Redux: Will Republicans Steal Your Right To Vote?

Posted by TomCat at 12:21 pm Blog News, Politics

May 312016

This article is republished from 3/6/2011. Republicans have a long history of disenfranchising people that they consider more likely to vote for Democrats. After all, they can’t allow something as minute as voting rights stand in the way of establishing a 1,000 year Republican Regime of one-party rule. In a master coup, they slimed ACORN, forcing that fine organization into bankruptcy, using fictitious information that looked so damning that Acorn was gone before the truth that Republicans doctored the video reached the public. During the Bush Regime, they fired US attorneys who refused to file false charges against Democratic candidates on the eve of elections. Google caging to find another favorite Republican ruse. And now they’re back to using false claims of voter fraud to steal the right to vote from millions of US citizens.

In statehouses across the country, Republican lawmakers are raising the specter of “voter fraud” to push through legislation that would dramatically restrict the voting rights of college students, rural voters, senior citizens, the disabled and the homeless. As part of their larger effort to silence Main Street, conservatives are pushing through new photo identification laws that would exclude millions from voting, depress Hispanic voter turnout by as much as 10 percent, and cost taxpayers millions of dollars. In the next few months, a new set of election laws could make going to the polls and registering to vote significantly more difficult — in some cases even barring groups of citizens from voting in the communities where they live.

Conservative legislators across the country have said these laws are necessary to combat alleged mass voter fraud. But these fears are completely overblown and states already have tough voting laws on the books: fraudulent voters face felony charges, hefty fines, and even lengthy prison time. In Missouri, for example, voter fraud carries a penalty of no less than 5 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Yet conservatives have insisted on finding a legislative solution to a non-existent problem. In states like Indiana, where an ID law passed in 2005, both nuns and college students have found themselves turned away from the polls. Similar laws are on the books in eight other states and that number could expand dramatically in coming months… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Think Progress>

Nothing in this country is so precious as our right to vote. The only way I know to protect our voting rights is to remove Republicans from power at every level of government, so completely that your great grandchildren ask your children, “Who were the Republicans?”

Update: we received an email from a lawyer to congratulate our work and inform us that one of the links in the source article I used, overblown, had been retired, and inviting is to update the link, which I did. I reposted this because it’s still valid today, except that the problem is now far worse.

Open Thread – 5/31/2016

Posted by TomCat at 12:20 pm Open Thread, Personal, Politics

May 312016

Another month is almost gone, and it’s medical mayhem time again. Today is grocery order day. Tomorrow is shower, collect data for Monthly Report, change Poll, and grocery delivery day. Thursday is Monthly Report, Bank Trip, and CAT Scan day. Friday is pre-surgery physical day. Saturday is shower, dreaded task and cleaning day. Finally Monday is Radiation Oncologist day. Two outpatient surgeries for eye cancer will follow soon after. Yes. My plate is full.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:39 (average 4:19). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Alternet: Trump has cast doubt on the presidential eligibility of not only Ted Cruz, who was born in Canada to a U.S. citizen, but also Marco Rubio, who was born in Miami, Florida.

As Garrett Epps writes in The Atlantic, Trump did so in the same evasive way that he floats other conspiracy theories:

Trump’s challenge to the U.S. Constitution is only one subchapter of that story; but the damage he is doing is real, and he’s not finished yet.

Consider that last weekend, Trump began to deploy his birther libel — first wheeled out against Barack Obama and then Ted Cruz—against Marco Rubio. His claims are only increasing in scope. Obama, Trump claimed, was not born in the United States. (He was.) Cruz was born (to an American citizen mother) in Canada. Trump says that means he’s not a natural-born citizen. (He is.) No one questions that Rubio was born in the United States. His parents were lawful permanent residents. The Constitution, on this point at least, is blessedly clear. To be born in the United States is to be born a citizen. Trump doesn’t question that. Not quite. Not yet. But late last week, he retweeted a supporter who suggested that Rubio is ineligible for the White House. When George Stephanopoulos asked him why he had done that, Trump responded: “Because I’m not sure. I mean, let people make their own determination.”

This is the way that Trump insinuates lies and libels into the discussion. It’s not me, he feigns, others have questions about Rubio, I’m just saying it could be a problem, and maybe we should look into it. Similarly, after repeating a supporter’s invective against Cruz, Trump shrugs:Hey,I didn’t make the indecent and sexist commentabout Cruz. What can I do? My supporters are passionate. But that was just the start. By the Iowa caucuses, he was calling the Texas senator “the Canadian anchor baby.”

