humankind’s innovations have been pressed into war service, but so it is that our access to this truly worldwide technological revolution has driven our citizenry, many of us unthinkingly and uncomprehendingly, into a state of permanent political warfare.

This cannot end well. The people of Cape Canaveral, that community thrust unintentionally to the front of the Cold War during the space race, will not need to be reminded that that famous standoff only ended because one side spectacularly collapsed: its economy, its politics, its entire raison d’être. If and when this happens in the digital political trenches we have drawn, it will be fellow Atlasians and fellow citizens who collapse. And this dismantling of our institutions in the name of efficiency or of taking power back for the people will only hasten that day. We can and must do better than this. We are not a people accustomed to wounding each other in the public square in the physical world, or to stand by and nod approvingly, so why do we do it online? It is ourselves who are responsible for the national conversation, and we are the ones who need to take a long look at our actions in the online sphere. At the end of the day, it is us citizens and not any technological advance who can and who will get our country through this crisis of our own making.

I am here under the banner of a political party, as are the others onstage with me today, but we know there is a nation that we as citizens all have a duty to protect and preserve. Partisan affiliation should not matter when it comes to bridging the national divide, and we who are gathered here are doing our best to do that. We are working with the communities we represent or hope to represent, we are looking beyond the partisan denominator that seems to determine so much of modern life, and if these folks here are elected this weekend they will continue serving the people of Florida not as partisan Federalists but as proud Atlasians – proud of working across the aisle, proud of getting things done for our communities, and proud of being Atlasian; and please believe us when we say that no label has meant more to us than that. Thank you for having us here once again, Cape Canaveral, and it is my deep pleasure to now hand the stage over to your next state senator!
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #204 on: November 26, 2020, 12:27:24 AM »

[Following a full day of leading Illinois Federalist Party volunteers in phonebanking and doorknocking efforts across various neighborhoods in northern Chicago, Representative Cao joined the mayoral candidate for an evening event in Albany Park in full compliance with COVID regulations. A transcript of his speech, which was livestreamed on the Federalist Party's website and social media alongside the debut of a link to independent fact-checkers' appraisal of Labor campaigning, may be found below.]

Good evening, Albany Park! Thanks for showing up – yes, that includes Andy Brennan there, a county commissioner who’s been doing a magnificent job for you all! As always, it is great to see everyone here masked up and social distancing. We know there is much still to accomplish on the COVID-19 front, on making sure our friends and family and those in our community are holding up in their personal struggles against the effects of this pandemic, but out here we can all continue to keep the physical wellbeing of those around us foremost in our minds and follow the medically recommended guidelines.

On that note: we’ve had a very productive session with community leaders here, the mayoral candidate and I, about a proposal to reinvest in our working-class areas and continue to support those hit hardest by COVID-19 and its associated fallout. I’ve said before and will say again that the responsibility for us officeholders in dealing with the pandemic goes far beyond simply consideration of its effects on public health. From the problems faced by our local small businesses to the rising case numbers in high-density housing areas, Albany Park and its fellow communities have been hit hard in many, many different areas, and any effort by the incoming mayor to get Chicago out of the COVID-19 hole must do its best to address all of these. Our team is doing its best to make sure you all know about the efforts we’re making to address the issues on which the recovery of our city must hinge, which is why we were out on the road this morning talking about our long-term citywide economic plan and why we’ve gathered here today to address the problems faced by our lower-income communities.

You all know by now about the massive funding gap between our West Side communities and the rest of Chicago, how the disparity is so severe that life expectancy within the Loop is several years higher than that of many of the West Side’s neighborhoods. It gives me hope that a number of hardworking private organizations are doing their best to step into the gap that we’ve historically had in these communities, but for them to recover – not just from this pandemic, but from the systemic cycle they’ve become trapped in – there must be a concerted effort from below and from above, from community leaders and the people and from the decision makers in City Hall. And they must recover. Leaving the West Side to fend for itself is not an option for us. If Chicago cannot adequately regain its previous footing unless all of its communities do so as well, or above and beyond in the case of the West Side and other similarly overlooked communities. It is Chicago’s diversity that demands this, a function of this city being more than the sum of its constituent geographical parts. The diversity we see in full flower in Albany Park, in many other neighborhoods across Chicago, drives the need for each disparate community and each person to look out for each other. It also drives the need for solutions that address both those problems common to us all and those unique to different communities, which must at their heart be solutions that work for the individual no matter what their socioeconomic status. The solutions we are working towards, which we’ve developed in consultation with many of the community leaders whose voices the incoming mayor must heed, are solutions that take into account the handicaps many lower-income communities face and that aim to bring them past these in service of assisting every part of our city in its recovery.

I will reiterate: this is what the Federalist Party stands for and always has. We are dedicated to the empowerment of the individual and the community regardless of their race or creed. Our own mayoral candidate’s first step onto the political scene was a plea for further investment in Hermosa and its surrounding working-class Hispanic neighborhoods, and through those efforts managed to bring a much-needed boost to a community that the political order in Chicago has left behind. Obviously this wasn’t done alone, and that young community organizer would not have succeeded if not for the backing of the West Side’s alderman and the various local leaders of all parties who came together to join this effort to lift up their fellow citizens and members of their community. It was a group effort then, and it is a group effort now. It is now my great pleasure to welcome that young community organizer, now on a mission to help lift up all of Chicago and all of its people: your next Mayor!
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #205 on: November 26, 2020, 12:27:12 PM »

[On Thanksgiving morning, Representative Cao joined the mayoral candidate in McKinley Park to record a quick message for Chicagoans and talk to voters about some of the mayoral candidate's policy plans; a transcript of the Representative's speech may be found below. All in attendance at the livestreamed event, and at the town hall afterwards, were required to wear masks and socially distance.]

Good morning, McKinley Park! Happy Thanksgiving to you all and to everyone watching this online. And you know, I’m far from the only one here who’s thankful that you all and the rest of the people of Chicago continue to value keeping their fellow citizens safe. Keep masking up and social distancing, and as you go about your preparations for this weekend please make sure to keep your friends and family safe.

It’s been a horrendous year in a lot of respects, but we’re nevertheless thankful for a great deal. We are thankful for the essential workers who have kept our nation and our city safe, for continuing to staff and keep running various public services vital to our city in spite of the personal danger they faced and still face. There are essential workers who help other essential workers do their jobs, and not least among them are the drivers and managers and workers of Chicago’s Transit Authority. The workers who have kept the bus and train services running in spite of a massive drop in usage have preserved the ability of ordinary citizens as well as healthcare and service workers to get to their places of work, to run errands, and to respond to emergencies. They’ve kept open an option of transport upon which many Chicagoans still depend. They will be critical to Chicago’s recovery from COVID as we try to contain the pandemic that has forced us off to stay at home and redefined “essential travel” as a luxury afforded only rarely and to a select few.

And they need help. The CTA’s budget proposal for the coming year includes a lot that Chicagoans can be thankful to hear: they have no plans to shutter services or hike fares for the foreseeable future (provided we are able to get back on the trains and buses en masse by then; to which I can only say, well, don’t hold your breath). But obviously they are facing a massive shortfall in revenue and in the state funding the transit system receives by Illinois law. That won’t be sustainable for them or for the public transport systems across the country which are staring down the barrel of another year of financial losses. I’m told by an independent public-transport consultant, who I think I can see in the crowd here this morning – yes, right over there, look; how ya doin’, Doug! Doug Watts, everybody! – that the Transit Authority could face service cuts within months if they aren’t able to get any other sources of revenue towards the continued upkeep of our rail and bus services.

Plans such as those the CTA has for improving its transit infrastructure and upgrading its services to the betterment of ordinary Chicagoans are part and parcel of what needs to be done if Chicago is to be rehabilitated and reenergized following a pandemic that has dealt historically deep wounds to our city and its social and economic fabric. Your Federalist mayoral candidate recognizes the integral role our public transport infrastructure currently plays in our city and must play in any proper citywide recovery. We’ll work to support our essential workers, to get the spotlight on this issue in the regional government and on the federal level, and we’ll fight to make sure any investment in public transport yields dividends in jobs and opportunities for the people of Chicago. At the end of the day, that is where our priorities are. Here with me now to expand on those priorities, and to urge you all to join us this weekend in taking the Orange Line down to City Hall, please welcome your next Mayor!
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #206 on: November 26, 2020, 11:56:59 PM »

[To close off the day, and in concert with a number of local Federalist community leaders, the mayoral candidate invited Representative Cao to give the concluding speech at a small, primarily livestreamed event (fully complying with masking and social distancing guidelines) in Norwood Park, a transcript of which may be found below.]

