Canadians for Obama flock to Wash. for campaign gear

PORT ANGELES, Wash. - Canadians have been visiting the Clallam County Democratic Party headquarters to stock up on Obama campaign buttons, bumper stickers and T-shirts, county party officials said.
“Several couples a week have been coming in since we opened in May,” said Melissa Randazzo, the county party's communications chairwoman.
She is the wife of Matthew Randazzo, who is chairman of the county party but is on a leave of absence to be communications director for Derek Kilmer, Democratic candidate for the 6th Congressional District seat also sought by Republican Bill Driscoll.
Melissa Randazzo said that Canadians have been posing for photographs with cutouts of President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, as well as collecting election items at the office at 124-A W. First St..
“They have been really enthusiastic about Obama stuff,” Melissa Randazzo said, adding that the office hasn't tracked the numbers.
“They have tried to give us donations,” she said.
But “we can't take donations from Canada.”
Dick Pilling, chairman of the Clallam County Republican Party, said he is not aware of Canadians coming to county GOP headquarters at 509 S. Lincoln St., in search of Mitt Romney-Paul Ryan items.
“To my knowledge, we have not had any infusion of Canadians expressing solidarity with Romney or hostility toward Obama,” Pilling said.
“There may have been a couple come past the headquarters, but I don't know,” he said.
“Any Canadian that would be smart enough to vote for Romney probably understands that they don't have a vote over here,” Pilling added.
Randazzo said she hadn't asked Canadians about their interest in the U.S. presidential election, but some had said they read a column in the Victoria Times Colonist, “so we wanted to stop by and get Obama gear.”
Times Colonist columnist Jack Knox wrote earlier this month of a red, white and blue billboard beside a Victoria-area highway that said: “Obama 2012. Yes! Yes! '1,000' Times Yes!”
Knox said the reference to 1,000 “is a bit of an in-joke, an allusion to the wager Reg Mooney has made with a friend. Victoria's Mooney has a cool grand riding on Barack Obama's re-election.”
Knox said the 79-year-old management consultant and his U.S.-born wife, Karen Mooney, decided to erect the full-sized billboard in the suburb of Saanich recently because they feel a lot rides on the election.
Saanich Mayor Frank Leonard was registered to volunteer on the Obama campaign, Knox said, and Obama cutouts were to be on display when the Victoria chapter of Democrats Abroad gathered to watch a televised Obama-Romney debate.
Mooney also paid for a billboard in 2008 that “reflected his dismay at the way Canada had lost its image as a global peacekeeper, its independence,” Knox said.
He quoted Mooney as saying: “I wanted to see an end to the constant warfare that we seem to get pulled into by following the Americans. We need to back off of being a warrior nation.”
This time, Knox said, Mooney just wants to see Obama win because he's “solid.”
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The Peninsula Daily News is a media partner of KOMO News. Read the original Daily news story with comments »
“Several couples a week have been coming in since we opened in May,” said Melissa Randazzo, the county party's communications chairwoman.
She is the wife of Matthew Randazzo, who is chairman of the county party but is on a leave of absence to be communications director for Derek Kilmer, Democratic candidate for the 6th Congressional District seat also sought by Republican Bill Driscoll.
Melissa Randazzo said that Canadians have been posing for photographs with cutouts of President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama, as well as collecting election items at the office at 124-A W. First St..
“They have been really enthusiastic about Obama stuff,” Melissa Randazzo said, adding that the office hasn't tracked the numbers.
“They have tried to give us donations,” she said.
But “we can't take donations from Canada.”
Dick Pilling, chairman of the Clallam County Republican Party, said he is not aware of Canadians coming to county GOP headquarters at 509 S. Lincoln St., in search of Mitt Romney-Paul Ryan items.
“To my knowledge, we have not had any infusion of Canadians expressing solidarity with Romney or hostility toward Obama,” Pilling said.
“There may have been a couple come past the headquarters, but I don't know,” he said.
“Any Canadian that would be smart enough to vote for Romney probably understands that they don't have a vote over here,” Pilling added.
Randazzo said she hadn't asked Canadians about their interest in the U.S. presidential election, but some had said they read a column in the Victoria Times Colonist, “so we wanted to stop by and get Obama gear.”
