Yup. This all plays right into the hands of the Leftists who WANT our country to collapse. Their aim is to build their utopia on its ashes. They always think that the next time is the time it will work.
Yup. This all plays right into the hands of the Leftists who WANT our country to collapse. Their aim is to build their utopia on its ashes. They always think that the next time is the time it will work.
Like I have always said, the left is Hell bent on destroying our democracy. They have this sick notion that out of the ashes of our of our wonderful system of government the workers will arise shoulder to shoulder and lead us into a Communist paradise. No matter what history tells these idiots, communism is a failed system. It never has worked and it never will. If the Chinese don't get to us first, the green initiative and the burning of our cities by the left led rioters will.
How did an article on the war in Ukraine slide so quickly into unrelated and utterly fatuous comments about the "left" being "Hell bent on destroying our democracy?" Can you give me a specific example, LonesomePolecat?
Which party is passing laws to empower state legislatures to overrule the will of the voters? Which party has passed laws impeding the right to vote in more than twenty states? Which party is replete with angry members who still believe, without any evidence and contrary to countless audits, court rulings, and investigations, that the 2020 Presidential election was fraudulent? Such attacks on our democratic processes and the results of our elections undermine faith in our system and lay the groundwork for a more successful effort to deny the will of the voters in the next Presidential election.
It's the far right that's shown its colors -- its love for orange-faced autocrats and bullies; its yearning for a tough guy to rule with an iron hand. It's been the forces on the left that have fought for civil rights for African Americans, women, and other groups that have not enjoyed full participation and representation in our society. Get over it.
I'm sorry it took so long to address your post. I answer posts like yours about twice a month and it gets tiring.
I will address you post and try to answer all of your concerns on the following conditions:
1. when answering me you will not change the subject. I try to use facts and history to address subjects in all of my posts. When confronted with something they can't refute, they will say something like, "Well what about Trump?" When the subject is say, Biden. That is what I mean about a subject change. They can't answer what I have presented so they divert.
2. No matter how angry you get with me through frustration, you do not call me names and I promise I won't do that to you. IOW, let's keep this civil.
I find that people on the left usually can't do the above two things. They get real nasty.
My comment began with an objection to changing the subject, Lonesome. The article was about the war in Ukraine and you and others turned it into an attack on the left and baseless allegations that the threat to our democracy comes from the left. I offered specific, factual evidence of attacks on our democratic infrastructure that have come from the right and that are supported and encouraged by Donald Trump. I don't need admonitions about civil discourse. I post under my real name, I don't hide behind a mask or handle, and for that I've been threated with violence by right-wing extremists. I await your "factual" response to my comment. Have a good day.
This is America, people can believe that an election has issues...seems like that was the prevailing thought when "orange man" won. That doesn't mean our Republic is under attack.
3) Contrast African American wages and unemployment between the Trump presidency and the Biden presidency.
4) Name a Democrat led city that has actually made life better in the last 2 years for minority residents....or any residents. What was the number of homeless across American in 2018 as compared to 2022.
I could go on. Instead of throwing out platitudes with ZERO facts as Lonesome has duly noted, answer the above and then we'll have a conversation.
The rest of your points are off subject. I'll say only that those who protested the 2016 election results did so on the basis of the un-democratic features of our electoral system. Trump lost the popular vote but "won" the election because the Electoral College empowers smaller states and disadvantages larger ones, resulting in such denials of the will of the people. The Senate, which confirms Supreme Court appointments is similarly undemocratic by its very makeup. Combine those impediments to majority rule with gerrymandering in the House, and we are left with a crisis of legitimacy in the courts, congress, and, occasionally, the Presidency. No Democratically-controlled state legislature following the 2016 election tried to pass laws making it harder to vote or empowering themselves to overrule the will of the voters.
So the electoral college should be abolished because only those living in large urban areas should get a vote? Who cares about the less dense states or the rural states! That's EXACTLY the point! One vote per citizen. It shouldn't matter where you live. I have this inkling that if it were the other way around, you'd want to keep the electoral college. Notice NO ONE in the 2016 rejection even mentioned the electoral college....it was all RUSSIAN COLLUSION!