This is only the 58th of 58 conspiracy theories promoted by Rump Dump Trump. Click through for the other 57.

From Crooks and Liars: CNN reports:

At least four people at a Bernie Sanders rally in Oakland rushed the stage Monday evening, spurring Secret Service agents to jump onto the raised platform and protect him.

The Democratic presidential candidate was uninjured and continued speaking, but not before several agents hugged him and pushed him away from the microphone. The identities of the individuals, who yelled as they approached the stage, were not immediately known. They were apprehended and led away by Secret Service from the podium at the Frank Ogawa Plaza, where the rally was being held.

After the events of Monday night in Northern California, Sanders spokesman Michael Briggs said, "It was handled professionally by the Secret Service."

It turns out that the activists approaching the stage were not rabid Clintonistas as some Bernie Bots are claiming, but animal rights activists. Bernie’s discussion with an animal rights activist in Portland, OR was far more pro social.

From Common Dreams: Tim Canova, the progressive challenger running to unseat embattled Democratic National Committee (DNC) chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, on Friday was endorsed by the grassroots advocacy group Democracy for America (DFA), which called Canova a "political revolutionary."

In a statement on Friday, DFA chairman Jim Dean criticized Wasserman Schultz for allying with "wealthy interests" that fuel inequality and said that "if Democrats are going to be the party that confronts the wealthy and powerful who dominate our political process and enable growing income inequality, we need political revolutionaries like Tim Canova in the U.S. Congress."

I also endorse Tim Canova for many of the same reasons. However, if DWS retains her seat, she must be ousted as head of the DNC. Her handling of the primary season has been not only biased, but also, sufficiently inept to transform a virtually assured Democratic landslide into a life or death struggle.

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Squatch’s Open Thread 30/05/2016

Posted by Lynn Squance at 1:43 am Open Thread, Politics

May 312016

Well it was a very busy day today. I left the house at 9:30 this morning and did not return until 21:30. I started with physio therapy, then a meeting with the financial planner who handles much of my mother's investments, and finally a visit with my mother. After I fed her, I sat brushing her hair for two hours. The care centre staff "don't like it" when I do that because my mother becomes so relaxed and then they have to rouse her to get ready for bed. Truthfully, my mother becomes very relaxed such that you can see it in her face. They truly do like to see her that relaxed. She is one of their favourites. Tomorrow will be much quieter. The weather here is sunny and warm at 24 C (75 F) after a cold, wet weekend. According to the news, Kansas and Texas are suffering through severe rain and flooding. Too bad some of that rain couldn't fall in California where it is badly needed. I hope all will be safe.

Short Takes

Alternet — Emails obtained by The Intercept from the State Department reveal new details of Hillary Clinton's behind-the-scenes efforts to export fracking—a method of extracting oil and natural gas from underground shale deposits—to foreign countries during her tenure as Secretary of State. The emails, acquired through a Freedom of Information Act request, could be particularly damning in light of Clinton's recent attempts to ally herself with the anti-fracking movement. …

The recently obtained emails appear to contradict the anti-fracking position the Democratic frontrunner takes in the spot. Recently, Clinton has tried to distance herself from the fossil fuel industry, fending off attacks from her opponent, Bernie Sanders, whose campaign argued that she "has relied heavily on funds from lobbyists working for the oil, gas and coal industry."

Several years ago now, there were protests and petitions regarding the sale of asbestos to developing countries by Canada, while the use of asbestos in Canada was banned. Certainly in this regard, Canada was ethically challenged and deserved, in my opinion, to be censured. Although there is considerable fracking in the US, federal and state governments and corporations are being challenged over fracking because of the many undesirable effects such as earthquakes and polluted water. Clinton has allied herself with anti-fracking groups as part of her campaign. Is Clinton being disingenuous about her position on fracking, or has she changed her position?

Politico — Donald Trump observed Memorial Day weekend on Sunday by speaking in front of the Lincoln Memorial at a rally of thousands of motorcyclists, where he praised veterans, called reporters “lowlifes,” thanked “the great Bobby Knight” for endorsing him and performed a derisive impression of a general he saw on television.

The presumptive Republican nominee took the occasion — the annual “Rolling Thunder” motorcycle rally, which raises awareness of unaccounted-for POWs and soldiers missing in action — to malign Hillary Clinton and tout his own electoral successes. …

Trump spoke at a stage set up at the end of the reflecting pool closest to the Lincoln Memorial to a relatively sedate crowd of hundreds of bikers and assorted tourists, who did not entirely fill the space between the pool and the memorial. The businessman said it was not the scene he expected to encounter.

