Marine 1 was helping your brother move? Neat!
Gas Bandit's Political Thread V: The Vampire Likes Bats
- Thread starter GasBandit
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GasBandit
Staff member
Yeah, what I was saying was, if he doesn't win ohio, it doesn't matter what else he wins.
http://www.ukprogressive.co.uk/brea...s-gop-is-stealing-elections/article20598.html
More and more GoP voter fraud. This is freaking huge. Definitely bigger than I though previously.
More and more GoP voter fraud. This is freaking huge. Definitely bigger than I though previously.
Liberals concerned with losing an election always seem to fall back on the "Conservatives are stealing the election" canard. It's really embarassing; you can't argue that there's no vote fraud so you don't need new voting laws, and then argue that certain groups are stealing the election through vote fraud.
All those empty smiles are so unsettling...
No, they argue that duplicate voting or ineligible voting is almost non-existent. Voter caging and voter suppression is absolutely happening, and is much more effective. Did you know that in some counties in Florida the ballot is 10 pages long?
Yes, but it takes time to vote on a ballot that large. Eleven proposed changes to the constitution? Really? What's the point of that other than to slow down voting and cause people to just give up and not vote? Keep in mind Florida had their attempt to cut the early voting time was rejected by a judge on the basis it was discriminatory. Here is a quote from the article-
"Four amendments run on for hundreds of words, and are full of legalese such as this, on Amendment No. 5, dealing with the court system: "If the Legislature determines that a rule has been readopted and repeals the readopted rule, this proposed revision prohibits the court from further readopting the repealed rule without the Legislature's prior approval."
What? How is that even remotely helpful to the average voter?
So if you argue against unnecessary new laws that are combating something that there is no evidence of , you can't argue that the GOP is using tried and true voter suppression tactics (we have a law against throwing out voter registration forms for a reason)? And if that retired NSA Analyst is on to something, which I admit his conclusion seems far fetched, is it not important to at least look into it? I'm far more inclined to believe that election fraud is happening through the use of rigged computers, whose results will most likely never be hand verified, than by thousands (the minimum scale it would realistically take to influence an election) of people impersonating dead folks.
I'm of two very different opinions on that.
1) It's legalese because it's the language of the law written by duly elected officials. To 'simplify' it means to possibly obfuscate the original intent of the bill. Truthfully, in a direct democracy this would be exactly the way to do it. People vote on the bill/amendment and know exactly what it says. If it's confusing, that's the fault of the writers and should work against their intent. So the politics of vote language move from the interpretation at the vote level do the development of the bill in the legislature.
2) 50% of the voting public is less smart than the other 50%. [DOUBLEPOST=1351283408][/DOUBLEPOST]
If exit polling didn't line up so much with election results, I'd be more inclined to believe rigged computers were a real thing but right now I think they're more a Simpson's fantasy than anything else. The reason that Republicans invest in voting machines is because it's easy money sucking at the government teat.
I strongly believe that voter ID laws are necessary.
1) It's legalese because it's the language of the law written by duly elected officials. To 'simplify' it means to possibly obfuscate the original intent of the bill. Truthfully, in a direct democracy this would be exactly the way to do it. People vote on the bill/amendment and know exactly what it says. If it's confusing, that's the fault of the writers and should work against their intent. So the politics of vote language move from the interpretation at the vote level do the development of the bill in the legislature.
2) 50% of the voting public is less smart than the other 50%. [DOUBLEPOST=1351283408][/DOUBLEPOST]
I looked through the data set that the analyst provided and he's made a tremendous logical leap. The first two things that stood out were that smaller voting districts voted more conservatively, which makes sense if you look at urban/rural voting patterns and secondly that the smaller voting districts had VERY few voters where one vote had a much more significant impact on the percentages of votes received.
If exit polling didn't line up so much with election results, I'd be more inclined to believe rigged computers were a real thing but right now I think they're more a Simpson's fantasy than anything else. The reason that Republicans invest in voting machines is because it's easy money sucking at the government teat.
I strongly believe that voter ID laws are necessary.
Just out of curiosity, why do you feel they are necessary?
Because voting is the most powerful action you can take (legally) in a democracy and the responsibility on both the voter and the government to make that a transparent, effective, effortless, verifiable and trustworthy transaction is tremendous. Working in banking, the regulations around identity are very strong - because the common person needs to know that their money is protected otherwise the banking industry would collapse. A vote should be treated with a similar respect. In economic terms, we've devalued a vote to nothing; there's no 'cost' to it, so people assign consider it valueless. There's no reason to protect it, no reason to fight for it and as such can be (and has been) taken away.
Ideally every person of voting age and ability would be provided at no charge an identity card attached to no database, no tracking that could act in replacement to commonly accepted identification methods such as driver's license, birth certificate, etc. You go through more identification to use a credit card at Walmart than you do to vote.
That's all fair points and I can respect that position. I think the 'ideally' part is the most contentious, though, and why there are so many efforts to oppose Voter ID laws. There needs to be in place a way to prevent not just fees for getting a Voter ID, but the hidden fees associated with the process (travel, time availability, etc). The main opposition to the Voter ID laws that have been put in place is precisely because of these factors.
I simply don't understand why nearly every first world nation has figured out how to do this other than the US.
Because in the US Voter ID isn't about making voting more secure, but about convincing people not to vote.
I think it's probably a bit more #1 than #2 than you think. Convincing people not to vote is WAYYY easier than Voter ID laws. Shit, at what, 57.37% voter turnout you don't even have to consider most not to vote.
Sure, but you only need to convince 2% this election to not vote in order to swing the Presidency.
2% of the poor people who have been stereotyped as voting Democrat or 2% of the rich people who have been stereotyped as voting Republican?
Because the GOP hate poor people and want them to prevent them from voting, duh.
Talking about all this voter intimidation makes me wonder if the Black Panthers will be out in front of polling places again.
Does it matter? Intimidation is intimidation, and has a negative effect on the voting process. I will say, as someone in a fairly wealthy neighborhood, I don't wait to vote. Seriously, we get high turn-out and I still didn't have to wait to cast a ballot in the last 3 elections. I can't say the same for the big cities. Rural areas have short wait periods.
They don't really have an incentive to prevent voting overseas because most democracies in places like Europe don't have a rigid two party system... they have huge multiparty free-for-alls. When your average citizen has more than two choices, it is MUCH harder to pick out the ones you don't like and therefore it's just a better investment to balloon the voter rolls than let the air out of them.
Basically, the entire Voter ID issue is just another problem caused by our two party system.
Basically, the entire Voter ID issue is just another problem caused by our two party system.
I think Washington has gone to all mail ballots now? I think that's a good idea.
It is and I support it, but if it went national it would only be a matter of time until...
- Republicans accuse Democrats of using the mail-in ballots as a way to help prop up the USPS.
OR
- Ballots go missing and one side accuses the other of intercepting the ballot delivery.
Well, some economists seem to think that voting (at all!!) is irrational. It DOES have a cost, but it is the return is what is so little valued.
Some economists think eating is irrational because there's far more efficient ways to get required nutrients into our system.
Hey, I at least gave a specious source for MY claim!
Ha, nice try.
Well, it was close. Trying to find the optimum match of calories, cost and uptake.Ha, nice try.
A for effort, definitely!
A for Adam.