Lonesome was right....you're incapable of arguing on fact....all conjecture. My sincere apologies to Lonesome for attempting this!
You appear to be unable to read a comment and respond to what's been written. I never said a thing about restricting voting to those living in large urban areas. The electoral college disadvantages voters in Texas and Florida, red states, as much as it does large blue states like California. Why should voters in Wyoming or Vermont have more say in determining the winner of a Presidential election than do voters in larger states? One person, one vote. That's democracy.
Fact: Republicans have controlled the White House for 12 of the past 20 years, only four of those years have resulted from a Republican having gotten more votes than his Democratic opponent, that being George W. Bush in 2008 when he was riding on the support he garnered after 9/11. He then led us into one of the largest foreign policy disasters in our history by invading Iraq.
And some Republicans have seen the light. They realize that Trump's efforts to empower states to overrule the will of the voters and undermine the Electoral College would hurt their best chance of winning back the White House. A group of Republican Congressional Representatives issued this statement opposing Trump's efforts to block certification of Biden's victory:
тАЬFrom a purely partisan perspective, Republican presidential candidates have won the national popular vote only once in the last 32 years. They have therefore depended on the electoral college for nearly all presidential victories in the last generation. If we perpetuate the notion that Congress may disregard certified electoral votes тАФ based solely on its own assessment that one or more states mishandled the presidential election тАФ we will be delegitimizing the very system that led Donald Trump to victory in 2016, and that could provide the only path to victory in 2024.тАЭ
You're simply factually wrong about frustration with the Electoral College. Democrats have been calling for its abolition for years. It's well known that the Framer's settled on the Electoral College largely for one shameful reason: slavery. The slave states would be disadvantaged in an election by popular vote -- i.e. a democratic election -- because they denied the vote to huge portions of their populations -- the enslaved. So the Framers came up with the Electoral College system. The slave states were allowed to count the enslaved as 3/5ths of a person even though they could not vote. The Electoral College should have been put to rest with the end of slavery and the extension of the right to vote to the formerly enslaved.
These are facts, rendered without silly, mocking rhetoric or insults. You appear unable and/or unwilling to respond to factual citations and comments I've made. I won't bother responding again; you're not a serious person.
Regarding the National Center attack on the Brennan Center's study "Citizens without Proof." The National Center draws on a critique from the Heritage Center that has been refuted point by point by the Brennan Center. What's more, "Citizens without Proof" has been substantiated by a number of other reliable studies:
The 2001 Carter-Ford Commission on Election Reform found that between 6 and 11 percent of voting-age citizens lack driverтАЩs licenses or alternate state-issued photo IDs.[2]
A 2007 Indiana survey found that roughly 13 percent of registered Indiana voters lack an Indiana driverтАЩs license or an alternate Indiana-issued photo ID. [3]
A 2009 study in Indiana found that of the citizen adult population, 81.4% of all white eligible adults had access to a driverтАЩs license, compared to only 55.2% of black eligible adults. It also found that strict photo ID requirements have the greatest impact on the elderly, racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants, those with less educational attainment and lower incomes. [4]
A 2007 report based on exit polls from the 2006 elections in California, New Mexico, and Washington State found that 12% of actual voters did not have a valid driverтАЩs license.[5]
A prominent national survey conducted after the November 2008 election found that 95% of respondents claimed to have a driverтАЩs license, but that 16% of those respondents lacked a license that was both current and valid.[6]
The National Center for Policy research has a long history of being funded by and supportive of Big Tobacco and the Fossil Fuel Industries:
"Internal Philip Morris documents described the NCPPR as one of the tobacco companyтАЩs тАЬnational alliesтАЭ,3 whose focus is on тАЬalerting the public to the dangers of big government in environmental, health care and other issuesтАЭ.4
What's more, Lonesome, I have no problem with photo ID requirements. I have long favored a National photo ID that would resolve both issues relating to voter certification and
employment verification. It's been conservatives who have opposed such identification from the time that Barbara Jordan proposed such a system back in the 1970.
