Democracy, for; or against?
Oct. 22nd, 2004 02:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumI am (though you may find it hard to believe) a registered Republican. I used to be fairly centrist, these days most people call me liberal. I happen to know I've not changed all that much, becuase I started writing political pieces when I was 16, for my high school paper, which means I have more than 20 years of recorded opinions, out where memory can't gloss them to be then, what they are now.
I didn't really agree with the Gulf War, but I didn't have any real problems with it, becuase Bush Pere did it right. All the ducks were in a row.
The War in Iraq is not why I oppose Bush Fils' candicacy. Rather it is the way in which he tramples the traditions of the nation. The ways in which he lies. He says Kerry was, "gutting," intel. It's not true. Kerry was proposing a 1 percent reduction, and a reduction, of about the same size was passed, that same day; from an amendment written by Arlen Spector (R-Pa). Why did he propose it? Because the intel community had socked away about a billion dollars in a slush fund. It was an accountabilty measure.
Even that I'm willing to tolerate (not forgive) such lies are, sadly, part and parcel of the process and I am too jaded now to keep my umbrage; as I did in my youth.
No, my disquietude hearkens back to Florida, in 2000. The Republican Party conspired to suppress the vote. They staged riots, and then said Bush had to be allowed to win, even with a stain, to keep the peace.
That's enough right there... it strike to my very being, to my vocation, because I swore an oath (and have repeated it, twice) to uphold and defend the Constitution, against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Had it ended there, I'd be willing to forgive, (but not forget) this thing I cannot tolerate.
But it hasn't.
The Republican Party has been engaging in a systematic attempt, and for years, to suppress the vote of it's opposition. Two years ago, in New Hampshire, a Republican team swamped the phones of the Democratic party's get out the vote effort. "Charles McGee, the former executive director of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee, and Allen Raymond, a GOP consultant, pleaded guilty to federal charges stemming from their involvement in the jamming of telephones on Election Day, Nov. 5, 2002. Democrats' computer-generated calls to get out the vote were blocked and thus voters did not receive the intended message due to illegal action by some in the Republican Party."
And the man who was responible... Jim Tobin, he was named a few days later. What was he doing when his name came out? He was the head of Bush's re-election campaign... in the same area.
But the DOJ... They've been very busy dragging their feet on this matter (as in so many matters which touch the White House). Questions for Justice
When Tobin stepped down (because his name came out) there was evidence that it was not a local freak, but rather had some Party sanction In late October 2002, the defendant, Allen Raymond, then the president of Virginia-based political consulting company GOP Marketplace, LLC, received a call from a former colleague who was then an official in a national political organization. The official indicated that he had been approached by an employee of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee with an idea that might give New Hampshire Republican candidates an edge over New Hampshire democratic (sic) candidates in the upcoming election.
That's from the court documents, the plea agreement. Look at last part again, where a, "national political organization" official, was approached. They knew about it, and did nothing.
Now, in Nevada, and Oregon,people people have been selectively removing people's ability to vote, by the simple expedient of lieing to them. Taking their registrations, and throwing them away. That way they can't vote. Cheaper than advertising, and more effective. You know that person plans to vote, or they'd not have gone to the effort, and you know they aren't likely to vote for your guy; because they made the point of registering out his party.
A bit of shredding and a host of votes (in what promises to be a close election) are gone, with no risk that a hanging chad might go the wrong way.
The man who has been doing this... he's been paid a lot of money, and by whom? Yep... the Republicans. Sproul and Associates has been paid about $500,000 this year. RNC to Sproul
In South Dakota there is an investigation of some other shenanigans. The head of Republican Victory (the regional Get Out The Vote drive)stepped down, six of his fellows were indicted. Where did he go? Ohio. Why? To head the Republican get out the vote efforts there.
Also, in Ohio, the Secratary of State tried to invalidate the registration forms of who knows how many, because they weren't on heavy enough paper. If, however, one downloads the federal form, it has to be taken no matter what.
He has also been playing games with the federally required (because of Florida) provisional ballots, "A federal judge ripped Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell yesterday for failing to comply with a court order regarding provisional ballots and for "failure to do his duty.''
U.S. District Judge James G. Carr in Toledo also suggested that Blackwell risked denying large numbers of Ohioans the right to vote on Nov. 2 and "apparently seeks to accomplish the same result in Ohio in 2004 that occurred in Florida in 2000.''