It’s a pleasure to be here in Norwood Park this evening with you all, and certainly an added pleasure to see those of you gathered here masked up and social distancing. To everyone else watching this online, I hope you’re keeping yourself and your friends and family and your fellow citizens safe this Thanksgiving season – wash your hands, wear your masks, and try to limit the number of people you have gathering together indoors. My thoughts are with you all.

I think this is only the second time I’ve been to this neck of the woods in the past six months. Back during the special election in May, I came here to talk to some of your community leaders, and while here I also had the privilege to meet a rather exceptional old woman. In some ways she was a lot like the millions of others in Chicago who will soon go to the polls to do their civic duty and make their voices heard, with one exception: when I met her, Louise Schaaf was 113 years old. This German immigrant and centenarian was not a world-changing visionary or a great stateswoman or a builder of large and imposing monuments. She emigrated to these shores; endured economic troubles that left her family virtually penniless; worked part-time at candy stores and in inn kitchens. She loved her husband and her children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and great-great-grandchildren. She sent care packages to her relatives in Germany in the aftermath of the Second World War. She lived her life seemingly without incident or lasting accomplishment. Yet she peacefully passed a few months ago not just as the oldest person in Illinois, but as possibly one of its richest as well. Rich in the sense of the social capital she accumulated over the course of her long life, the friends and family who mourned her passing and all the many thousands who knew through her actions and her words that she cared about them.

Financial capital is usually the first indicator of success which many of us think of and seek after. There’s been some research by economists at the World Bank which concluded that much of our wealth is not monetary or even in the form of economic products, but is instead intangible: the wealth that Switzerland has is not primarily in its tangible assets, but instead lies in the traditions and expertise that the Swiss hold and have held. Our nation has its own form of social capital in the institutions and norms and knowledge that enables Atlasian society to function; and unlike most of what nowadays constitutes financial capital, its worth is very much in our hands. Because of ordinary Atlasians’ efforts, it held even during the Great Depression that wiped out Louise Schaaf’s meager savings, when our collective financial capital flatlined. Because of their efforts, it held during the World War and Cold War that prompted Schaaf to send those care packages – bundles of both financial and social capital. And in the face of COVID-19 today, because of the efforts of many ordinary Chicagoans and citizens of Atlasia, it is holding.

We’ve understood, we at the Federalist Party, that a nation’s progress is not simply measured in the topline indicators of its economy. Our nation was and is strong because of the institutions that hold us together, the individual and the family and the community, and it is weakened when the social capital we hold is burned through by losses in our intellectual and moral and institutional capital. And we recognize the need to fix the intellectual morass and the institutional failures that contribute to this loss. There is a question before us all: what will the Chicago of the future look like and be like; what will our children say to it if some of them live to be as old as Louise Schaaf? This weekend, it’s our time to answer that question – to build a Chicago for the future that replenishes its social capital, fixes failing institutions and helps to restore public trust in them, and reaffirms the self-evident truth that all the inhabitants of this Chicagoan and Atlasian melting pot are created equal and endowed with certain inalienable rights. We all deserve a chance to help make this city a better one; I urge you all to get out to vote Federalist this weekend for a mayor who will give you all that chance. Thank you, Norwood Park; happy Thanksgiving, and stay safe!
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Joseph Cao
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« Reply #207 on: November 27, 2020, 11:59:52 PM »
« Edited: November 28, 2020, 12:03:55 AM by People's Speaker Joseph Cao »

[The following video of Representative Cao in front of the Cloud Gate was posted to the Federalist mayoral candidate's campaign website and social media on Friday morning with the hashtag #GoVote.]

Good morning, Chicago! It’s a busy day for us all – a Vantablack Friday, if you will – so I’ll keep this message short. And that message is: go vote!

Every one of you, whichever party you support, whether you support the Cubs or the White Sox, has the democratic right to a say in how you choose your affairs to be run. Since the city-states of Ancient Greece, when voters would use either white or black beans as proxy symbols for yes or no votes, humanity has tested the notion that all of us have an equal voice which we all have the same right to exercise; our own nation was founded on precisely this self-evident truth. Whether in Chicago, in Atlasia, or in countries and municipalities across the world, it has undoubtedly been a bumpy ride, this thing called democracy. But we persist in this pipe dream because it is a form of government that rewards civic participation; a form of government whose promise has brought many millions to these shores in search of a better life; a form of government that has stumbled many many times but is always able to recover itself because of the fundamental dedication of our citizens to those same ideals that continually drive us on with the exhortation: we can and must do better.

We still have a long way to go. Our own history of democracy has been marred by the many deliberate roadblocks put in place to disenfranchise voters and deprive them of their constitutional right. History has recorded the struggles our own fellow citizens have had to go through to avail themselves of that right, some involving jellybeans in a jar, and the yawning moral gap in any government formed in the absence of their voices. Any government by and for Chicagoans or any other constituency in Atlasia must take the voices and preferences of all its citizens into account, in its election and in its governance, if it is to succeed. We at the Federalist mayoral campaign have proposed many policies and pointed out solutions to many problems during this month of campaigning and we couldn’t have done it without the feedback from all the communities and individuals who we’ve talked with; so we want to make clear that good governance starts with a good electoral process that respects everyone’s voice. And we as a party have made clear, time and time again with our words and actions, our commitment to ensuring that all citizens get as full and unbiased a set of facts as they can so that you all can decide how best to express your voice at the ballot box. We have applauded our fellow parties and campaigns who – despite our differences – have shown the same fundamental respect for your vote and how you choose to exercise it.

You can see exactly one bean behind me, and it isn’t in a jar. It’s not black. It’s not white either. But I have full confidence that whatever the outcome of this weekend’s election, the choice you Chicagoans make will reflect its future and the path it takes over the next several months on our long journey through the ongoing experiment that is Atlasian democracy. And whatever the outcome is, we Federalists will continue fighting for the individual and the community – for the betterment of Chicago and Chicagoans. Go vote, everyone, and let your voice be heard loud and clear. Dave bless you all. See you this evening!
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« Reply #208 on: November 28, 2020, 12:00:08 AM »

[To close off the campaign, Representative Cao joined the mayoral candidate in Bridgeport to make a final pitch to voters and urge them all to get out to vote. A transcript of his speech at the masked and socially distanced event may be found below.]

Thank you! Thank you, Bridgeport! Thank you so much for coming out this evening, for masking and socially distancing like the good citizens you are, and for being willing to subject yourselves to yet another of my speeches. While you’re all on your way to vote, I suppose it is incumbent upon us at the Federalist campaign to offer a closing message of sorts.

We’ve come so far. I have been honored and frankly bowled over by the response we’ve gotten from communities all across Chicago, from people who have helped our various policies pass muster with their communities and who genuinely want this city to succeed. And I think our next mayor, who you’ve just heard from tonight, will not soon forget all that we’ve seen and heard on the campaign trail. We at the Federalist Party of Illinois have had the goal, no matter what we campaign on or where we campaign, of finding solutions that work for Illinoisans and Chicagoans, that work towards the empowerment of our individuals and communities, that take into account the role played by strong communities and strong institutions and work to build them up. No matter what happens tonight, we here – your mayoral candidate, myself, the rest of our party – will continue fighting for Chicagoans to the best of our collective ability. We wouldn’t be worthy of the name if we didn’t work towards a government that delivers results at the local level and towards the betterment of our individuals and communities here in Chicago or anywhere else.

Chicago, too, has come so far. It’s seen so much. But there is still much more to do. And no other community I’ve come across exemplifies this better than Bridgeport, whose history has been marked by racial troubles, by pro-Confederate rallies, by  ethnic clash after ethnic clash. This community has put itself past that and healed over time to form the diverse and booming community we have now. Like Chicago, in a sense. The people first drawn to Chicago, to communities like Bridgeport, came seeking better lives. They found employment, and where they felt fulfilment was lacking, they made their own. They brought slices of their original communities with them to form Chicago and neighborhoods like Bridgeport into the melting pots of diverse ethnicities and interests and talents that we see today. In this unique time of a crippling pandemic and a slowing economy, we are holding up as a shared community precisely because of this diversity coupled with the unity that brings us together, the ties that bind us all and force us to remember the fellow-citizens around us, and the work put in by individuals and institutions who work every day to preserve, protect, and defend our city and our shared community.