The attack on democracy from the right involves far more than photo ID laws. Consider this:
" Republican lawmakers this year passed an unprecedented bevy of bills targeting the authority of state and local election officials, a power grab that might allow partisan legislators to overturn future election results by claiming there was fraud.
"GOP legislators in at least 14 states have enacted 23 new laws that empower state officials to take control of county election boards, strip secretaries of state of their executive authority, or make local election officials criminally or financially liable for even technical errors, according to Protect Democracy, a left-leaning Washington, D.C.-based voting rights nonprofit.
That article was published more than a year ago. Since then other states have joined the assault on democratic elections and "we the people." In my original comment that you challenged, I claimed that some 20 states have passed such laws -- laws that are far more restrictive than photo ID. I await any evidence that my statement was false or inaccurate. Have a nice day.
It's rather hilarious for Richard to continually suggest that more densely populated areas, which tend to lean blue should have more say than less densely populated areas like, say Montana, that might lean more red. I used to live in the Hell Hole, also known as Illinois, where those downstate literally have no voice/no vote because Chicago and the metropolitan area is blue. If you looked at a map after an election there was small geographic area that's blue, although densely populated and the remainder is red. My vote never counted for a thing. And now IL has one of the most progressive and wealthiest governors in it's history (the Pritzker family is behind WPATH and all of the transgender surgery/medical money), there will be no bail laws beginning Jan. 1, Kim Foxx is the corrupt DA in Chicago and Lori Lightfoot, the incompetent mayor of Chicago. Chicago is dangerous and disgusting and it was one an absolutely beautiful city on the lake. What a shame.
If we didn't have the electoral college, every state would slowly start looking like California, Illinois, and NY. Richard needs to remove the blue lenses and see what's really happening in this country.
I tried to engage him but he did what I asked him not to do change the subject and never give me a direct answer.
I have two simple rules. Don't change the subject and don't call me names.
He couldn't do it.
It is impossible to engage these leftists in civil discourse.
I would have asked the same questions you just did and that is to be specific ie he said some states restrict voting. Which states and what is the wording of their "restrictive" bills?
Remember when they said asking for a photo id was keeping people from voting? Well if that is the case, why do all of the Democrat state conventions and their national convention ask for a photo id to gain entrance? Isn't that restricting people from participating in the conventions.
To get on an airplane you have to show a photo id. Isn't that restricting access to travel?
I could go on and on. For example, if the Dems aren't at all racists and are such wonderful protectors of minorities why did they elect Robert Byrd senate majority leader and minority leader multiple times? Robert Byrd was a Grand Cyclopes in the KKK. He filibustered the 1964 civil right bill, the longest filibuster in senate history. It to 20 Rep votes to help the Dems break the filibuster. You will never hear that little fact out of the mouths of these defenders of the minorities.
And who but you, Lonesome, is calling people names -- "Lying, (sic) hypocrites all!!! The left are a bunch of lying distorting jerks." I declare this conversation over because you evade every civil effort I've made to urge you to respond to my original comment and now you have succumbed to sweeping generalizations and crude name calling. Good day.
That post was addressed to madaboutmd not you. If I were to address you I would be more civil but what I said to md was for him and it basically is how I feel about all politicians.
I am a conservative but not aligned to any party. I believe all both parties are full of lying sociopaths.
Oh, and BTW lying is correctly spelled so the (sic) was unnecessary.
Here are specifics, not some right wing conspiracy web site:
Remember when the Democrats said asking for a photo id was keeping people from voting? Well if that is the case, why do all of the Democrat state conventions and their national convention ask for a photo id to gain entrance? Isn't that restricting people from participating in the conventions.
To get on an airplane you have to show a photo id. Isn't that restricting access to travel?
