General Current Events/Political Discussion

[Quest4Nes | 376]

Do most states not have early voting and absentee voting? There is no excuse to not being able to go on election day

[arch_8ngel | 1,597]

8 hours ago, Estil said:

I don't see what's so wrong with mail in voting...it works for the census, we already have that option for absentee ballots anyway.  I mean, if you got a better idea I'm all ears.

Making voting easier and more convenient means Republican candidates are guaranteed losses, so they roadblock it at every opportunity.

[arch_8ngel | 1,597]

1 hour ago, Quest4Nes said:

Do most states not have early voting and absentee voting? There is no excuse to not being able to go on election day

What?  In what paradigm of reality do you think there is "no excuse" for not being able to vote in person during limited hours on a single weekday?

[Quest4Nes | 376]

4 hours ago, arch_8ngel said:

What?  In what paradigm of reality do you think there is "no excuse" for not being able to vote in person during limited hours on a single weekday?

No excuse since there are other means. Atleast in most states

[arch_8ngel | 1,597]

1 hour ago, Quest4Nes said:

No excuse since there are other means. Atleast in most states

Absentee voting is handled state-by-state, with a wide array of different rules, with varying levels of intentional inconvenience applied to the process.

You don't just tell them "hey, I want to mail in my vote", at least not in most states.

 

I took a skim of how it works in VA, and they have a list of reasons you have to choose from (and defend) for why you want an absentee instead of in-person.

And you have to get this registered far enough in advance of election day that many hourly employees don't even firmly know their schedule.  (and on top of that the "work related" justification requires that your commute + work be at least 11 hours on election day)

There is no legitimate reason to make the process inconvenient or difficult.

Edited April 22, 2020 by arch_8ngel

[TrekMD | 1,422]

I live in Florida and I vote by absentee ballot for every election that goes on in the state for any given year.  I had to request this voting method because of my line of work and every certain number of years I have to "renew" my request for voting in this manner.  I've been doing this now for over 20 years 

Edited April 22, 2020 by TrekMD

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,014]

8 hours ago, arch_8ngel said:

Making voting easier and more convenient means Republican candidates are guaranteed losses, so they roadblock it at every opportunity.

That's an over simplification of the issue to be fair. R claims D uses ease of voting as a way to commit voter fraud e.g. using dead ppl as valid votes. D claims simpler voting would make minorities more likely to vote. Thus conclusion is drawn R would get "guaranteed losses". Both the arguments are fundamentally flawed. 

 

[spacepup | 2,405]

The whole "democrat voter fraud" conspiracy has been touted for years without any real evidence.  I've yet to see any moderately relevant, materially significant, instances of voter fraud, much less democrat-conspired fraud on that level.  It is a boogeyman that has been used to manipulate people, in my opinion.

It occurs, no doubt.  I'm not saying it's completely nonexistent.  But, I think it is exaggerated and used as a scare tactic.  I really do.  And please don't link me to a few examples of one-off situations, as if we should somehow extrapolate it to larger effect.

[Andy_Bogomil | 815]

In Canada there are advance polls open for weeks before an election for extended periods of time including evenings and weekends. You can also vote by mail. Your employer also has to give you paid time off (3 hrs maybe) on election day to vote.

 

 

[Lincoln | 230]

Yeah there's virtually no issue with voter fraud. The real issue is election fraud, where someone is interfering with the process, is an actual problem, and it typically presents in Republican controlled areas.

[spacepup | 2,405]

17 minutes ago, Lincoln said:

Yeah there's virtually no issue with voter fraud. The real issue is election fraud, where someone is interfering with the process, is an actual problem, and it typically presents in Republican controlled areas.

I don't think it's fair to make the same accusation on either side.  I maintain my comments from earlier.  Voter fraud, AND election fraud - while both do occur and there are criminal convictions to prove it, neither is a particularly widespread or material problem.   Now if you want to throw in the concept of gerrymandering, well, there may be something there but I'm not going to get into that at the moment.