While an appeals court decides the legal dispute over provisional ballots in Ohio, Carr wants Blackwell to give county election officials alternative instructions for the possible outcomes in the case so no time is lost once there's a ruling.
The judge even offered his own language for those guidelines, saying Blackwell can't be trusted to do so.
"I cannot be confident . . . that Blackwell will, indeed, fulfill his obligation to this court, Ohio's election officials, and Ohio's voters,'' the judge wrote."
Columbus Dispatch
In Philadelphia people tried, at a late date, to move the polling places in neighborhoods likely to vote for Kerry. It was 63 precints they tried to move Philly.com The argument was it made the voter safer.
A federal judge has handed down a ruling which makes it very hard to challenge any voting statute passed by a state decision pdf / briefs pdfs
Not that Posner, of the Seventh Circut ought to surprise anyone with the ruling, he after all praised the decision in Bush v Gore for its pragmatism, a pragmatism founded in the thinking I mentioned above, since civil unrest was possible (because the Republicans were causing it) the Court did the right thing in giving Bush the White House.
That's caving in to thugs, and it's being upheld as a virtue. Neville Chamberlain did that. We don't think well of him today.
But today, today was the icing on the cake, the straw that broke the camels back... the thing which moved me to resigned desperation, which makes me want to see the Party not merely defeated, but ripped out, root and branch.
Person, or persons unknown have been stealing completed ballots. Posing as election officials they are going to the houses of people who have ordered absentee ballots and collected them. Sweet. Better, almost, than eradicating a registration form, because some of them might manage to get a provisional ballot and vote anyway. No, this take the completed ballot and tosses it. One vote gone, unless of course it's for the guy he likes.
Warning
Has this been happening in Bush counties... no, of course not.
Even if I thought him the better candidate, that his Party is doing such things, makes him undeserving of votes. It is not only undemocratic, it is anti-democratic. It is evil, and where will this disregard of the people lead?
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed
Those are important words, but they lead to...
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness
Which brings to mind...
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security
We can still do that at the ballot box.
That, at least, is my hope and prayer.
I didn't really agree with the Gulf War, but I didn't have any real problems with it, becuase Bush Pere did it right. All the ducks were in a row.
The War in Iraq is not why I oppose Bush Fils' candicacy. Rather it is the way in which he tramples the traditions of the nation. The ways in which he lies. He says Kerry was, "gutting," intel. It's not true. Kerry was proposing a 1 percent reduction, and a reduction, of about the same size was passed, that same day; from an amendment written by Arlen Spector (R-Pa). Why did he propose it? Because the intel community had socked away about a billion dollars in a slush fund. It was an accountabilty measure.
Even that I'm willing to tolerate (not forgive) such lies are, sadly, part and parcel of the process and I am too jaded now to keep my umbrage; as I did in my youth.
No, my disquietude hearkens back to Florida, in 2000. The Republican Party conspired to suppress the vote. They staged riots, and then said Bush had to be allowed to win, even with a stain, to keep the peace.
That's enough right there... it strike to my very being, to my vocation, because I swore an oath (and have repeated it, twice) to uphold and defend the Constitution, against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Had it ended there, I'd be willing to forgive, (but not forget) this thing I cannot tolerate.
But it hasn't.
The Republican Party has been engaging in a systematic attempt, and for years, to suppress the vote of it's opposition. Two years ago, in New Hampshire, a Republican team swamped the phones of the Democratic party's get out the vote effort. "Charles McGee, the former executive director of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee, and Allen Raymond, a GOP consultant, pleaded guilty to federal charges stemming from their involvement in the jamming of telephones on Election Day, Nov. 5, 2002. Democrats' computer-generated calls to get out the vote were blocked and thus voters did not receive the intended message due to illegal action by some in the Republican Party."
And the man who was responible... Jim Tobin, he was named a few days later. What was he doing when his name came out? He was the head of Bush's re-election campaign... in the same area.
But the DOJ... They've been very busy dragging their feet on this matter (as in so many matters which touch the White House). Questions for Justice
When Tobin stepped down (because his name came out) there was evidence that it was not a local freak, but rather had some Party sanction In late October 2002, the defendant, Allen Raymond, then the president of Virginia-based political consulting company GOP Marketplace, LLC, received a call from a former colleague who was then an official in a national political organization. The official indicated that he had been approached by an employee of the New Hampshire Republican State Committee with an idea that might give New Hampshire Republican candidates an edge over New Hampshire democratic (sic) candidates in the upcoming election.