I could go on and on. For example, if the Dems aren't at all racists and are such wonderful protectors of minorities why did they elect Robert Byrd senate majority leader and minority leader multiple times? Robert Byrd was a Grand Cyclopes in the KKK. He filibustered the 1964 civil right bill, the longest filibuster in senate history. It to 20 Rep votes to help the Dems break the filibuster. You will never hear that little fact out of the mouths of these defenders of the minorities.
"I shall never fight in the armed forces with a negro by my side ... Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds."
тАФтАЙRobert C. Byrd, in a letter to Sen. Theodore Bilbo (D-MS), 1944
Paula Dean lost her TV show over something she said 20 or 30 years ago and your wonderful Woke jerks got her fired. How come the Woke morons don't hammer the wonderful Democrats for lionizing the racist Robert Byrd?
You and NCMaureen are the ones who changed the subject, Lonesome and my first comment made note of that. I never called you any name other than your handle. You're being evasive and laying down ground rules that I've never broken in the first place and I refuse to accede to your silliness. When you're ready to discuss the challenges I offered, I'm ready at any time. Now MadaboutMD is changing the subject yet again, asking me to respond to matters I never raised except on very obvious one -- the fact that Republican state legislatures have passed laws making it harder to vote and/or empowering state legislatures to reverse the will of the voters. Any informed citizen should know about these outrageous challenges to our democracy:
Why is making it hard to vote a bad thing? Don't we all want free and fair elections? Doesn't that require security? "Making it hard" is a feeling. I don't think it's hard to show my ID. I moved from one state to another in spring 2020. Our family of four drivers went to the DMV in the midst of COVID---as in May 2020. Was it "harder" because of COVID? Well, yes, we had to get four back to back to back to back appointments and my husband had to take the day off of work (he's essential), but like everything in life, you just do it. So I had the proper ID to establish residency in my new state in order to vote some 6 months later. And we did, without a problem. "Harder" is a feeling. Your links are actually kind of funny at how biased the words are from the top.
I mean, Richard, if you think life isn't going to be hard sometimes, you should wake up from the dream your living in. Did you watch the video from Matt Orfalea that I posted to you to see the Dems who FIRST called the 2016 election rigged, interfered with and ILLEGITIMATE. I almost forgot, Stacey Abrahms is running for a second term as governor of GA because she never conceded the first time!
You need to give this feeling stuff a break. Life is hard when you are living in the inner city and every one around you has an illegal gun and you have no way to defend yourself legally. That's hard!
Not a serious response, madaboutmd. You challenged me to offer evidence that more than 20 states have passed laws making it more difficult to vote, some of them empowering state legislatures to overrule the will of the voters. I provided that evidence and the laws passed do far more than require photo ID. You responded with a verbose, rambling comment suggesting that there's nothing wrong with making it hard to vote since we all want clean and fair elections. We already have clean and fair elections. More than 60 judges from both parties, some of them appointed by Trump have reviewed the "evidence" of voter fraud in our last election and found them unworthy of serious consideration. Numerous audits, including some by pro-Trump groups like Cyber Ninjas have turned up nothing. In fact, they found that Biden's margin of victory in Arizona was wider than the official total.
If you're serious about protecting our democratic procedures and voting rights, consider this article from the Harvard Law Review:
"This Essay describes the path to this unexpected moment of democratic peril in the United States. Part II explains the three potential mechanisms by which American elections may be subverted in the future. Part III recommends steps that can and should be taken to minimize this risk. Preserving and protecting American democracy from the risk of election subversion should be at the top of everyoneтАЩs agenda. The time to act is now, before American democracy disappears."
I was responding to Sean and MCMareen. I asked you for civil discourse and you turned me down. I don't think you responded with facts. You responded with generalities. I will give you actual historical facts that I can back up refuting your post but I guess it will never be. You sound pretty angry which is typical of my experiences with the left.