[Californication | 1,478]

1 hour ago, spacepup said:

I don't think it's fair to make the same accusation on either side.  I maintain my comments from earlier.  Voter fraud, AND election fraud - while both do occur and there are criminal convictions to prove it, neither is a particularly widespread or material problem.   Now if you want to throw in the concept of gerrymandering, well, there may be something there but I'm not going to get into that at the moment.

Is voter fraud a real thing. If you said voter suppression, I would agree with you. That is, voters being kicked of the polls, certain areas getting less polling places than others, id laws, etc. 

[Tabonga | 2,325]

10 minutes ago, Californication said:

Is voter fraud a real thing. If you said voter suppression, I would agree with you. That is, voters being kicked of the polls, certain areas getting less polling places than others, id laws, etc. 

Landslide Lyndon! 

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Historically the Democratic Party in the south practiced the most widespread voter suppression in the history of the country.   As soon as Reconstruction ended state by state  various Jim Crow laws and Black Codes were put in place which were meant to keep blacks in their place - along with (or as part of)  these various nasty things such as poll taxes* and literacy tests* were put in place to discourage blacks from voting. These persisted until 1965 when the voting rights act was passed. (In other words this stuff was still occurring withing living memory of a good chunk of the population - so it really can't be considered "ancient history".

Another odd (IMHO) anomaly that occurred during that period is that the earliest gun control laws that began to be codified on state levels were put in place to take guns away from blacks.  I think that if Billy Bob and Earl Ray had run the risk of being blown out of the saddle on their "courageous" midnight rides those boys might have stayed home.

*Those laws were also used against Native Americans and poor whites (of which there were many).

[Californication | 1,478]

@Tanonga, you don't have to look 100 years back, this is happening in every major election.

Not directed at you Tabonga, I am speaking generally now, if you are a conservative and you say that the Republican's and Democrats are doing it equally, you sound silly.

Now if you say the Republicans do it more, but I don't care because I am a Republican and I want their policies to go through no matter what, that is a more honest conversation because the Democrats did not do enough to protect peoples right to vote.

Edited April 22, 2020 by Californication

[MachineCode | 159]

19 minutes ago, Tabonga said:

Landslide Lyndon! 

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Historically the Democratic Party in the south practiced the most widespread voter suppression in the history of the country.   As soon as Reconstruction ended state by state  various Jim Crow laws and Black Codes were put in place which were meant to keep blacks in their place - along with (or as part of)  these various nasty things such as poll taxes* and literacy tests* were put in place to discourage blacks from voting. These persisted until 1965 when the voting rights act was passed. (In other words this stuff was still occurring withing living memory of a good chunk of the population - so it really can't be considered "ancient history".

Another odd (IMHO) anomaly that occurred during that period is that the earliest gun control laws that began to be codified on state levels were put in place to take guns away from blacks.  I think that if Billy Bob and Earl Ray had run the risk of being blown out of the saddle on their "courageous" midnight rides those boys might have stayed home.

*Those laws were also used against Native Americans and poor whites (of which there were many).

While you aren't factually incorrect, these were Democrat (Dixiecrat to be more precise) actions and policies, this completely ignores the Southern Strategy and the more or less party swap that occurred in the late 60's through the 70's. That's 50 years of policy. Add in the fact that the majority of Black voters vote Democrat, mixed with all of the disparate impact on the black community Republican policies create, the unavailability of polling places in predominantly black and minority areas, gerrymandering to such an extreme degree that there will literally be lines drawn to encompass specific individual city streets in an otherwise Democratic voting area, and Republican citation of the events listed in the quote above as a means to accuse Democrats of voter suppression and/or fraud boils down to misdirection at best.

It's damn near gaslighting. They might as well still refer to modern Germans as nazis while simultaneously attending a Proud Boys rally.

(I understand that you never claimed these to be your views and seemed to be pointing out a common argument used in this situation so none of this is directed at you personally in any way.)

[Tabonga | 2,325]

1 hour ago, Californication said:

@Tanonga, you don't have to look 100 years back, this is happening in every major election.

Not directed at you Tabonga, I am speaking generally now, if you are a conservative and you say that the Republican's and Democrats are doing it equally, you sound silly.

