Republicans in Jefferson City, At It Again

Image: Think Progress

Yessir, Republican legislators in Jefferson City are at it again. They're writing and trying to pass very self-serving legislation, all in the guise of "protecting our vote." Here it is.

Missouri voter photo ID measures pass 

House committee

Never mind that it's been proven, time and again, that there really is no significant problem with vote fraud of any kind.

How Voter ID Laws Are Being Used 

to Disenfranchise

Never mind that the costs of voter ID far exceeds any value obtained in keeping voting rolls any more clean and accurate than they already are.

How Republicans Rig the Game 

This is yet more un-American, Right Wing, Republican vote suppression and disenfranchisement of Americans. It helps them get and keep the poor, blacks, Hispanics, the elderly and physically-challenged, at minimum---read: possible Democratic Party voters---from voting.

It's not just wrong but deeply wrong and we need to fight this, we need to end it in America. They've been pushing these "voter ID" laws and gerrymandering for far too long. It all needs to end and we need to get started on it. We can and should tolerate this no longer.

Links:

Texas Voter ID Law Is Unconstitutional and Discriminates

Federal Court Rejects Texas' Voter ID Law As Unfair

Dartmouth Study: N.C. Voter ID Law Unfair to Black Voters

Missouri Republicans' Successful Gerrymandering

First, because I don't think enough people know what gerrymandering is, I put up a definition. Gerrymandering is to manipulate the boundaries of (an electoral constituency) so as to favor one party or class.

Political parties gerrymander districts so that their candidate(s) gets elected or re-elected to government office.

And it's wrong.

It skews voting away from the will of the people in the area, in the district, and puts more in the favor of the political party instead of the constituents.

And news out this week shows, further, that the Republicans in the Missouri statehouse in Jefferson City keep doing precisely this and it's a beauty. This from Addicting Info:

Huge Gerrymandering Fail Leaves College Student As Sole Voter In Missouri District

Businesses in Columbia, Missouri attempted to use their political pull to throw taxes at consumers instead of themselves, but a massive failure in their gerrymandering effort left them with one major roadblock: a 23-year-old college student who, on February 28, became the only registered voter in the district.

Representatives of the Business Loop 70 Community Improvement District attempted to remove every single eligible voter as part of an effort to ensure that local businesses had complete control over legislation — including a sales tax increase that would enable them to effectively force citizens to pay the businesses’ bills. The Columbia City Council voted in 5-2 in April to establish the district, which resembles a dinosaur drawn by a kindergartener (pictured below).

With this, their handiwork was done:

The Columbia Daily Tribune notes that, with pesky voters out of the way, the local businesses could effectively set their own laws:

“The Columbia City Council established the district on a 5-2 vote in April in response to a petition from a group of property owners in the CID boundaries. The “qualified voters” in a CID are capable of levying various taxes or assessments within the boundaries of the district to fund improvement projects. Under state law, decisions to impose sales taxes in a CID are to be made by registered voters living in the district boundaries. If no such registered voters are present, property owners vote.”

This is bad enough, certainly, but I think it's been shown, time and again, across cities, states and the nation, that the worst outcomes of all this gerrymandering is when they weaken votes of Americans due to their skin color.

We need to overcome this gerrymandering, certainly, and it can be done. We need to outlaw it so we can take our state and Federal governments back, for the people.

That and overturning the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling and ending campaign contributions so we get the big money out of our election system and government.

No small tasks, to be sure but these can be done. We have to stand up.

Lessons and Messages from Last Night's Academy Awards, Part II

“We know that the Voting Rights Act that they fought for 50 years ago is being compromised right now in this country,” John Legend said.   http://politi.co/1BamNyq

And it's the Republicans and their Republican political party that are doing it, bringing back very Jim Crow like laws, all under the guise of "voter ID laws."

John Legend and Common get political at Oscars

A Senate Republican Speaks Truth to Their Power

At last, long overdue, but we get some truth and honesty from someone inside this political party, calling their "Voter ID laws" what they really are and that is voter suppression.

Most assuredly un-American.  It's shameful. We need to rise up, speak out against this and overturn these efforts and soon as possible.

Go. Now. Or soon as possible

3 Simple, Intelligent Improvements/Soutions to Our Current Problems

So simple. So smart. So helpful. So important.

Unlike

Another bad list Kansas is on

This little gem:

These states are trying to stop young people from voting

No, it's no surprise but still, it's disheartening. From the Washington Post:

Earlier this year, North Carolina lawmakers passed a bill aimed at stifling the newfound political muscle of their youngest eligible voters. The package of laws, known as HB 589, stripped away crucial policies that made it easier for young people to cast their ballot and participate in the political process. This week, lawyers have descended on Winston Salem to argue that eliminating these policies may have violated the 26th Amendment, which prohibits age-based voting discrimination.