Times Colonist columnist Jack Knox wrote earlier this month of a red, white and blue billboard beside a Victoria-area highway that said: “Obama 2012. Yes! Yes! '1,000' Times Yes!”
Knox said the reference to 1,000 “is a bit of an in-joke, an allusion to the wager Reg Mooney has made with a friend. Victoria's Mooney has a cool grand riding on Barack Obama's re-election.”
Knox said the 79-year-old management consultant and his U.S.-born wife, Karen Mooney, decided to erect the full-sized billboard in the suburb of Saanich recently because they feel a lot rides on the election.
Saanich Mayor Frank Leonard was registered to volunteer on the Obama campaign, Knox said, and Obama cutouts were to be on display when the Victoria chapter of Democrats Abroad gathered to watch a televised Obama-Romney debate.
Mooney also paid for a billboard in 2008 that “reflected his dismay at the way Canada had lost its image as a global peacekeeper, its independence,” Knox said.
He quoted Mooney as saying: “I wanted to see an end to the constant warfare that we seem to get pulled into by following the Americans. We need to back off of being a warrior nation.”
This time, Knox said, Mooney just wants to see Obama win because he's “solid.”
-----
The Peninsula Daily News is a media partner of KOMO News. Read the original Daily news story with comments »
The US needs a CEO! We need an accountant desperately! Not a personality, a puppet, a boss, or a person that has made politicians his or her career. Above everything social, it is our economy and should be are biggest focus! Just look around you! We are failing as a nation and have been for decades! Turn off your tv and walk your neighborhood and see how many SALE signs are up. Go into the public schools, local hospitals, welfare offices! We are damn near a second world country. Might sound harsh but very true open up your eyes people! This administration cannot secure our borders, they refuse and provide sanctuaries as they are more concerned with importing and supporting illegals (aka criminals) so these scabs on our society can vote for more FREE stuff! Nothing is for free people! It's an illusion. This administration cannot balance a check book, can't pass a budget, but continue to spend your future hard earned social security dollars and continue to raise the debt ceiling! 53 percent is forced to pay for programs they do not benefit from! That's right it's only for folks who do not contribute, not you the taxpayer - you are being stolen from under this administration! These scumbags use executive orders to break illegal immigration laws! We need to draft in the best NON political leaders to run this nation.Throw out all the bums, fire them all and start fresh! We need new leaders that can balance the budget, quit spending and create jobs! That non affordable healthcare act needs to be gone ASAP! Tear it up and start over... It is the worse One Party Bill ever passed. Those of us that purchase health care, at great expense, should NOT have to pay for those who don't, won't or refuse to. If you think health care is expensive now,, just wait until its FREE!!!
they support Obma  to keep the US down, while the keep thier conservative PM. The joke is on the US.
 @slyderwsoÂ
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The Canadian conservative party would be derided as a bunch of communist hippies here in the US.
I sorry I have no idea what you are talking about.  Â
http://www.conservative.ca/
 @slyderwsoÂ
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I know you don't.  Because you don't know crap about Canadian politics.  The conservative PM in Canada has declined to argue abortion, declined to argue Canada's same sex marriage laws, and wouldn't even consider opposing Canada's hugely popular single payer health care system.  Find me an American "conservative" that thinks like that, and I'll show you an American liberal.
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You know what makes the Canuk conservatives conservative?  They like being part of the Commonwealth.
Dear Canada, you can HAVE HIM! no questions asked
It's pretty funny that Canadian citizens as individual foreigners can't contribute to our campaigns but multinational corporations headquartered in the Cayman Islands or Bahama or anywhere in the world can contribute as much as they want thanks to the Citizens United decision. I guess Romeny was wrong when he said "corporations are people my friend" - corporations are even better than people and have more rights to buy our elections!
 @Chickadee ...and unions buy elections for the left.....same feces, different day...git along now little doggie.
 @Sydthepiper No thats not really correct. A union is simply a group of US citizens that happen to work together in an industry. Members dont give to the left if they dont want to in fact, many donate to the right. Corporations are not people my friend.
 @T_BONE_WALKER If you deny that unions, for the most part, historically endorse Democrats & encourage their members to vote Democrat, and have their "sub groups" donate to Democrats, the you would also deny that on a sunny day the sky is blue, and the oceans have salt water.