We see the work that has been done, and we see how much more we can still do. The work that will involve bringing our communities and the neighborhoods of Chicago back to the table – all of them, not just the ones that vote a certain way or have a certain income level or come from a certain ethnicity. That work needs a mayor who will look beyond the divisions and focus on what we can do to build everyone up; to reclaim the potential that all Chicagoans have for pushing our city forward. I think our mayoral candidate has demonstrated the ability to do just that, and I am not so blinded by partisanship as to see that many of our fellow parties’ candidates have demonstrated that as well. I hope those of you who have voted have carefully weighed the various candidates and their policies in your mind, an effort that those parties who have stuck to debating the issues and avoided mudslinging have very commendably aided; if you haven’t, I urge you all to do so. Because when the electorate makes an educated decision, they give the best reflection of what Chicagoans are and can be. And if you do that, no matter who is sitting in City Hall a few weeks from now, I think I and the rest of the Federalist Party can sleep easier knowing that our fellow citizens are making the best decisions they can for the betterment of themselves and their communities.

Let’s build Chicago up; let’s build our fellow citizens up. Thank you, everyone, for coming. Please stay safe when going to vote. Dave bless you all, and good night.
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« Reply #209 on: December 07, 2020, 02:18:21 AM »

The following states are up for election in the December cycle:

Frémont: Oregon, Nevada, Minnesota, and the American Samoa
South: Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee, and the Houston mayoralty
Lincoln: Ohio and Connecticut

Once more, all Federalists are encouraged to campaign wherever they can and claim it by posting in this thread.

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« Reply #210 on: December 07, 2020, 03:30:41 AM »

Rally at Dalton, GA
Outside of the Shaw Industries carpet factory

All covid precautions are taken for all attendees with masks mandatory, temperatures taken, and 6 feet distance mainatined.

Good evening Dalton! It's great to be here with y'all in North Georgia to kick off our campaign! This town is very special to the Federalist Party, and your votes won't be taken for granted any longer. Up on the stage with me is our very fine gubernatorial candidate and some of our state legislative candidates who will work hard representing your interests at the state capitol.

In this time when our economy is struggling, it feels like the government has forgotten about you. Well, you won't be forgotten anymore. A Federalist government for Georgia will work to bring back more jobs especially in manufacturing that middle and working class families in North Georgia count on to provide for themselves. The fabric of this nation is woven through Atlasian ingenuity and hard work that lets us all succeed. A Federalist government will pass legislation similar to what we've seen in New York with the rates being tied to the number of new employees hired at above the statewide average pay for each position for any new factory looking to start up, expand, or relocate in Georgia. This kind of policy will not be a handout to CEO's but rather they will be held accountable for creating the good jobs we need. This approach is soundly Main Street Federalist and it will make our post-covid future even better than ever before.

Thank y'all for coming, and be sure to tell all your friends to go vote in these upcoming state elections. It's for your livelihoods!
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« Reply #211 on: December 10, 2020, 11:36:41 AM »

Quote
Whistlestop #1: Knoxville, TN
This speech was made both for Senator NC Yankee's reelection efforts and to also rally support for East Tennessee's Federalist state level candidates in the December election cycle. Covid precautions were taken, masks were required and provided and temperatures were checked at the door. Crowd size was limited with video monitors displaying the remarks in various crowd sized rooms

As difficult as campaigning is during this pandemic, we have shown that with responsible precautions we can in fact continue with our democratic traditions while at the same time doing the things necessary to protect people from the spread of this pandemic. I encourage everyone to continue with doing the difficult and important steps to keep yourselves and each other safe. While saying that these things are an inconvenience and are difficult is an under statement, it is also true that traditionally speaking things of great consequence and importance often are.

More work needs to be done to help those who are struggling obviously, but the work that we have done so far is also of great note. We have passed a half dozen bills at this point and in spite of an issue with one or two, most of them were passed in record time. I also want to commend the hard work of President Pericles as his leadership was essential and during a pandemic, disease knows no boundary of partisanship or concern for differing localities.

Some of the things that I supported were controversial especially on my own side, such as the mask mandate and while we should recognize and promote and protect the interests of local control and regional rights, there are things related to domestic and external security that fall under the auspices of the Federal Government in a balanced system and this is one such instance. Other measures such as those substituting for lost income, as those proposed by Thumb and others are of great consequence to the many who are struggling to get by with lost wages and lost jobs. I will also say that the efforts to help small business, which was the subject of multiple bills and pieces of broader relief efforts. I think total we are up to 6 or 7 bills and we will soon be adding another to that list.

No amount of bills passed will however end this crisis, the end to this crisis can only be achieved through science and the development of a vaccine. Our efforts are merely that of providing the resources to facilitate that, and efforts to mitigating the impact of efforts to contain and slow the spread, hence the economic impact and the necessity of passing relief and support mechanism to help in that situation. I will not make rosy predictions or declarative statements in regards to what has been a dangerous and evolving situation, when we could easily face a new dynamic with such a situation but our success in beating back another wave and combined with progress towards a vaccine does give us some degree of hope that this will soon be over.

Until that time though, and while everyone will try to argue and point fingers and attack each other I can only speak for myself and for a large number of members of my party. For myself, I have been a cooperative and helpful ally on most every pandemic related measure, both in terms of procedure and getting them passed quickly as Senate President Pro-Tempore and as a Senator concerned about the welfare and well being of our region and its people during these deadly times. If I am so honored as to be reelected to another term, I will continue to always fight for this region and will continue to assist my colleagues regardless of party on policies that help get us out of this pandemic. I therefore ask for your vote and support in this weekend's Senate elections.

The same goes for my party here in the state of Tennessee and I encourage you to get out and vote Federalist generally both this weekend for House and Senate, but also two weeks from now when you go to the polls and vote for the state and local officials. Federalists are determined and committed to put the interests of main street first and that means fighting for you and not engaging in the one up man ship game of empowering either the Federal Gov't or Wall Street at your expense.


Thanks and have a blessed evening!!!
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« Reply #212 on: December 10, 2020, 12:07:39 PM »

Whistlestop #2: Chattanooga, TN
This speech was made both for Senator NC Yankee's reelection efforts and to also rally support for East Tennessee's Federalist state level candidates in the December election cycle. Covid precautions were taken, masks were required and provided and temperatures were checked at the door. Crowd size was limited with video monitors displaying the remarks in various crowd sized rooms

I talked just a short while ago in Knoxville, about what is probably the most pressing matter of all before us right now and that is naturally the pandemic and the related economic concerns pertaining to it. If you have not seen it, I encourage you to view it on our campaign website, where you can find access to important resources such as our speeches but also other important things as well.

For this speech though I want to talk about something else and that is of course the budget, and how we should fix our current problems. Right now we have a system that is frankly always late and always struggles because it becomes difficult to compile and score spending and revenues over the course of so many bills during the course of the year. Then there is the issue of compiling the text over the course of that time period since that also can be daunting, pain staking and not very enticing to say the least.

Lastly, there is the perpetual problem of the budget always being late. Since the passage of the Budget Process and Control Act in 2017, the deadline for the administration to have a budget before Congress is set in the Spring, so as to give a few months for both chambers of congress to debate the bill. At the same time period, I created rules resolutions for both chambers, which created the Budget slot and with that budget slot was suppose to facilitate this budget debate, being the highlight of the summer months in congress without its very dragging out causing delay of other worthy bills and projects.

This was the system as designed and conceived at the time with the assumption that the spring deadline would be regarded as the big one for the Administration and then the fall one the big overall one, which would mainly concern Congress. However, this has not happened, the fall deadline remains fixated in people's minds and many people do not even know about the Spring deadline at all and the Administrations have not been able to get ready even in the best of circumstances. As a former President I can sympathize totally with the overwhelming nature of the position and the difficulty in staffing committees be it Domestic Policy Council or Budget Council with active and dedicated people to relieve that burden.

Going forward we should instead of relying on some kind of magic sea change in the ability of these councils to succeed in a way that they have not for the past year on the budgetary concerns, instead shift more towards a Congress first model. This is not a stripping of power as the administration is and would still be capable of composing their draft and having it submitted  as an amendment. What it does mean is that instead of prioritizing the October Deadline, we will instead prioritize the spring one and strive to have a Budget on the floor by the April 1st Deadline. If I am reelected to the Senate, my term will extend through that date and I will introduce a budget resolution of some kind by that date for the budget slot to kick start the debate. To make this possible, we need to adhere to a cut off where non-emergency spending is delayed until the following fiscal year (not the one starting in October), so that we aren't rendering work obsolete over the same months we are doing it. This could be around July with anything from May or June being incorporated in via amendment after the July 1st date.