Please show me any part of my commentary that is outside the bounds of civility. I responded to you with facts -- state legislatures across the country have passed new laws restricting voting, access to polls, and bills that empower legislatures to overturn the will of the voters. You have not refuted those statements because they're factually true. I could have added that far-right MAGA groups have harassed, intimidated, and threatened election officials from both parties in several key states. Please show me evidence of a similar nature supporting your contention that the left threatens democracy. I don't expect a reply because you're already making excuses for withdrawing from the exchange. Am I angry? You bet I am. I'm angry with anyone who threatens our democratic electoral process. Does that prevent me from participating in a civil discussion? Of course not. Anyone who's not concerned about the threats to our democracy and angry with those who are willing to participate in seditious acts to undermine it is either an enemy of democracy or too deluded to acknowledge the threat. Show me your hand, Lonesome, or acknowledge that it's time to fold 'em.
I have been civil and factual. You've been evasive and conditional. It sounds to me like you have nothing to say. Anytime you'd like to document your allegation that the left threatens American democracy, I'm all ears. I have not changed the subject. I have made a statement challenging your statement in a direct and civil manner. I await your response.
I am actually far more concerned about Chinese Imperialism, because their soft power on the West Coast has grown at a frightening rate, and they've already shown they can feed our federal authorities crafty lies to get them to wreck our country on the inside.
I majored in Chinese and it's a pretty cool language, actually. If we all could speak and read Chinese, it might make us all a bit more civilized and cultured.
But the Communist regime of China is another beast altogether. Monsters.
China has had all those things... but it has also had centuries of peace and prosperity that fostered economic expansion and stunning cultural achievements.
I'm not some shill for China; but having studied the history, culture, and language (and having lived in Taiwan), I do have a deep appreciation for it.
The subject was China not the West. Instead of addressing the subject you do what the left often does. Instead addressing the subject, they change the subject and that change is often ant western democracies.
Does the West have a bloody history. Of course, they do but we have changed. China hasn't and to prove this please gave me a list of all the death camps that now exist in the Western Democracies.
I did address the subject of this thread, which is not just China, but China and the West. You argued that "the history of China swims in blood, poverty, and famine." I pointed out that ours did, too, until WWII changed that.
We're both right. China and the West had the same bloody history, but the world wars changed our trajectory for the better and, I hope, forever.
Thanks to Mao, China's trajectory became worse, with death and "re-education" camps for any minority that annoys its party leadership. China's brutality continues to this day.
For the record, Western democracy is the best invention for the care of human needs and spirit since fire and the wheel.
Yup. This all plays right into the hands of the Leftists who WANT our country to collapse. Their aim is to build their utopia on its ashes. They always think that the next time is the time it will work.
Like I have always said, the left is Hell bent on destroying our democracy. They have this sick notion that out of the ashes of our of our wonderful system of government the workers will arise shoulder to shoulder and lead us into a Communist paradise. No matter what history tells these idiots, communism is a failed system. It never has worked and it never will. If the Chinese don't get to us first, the green initiative and the burning of our cities by the left led rioters will.
How did an article on the war in Ukraine slide so quickly into unrelated and utterly fatuous comments about the "left" being "Hell bent on destroying our democracy?" Can you give me a specific example, LonesomePolecat?
Which party is passing laws to empower state legislatures to overrule the will of the voters? Which party has passed laws impeding the right to vote in more than twenty states? Which party is replete with angry members who still believe, without any evidence and contrary to countless audits, court rulings, and investigations, that the 2020 Presidential election was fraudulent? Such attacks on our democratic processes and the results of our elections undermine faith in our system and lay the groundwork for a more successful effort to deny the will of the voters in the next Presidential election.
It's the far right that's shown its colors -- its love for orange-faced autocrats and bullies; its yearning for a tough guy to rule with an iron hand. It's been the forces on the left that have fought for civil rights for African Americans, women, and other groups that have not enjoyed full participation and representation in our society. Get over it.
I'm sorry it took so long to address your post. I answer posts like yours about twice a month and it gets tiring.
I will address you post and try to answer all of your concerns on the following conditions:
1. when answering me you will not change the subject. I try to use facts and history to address subjects in all of my posts. When confronted with something they can't refute, they will say something like, "Well what about Trump?" When the subject is say, Biden. That is what I mean about a subject change. They can't answer what I have presented so they divert.