Yes, there are some union members who actually have a brain & can vote for a candidate on the right, or whomever they want without relying on their leadership to tell them who to vote for, but I'd say it less than about 2%, not "many" as you claim. ...I used my union paper of endorsements to line the litter box for the cat, because that is all it is good for.
Unions vote left, and, at least with the public sector union, the left rewards them with higher pay and benefits than they would get in the private sector.
That is the undeniable fact that is un-refutable
@Sydthepiper Yeah you do seem like the type who would appreciate money from robmoneyâs and other corps. in China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, Iraq, and from who knows where, coming into PACs that support said robmoney. You might actually discover what âgit a long little doggieâ really does mean if robmoney is elected POTUS, however unlikely that really might be. So I guess French, Italian, etc. unions would also be allowed to contribute to Americaâs PACs in support of various election campaigns. hmmmmâ¦.. So are they? Maybe we are moving faster towards that New World Order, UN dream than many suspect. Thereâs just going to be a boat load of peons for the corps. and the 2%.
Let's see, Obuma sends work up there, has weakened the US dollar to the point of the Canadian dollar is par or worth more, he allows the import of aliens to this country to work when we have a huge work force out of work. Hell, I'd vote for the idiot too if I was Canadian. Who cares what the Canadians want, I want a government that represents me the working stiff, my kids and my neighbors not some power group that don't give a damn weather this country lives or dies as long as they can stuff more money into their pocket. No, I am not that hot for Romney, but he has to be better than that do-nothing in there now.
 @LongBeachBumÂ
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Lol. Facts aren't your friend.
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http://www.xe.com/currencycharts/?from=USD&to=CAD&view=10Y
God there are some stupid comments here...
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 @caphillkid Welcome to every online comment board ever.
Stupid is Having Clinton speak at the 2012 Democratic convention when he wiped out half the jobs by signing "NAFTA" into Law. Thats Stupid!
 @Bill Bylthe Sounds like socialism talk to me. Where were you born?
Including yours!
 @Shelly You're a socialist. lol
 @caphillkid ....so is Obama
 @caphillkid Its funny cause they don't get it.Â
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 @Andrew Bush  @caphillkid LOL! LOL!
 @caphillkid LOL!
âThey have tried to give us donations,â she said.But âwe can't take donations from Canada.â
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Come on they already have hundreds of thousands of jobs because of NAFTA and Clinton
gets a "quid pro quo"Â speaking scum Money for screwing the US by signing "NAFTA" and the "Idiot" Clinton did not even Read it.
"Dear Friends from the Great White North, if you like Obama enough to come down here and collect campaign bling, why don't you step it up a notch, and take the man himself? Honest, you can HAVE him."
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Sincerely,
Joe Overtaxedpayer
Canada is a nice country...... please stay there..........PLEASE
âSeveral couples a week have been coming in since we opened in May,â
This is not 'flocking to Washington' as the headline would like us to believe.
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I just wonder why every election is hijacked by the extremes on both sides? Where are the sane moderates? *Sigh*
@Necrobio I'm with you! They do exist but people are too brainwashed by the cults of personality!
....so the Canadians want four more years to be one in spirit with the exalted socialist one, eh.?
Maybe they'll propose a merger...one world mentality sort of thing.
This comment has been deleted
@scychan Yes because we hand them our jobs!
@scychan  Pure bull. We are hated world wide and Obama is laughed at.
@ObsidianOne Pure bull.....stuff.
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Chavez to Obama:" I'd vote for you, and you for me"
Here is wahat they are saying:
The weakening of Venezuelaâs democratic system of checks and balances under President Hugo Chávez has contributed to a precarious human rights situation. Without judicial checks on its actions, the government has systematically undermined free expression, workersâ freedom of association, and the ability of human rights groups to function.
Violent crime is rampant in Venezuela, yet few people are prosecuted or convicted, as law enforcement is seemingly unable or unwilling to effectively tackle it. Extrajudicial killings by security agents continue, and impunity for such human rights crimes remains the norm. Prison conditions are deplorable, and prison fatality rates are high due to inmate violence.
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http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/09/30/venezuela-election-obama-idUSL1E8KU37A20120930
Yes they support "NAFTA"Â which outsourced US Jobs and the "Idiot" Clinton signed into law.