Also, I am looking to begin "compiling as we go" (play on pay as you go" whereby as we pass bills that include spending or revenues, the name and link to that bill are at minimum logged and possibly even incorporated into a draft budget resolution so as to eliminate the scramble to compile and incorporate a years worth of spending. This might even be a place where we should consider just having a budget resolution draft in the budget slots of both chambers all year long and as bills pass, they can be incorporated in via amendment. Were this to be the case, rather then needing to worry about adding in the stuff in from that April 1st - July 1st window mentioned above, they would be added in as we go and then further non-emergency spending  would be set to start in the fiscal year after next.

I have seen many people struggle with the budget and when it was just torturing myself it was one thing, but now seeing the difficulties tack has been having, I think it is time we embrace a new model, stop torturing ourselves with this current process and move towards one that compiles as we go so that can then spend our time in the Summer actually debating the merits of tax and spending proposals, something this game has been deprived of since before the reset when budgets were debated in the summer and early fall and were a key focal point of the calendar game wise. I want to get to a point where the budget debates can create issue contrasts and we cannot do that without changing our mindset and our approach.

If I am so fortunate as to be reelected to another term as your Senator, I want to bring this new approach to fruition for the FY beginning October 2021 and that will begin during the course of this next Senate term with the April 1st 2021 deadline, for the FY2021 budget to be before Congress. I therefore ask for your support for reelection in this Senate campaign and encourage you get out and vote this weekend.

I also need to stress the importance of getting out and voting two weeks from now during the December state and local elections. The Federalist Party is committed to fiscal responsibility minimizing the damaging effects of debt burdens long term by paying for non-emergency long term spending with dedicated revenue streams. The impacts and success and health of any economic depends on the responsibility and care that its leadership shows towards the financial stability and long term solidity of the system's underpinnings. Debt can only be considered as a tax all its own, that will reap its due one way or another and in the most regressive form imaginable. I urge you to vote Federalist this weekend for House and Senate and to vote Federalist in two weeks for the local and stated elections.


Thanks and have a blessed evening!!!
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« Reply #213 on: December 10, 2020, 12:32:13 PM »

Whistlestop #3: Cobb County, Georgia
This speech was made both for Senator NC Yankee's reelection efforts and to also rally support for Georgia's Federalist state level candidates in the December election cycle. Covid precautions were taken, masks were required and provided and temperatures were checked at the door. Crowd size was limited with video monitors displaying the remarks in various crowd sized rooms

A short while ago I talked about the pandemic in Knoxville and I talked about how to reform the Budget Process in Chattanooga. If were not able to see these live, I encourage you to view them on my campaign website, there will find these speeches along with my other speeches in this campaign and a number of important resources and information for the upcoming elections.

I want to talk to you tonight on the importance of education both for my own role at the Federal Level, but also the role that the state government plays in this. I have often stressed the importance of local control with state, then regional and then federal government intervening to helped with resource deficiencies. These are important aspects because education governed locally is going to be most attune to the needs of the children on the ground rather than aloof political considerations and divisive measures foisted down upon schools from on high.

That being said and while it is vitally important for education to be handled at lower levels, local control on its own is not an education agenda. There is and remains the importance of reforming the public school system and while school choice is importance and should be an option, provided that it is regulated, safe and effective, the vast majority of students will be attending public schools and thus our priority in communities like Cobb County, should be to promote a policy of reform and performance in the public school system to ensure that we are helping everyone have a chance at success.

Reform is not easy because there are vested interests that want to get in the way and preserve the status quo. For some these are people who have monetary interest in certain education venues, for others it is people who are committed to the status quo at any price. For us though, we should set a principle that no status quo and no monetary interest should take precedence over the quality education of our kids.

Reforming the curriculum is the first most important thing because that ensures that we not only are giving our kids the tools to succeed not just in the economy, but also in life as well and as a society as whole. Empowering people to discern fact from fiction is perhaps the most pressing and vital interest right now and we see the consequences of this daily now where more people are falling pray to snake oil salesmen and to conspiracy theorists pushing simple answers to complex problems or providing people with answers they want to hear as opposed to complex incomplete answers that the factual record actually supports.

Beyond just reforming the curriculum is how we are teaching and this incorporates responsibly the use of technology into the learning environment but at the same time incorporates new and innovative teaching methods to ensure that we more effective at reaching the most amount of kids possible as the effects of doing so can be monumental and helpful both for the economy and society at large.

While controversial, we need to examine our teaching standards and recognize at the same time that teachers do an important and critical job and they must be paid accordingly. This will ensure that quality teachers are retained and make it easier to professionalize and improve the ability and performance of teachers and better empower them to succeed as a result with the support of the community and recognition they deserve within the community.

The Federalist Party is committed to a responsible reform of education and recognizes that while there are obstacles and vested interests that stand in the way, the improvement and reform of the education system must take priority, including the three big ones I have mentioned above, but also of course others well. The consequences and the necessity are too great and the need never more pressing and we need to be of a mind to push forward to achieve results.

I humbly ask for your support in this weekend's Senate elections and I also ask that you get out and vote Federalist this weekend not just for Senate but for your state and local elections two weeks from now.

Thanks and have a blessed evening!!!

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« Reply #214 on: December 10, 2020, 12:53:32 PM »

Whistlestop #4: Savannah, Georgia
This speech was made both for Senator NC Yankee's reelection efforts and to also rally support for Georgia's Federalist state level candidates in the December election cycle. Covid precautions were taken, masks were required and provided and temperatures were checked at the door. Crowd size was limited with video monitors displaying the remarks in various crowd sized rooms


A short while ago I talked about the pandemic in Knoxville, I talked about how to reform the Budget Process in Chattanooga and I talked about education in Cobb County, Georgia. If you were not able to see these live, I encourage you to view them on my campaign website, there will find these speeches along with my other speeches in this campaign and a number of important resources and information for the upcoming elections.

I always make sure to discuss the issue of healthcare in all of my campaigns and along with it mental health care and addiction as they are pressing issues for our region and they have been an area of focus for me going back almost ten years. That experience gives me a good working knowledge of the policy as it exists in the game and thus what should be gone going forward on these matters of course. 

In the recent term a bill from the house came before us aimed at eliminating co-pays for veterans under our Atlascare system, but this was of course already eliminated for those directly on Atlascare, so I amended the bill and instead expanded the protections for preventative care. As many of your know I have long stressed the importance of preventative care under the simple doctrine that if you detect and solve a problem quickly, it will be cheaper then delaying action and it will also be less costly not just economically speaking but in terms of ability of people to work (dead people and disabled don't make for a good work force) but also the whole that creates in society and thus the importance of helping people is more then just the direct impact of whether this person lives or dies, but also their impact on the community, their family and their friends.

The proposal requires the regions, which already had to ensure that there was a plan covering preventative medicine on their exchanges, to now ensure that said plans also cover such with no out of pocket expenses. The bill also beefed up provisions dealing with preventative medicine in Atlascare itself, and together this helps to strengthen the premise that the original 2017 bill had and that was that preventative medicine is the road to lowering health care costs long term and moving in that direction helps to ensure the success and financial stability of the overall project.

To this end I have interacted with Attorney General Truman since his office is in charge of enforcement, mostly in regards to Fremont where he is most knowledgeable of the situation, but also as it pertains to Lincoln. The South is a bit more complex since it has an extensive regional law to review and probably amend, and my goal before the end of this current term is to extend those talks to the South and work with the Governor and Chamber to amend and revise as needed. For the next term my goal is to continue to strengthen and work to improve health care in the South via collaborations with the Governor, Chamber of Delegates and when necessary amending or improving parts of the 2017 law very federal law. My experience, knowledge of the 2017 law and Atlasian health care overall, and also my working relationships on both sides of the aisle, make me the strongest candidate to pull this off and thus the best candidate for health care in this election.

Just as important as mainline health care policy is, so to is policy dealing with mental health issues and the 2017 health care law helps provide access coverage wise to people who are in most need of it, including those suffering from mental health. But coverage of care and actually providing care are two different things and while having coverage in places helps keep health care and mental health care facilities solvent, it is important to work to improve the facilities and build new ones because just like every person is different, every case requires its own level of care and for too long we have let financial restrains cripple the mental health infrastructure. This dove tails with the pandemic of course as people are struggling now like never before, but also with the crisis of addiction. I have worked with my colleagues at the federal level to support efforts to curb addiction and implement necessary reforms in this regards to minimize the exposure to addictive medications and opiates.