2. No matter how angry you get with me through frustration, you do not call me names and I promise I won't do that to you. IOW, let's keep this civil.
I find that people on the left usually can't do the above two things. They get real nasty.
What do you say? Can you do this?
My comment began with an objection to changing the subject, Lonesome. The article was about the war in Ukraine and you and others turned it into an attack on the left and baseless allegations that the threat to our democracy comes from the left. I offered specific, factual evidence of attacks on our democratic infrastructure that have come from the right and that are supported and encouraged by Donald Trump. I don't need admonitions about civil discourse. I post under my real name, I don't hide behind a mask or handle, and for that I've been threated with violence by right-wing extremists. I await your "factual" response to my comment. Have a good day.
1) Which specific state legislatures have restricted voting and how?
2) Have you seen the denials of the 2016 election? I'll help you with this Matt Orfalea mash up via Matt Taibbi: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uoMfIkz7v6s
This is America, people can believe that an election has issues...seems like that was the prevailing thought when "orange man" won. That doesn't mean our Republic is under attack.
3) Contrast African American wages and unemployment between the Trump presidency and the Biden presidency.
4) Name a Democrat led city that has actually made life better in the last 2 years for minority residents....or any residents. What was the number of homeless across American in 2018 as compared to 2022.
I could go on. Instead of throwing out platitudes with ZERO facts as Lonesome has duly noted, answer the above and then we'll have a conversation.
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-may-2022
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-december-2021
The rest of your points are off subject. I'll say only that those who protested the 2016 election results did so on the basis of the un-democratic features of our electoral system. Trump lost the popular vote but "won" the election because the Electoral College empowers smaller states and disadvantages larger ones, resulting in such denials of the will of the people. The Senate, which confirms Supreme Court appointments is similarly undemocratic by its very makeup. Combine those impediments to majority rule with gerrymandering in the House, and we are left with a crisis of legitimacy in the courts, congress, and, occasionally, the Presidency. No Democratically-controlled state legislature following the 2016 election tried to pass laws making it harder to vote or empowering themselves to overrule the will of the voters.
AHAHAHAHAHA! That's a good one Richard!
So the electoral college should be abolished because only those living in large urban areas should get a vote? Who cares about the less dense states or the rural states! That's EXACTLY the point! One vote per citizen. It shouldn't matter where you live. I have this inkling that if it were the other way around, you'd want to keep the electoral college. Notice NO ONE in the 2016 rejection even mentioned the electoral college....it was all RUSSIAN COLLUSION!
Lonesome was right....you're incapable of arguing on fact....all conjecture. My sincere apologies to Lonesome for attempting this!
You appear to be unable to read a comment and respond to what's been written. I never said a thing about restricting voting to those living in large urban areas. The electoral college disadvantages voters in Texas and Florida, red states, as much as it does large blue states like California. Why should voters in Wyoming or Vermont have more say in determining the winner of a Presidential election than do voters in larger states? One person, one vote. That's democracy.
Fact: Republicans have controlled the White House for 12 of the past 20 years, only four of those years have resulted from a Republican having gotten more votes than his Democratic opponent, that being George W. Bush in 2008 when he was riding on the support he garnered after 9/11. He then led us into one of the largest foreign policy disasters in our history by invading Iraq.
And some Republicans have seen the light. They realize that Trump's efforts to empower states to overrule the will of the voters and undermine the Electoral College would hurt their best chance of winning back the White House. A group of Republican Congressional Representatives issued this statement opposing Trump's efforts to block certification of Biden's victory:
тАЬFrom a purely partisan perspective, Republican presidential candidates have won the national popular vote only once in the last 32 years. They have therefore depended on the electoral college for nearly all presidential victories in the last generation. If we perpetuate the notion that Congress may disregard certified electoral votes тАФ based solely on its own assessment that one or more states mishandled the presidential election тАФ we will be delegitimizing the very system that led Donald Trump to victory in 2016, and that could provide the only path to victory in 2024.тАЭ
You're simply factually wrong about frustration with the Electoral College. Democrats have been calling for its abolition for years. It's well known that the Framer's settled on the Electoral College largely for one shameful reason: slavery. The slave states would be disadvantaged in an election by popular vote -- i.e. a democratic election -- because they denied the vote to huge portions of their populations -- the enslaved. So the Framers came up with the Electoral College system. The slave states were allowed to count the enslaved as 3/5ths of a person even though they could not vote. The Electoral College should have been put to rest with the end of slavery and the extension of the right to vote to the formerly enslaved.