“I thought this would be like Dr. Martin Luther King, where the people will be lined up from here all the way to the Washington Monument,” said Trump. King delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to a quarter-million supporters in August 1963.

Trump knows no bounds of propriety! To turn a solemn occassion into a political event and then invoke MLK Jr . . . that is totally disgusting. Dump Trump in the trash heap of history!

MotherJones — Randy Sutton, a spokesman for Blue Lives Matter, a national law enforcement group, told CNN last week that "it's usually people committing crimes like robbery, or that are being pursued by police, that turn to shooting officers." That, notes Padilla-Goodman, is essentially a concession that people don't usually attack cops because they hate them: "Somebody committing a crime against somebody because they're black didn't mean that the black person had to do anything" to provoke it.

Only in Louisiana (or another red state) would legislators consider adding police officers and other first responders to a list of people, who if attacked, would constitute a hate crime. Interesting when a police officer counters that position.

Alternet — In an election year that's slated to produce the most unpopular candidates in history, there is one shining light—Senator Elizabeth Warren.

The Massachusetts senator/women's advocate/campaign finance reformer/human goddess has been dishing up truth bombs all year long. Utilizing social media with the skill of a millennial San Fransisco start-up owner, Warren slammed GOP candidates repeatedly for their asinine comments. …

"Two weeks ago, he said that he was more than happy to dodge taxes because he doesn't want to throw his money, quote, 'down the drain,'" she said. "Nurses and teachers and dockworkers, they pay their fair share to keep Trump's businesses going … Donald Trump thinks that supporting them is throwing money down the drain? Then I say we throw Donald Trump down the drain."

Go Lizzie! A national treasure is clobbering a national disgrace!

My Universe —

5 Top Commencement Speech Zingers This Graduation Season

Posted by Joanne Dixon at 5:06 pm Politics

May 302016

AlterNet has acquired a well-deserved reputation for doing what I call "Five-Most" articles. The obvious example is their weekly selection of five most absurd, most offensive, most delusional, most generally awful things that right-wingnuts have said during the week, which TC follows, and we follow with him, weekly.

They generally want to make me beat my head against the wall.

But this morning they featured a Five-Most article which made me smile, some of them even though bittersweetly, and I though it might be a good article to share.

As AlterNet points out in introduction, "The year 2016 is a hell of a time to graduate. Donald Trump is the presumptive Republican nominee, the past four months have successively been the hottest on record, the chasm between the rich and poor continues to widen, and bloody Andrew Sullivan is openly wondering if this whole Democracy thing has run its course. WTF!

Fortunately, this time of the year brings one reliable reprieve from the dispiriting caprices of our politics: commencement speeches. This year’s crop of speeches were as pointed, witty and incisive as ever, taking on hot-button topics ranging from political apathy to the big orange elephant in the room."

And here's one:

2. Lin-Manuel Miranda at University of Pennsylvania.

Zinger: “In a year when politicians traffic in anti-immigrant rhetoric, there is also a musical reminding us that a broke, orphan immigrant from the West Indies built our financial system.”

Lin-Manuel Miranda, whose hit musical Hamilton has garnered widespread critical acclaim and recently earned a record-breaking 16 Tony nominations, is having a huge moment right now. A child of Puerto Rican immigrants, Miranda is using his new platform as a celebrity to advocate for political causes he believes in: just recently, he performed a blistering rap about Puerto Rico’s debt woes on "Last Week Tonight."

At his University of Pennsylvania commencement speech, Miranda wisely took a different tack. He framed a relatively contemporary issue—the hateful rhetoric around undocumented immigrants—in its historical context, reaching all the way back to the nation’s founding for some perspective. This wasn’t coincidental. Many of the same people who cheer on anti-immigrant rhetoric tend to forget, or at least conveniently overlook, that our nation was founded by immigrants.

Ultimately, Miranda’s message was simple. Not only do immigrants have something to contribute to civic and cultural life in America, they’re the reason we’re here and that we enjoy many of the advantages we do.

Click through for the other four, including one from Elizabeth Warren. I hope they will make you smile too.

Cross posted to Care2 at

http://www.care2.com/news/member/101612212/3988347

On Fallen Heroes

Posted by TomCat at 12:51 pm Holiday, Politics

May 302016

Memorial Day

You may ask why I, as one who opposes war almost by definition, would want to celebrate the day in which we honor those military service people, who have given their lives in service to America. From my earliest days as an antiwar activist opposing the war in Vietnam, I have believed that it is as important to honor the warriors, as it is to oppose the wars.