While addiction is certainly a crisis, we need to be careful that we aren't treating a health care problem as an issue for the courts and jails instead of medical attention and treatment facilities. I support efforts to move away from the incarceration model that has broken up families and destroyed more lives then it has saved and move more towards rehabilitation generally and more towards treatment for addiction to get people off of addictive substances and back to being healthy and contributing members of society and back to being parts of strong and vibrant family structures.

I humbly ask for your vote this weekend and I would thus also ask that you get out and vote for Federalist candidates for House and Senate this weekend, as well as to vote two weeks from now in your state and local elections for Federalist Candidates for Georgia State Government.


Thanks and have a blessed evening!!!
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« Reply #215 on: December 10, 2020, 01:23:54 PM »

Whistlestop #5: Little Rock, Arkansas
This speech was made both for Senator NC Yankee's reelection efforts and to also rally support for Arkansas Federalist state level candidates in the December election cycle. Covid precautions were taken, masks were required and provided and temperatures were checked at the door. Crowd size was limited with video monitors displaying the remarks in various crowd sized rooms


A short while ago I talked about the pandemic in Knoxville, I talked about how to reform the Budget Process in Chattanooga, I talked about education in Cobb County, Georgia and I talked about health care, mental health and addiction in Savannah, Georgia. If you were not able to see these live, I encourage you to view them on my campaign website, there will find these speeches along with my other speeches in this campaign and a number of important resources and information for the upcoming elections.

I have often talked about the importance of equality before the law and while that may sound incompatible with a conservative philosophy, my goal has been to illustrate that just the opposite is the case based on the long standing conservative principle of opposition to arbitrary law and the risk that arbitrary law poses. One of the first areas of concern where arbitrary law is present is when one group is being treated differently then the next and it is in that environment and in that context where a conservative should take issue on a philosophical ground with legal inequality.

The opposition to arbitrary law goes back to the 17th century and it is enshrined in our founding and is a fundamental basis for the post Burkean Conservatism, in its opposition to radicalism and revolution where there too you saw excesses that violated law in favor of momentary passions and the net result was that government was arbitrary in its nature and thus very dangerous to its own people. We should thus be vigilant about this trend in government and we should seek to make our system one where the law is upheld regardless of what or who is in consideration. That is basic fundamental necessity for any system with democratic principles to survive.

Going further from that we must be mindful of our institutions and the important in preserving those institutions and traditions that safeguard and protect people from the excesses, excesses of the people as some areas have in their history seen far too much of in the form of lynch mobs and also in terms of government arbitrarily casting out one group as a second class or inferior group, which likewise there has been far too much of in our own history as a country, much less in many other other places as well.

We all should be committed to opposing arbitrary rule and supporting equality before the law and while I will not stoop to claim that anyone else does not, I will say affirmatively that for myself and for the Federalist Party as a group, we do opposed arbitrary law and we support equality before the law as has been codified in our platform for over six years now, and was strained to the limit during the period of 2015, but we stood firm in a difficult situation and our message of an Atlasia for all, not restricted by the whims of a clique or elitist echo chamber prevailed as a message that everyone could embrace.

We should cherish our legacy as a Party as I do, and we should restrain passions and excess that violate our sacred principles, even if they know emanate from the right, the actions and the consequences are still very real and don't get checked at the door simply because it originates on a different side of the aisle, a cautionary tale and one that I hope that everyone in every party will take to heart and will remain ever vigilant in the protection of our liberties, our constitutional rights and the institutions and traditions that protect them for all to enjoy and live under.

I humbly ask for your vote in this weekend's Senate election and I also ask that you vote for your Federalist Candidates for House and Senate this weekend, as well as for Federalist Candidates in the Arkansas state elections late on this month.

Thanks and have a blessed evening!!!

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« Reply #216 on: December 18, 2020, 02:22:06 AM »

[Following his return from another week of travelling among constituents in Lincoln and listening to their concerns, Representative Cao made a short trip to Cincinnati to support a couple of the area’s Federalist state legislative candidates at a rally at which masking and social distancing policies were strictly enforced. The transcript of the speech may be found below for public release.]

Good morning, Ohio! Good morning, Cincinnati! Thank you all for making it here and doing your duty as a conscientious citizen to find out what your candidates stand for. And in a similar vein, I also want to thank you all for getting out to vote last weekend! There’s a good chance that many of you voted differently on your House ballot, but my duty as an officeholder is to represent all my constituents – those who supported me, were ambivalent, or actively campaigned against me – and I’m always willing to listen and learn from all of you.

Speaking of elections, I can only hope that you’ll likewise recognize the importance these local elections have in fixing the potholes on your roads, in providing adequate resources for your kids’ education, and in keeping all of us safe during this pandemic. It’s a tough job for local officials to do, and we need to be very clear about what their job entails – if a candidate has a proven record in serving the community they are running to represent, in listening to the needs of the individuals and groups who make up that community, and in building up these individuals and communities, then there is a person who is up to the job of representing and fighting for their constituents in the legislature. Candidates do not, as a general rule, carry prewritten laundry lists of Policies to Fight For into their community and propose to enact them in Columbus on behalf of a community that has had no input on them, and such candidates are not fighting for a community as much as they are fighting for a cause that may at best be tangential to their community’s needs. It misses the point – we begin with the communities we are aiming to serve, then involve and lead them in developing policies that will improve their lot. Communities differ; what works in Akron is unlikely to work well, or even similarly, in Cincinnati. We’ve had a great deal of input from you wonderful folks over our candidate’s public three-point requirement for any further economic relief bills that the legislature proposes – support for small businesses, wage subsidies, and a funding proposal for each spending item – and I for one am glad that the people of Cincinnati remain committed to the principles of community and fiscal responsibility that they’ve held over the years.

Furthermore, it is incumbent upon candidates to be honest with the people they hope to represent. I understand that attacking opponents is a common practice, even if I have my disagreements with it – it is part of what makes politics one of the world’s oldest professions. And there have been times when I’ve let the criticism fly. But when there are attacks, I would hope to at least see some basis in fact present; and, moreover, if the attacks must come, for there to be substance beneath the mud. Insult without justification invites further injury. The presence of mud without anything to back it up is a waste of everyone’s time: ours, yours, that of the people listening. So if a candidate feels the urge to go all out on their opponents; to make everyone feel dirtier than before they began to pay attention; to convince the Atlasian people that politics is the art of the pointlessly provocative rather than that of the possible – they are very welcome to commit to flood the zone with whatever mud they want. But it should be reminded that every breath my fellow candidates spend on hurling grammatically incorrect pejoratives and accusations of unelectability and incapability every which way is a breath wasted on the ordinary people who look to them for leadership and policy in the midst of a confluence of crises that demands cooperation rather than antagonization and building up rather than tearing down.

In relation to honesty with voters, there have also been a number of more concerning developments in the state of political discourse: the seeming inability of some folks to positively identify who their opponents are. I’ve even learned, according to a flyer I received this morning, that the Labor candidate for state House is to be joined on Ohioans’ ballots by the federal Congresswoman from Mississippi! Now we can't have people being misled like that – there is no value in leaving citizens unaware of the basic facts of politics that we all have to use when deciding our vote. So I would like to be very clear about what I and the people here with me onstage today are campaigning for. This is, to be absolutely clear, a state senate race. We are the Federalist Party, a proud institution devoted to the empowering of Atlasia’s communities and individuals and to the good governance at all levels of government that we continue to desperately need. And the person to whom I am about to yield the stage is a proven representative of his community and its people, a clean campaigner like the rest of his fellow Ohio Federalists, and your next state senator!
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« Reply #217 on: December 18, 2020, 02:23:17 AM »

[On a personal request, Representative Cao traveled down south to Brunswick to join the Federalist gubernatorial candidate and other state legislative candidates for a masked and socially distanced general rally for their various campaigns. The Representative's role was to introduce a state representative and old acquaintance in support of his state Senate bid; like the rest of the event, the speech was livestreamed on the Georgia Federalist Party's website and social media, and a transcript is provided below.]

Evening, folks! Thanks for having us here today and for coming out still masked up and doing your best to socially distance. You’ve just heard a great deal from the next governor of Georgia about her plan to get our communities through COVID as safely as possible, and more besides. It’s not a plan that any one person or community can execute alone; your efforts to keep your family and friends and neighbors safe through washing your hands and wearing your masks are only one aspect of that. Human decency and empathy is something we could always use more of, and I’m glad to see that Georgia is also stepping up to show our nation how it is done.