The programs under attack have been proven to boost youth participation. In 2012, young people in the state were 2.6 times more likely to take advantage of same day registration.  And over a three-year period, 160,000 eligible young people were automatically registered to vote from pre-registration of 16- and 17-year-olds. Now these options are unavailable to the young residents of North Carolina.

Laws like HB 589 are part of a troubling pattern taking hold across the country, triggered by the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn key provisions of the Voting Rights Act, thus allowing Southern states to make changes to their voting laws without securing federal approval. A raft of voter ID laws—designed primarily to suppress turnout of minority voters—are also turning away young people, and often, both at the same time. Millennials are the largest, but also the country’s most diverse generation, with 43 percent identifying as people of color. In all, 22 states have new, restrictive voting laws that will go into effect before the 2014 midterms.

An undisguised attempt to block new immigrants and minority voters, new laws in Kansas and Arizona require voters to present proof of citizenship in order to register to vote in the first place. That means when you’re stopped on the street by a nice kid with a clipboard, you have to have your birth certificate, passport or naturalization documents just lying around in your purse or back pocket. Rock The Vote recently joined other community-registration arms including Voto Latino to sign an amicus brief, arguing that the laws unduly impair efforts to register new voters. It also launched an online petition to spread the word.

It seems the opposite of what we thought America was and Americans are about, doesn't it?

I'm telling you, folks, we have to fight to get our country back. We have to fight to end campaign contributions. We have to get the big, ugly, corrupting influence of money from the wealthy and corporations out of our elections and government. Until we do that, nothing will change.

Link:  Get the Big, Ugly Money Out of Our Election System and Government

Republicans: Against progress, even against America

Republicans and the entire Republican Party have been impeding progress for the nation and for Americans for so long, we're nearly getting immune to it.

But we can't be. We can't let these injustices stand. We need the nation to move forward and on so many different levels, not least of which is regarding the economy. Here's just two current examples, from yesterday  in The New York Times:

New GOP Bid to Limit Voting in Swing States

Already, nine states, under Republican control, have passed measures making it harder to vote since the beginning of 2013.

And this is one of the worst cases of the Republicans' handiwork. Getting fewer and fewer Americans to vote. How un-American can they be or get?

Then there's this one:

California Farmers Short of Labor, and Patience

Growers say inaction on immigration legislation is hurting productivity, and a powerful group that represents them says its members may withhold campaign contributions.

And this one is a real beaut since, in the last few elections, more and more Hispanics have been voting for the Democrats because, well, they get support from them. The Republicans say they're trying to be inclusive for all kinds of people--Hispanics included--yet they've famously and even notoriously and very publicly been fighting anything remotely close to creating a path to citizenship for Hispanics, Mexicans and others.

The types of people the voter ID laws effect

Let's see, female, check; handicapped, check; elderly, check; possibly even Hispanic--that way they'd get a four-way win.

The Republican strategy:  If you can't get 'em to follow and vote for you, take away their vote.

On the Supreme Court's Affirmative Action vote yesterday

And the Republicans should know that and respond accordingly.

NPR asks a great question

The question they ask is: Should Elections Be Held On Weekends? and the answer is--forgive me-- HECK YES! I've written about this before: http://moravings.blogspot.com/2011/04/kansas-gop-keeping-people-away-from.html. Link: http://www.npr.org/2012/01/18/145397003/why-vote-on-tuesday-why-not-the-weekend?sc=fb#commentBlock

Formerly for Hillary... now for McCain??

You gotta be kidding me:


Some Clinton Money Edges Toward McCain

Wednesday, July 09, 2008, 8:38:46 AM | Lindsay Renick Mayer

Hillary Clinton's endorsement of Barack Obama last month may not have been enough to win over some of her biggest donors. It seems Obama is struggling to gain favor with Clinton's financial supporters, while Republican John McCain is having some luck with them. In May, when Obama seemed to have his party's nomination in the bag, 115 donors who had given Clinton more than $1,000 donated at least that amount to Obama for the first time, according to CRP data cited in the Wall Street Journal. But an equal number also made their first big contributions to McCain that month. In 37 cases, the former Clinton supporters gave more money to McCain than they had contributed to Clinton, while that was true for only 19 Clinton donors who started giving to Obama. It will be interesting to look for movement by Clinton's donors in June, after she bowed out of the race, but that data won't become available until July 20.

originally from the Center for Responsive Politics web page:
http://www.opensecrets.org/news/atom.xml


What kind of sick, stupid or shallow dumbass could go from wanting Hillary Clinton as their next President, to wanting John "I don't care if they're there 100 years" McCain? Holy cow, people. You cannot possibly be so short-sighted to go from some kind of progressive stance to a reactionary twit. Really. No one can be that out and out stupid or bitter.

Ah, but I forget the intelligence of the American voter.

I give people too much credit, once again.