They took an oath to obey and honored it. They had nothing to do with the decisions. I have no doubt that, if those who died in our Revolutionary War, for example, can look at today’s wars, they are shedding tears over the senseless waste of life, but honoring their comrades as they fall.

Now, unlike Veterans day, Memorial Day is not intended as celebration of those who served and survived. Nevertheless, to all veterans who read this, thank you for your service. I thank God that you are not among those whom we honor today.

Open Thread – 5/30/2016

Posted by TomCat at 12:50 pm Blog News, Open Thread, Personal, Politics

May 302016

Because it’s a holiday, and I really need one, the blog, feeding me, and spending a few hours on George are my only plans for the day.

Special Announcement:

I am very sorry to inform you that JLA has resigned her post as an Author here at Politics Plus. She said this is no longer the best place for her efforts, because she feels unable to support Hillary Clinton, if she is the nominee, and all the other Administrators and Authors promote supporting the Democratic nominee, whoever that is. JLA is still welcome here and I thank her for her excellent work on our behalf. We hope she will not be a stranger.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today.s took me 3:40 (average 5:41). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Upworthy:

Myth 1: Higher incarceration rates cause corresponding decreases in crime.

Truth: Imprisoning people isn’t always a good way to fight crime.

A study by The Sentencing Project found that simply putting more people in prison isn’t an effective strategy for fighting crime.

In fact, states that imprisoned fewer people actually saw significant improvements in crime reduction compared with states who were more aggressive about incarceration.

In the words of the study’s authors, "Increasing incarceration while ignoring more effective approaches will impose a heavy burden upon courts, corrections and communities, while providing a marginal impact on crime."

This is the first of five myths about prisons. I agree with the author, based on my many years as a prison volunteer. My only issue is that rather than myths, some are lies to justify continuing the status quo. Click through fir the other four.

From Think Progress: There is no drought in California

Donald Trump told an audience in Fresno that “there is no drought” in California. According to Trump, the state has plenty of water but it’s being held hostage by environmentalists in government. The idea that the government is engineering the drought was popularized by professional conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones.

California, in fact, is facing a severe drought of historic proportions that covers nearly 95% of the state.

The state is drier than it has been in at least 500 years.

0530Cali

This is one of twelve InsaniTEA based conspiracy theories propagated by Rump Dump Trump. Click through for the other eleven.

From TPM: The Libertarian Party has nominated former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson as its presidential candidate just as it did in 2012.

Delegates to the party’s convention in Orlando on Sunday picked Johnson on the second ballot over Austin Petersen, the founder of The Libertarian Republic magazine, and anti-computer virus company founder John McAfee.

Johnson got about 1 percent of the popular vote in 2012.

Voting for this and other third party candidates is a great solution for disgruntled neocons, theocons, corporacons, plutocons, and TEAbaggers. Lefties, on the other hand, have only one viable solution:

Vote Blue No Matter Who!

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Last Week’s Most Insane Republican Moments

Posted by TomCat at 1:57 pm Politics

May 292016

Almost every week, Republicans join a competition to see who can say the most outlandish things, and in the process, they push the envelope on just how insane InsaniTEA can become. I trust that you will believe it, when I tell you that last week was no exception.

Is this the stupidest Fox Newsian of all?

There is huge, huuuuuuge, competition in the race for stupidest Fox Newsian of all. But now that Andrea “America is awesome” Tantaros has been sidelined, another contender appears to be leading the idiot pack: Kimberly Guilfoyle.

While Guilfoyle regularly spews a variety of nonsensical drivel, she managed to up her own considerable ante this week when she argued, wait for it, that when Donald Trump dubs Elizabeth Warren “Pocahontas” in their ongoing Twitter feud, it actually can be seen as a compliment. “I said I wanted to be Pocahontas one time,” Guilfoyle reasoned this week in a telecast, bizarrely bringing up her own, one hopes, childhood to make her case. “I get the way he’s saying it,” she bravely persevered, “but I think ‘Pocahontas’ is quite complimentary when you think about it.”

Well, no, Kimberly, when you think about it, even for a millisecond, it is entirely offensive and not at all a compliment, and saying so is simultaneously nuts and offensive, for starters because it conflates all Native Americans into one stereotypical persona (based on an actual historical figure) popularized by a Disney movie.