But COVID isn’t the only crisis we face. Down here in Glynn County, you’ve seen a few devastating hurricanes in your time – especially in recent years – and countless other storms and floods and disasters that may have done less damage in relative terms, but damage that matters to the people and communities affected nonetheless. The weather has become increasingly catastrophic for the people and communities of coastal Georgia, and I shouldn’t have to tell you that this is a threat that must be defended and guarded against – this coupled with the rising sea level that could take out hundreds of square miles’ worth of private property and public infrastructure within decades. And the fight against this needs a better solution than band-aids for each road that is rendered impassable or each home that floods out. For a while now, this part of the state has been crying out for a comprehensive plan to safeguard Georgians’ homes and schools and infrastructure from this looming threat. And so I’m really very pleased to join your state representative here; he’s taken the lead on working with your county and with other coastal counties on coordinating a strategy for dealing with each flooding case and finding funds for each solution that must be undertaken. The bill he wrote and sponsored, which brings significant funding for this project from the NOAA, just passed the state House today and is on its way to the state Senate, where we hope it can pass before the new legislative session begins.

And just like with COVID, if this bill is signed into law – and as someone who’s sponsored House measures to combat the effects of climate change, I sincerely hope it is – it is also up to you all as individuals and as communities to take the lead on making sure your local governments, the level of government you exert the most individual power over, take up the lead of making good on these plans and funding proposals. It’s very necessary that the part of government closest to its citizens, the part of government with the clearest information on each flooded home and each decommissioned utility, is able to do its part in our efforts to protect coastal communities like Brunswick. There are local solutions that can be easily implemented – indeed, some of which have already seen debate and discussion in your county governments recently. There will be proposals that are much harder to carry out, due either to infeasibility or to lack of sufficient funds for this or that measure. Without some of these, it may seem impossible to safeguard our communities; yet the success of projects like this depends on the level of cooperation and communication between the various levels of government and the clarity of the information they are able to work with. It comes back to whether or not the people who make up our government are able and willing to do their jobs; whether they are dedicated to our communities and the people therein; whether they can leverage the problems faced and the struggles made each day in these communities into solutions that can truly be said to serve their constituents and the people of Georgia.

There are a few ways to fight for a government that does its duty to its constituents and to the citizens whom it serves. You are all very much able to let your representatives in government know what they ought to do and what they can do better. If there is something that must be done, fight for it. Call your government officials; join their town halls, whether physical or virtual; be the active voice in this participatory democracy that we all have a constitutionally guaranteed right and ability to be. And if you must do it yourself, to the extent of running for office yourself, do so! A certain representative here today did just that ten years ago, when his frustration with bureaucratic inaction in Brunswick drove him into a state assembly race; now, in his run for the state senate, please welcome your favorite son and a staunch defender of Georgia’s coastal communities. Let’s give him a warm welcome, Brunswick!
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« Reply #218 on: December 20, 2020, 03:18:19 AM »

[Federalist Party leaders joined an enterprising state House candidate and others running in nearby districts for a general masked and socially distanced event in Statesboro to talk about policies particularly pertinent to the communities of eastern Georgia. Representative Cao was invited to introduce the party's gubernatorial candidate at the livestreamed event; his speech may be found below for public release.]

Hello, Statesboro! Glad to be here today with you lovely folks, especially with all of you doing your best to stay masked and socially distanced, and further thanks to your mayor for inviting us down to talk with everyone here ahead of the tight race he's running for the state House. It's been a turbulent year and a hectic campaign coming on top of the holiday season, but I hope you don't lose sight of why those are both important – your local and state government is the government you'll all see the effects of daily, and this campaign, as much as anything else, will be determinative of the direction Georgians take in the coming year.

I don't think it needs to be pointed out to you all here in Statesboro, where Georgia Southern University is the largest employer in the area, that education has a particularly important role to play in all of this. The theory of education as we understand it, broadly speaking, is built to equip our children with the basic tools they need as functioning members of the society we live in: not specific "hard" or "soft" skills per se, but the key functions of intensive thinking and critical thinking. Society at its roots runs on these forms of thinking, on the fruits of objective analysis and of creative appraisal, of thinking in the imaginative sense, and of employment of other tools learned during the course of our education to bring a new or improved idea or proposal out into the world. The education of an individual requires that that individual learn the ins and outs of thinking both intensively and critically. And there is no doubt that whatever the ultimate efficiency of our education system, it has been built around one or other or both of these basic aims for much of its history.

But education can't stop there – it must give us worthy objectives to think intensively or critically about. With no knowledge of that, the ultimate product of our education system would be a racing-engine of a student, ready to burn nonexistent fuel to move down tracks that have not been laid. The proper form of education requires development of a love for truth;  for what is not always possible to capture as a collection of bits or the answer to a test question. The difference between knowledge and wisdom is not easily articulated, but in rough terms it is what serves to give meaning to the critical faculties and capabilities which our education system seeks to develop. And for Georgia and our nation to thrive, we need future generations to understand that difference – to live that difference and know firsthand what such an education system can do for them and for this nation's potential. It was often said that the universe is a law-abiding universe, one that recognizes the truth for what it is and gives meaning to the moral arc that always bends towards justice regardless of its length. A good education system recognizes that. And a good education system is what our Federalist candidates here and all over the state recognize the importance of: one that gives our kids of whatever income level, race, gender, or creed the tools not only to survive society but also to improve it.

Now how we teach is just as important as what we teach. Our kids' education has been severely disrupted this year and part of our teachers' efforts to fix this has been their use of online learning. The incorporation of technology into our children's learning environment has been a long time in coming, and it will assuredly be a credible option for learning going forward thanks to its widespread use, but this must be done responsibly and, as always, with regard for our kids' wellbeing. Online learning has had a number of flaws and shortcomings explode into full view this year, not least its widening of the education gap and its limitations in reaching our lower-income communities who are particularly in need of an education system that helps them break the poverty cycle. So we need to see inroads into its improvement as a medium if we are to make the education system effective in reaching the kids who need it most. Online or in-person, our teachers have continued the hugely important job of training our next generation. They deserve administration that rewards their work, recognizes the qualified teachers who daily change our kids' futures for the better, and empowers them and their communities to succeed.

It's a tough job. But it was once said that the road out of poverty (and out of many, many other situations) runs through the schoolhouse. If we can improve our education system; fix the potholes and dents made by outside groups that put their own interests ahead of those of our children's; and make a system that puts the full development of our kids first – one run, moreover, by those at the local and regional level most in tune with what needs to be done to get to an education system that most benefits their communities – then, having planted the seeds in a garden some of us may never get to see, we can see our kids take up the fight for knowledge, for the power that comes with it, and for a wisdom that our people and our communities and our nation sorely needs. And here with us today is someone who recognizes the importance of an education system that does just that, having seen and fought her share of the fight for a better education for every single one of our kids: Stateboro, please welcome your next Governor!
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« Reply #219 on: December 21, 2020, 02:42:01 AM »

[Following a series of fundraising Zoom calls in the Atlanta media market alongside several other Federalist Party leaders, Representative Cao joined the party's gubernatorial ticket on a swing through several towns and communities in Gwinnett County to greet voters and encourage volunteers in continuing their GOTV efforts just a few days out from the election. The following livestreamed speech was delivered during a stop in Snellville, where (as per official party policy) all persons involved wore masks and socially distanced.]

Honored to be here in Snellville this afternoon, and thanks very much for taking the time out of your day to listen to us – whether you're here in person, masked up and socially distancing, or watching this virtually and hopefully keeping yourself and others safe. We aren't through this pandemic by any means, regardless of what the next COVID report says. So I hope everyone continues to stay safe, keep your guard up and protect your friends and family this season.

And you know, coming in off US 78 it was heartening that most of the folks I saw out and about were doing just that, so our national guard against a resurgence seems to be holding up well in this neck of the woods. A very good development, and I hope Georgia continues to hold the line in that sense. I can't speak for the other roads into Snellville, though, particularly not the Ronald Reagan Parkway, which seems to be closed for the week. But it does seem as good an opportunity as anything to talk about a city as associated with Reagan's name as this parkway is today, and one that still has resonance in the present state of our nation.