These are facts, rendered without silly, mocking rhetoric or insults. You appear unable and/or unwilling to respond to factual citations and comments I've made. I won't bother responding again; you're not a serious person.
LOLOLOL
(Just driving home the point that I'm not a serious person.)
The Brennan is a left wing propaganda site. Of course Richard is going to quote it. He is a on the left.
https://nationalcenter.org/ncppr/2012/07/26/report-exposes-brennan-center-for-justices-biased-reporting-and-liberal-funding/
Regarding the National Center attack on the Brennan Center's study "Citizens without Proof." The National Center draws on a critique from the Heritage Center that has been refuted point by point by the Brennan Center. What's more, "Citizens without Proof" has been substantiated by a number of other reliable studies:
The 2001 Carter-Ford Commission on Election Reform found that between 6 and 11 percent of voting-age citizens lack driverтАЩs licenses or alternate state-issued photo IDs.[2]
A 2007 Indiana survey found that roughly 13 percent of registered Indiana voters lack an Indiana driverтАЩs license or an alternate Indiana-issued photo ID. [3]
A 2009 study in Indiana found that of the citizen adult population, 81.4% of all white eligible adults had access to a driverтАЩs license, compared to only 55.2% of black eligible adults. It also found that strict photo ID requirements have the greatest impact on the elderly, racial and ethnic minorities, immigrants, those with less educational attainment and lower incomes. [4]
A 2007 report based on exit polls from the 2006 elections in California, New Mexico, and Washington State found that 12% of actual voters did not have a valid driverтАЩs license.[5]
A prominent national survey conducted after the November 2008 election found that 95% of respondents claimed to have a driverтАЩs license, but that 16% of those respondents lacked a license that was both current and valid.[6]
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/citizens-without-proof-stands-strong
The National Center for Policy research has a long history of being funded by and supportive of Big Tobacco and the Fossil Fuel Industries:
"Internal Philip Morris documents described the NCPPR as one of the tobacco companyтАЩs тАЬnational alliesтАЭ,3 whose focus is on тАЬalerting the public to the dangers of big government in environmental, health care and other issuesтАЭ.4
What's more, Lonesome, I have no problem with photo ID requirements. I have long favored a National photo ID that would resolve both issues relating to voter certification and
employment verification. It's been conservatives who have opposed such identification from the time that Barbara Jordan proposed such a system back in the 1970.
The attack on democracy from the right involves far more than photo ID laws. Consider this:
" Republican lawmakers this year passed an unprecedented bevy of bills targeting the authority of state and local election officials, a power grab that might allow partisan legislators to overturn future election results by claiming there was fraud.
"GOP legislators in at least 14 states have enacted 23 new laws that empower state officials to take control of county election boards, strip secretaries of state of their executive authority, or make local election officials criminally or financially liable for even technical errors, according to Protect Democracy, a left-leaning Washington, D.C.-based voting rights nonprofit.
https://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/blogs/stateline/2021/07/28/republican-legislators-curb-authority-of-county-state-election-officials
That article was published more than a year ago. Since then other states have joined the assault on democratic elections and "we the people." In my original comment that you challenged, I claimed that some 20 states have passed such laws -- laws that are far more restrictive than photo ID. I await any evidence that my statement was false or inaccurate. Have a nice day.