Obama (as a way to get elected in 2008) said he was going to fix "NAFTA"Â Never Happened!
So that is why countries like Canada love the US because our Idiot Leaders are giving other Countries our US Jobs.
Can-O-bamians...ehhh...?
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I kept waiting for Baldwin and other left winger Hollywood types to to leave after Bush won as they said they would, darn it they stayed. However I'll gladly give them our SOCIALIST OBAMA to live in their SOCIALIST country after his defeat.
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Interesting - the cardboard cutouts probably have more substance then the real life versions... I wonder if the cardboard Michelle is now proud to be an American or is that Can-O-bamian or ...?
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If Romney wins I will be moving up to Canada.
 @sb in seattle ...and when you get there, demand your free housing, healthcare, college tuition, cell phone, food card, etc......have fun.
@Sydthepiper @sb in seattle You must be talking about their balanced budget. The envy of the world.
@sb in seattle -- Can I get that in writing?
In Canadian Immigration office Seattle,I 'd seen some Americans actually given up their U.S. Citizenship to move to Canada when Bush's year in 2001.They all told me "it's all heartbroken
seeing this man ruins our great country".
@sb in seattle  Dont let the door hit you in arse!
 @sb in seattle really? house on the market yet? See ya!
 @yeahguy  @sb in seattle you're kidding yourself if you think Romney's got a chance hahaha.
 @sb in seattle Just curious, but why? I've never understood the whole mindset of "if X is elected, the world will end and I will be forced into exile."
hmmmmm... wonder if we'll see Russian Leaders for Obama (who will have so much flexibility after the election) anonymously donating?
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The following are 55 facts about the debt and U.S. government finances that every American voter should knowâ¦.
#1 While Barack Obama has been president, the U.S. government has spent about 11 dollars for every 7 dollars of revenue that it has actually brought in.
#2 During the fiscal year that just ended, the U.S. government took in 2.449 trillion dollars but it spent 3.538 trillion dollars.
#3 During fiscal year 2011, over a trillion dollars of government money was spent on 83 different welfare programs, and those numbers do not even include Social Security or Medicare.
#4 Over the past four years, welfare spending has increased by 32 percent. In inflation-adjusted dollars, spending on those programs has risen by 378 percent over the past 30 years. At this point, more than 100 million Americans are enrolled in at least one welfare program run by the federal government. Once again, these figures do not even include Social Security or Medicare.
#5 Over the past year, the number of Americans getting a free cell phone from the federal government has grown by 43 percent. Now more than 16 million Americans are enjoying what has come to be known as an âObamaphoneâ.
#6 When Barack Obama first entered the White House, about 32 million Americans were on food stamps. Now,nearly 47 million Americans are on food stamps. And this has happened during what Obama refers to as âan economic recoveryâ.
#7 The U.S. government recently spent 27 million dollars on pottery classes in Morocco.
#8 The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently spent $300,000 to encourage Americans to eat caviar at a time when more families than ever are having a really hard time just trying to put any food on the table at all.
#9 During 2012, the National Science Foundation spent $516,000 to support the creation of a video game called âProm Weekâ, which apparently simulates âall the social interactions of the event.â
#10 The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave the largest snack food maker in the world (PepsiCo Inc.) a total of 1.3 million dollars in corporate welfare that was used to help build âa Greek yogurt factory in New York.â
#11 The National Science Foundation recently gave researchers at Purdue University $350,000. They used part of that money to help fund a study that discovered that if golfers imagine that a hole is bigger it will help them with their putting.
#12 If you can believe it, $10,000 from the federal government was actually used to purchase talking urinal cakes up in Michigan.
#13 The National Science Foundation recently gave a whopping $697,177 to a New York City-based theater company to produce a musical about climate change.
#14 The National Institutes of Health recently gave $666,905 to a group of researchers that is studying the benefits of watching reruns on television.
#15 The National Science Foundation has given 1.2 million dollars to a team of âscientistsâ that is spending part of that money on a study that is seeking to determine whether elderly Americans would benefit from playing World of Warcraft or not.
#16 The National Institutes of Health recently gave $548,731 to a team of researchers that concluded that those that drink heavily in their thirties also tend to feel more immature.