That's from the court documents, the plea agreement. Look at last part again, where a, "national political organization" official, was approached. They knew about it, and did nothing.
Now, in Nevada, and Oregon,people people have been selectively removing people's ability to vote, by the simple expedient of lieing to them. Taking their registrations, and throwing them away. That way they can't vote. Cheaper than advertising, and more effective. You know that person plans to vote, or they'd not have gone to the effort, and you know they aren't likely to vote for your guy; because they made the point of registering out his party.
A bit of shredding and a host of votes (in what promises to be a close election) are gone, with no risk that a hanging chad might go the wrong way.
The man who has been doing this... he's been paid a lot of money, and by whom? Yep... the Republicans. Sproul and Associates has been paid about $500,000 this year. RNC to Sproul
In South Dakota there is an investigation of some other shenanigans. The head of Republican Victory (the regional Get Out The Vote drive)stepped down, six of his fellows were indicted. Where did he go? Ohio. Why? To head the Republican get out the vote efforts there.
Also, in Ohio, the Secratary of State tried to invalidate the registration forms of who knows how many, because they weren't on heavy enough paper. If, however, one downloads the federal form, it has to be taken no matter what.
He has also been playing games with the federally required (because of Florida) provisional ballots, "A federal judge ripped Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell yesterday for failing to comply with a court order regarding provisional ballots and for "failure to do his duty.''
U.S. District Judge James G. Carr in Toledo also suggested that Blackwell risked denying large numbers of Ohioans the right to vote on Nov. 2 and "apparently seeks to accomplish the same result in Ohio in 2004 that occurred in Florida in 2000.''
While an appeals court decides the legal dispute over provisional ballots in Ohio, Carr wants Blackwell to give county election officials alternative instructions for the possible outcomes in the case so no time is lost once there's a ruling.
The judge even offered his own language for those guidelines, saying Blackwell can't be trusted to do so.
"I cannot be confident . . . that Blackwell will, indeed, fulfill his obligation to this court, Ohio's election officials, and Ohio's voters,'' the judge wrote."
Columbus Dispatch
In Philadelphia people tried, at a late date, to move the polling places in neighborhoods likely to vote for Kerry. It was 63 precints they tried to move Philly.com The argument was it made the voter safer.
A federal judge has handed down a ruling which makes it very hard to challenge any voting statute passed by a state decision pdf / briefs pdfs
Not that Posner, of the Seventh Circut ought to surprise anyone with the ruling, he after all praised the decision in Bush v Gore for its pragmatism, a pragmatism founded in the thinking I mentioned above, since civil unrest was possible (because the Republicans were causing it) the Court did the right thing in giving Bush the White House.
That's caving in to thugs, and it's being upheld as a virtue. Neville Chamberlain did that. We don't think well of him today.
But today, today was the icing on the cake, the straw that broke the camels back... the thing which moved me to resigned desperation, which makes me want to see the Party not merely defeated, but ripped out, root and branch.
Person, or persons unknown have been stealing completed ballots. Posing as election officials they are going to the houses of people who have ordered absentee ballots and collected them. Sweet. Better, almost, than eradicating a registration form, because some of them might manage to get a provisional ballot and vote anyway. No, this take the completed ballot and tosses it. One vote gone, unless of course it's for the guy he likes.
Warning
Has this been happening in Bush counties... no, of course not.
Even if I thought him the better candidate, that his Party is doing such things, makes him undeserving of votes. It is not only undemocratic, it is anti-democratic. It is evil, and where will this disregard of the people lead?
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed
Those are important words, but they lead to...
That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness
Which brings to mind...
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security
We can still do that at the ballot box.
That, at least, is my hope and prayer.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:38 pm (UTC)I am pro-constitution (including the second amendment), anti-death-penalty (because it cannot be evenhandedly enforced, and because innocent people are convicted, not because I have any problem with executing people who commit truly abominable crimes), pro-choice, pro-equal-rights, and pro state's rights.
And these days, I feel like a megaphone-wielding radical, and I don't think it's me that's changed.