The "shining city on a hill" motif extends beyond Reagan, obviously. It goes back to the true-to-Puritanism John Winthrop, who built up on a theme drawn straight from the Sermon on the Mount. But no other leader returned to it as frequently throughout their political career, not least because Reagan was always a firm believer in the ideals that this nation held at its core. Throughout a decade where people across the nation were afraid, or hungry, or living comfortable lives, or apprehensive at the upswing in economic and international turmoil, he returned to the motif in his addresses to the nation and his reassurances that such setbacks were not the end of a country that stood for lofty ideals that would not die with any one person. Whatever other conclusions he drew as a result of this comparison, he was correct about the endurance of those self-evident truths upon which our nation was founded – truths whose axiomatic nature enabled the consistent construction of a raison d'être that has stood the test of nearly two hundred and fifty years and counting.

But a city is not exclusively composed of its foundations, strong though they may be. There were those in Reagan's time who knew that those ideals existed and yet struggled to see how those ideals could be applied to their lives: the vanishing loans, the slim job prospects, the poverty traps; so many problems and so little help available. Those unquestionably still apply today – today, where the pandemic claims hundreds and thousands of lives a day; where the climate crisis has already exerted a toll that our predecessors in the Reagan era saw but could not (or chose not to) avert; where so many people and livelihoods and communities have died and many more are struggling, seeing no relation between their plight and the foundations of the "shining city" that they live in. A city is made up of its people, and it cannot truly shine – its ideals are not truly revealed for all to see and marvel at and emulate – unless the people can shine.

The ideals must be made clear in the lives of all inhabitants of this city that we call Atlasia. The policies pursued at all levels of government must reflect the proper invocation of ideals that have not yet found their full flower, even after the struggles of the abolitionists and protestors, of Lincoln and King and countless others who recognized the need for the struggle and fought the good fight: that all men and women are created equal, endowed with inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that governments must be instituted with the express goal of securing these rights, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; and that we the people are duty-bound to ensure that our governments do their duty in that regard. Let us bring that shining city to pass: a nation where every single one of our citizens can see in their lives the flowering of this very foundational principle which the Founders set on paper in such form as to create the opportunity for its full development. Let us keep the faith that animated the preacher from Atlanta and all the others who fought to make this full development a reality. Let us finish the course of that fight at all levels of government. And to begin that, Snellville, please welcome two upstanding public servants of the highest order who have dedicated their careers to efforts in this great state to further the continuation of that dream which the Founders held, which Dr. King held, and which the Federalist Party of Georgia still holds: your next Governor and Lt. Governor!
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« Reply #220 on: December 22, 2020, 11:25:24 PM »

[Ad airing online and in all Georgia media markets until Election Day.]

[Speaker Cao and Councillor KaiserDave stand six feet apart in a white room; Cao is wearing an orange Federalist rosette and KaiserDave is wearing a red tie and rosette. KaiserDave gave his full consent to appear in this ad before it aired.]


KaiserDave: I’m KaiserDave of the Labor Party.

Cao: And I’m Joseph Cao of the Federalist Party. Our parties are in the final days of campaigning against each other. And while I think you should vote Federalist—

KaiserDave: —But actually, you really should vote Labor—

Cao: —there are some things we both can agree on.

KaiserDave: Throughout this cycle, we’ve both been able to debate on the issues that matter to ordinary Atlasians without resorting to personal attacks.

Cao: More than that, we’ve shown that we can disagree as partisans without hating each other as fellow citizens.

KaiserDave: And whatever the outcome of this or any other election, we can and will work together for a better country.

Cao: This holiday season, let’s reject the petty personal and partisan rancor and put what really matters to Atlasians first.

KaiserDave: I’m KaiserDave of the Labor Party,

Cao: I’m Joseph Cao of the Federalist Party,

Both: and we approve this message.
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« Reply #221 on: December 23, 2020, 01:46:18 AM »

Quote
Following the recent slander of conservatives and Federalists in Georgia, newly elected representative Deadprez attends a rally in Savannah, Georgia with the gubernatorial ticket.

Greetings everyone,

What a wonderful time it is to be a conservative in Georgia, only if you don't follow the news and pay attention to left-winged politicians and activists. The sad truth is we live in a divided time and some people are willing to go low in order to energize voters and discredit any dissenting opinions. There was once a time in Atlasia where the left and the right could co-exist. Differences existed, but there was a certain level of respect each side gave each other. We seem to have lost that in recent times. Because we are descendants of both Burkean and Lockean thought, it's important to stress their character at times like this. When the other side goes low, we go high. We take the high rode not because we aren't willing to fight, but because we understand at the end of the day, people are going to disagree and there should never be room for egregious slander on the level we see today.


Calling another person a Nazi just because of their belief is immoral and hurtful to those that actually dealt with Nazis in the past. Conservatives believe in a transcending moral order that binds not only our great nation, but the world. It exists no matter where you go, what culture you grew up  in, and what community you have an allegiance to. This moral order has no place for reprehensible views such as Nazism and my colleagues will do everything humanly possible to make Georgia a welcoming place for everyone. I know it's tough to not go low at a time where it feels like all hope is lost, but it is during these hardships we must display and promote peaceful discourse. We never slander the other side with false accusations. We focus on the facts and criticize the other side when bad policies are promoted. That is the way we move forward.

We are a welcoming party with a variety of ideas. Just look at the makeup of politicians. From Cao to myself. While we may differ on a few key issues, what binds us together is our belief in freedom, independence, local communities, and personal responsibilities. Is this Nazism? Is this discrimination, persecution, imprisonment, authoritarianism, or supremacy? At a time when we are a minority in representation, it's ridiculous to suggest we are promoting an ideology that has been rejected for generations. I think it's safe to say we have the moral high ground here. This isn't the first time we have been slandered and it won't be the last. What's important is what we learn from this and how we address it. We do this by continuing to engage local communities and stressing key issues such as the debt, covid relief, reforming both federal and local governments, and promoting a sound rule of law. Additionally, it's also important to work across the isle no matter how difficult it may be with a few people that see us nothing more than spawns of Hitler himself. It's our job to work with these politicians if they remain in office and I will continue to do so. Maintain high spirits in these tough times and don't falter. God bless
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« Reply #222 on: December 23, 2020, 02:45:07 AM »
« Edited: December 23, 2020, 11:54:54 PM by People's Speaker Joseph Cao »

[Representative Cao spent the day in the Columbus metropolitan area and outlying communities assisting a group of Federalist state legislative candidates and volunteers in phonebanking, doorknocking, and other GOTV efforts. These efforts were brought to a close for the day with a general masked and socially distanced event downtown, where the Representative was invited to give the opening speech, of which a transcript is provided below.]

Good evening to you all, and a very happy holiday season to everyone who made it here today. It’s great to see all of you here in Columbus continuing to keep yourselves and your friends and family and communities safe by masking up and socially distancing, actions that fittingly for this season are about being considerate of others and treasuring what life we have. And I hope you’ll continue to stay safe, you and yours, as we move through this campaign season and holiday season.

So it is rather jarring to me and probably to many of you here to see the state of the campaign. I for one was not particularly expecting that several elected officials would, in the very midst of this season of peace and goodwill, be hurling invective and poison with the express intent of using their platforms to rile up Atlasian citizens and make them angry and afraid. Now some people have told me that this is all simply part of the art of politics, of carefully controlling the amount of vitriol and heavy rhetoric spilled in the course of partisan events; that it is all right to rile people up even in service of a politically helpful cause that you and I ultimately know is baseless and fact-free; that even if citizens are turned against their fellow citizens in a devil’s brew of hate and fear and paranoia, it is all right because people want boogeymen, want a target to be fearful of, and that it isn’t wrong to give them just such a target if they want to feel safer. That is, in a word, hogwash. It is not obvious to me that politicians exist to pander to the baser instincts of Atlasian citizens. It is even less evident that such pandering is the antidote to a political scene that is already suffering from an overdose of finger-pointing and strained relations, when what is needed is a defusing of the high temperature that has afflicted our nation over the past days and weeks.

Demagoguery doesn’t suit our country very well. It especially does not need to return in the middle of a pandemic that has proven what can be done by buckling down and listening to the voices of sanity, of reason, and of not going out of one’s way to blame the other. The people of Georgia and all those across this nation have plenty to worry about each day without unscrupulous officeholders adding fuel to their fears – especially so when that fuel is unsubstantiated, does no good, and actively impedes the average citizen’s ability to function in our political system. This nation is held together by the common understanding that we citizens are possessors of certain inalienable rights and that a basic level of accession to these rights, to institutions, and to our fellow citizens is necessary. When our vision is distorted by a willingness to put partisanship over all of these ties that bind, over the fundamental consideration of courtesies that come with being a citizen of Atlasia, we lose the objectivity that is required of us. We can’t think straight; we can’t see straight; we can’t walk straight. If I may borrow a phrase, we get high off our own supply. The blinding effect of demagoguery is among the most damaging effects it is possible for this nation to inflict upon itself, and those of us gathered here today know well – and, for some of us, lived – the damage it has done to Georgia in the past.