#17 The National Science Foundation recently spent $30,000 on a study to determine if âgaydarâ actually exists. This is the conclusion that the researchers reached at the end of the studyâ¦.
âGaydar is indeed real and⦠its accuracy is driven by sensitivity to individual facial featuresâ
#18 Back in 2011, the National Institutes of Health spent $592,527 on a study that sought to figure out once and for all why chimpanzees throw poop.
#19 The U.S. government spends more on the military than China, Russia, Japan, India, and the rest of NATOcombined. In fact, the United States accounts for 41.0% of all military spending on the planet. China is next with only 8.2%.
A d v e r t i s e m e n t
#20 In a previous article, I noted that close to 500,000 federal employees now make at least $100,000 a year.
#21 In 2006, only 12 percent of all federal workers made $100,000 or more per year. Now, approximately 22 percent of all federal workers do.
#22 If you can believe it, there are 77,000 federal workers that make more than the governors of their own states do.
#23 During 2010, the average federal employee in the Washington D.C. area received total compensation worth more than $126,000.
#24 The U.S. Department of Defense had just nine civilians earning $170,000 or more back in 2005. When Barack Obama became president, the U.S. Department of Defense had 214 civilians earning $170,000 or more. By June 2010, the U.S. Department of Defense had 994 civilians earning $170,000 or more.
#25 During 2010, compensation for federal employees came to a grand total of approximately 447 billion dollars.
#26 If you can believe it, close to 15,000 retired federal employees are currently collecting federal pensions for life worth at least $100,000 annually. That list includes such names as Newt Gingrich, Bob Dole, Trent Lott, Dick Gephardt and Dick Cheney.
#27 During 2010, the federal government spent $33,387 on the hair care needs of U.S. Senators.
#28 During 2010, U.S. Senators pulled $72,370 out of the âSenate Restaurant Fundâ.
#29 During 2010, an average of $4,005,900 of U.S. taxpayer money was spent on âpersonalâ and âofficeâ expenses per Senator.
#30 In 2013, 3.7 million dollars will be spent to support the lavish lifestyles of former presidents such as George W. Bush and Bill Clinton.
#31 During 2011, the federal government spent a total of 1.4 BILLION dollars just on the Obamas.
#32 When you combine all federal government spending, all state government spending and all local government spending, it comes to approximately 41 percent of U.S. GDP. But donât worry, all of our politicians insist that this is not socialism.
#33 As I have written about previously, less than 30 percent of all Americans lived in a home where at least one person received financial assistance from the federal government back in 1983. Today, that number is sitting at an all-time high of 49 percent.
#34 Back in 1990, the federal government accounted for just 32 percent of all health care spending in America. This year, it is being projected that the federal government will account for more than 50 percent of all health care spending in the United States.
#35 The number of Americans on Medicaid soared from 34 million in 2000 to 54 million in 2011, and it is being projected that Obamacare will add 16 million more Americans to the Medicaid rolls.
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@CrankyPanky Copy and paste much?
 @CrankyPanky Facts and data will cause their heads to explode.. Hopefully CNN and he Crowley types will not use Fact Check to review your list because once it gets through FC Spin Cycle and further massaged by George Soros's minions who work at FC your numbers will somehow either be considered lies or regurgitated to look like positives for Obama....
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EXCELLENT JOB!
 @Truth Percolates  @CrankyPanky There is a major difference between fact, data, and information.  You are posting data.  Interpretation or, rather, the information can go either way.  For example, in your first so called fact, which is actually data (stand alone figures with no quantitative or qualitative analysis), consider that it cost money to make money.  Most of the millionaires who worked for their wealth spent lots of money for their education, training, investment, etc...  Yeah, the sunk costs appear high, but over the long run, the benefits out-weighed the cost.  Governments, businesses, people all spend money to make money, and the smart ones make more than what they spent originally, over the long-run.  If our government as to spend money now so that we are secure and better off later, so be it.  It's unfortunate that many people only want instant gratification... that's not the way professional do things!
@CrankyPanky No. Many likes for someone actually trying to inform your ilk, however futile that attempt might actually be.
 @CrankyPanky  @31F  @Truth Percolates Zero for unrelated retort.
 @31F  @Truth Percolates Two likes for wasteful government spending?
 @CrankyPanky Are you crankypants under yet another new screen name? Â