Good for the left, that is.
Remember when Michelle Bachmann was leading the charge with Glenn Beck attacking the Census?
Bachmann then said this to Megyn Kelly:
Bachmann: Take this into consideration. If we look at American history, between 1942 and 1947, the data that was collected by the census bureau was handed over to the FBI and other organizations, at the request of President Roosevelt, and that’s how the Japanese were rounded up and put into the internment camps. I’m not saying that’s what the Administration is planning to do. But I am saying that private, personal information that was given to the census bureau in the 1940s was used against Americans to round them up and put the Japanese in internment camps.
Well, we can all thank her now because the GOP could lose some seats over it.
But now some on the right are raising concerns that the partial boycott could hurt their own cause. Since governments at all levels base their funding decisions and political redistricting on population, fueling the fire against the census could rob heavily conservative districts and suburbs of needed funds and services.
Three Republican congressmen on the census committee -- North Carolina's Patrick McHenry, Georgia's Lynn Westmoreland and Florida's John Mica -- approached Bachmann privately and asked her to stop the boycott. Roll Call reports that they went public with their concerns because Bachmann "appeared unfazed by their request."
And Steve Benen thanks Ron Paul too and adds:
The Houston Chronicle's report looks specifically at Texas, which is counting on the census to gain additional House seats, electoral votes, and federal funding relating to transportation, agriculture, health, education, and housing
But some anti-government types are shooting themselves in the foot.
The national average on the return rate for census forms is 34%. In much of Texas, the more Republican the area, the lower the return rate. In Briscoe County in the Panhandle, McCain/Palin won nearly 75% of the vote -- and 8% of locals are sending in their census materials. In King County, near Lubbock, McCain/Palin won nearly 93% of the vote -- and only 5% of locals are answering the census.
They apparently have no idea that they're acting against their own interests.
Shhhh, I know I shouldn't have posted about it.