Now if you say the Republicans do it more, but I don't care because I am a Republican and I want their policies to go through no matter what, that is a more honest conversation because the Democrats did not do enough to protect peoples right to vote.

I tend to reject labels - while I  am what is considered to be conservative on some things on others I would be liberal.  I have never understood the herd mentality that if you support some issues on one side you have to buy into their whole enchilada (and it leads to the erroneous logic that one side or the other perforce is correct - most of the time neither of them are IMHO).  For what it is worth I have never been a member of either party - I used to vote mostly Democratic until they moved away from my core beliefs - not that my core beliefs necessarily changed.

(In fact I still am trying to decide who the worst president in my lifetime has been  - George W. Bush or Barack Obama - how many Republicans or Democrats would say that???)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

@MachineCode   @Californication

You both seem to have missed my larger point.  Which is that either party is capable of shenanigans if they are given the opportunity - neither party is (or ever has been)  lily white (as it were) - thinking that whomever one supports couldn't do that is just plain silly (or very disingenuous) IMHO.   I can reach back into history (and not terribly far)  for numerous examples from either party when they get control of things and think they won't get called on it.   The post civil war period is great because it is the most glaring and incontrovertible  example of it.*   Political parties are  particularly susceptible to corruption since they will invariably do just about anything to either gain or maintain power. 

To a certain extent trying to say that the Democrats in the south** weren't really  Democrats  (by whatever justification) is somewhat of  an evasion since the Democratic Party used their support until the bitter end (and overlooked their excesses all along) in fact Johnson was advised by fellow Democrats that signing the 1965 Civil Rights Act would cost the Democrats the next election - which it apparently did. (This shows that the Democratic party at that time was heavily invested in the Southern Democrats influence rather than any consideration for human rights.)  

(Mentioning the post civil war stuff is not gaslighting (IMHO) since it is the penultimate example of voter suppression - trying to say one shouldn't talk about it would be akin to saying that we shouldn't talk about 911 when talking about Islamic terrorism in the US.  Again IMHO of course.)

**And we haven't even touched on the founding of the Democratic party - which is another kettle of very smelly fish.

Edited April 23, 2020 by Tabonga

[RegularGuyGamer | 2,014]

I don't think voter fraud is a legitimate argument but I also don't think that if you made voting easier by relaxing methods of voting that minorities would vote substantially more mainly bc most of the assumptions around that argument are ignorant. To think minorities don't vote bc they don't have a driver's license or other ID is not valid and holds no water. Minorities who don't vote overwhelming don't do so bc they don't feel included in policies or seen as another group to pander to during elections and drop once in office. A mail in ballot isn't changing that stance, I'm sorry. 

 

Both D and R just throw around these issues when their agenda stays hidden. R just throws around the "D's are crooked" argument and D just throws around the "muh minorities" argument. It's pathetic on both ends tbh. 

[Quest4Nes | 376]

8 hours ago, arch_8ngel said:

Absentee voting is handled state-by-state, with a wide array of different rules, with varying levels of intentional inconvenience applied to the process.

You don't just tell them "hey, I want to mail in my vote", at least not in most states.

 

I took a skim of how it works in VA, and they have a list of reasons you have to choose from (and defend) for why you want an absentee instead of in-person.

And you have to get this registered far enough in advance of election day that many hourly employees don't even firmly know their schedule.  (and on top of that the "work related" justification requires that your commute + work be at least 11 hours on election day)

There is no legitimate reason to make the process inconvenient or difficult.

texas has early voting. There isnt an excuse here.

[MachineCode | 159]

28 minutes ago, Tabonga said:

To a certain extent trying to say that the Democrats in the south** weren't really  Democrats  (by whatever justification) is somewhat of  an evasion since the Democratic Party used their support until the bitter end (and overlooked their excesses all along) in fact Johnson was advised by fellow Democrats that signing the 1965 Civil Rights Act would cost the Democrats the next election - which it apparently did. (This shows that the Democratic party at that time was heavily invested in the Southern Democrats influence rather than any consideration for human rights.)  