Scary times.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:42 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:43 pm (UTC)That's me. Gun totin, press wielding, 9th amendment preaching, tolerant motherfucker, who thinks fairness ought to trump all, choice means choice, capital punishment means innocent people get killed (I'm not against people getting killed for commiting crimes, I'm just against the state doing it) left-wing hippe freak.
At least that's how it plays in today's press.
Enough to make ya' nuts.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:49 pm (UTC)So, this year, practically every person I went to law school with will be poll watching and manning the Boiler Room for 12 hours straight to protect the rights of every voter. Our country cannot afford another Bush v. Gore.
Thank you as always for sharing your insight.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:53 pm (UTC)TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:58 pm (UTC)That's wonderful that convicted felons who have served their time and are done can vote there! Here in Arizona, once you've been convicted of a felon, you can *never* vote again.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 10:59 pm (UTC)My landlords voted today; they reported that the lines here in Nashville are long at early voting. The poll officials said this was the highest turnout they'd seen since Tennessee began early voting. Luckily, things are fairly stable here, as far as security and reliability. I notice that organizations like Election Protection don't consider us much of a problem.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:00 pm (UTC)One of the things they did in Fla., was to apply Forida law to out of state felons. A small violation of full faith and credit, but hey... have to get the win.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:01 pm (UTC)TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:02 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:11 pm (UTC)So Florida illegaly took away that which was not theirs to remove.
Which was one of the ways in which Bush won the election.
And is trying to do it again.
One of the other things was that, for some reason, Cubans were disproportionatly not purged, when the State Registrar of Voter purged the rolls.
Oddly enough, most Cubans, even felons, vote (or did) Republican.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:19 pm (UTC)I'm starting to be scared shitless that somehow someone will find a way to deny my right to vote. I've got another 30 minutes to choose a mailed ballot as opposed to going in person, and I'm still not sure if I should do it to ensure that I do get a chance to vote. But I really *like* going in person to the polling place and voting. I have in the past done the "fight for a vote that I'm told can't be done" when there was a screw-up back in NJ with my registration after I moved, but I was lucky in that it was easy - everyone was very helpful in showing me how to do a delayed ballot and getting it straightened out. I've voted at my current polling place, and I just don't want to miss out on that feeling of going to vote....
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:22 pm (UTC)Calif. forms ask the questions: Have you been convicted of a felony, if yes, have you been pardoned, or had your civil rights restored.
If the answer to the second question is yes, you get to vote.
If you were convicted in Ariz., only a pardon (or a change in the law) would let you vote. Here, there, or anywhere.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:23 pm (UTC)It is a very hollow feeling that I might miss my chance, because I will be on duty.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:32 pm (UTC)Sort of like a person in Tenn. can marry, with parental consent, at 14 (or 15, I forget) but that same marriage couldn't take place in Calif.
But, because it took place in Tenn, not only are they legally wed in Calif., the bride (assuming both parties are minors) is emancipated (i.e. legally an adult) if they move to Calif., but (last I checked) the male isn't. He is still a minor.
I have a friend who had this exact problem. He got a ticket in Monterey. He was 17, married; in the bloody army. The law required his parents to appear with him.
He showed up with his wife (his parents being in Mass.) and got it all straightened out. But he wasn't a legal adult.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:33 pm (UTC)Hrmn... COL Harrell, female type, would love to deal with something like this.
heh.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:42 pm (UTC)My father still gets angry talking about the change in drinking age to 21. He doesn't have a problem with the drinking age being 21. He has a problem with someone being considered able to serve for their company, carry arms, and even die if necessary, while still being considered too irresponsible to buy a beer. (He enlisted at 17 to go to Vietnam - he was never denied the right to buy a beer, but legally, he wasn't considered old enough to do so.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-22 11:55 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 12:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 12:04 am (UTC)Racism still exists.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 12:17 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 12:20 am (UTC)TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 12:24 am (UTC)I've already told the Boss of Me that I'll be taking the 3rd off or at most telecommuting.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 01:25 am (UTC)I hope we'll all feel like partying then, and not in the sense of partying to forget our troubles, either.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 02:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 04:26 am (UTC)I want to. And I have some clothes, english, but renaissaince.
Sigh...
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 04:37 am (UTC)You and me both, buddy. I keep hoping, but I'm not feeling very optimistic.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 05:15 am (UTC)TK
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 05:19 am (UTC)Thanks for that.
no subject
Date: 2004-10-23 06:07 am (UTC)*tense smile*
k.