I do not believe our citizens will be so easily misled, nor that it is wise to fight fire with fire and add our own oil to the flames of mob mentality. As an elected officeholder and representative of the people here in Columbus and in Georgia and of all Atlasians, I know that my words and actions matter. But more than that, all of us gathered here today hope you all likewise realize as fellow citizens of our representative democracy that your words and actions also matter – that your own bearing and step with those of your fellow Atlasians affects this nation’s direction. We hope you will all know that just as it is possible for a mob to inflict untold amounts of damage to our national fabric, it is also possible – if all of you make a conscious effort to think of your families and communities and what needs to be done in the real world rather than in the excessively hyperbolic world of partisan politics – to build our nation up community by community, town by town, person by person. We hope that you will make the conscious decision to base your vote upon a serious and sober discussion of the policy that Federalist and Labor and DA and Liberal and Peace candidates across this state have laid out, for the tangible proposals each candidate has worked on and highlighted each in their communities and districts.

We hope that every last one of you across Georgia will go to the voting booth in the knowledge that the act of voting is hidden from outside view because you all are, first and foremost, Atlasians rather than partisans. And when you all emerge from the booth, we hope that all of us will get down to the serious business of building a better Georgia and show the nation the unimpeachable power and potential afforded to us by our democratic system. And it is my pleasure to now yield the stage to a veteran of that process, of ignoring the partisan rancor and getting things done for her community and her district: folks, please welcome your state senator!
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« Reply #223 on: December 23, 2020, 11:53:49 PM »

[A video of Representative Cao standing outside the National Center for Civil and Human Rights was posted to his office and social media (and various statewide Federalist Party accounts, including Georgia’s) on Wednesday morning, accompanied by the hashtag #GoVote.]

Good morning, Atlasia! Voting begins very soon, and my message to you this morning is simple. Whatever your party affiliation, whatever your inclination – go vote!

Yes, voting has had a fraught history down in these parts. It is indisputable that for a very long time, an unconscionably long time in fact, that constitutional right was loosely interpreted by those in the halls of power to the point of virtual irrelevancy. And the fact of the matter is that the rights, freedoms, and lives of millions were trampled on for centuries. The fact of the matter is that it took the second-bloodiest war this nation has ever fought and the largest-scale protest movement it has ever seen to begin righting the wrongs that were done; and even now we are short of fully achieving the lofty ideals that the Founders set down. There are many who, through no fault of their own, still face restrictions on their right to vote; they are still struggling up the path towards that attainment of their rightful constitutional duty, and we as a nation with them. But we are on that path nevertheless.

I want to be clear about the wrongs that were done, and the damage it did to the lives of the people whose only mistake – in defiance of a certain self-evident truth – was being born with the wrong skin color or in the wrong class or of the wrong gender. The march to the sea was evidence of that. Jim Crow was evidence of that. Stone Mountain was and is evidence of that. But we can see the injustices as the un-Atlasian states of affairs that they are because we have the measuring stick of the Declaration, the Constitution, and the ideals contained therein. We have the tools to fix them because of that same Constitution, its conception of a free people, and the laws and measures it built around that fundamental principle. And perhaps most importantly, we have the drive to get rid of them because of the brave people who stood up and found their voices and showed their courage in the face of a society that said it wasn’t their time or their place and was willing to back that sentiment up with dogs and firehoses. They likewise give us the impetus of following the trail they blazed; of being a citizenry unafraid of using its voice to change things for the better.

So we must continue to do that. Things never change overnight; a century passed between Lincoln and the Civil Rights Movement. But it is imperative that we continue to speak up and use all the tools we citizens have at our disposal, as people did during that century of nothing much happening on the surface – and the most important of that is your vote. Get out to vote for your communities and what needs to be done; what wrongs need to be fixed; what problems need to be solved. And after the election, stay around! Put pressure on your elected officials and make sure they do what they swore to do. Go vote, bring your family and friends to vote – and know that when people get out and make use of their voices, things can change for the better.
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« Reply #224 on: December 23, 2020, 11:58:33 PM »

[The final day of the Georgia Federalist Party’s GOTV efforts across the Atlanta area was concluded with a livestreamed general rally attended by the party’s gubernatorial ticket and most of the area’s state legislative candidates as well as several party luminaries, at which masking and social distancing policies were strictly enforced. Representative Cao (by no means a luminary) was asked to deliver the concluding speech in a series of speeches by other candidates exhorting Georgians to get out to vote; a transcript of his speech is provided below.]

Atlanta! Thank you very much for having us tonight; and thank you, all of you, for coming out masked and still socially distancing. Keep it up, folks! There is the charged atmosphere of partisan bickering, and then there is downtown Atlanta, where, like countless other communities across this great nation, you good citizens are all still aware first and foremost of the pandemic and your duty in keeping your friends and families safe. And personally, I think we all know which sphere we’d like to conduct our daily business and our lives in.

Our political scene today can fairly be described as cacophonous. I don’t think anyone would dispute that, particularly those of you across this nation who have seen in three short weeks all of the noxious miasma that usually gets confined to the Beltway. And frankly, having spent going on six months in Nyman, it wears on you. If we weren’t already required to wear masks, I would’ve gotten one on my first day just to keep my lungs fit for future use. But as a public servant duly elected by the people to do the job prescribed in our Constitution, it wasn’t really in my line of duty to contribute further to that – so all I could do and did was bunker down and get to work.

Because that’s what we as elected officials are ultimately called and required to do: work for the people. We have a duty to uphold the rights enshrined in the Constitution – yes, even the right to call your opponents fascists and white supremacists – and to work within that framework to make life better for the people who we serve, to improve the lot of the communities we all live in, to build a government that really works for every single individual in the diverse patchwork of our state. That begins with a focus on the community level and an understanding of what people at that level need. It begins with a dedication to government that serves the people from as close to the ground as possible, which necessitates a bottom-up approach: beginning from local government, all higher levels at the state and regional and federal government must likewise value the community and the individual and the interplay between them and the very real progress that results from keeping that interplay at the center of our focus.

We in the Federalist Party have spent the past month and months on the ground not just here in Georgia, but in communities and states all across Atlasia with countless candidates who bore that in mind and brought the levers of control back to the people they served through their policies and the manner in which they conceived and advanced those policies. We’ve focused our policy on what the citizen and the local government can lead, on what the regional and federal governments can assist in implementing, and on what works for each community. In state legislatures and governor’s mansions all across this nation, newly elected Federalist leaders have put their heads down and gotten to work with their constituents’ input and participation. Good governance looks like that – not overly boastful, not focused on the spin or the mud or the horse race, but focused instead on what matters for serving the people and the Constitution in their constituency. We’ve never claimed to be the final arbiter of all that is right or wrong with government, but nevertheless the Federalist Party has stood firm in its ideals and their vindication for the most part in the progression of Atlasia’s political scene regardless of the spin and mud that has come our way. Because we prioritize good government, by, of, and for the people to carry out the government’s fundamental duty of securing our rights and effecting our safety.

For those who still believe in the ultimate ability of our nation’s citizens to reform and advance, of government at every level to serve its constitutional duty of safeguarding our rights and liberties, of this country to rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed – there is a bell ringing out there. Its peals were described in memorable detail by a man whose footsteps and the footsteps of the movement he led changed this state and this nation and reminded us of what we can still accomplish. Get out to exercise your right to vote – vote for your families, for your communities, and for all that you can accomplish as a citizen through the state legislators and governor you will elect – and from every city and hamlet, from every house and apartment and tenement, from every hill and molehill and mountainside in this state and this nation, let that freedom ring as it has never rung before; let it ring truly; let everyone who hears it, citizens and elected officials alike, join in to bring new meaning to the words that founded our nation. Let freedom ring!

And let us all, one vote at a time and one fight at a time, step closer to the day when every Atlasian will hear that bell and that ringing and find that, after all, politics is in fact the art of what is possible for this nation, its society, and its people. Thank you very much, Georgia. Thank you, Atlasia, for this campaign and the lessons you’ve brought to us all one citizen and one vote at a time. If you haven’t voted yet, get out and do your civic duty with all the urgency it is due. Keep safe, all of you. Happy holidays, Dave bless you all, and good night.
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