Trump loves to ridicule the fact that Warren’s great-great-great grandmother was Native American, and that Warren is 1/32 Cherokee. He will also likely never ever tire of making this hilarious joke. He likes to call her “Goofy Elizabeth,” which Guilfoyle has yet to defend as “quite complimentary when you think about it,” but stay tuned. It’s quite possible that maybe Guilfoyle longed to be Disney character Goofy when she was young.

From <Alternet>

Kimberly, a former Victoria’s Secret model, was hired as a Faux Noise bimbette to exercise her non-journalistic talent to keep Bubba Bagger drooling in a hypnotic trance long enough for the brighter pundits to fill his small brain with Republican propaganda. This is only the fourth of five insane Republican moments listed for last week alone. Click through for the other four.

Open Thread 5/29/2016

Posted by TomCat at 1:56 pm Open Thread, Personal, Politics

May 292016

Except for writing, I think I’m going to take a lazy day. I earned it!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:00 (average 5:10). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Short Takes:

From The New Yorker: The I.G.’s eighty-three page report, “Office of the Secretary: Evaluation of Email Records Management and Cybersecurity Requirements,” is one of the more comprehensive examinations the government has ever issued on proper document-retention habits in the federal bureaucracy. Skip to page forty-two if you want the scintillating conclusion:

Longstanding, systemic weaknesses related to electronic records and communications have existed within the Office of the Secretary that go well beyond the tenure of any one Secretary of State. OIG recognizes that technology and Department policy have evolved considerably since Secretary Albright’s tenure began in 1997. Nevertheless, the Department generally and the Office of the Secretary in particular have been slow to recognize and to manage effectively the legal requirements and cybersecurity risks associated with electronic data communications, particularly as those risks pertain to its most senior leadership. OIG expects that its recommendations will move the Department steps closer to meaningfully addressing these risks.

That’s it. Clinton, like some of her predecessors, especially Colin Powell, flouted departmental regulations on the use of private e-mail, and she was careless about cybersecurity. In the pantheon of Clinton scandals, the I.G. report, in terms of actual malfeasance, ranks somewhere below running the health-care task force of the mid-nineties in secret and above making a lopsided profit on the cattle-future markets while she was First Lady of Arkansas. [emphasis added]

As I, and most other progressives, that are far more acclaimed than I, including Bernie Sanders and most of his supporters, except for a small desperate fringe, have repeatedly stated, this is nothing but tempest in a tea pot.

From NY Times: As they sliced and diced state programs this month to close a budget deficit, Republicans controlling the Oklahoma Legislature cruelly targeted some of the state’s most vulnerable citizens — the working poor — by cutting an average $147 a year from the income of 200,000 households.

This may seem negligible to the state’s wealthy and middle class, but not to a poor family with a breadwinner struggling at the margins. The method chosen is deplorable — cutting the state share of the earned-income tax credit for low-income workers, a federal program widely praised as an effective lift from poverty. “It’s one of the most valuable antipoverty programs on the books today,” Carl Davis, research director for the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, told The Tulsa World.

After years of enacting generous tax cuts for the wealthy and for the powerful oil industry, however, the Oklahoma Legislature was facing falling revenues and resorted to an assortment of questionable cuts to close a $1.3 billion deficit. None is more regressive than penalizing the working poor. It will net an estimated $29 million for the state coffers while cutting $312 for a family with three or more children and a parent earning $13,850 a year. The federal earned-income credit program, based on income and family size, is not affected; only the state share is being cut.

Failin’ Fallin Farted.

From The Topeka Capital Journal: SCOTUS appointments should come before free college, everybody getting free healthcare, and equal rights for women and gays.

How could a progressive say such a thing?

It’s a good question because all those things are seriously important to me and I hope to you, too.

What I’ve heard from various sources is that the next president may appoint anywhere from 2 to 4 new SCOTUS members.

….small pause for that to sink in…

…Bernie voters, a message for you… you may truly dislike Hillary Clinton… but you know as well as I do she won’t push the SCOTUS further right.

And if we ever get free college, free healthcare, full democratic rights for gays and women…. a far right SCOTUS can make or break it, just like they did ACA. Don’t think a conservative SCOTUS won’t do it. Trump will assure with his SCOTUS nomination that any progress Democrats try to make in the future would be shot down. A member of the SCOTUS serves until death if he or she wants to stay there. This decision can have harsh consequences far into our future.

Even in the oppressed state of Kansas, progressives know that this election will decide whether the Supreme Court becomes SCOTUS or remains SCROTUS (Republican Constitutional VD) for decades to come. There could there be no better reason to…

Vote Blue No Matter Who

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Depose the Fartfuhrer of Fitzwalkerstan!

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