(Mentioning the post civil war stuff is not gaslighting (IMHO) since it is the penultimate example of voter suppression - trying to say one shouldn't talk about it would be akin to saying that we shouldn't talk about 911 when talking about Islamic terrorism in the US.  Again IMHO of course.)

Not that they weren't Democrats, but rather that is not and has not been the platform of the Democratic party for around 50 years now and that many of the folks involved switched over to the GOP. Thus the whole thing about the "Southern Strategy" and more specifically Nixon's Southern strategy. It is absolutely gaslighting coming from GOP members as they are the ones performing the modern versions of those policies while attempting to call out those that were abandoning that way 50 years ago. Thus the comment about it being akin to people who are favored by the modern day nazi movements attempting to call modern Germans nazis when they abandoned those policies and actions more than half a century ago.

[Tabonga | 2,325]

8 hours ago, MachineCode said:

Not that they weren't Democrats, but rather that is not and has not been the platform of the Democratic party for around 50 years now and that many of the folks involved switched over to the GOP. Thus the whole thing about the "Southern Strategy" and more specifically Nixon's Southern strategy. It is absolutely gaslighting coming from GOP members as they are the ones performing the modern versions of those policies while attempting to call out those that were abandoning that way 50 years ago. Thus the comment about it being akin to people who are favored by the modern day nazi movements attempting to call modern Germans nazis when they abandoned those policies and actions more than half a century ago.

An organization (or person for that matter)  is always going to be sum of its parts - and those parts will include the history both good and bad,   One can excuse it by obfuscation (or more often the case I am afraid feigning ignorance) - the fact is that the Democratic party has been steeped in racism of one stripe or another for much more its history than not. (And Robert Byrd for example continued to serve in the Senate until his death in 2010 - despite his irrefutable (to the point of being irredeemable IMHO) ties to the KKK - hardly ancient history on either count.)  

Whatever the donkeys accuse (and it generally just that) the elephants (vis a vis "racism") of doing it much less worse than what that party has done for the majority of the party's history (don't think that the passage of the civil rights act  instantly made them all people pouring out the milk of human kindness)*.  And isn't the the rampant labeling someone whom a person may disagree with as either  (or both)  a racist or a nazi a variant of gaslighting - a crude propaganda of the vilest sort (IMHO)? But acceptable when used against someone you disagree with.  To the extent that both terms have IMHO become largely meaningless - a trope of the boy who cried wolf genre.

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" Thus the comment about it being akin to people who are favored by the modern day nazi movements attempting to call modern Germans nazis when they abandoned those policies and actions more than half a century ago."   Eh???? 

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*I can assure you this didn't happen on July 3rd 1964 (and we can get into the history of the Knights of the Golden Circle if you would like (I am guessing you would rather forego that insightful pleasure) - in some ways a much more interesting one than that of the KKK): 
 

 

Edited April 23, 2020 by Tabonga

[captmorgandrinker | 1,649]

For the people that have apparently never heard of this thread, here it is.

[Tabonga | 2,325]

6 minutes ago, captmorgandrinker said:

For the people that have apparently never heard of this thread, here it is.

 

For what it is worth I once told a reigning Miss America off.................  

[Link | 2,715]

Surprise, surprise. Quarantine protests are politically motivated, and organized by parties with close ties to the president. Does anybody who’s not on the left here care to provide some perspective?

https://rampantmag.com/2020/04/27/what-does-the-far-right-want-from-the-covid-19-crisis/

 

[Lincoln | 230]

Im not a conservative and i know these protests are mostly astroturfing but i get the idea they're tapping into. 

The idea that the government can order your livelihood shut down without compensation is a scary prospect and not a power they should necessarily be granted. People are going to lose businesses and jobs and go broke. A one time minimum wage payment is not gonna cut it. Relief from recurring payments an/or replacement income is needed. And cap it off a lot of people are going to lose health insurance since its almost universally tied to employment in the usa.

The saving grace so far is the stay at home orders have had very little legal enforcement to be tested, its mostly been an agreement with the public that we're doing this to keep shit from completely falling apart. And unemployment payments are taking up the slack for a lot of people, although its taking a while to actually get money into people's hands.

[Link | 2,715]

right