It's rather hilarious for Richard to continually suggest that more densely populated areas, which tend to lean blue should have more say than less densely populated areas like, say Montana, that might lean more red. I used to live in the Hell Hole, also known as Illinois, where those downstate literally have no voice/no vote because Chicago and the metropolitan area is blue. If you looked at a map after an election there was small geographic area that's blue, although densely populated and the remainder is red. My vote never counted for a thing. And now IL has one of the most progressive and wealthiest governors in it's history (the Pritzker family is behind WPATH and all of the transgender surgery/medical money), there will be no bail laws beginning Jan. 1, Kim Foxx is the corrupt DA in Chicago and Lori Lightfoot, the incompetent mayor of Chicago. Chicago is dangerous and disgusting and it was one an absolutely beautiful city on the lake. What a shame.
If we didn't have the electoral college, every state would slowly start looking like California, Illinois, and NY. Richard needs to remove the blue lenses and see what's really happening in this country.
I tried to engage him but he did what I asked him not to do change the subject and never give me a direct answer.
I have two simple rules. Don't change the subject and don't call me names.
He couldn't do it.
It is impossible to engage these leftists in civil discourse.
I would have asked the same questions you just did and that is to be specific ie he said some states restrict voting. Which states and what is the wording of their "restrictive" bills?
Remember when they said asking for a photo id was keeping people from voting? Well if that is the case, why do all of the Democrat state conventions and their national convention ask for a photo id to gain entrance? Isn't that restricting people from participating in the conventions.
To get on an airplane you have to show a photo id. Isn't that restricting access to travel?
I could go on and on. For example, if the Dems aren't at all racists and are such wonderful protectors of minorities why did they elect Robert Byrd senate majority leader and minority leader multiple times? Robert Byrd was a Grand Cyclopes in the KKK. He filibustered the 1964 civil right bill, the longest filibuster in senate history. It to 20 Rep votes to help the Dems break the filibuster. You will never hear that little fact out of the mouths of these defenders of the minorities.
Lying, hypocrites all!!!!
The left are a bunch of lying distorting jerks.
I hear ya!
And who but you, Lonesome, is calling people names -- "Lying, (sic) hypocrites all!!! The left are a bunch of lying distorting jerks." I declare this conversation over because you evade every civil effort I've made to urge you to respond to my original comment and now you have succumbed to sweeping generalizations and crude name calling. Good day.
That post was addressed to madaboutmd not you. If I were to address you I would be more civil but what I said to md was for him and it basically is how I feel about all politicians.
I am a conservative but not aligned to any party. I believe all both parties are full of lying sociopaths.
Oh, and BTW lying is correctly spelled so the (sic) was unnecessary.
Check your punctuation, Lonesome. BTW, you still haven't responded to my original comment. Show me your evidence, please.
Here are specifics, not some right wing conspiracy web site:
Remember when the Democrats said asking for a photo id was keeping people from voting? Well if that is the case, why do all of the Democrat state conventions and their national convention ask for a photo id to gain entrance? Isn't that restricting people from participating in the conventions.
To get on an airplane you have to show a photo id. Isn't that restricting access to travel?
I could go on and on. For example, if the Dems aren't at all racists and are such wonderful protectors of minorities why did they elect Robert Byrd senate majority leader and minority leader multiple times? Robert Byrd was a Grand Cyclopes in the KKK. He filibustered the 1964 civil right bill, the longest filibuster in senate history. It to 20 Rep votes to help the Dems break the filibuster. You will never hear that little fact out of the mouths of these defenders of the minorities.
"I shall never fight in the armed forces with a negro by my side ... Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds."
тАФтАЙRobert C. Byrd, in a letter to Sen. Theodore Bilbo (D-MS), 1944
Paula Dean lost her TV show over something she said 20 or 30 years ago and your wonderful Woke jerks got her fired. How come the Woke morons don't hammer the wonderful Democrats for lionizing the racist Robert Byrd?
Is that specific enough for you?
I did check and it is correct with or without the comma. I thought it was petty to try and point out a punctuation error.
BTW everybody makes grammar, punctuation and spelling error from time to time.
If you are going to criticize me, criticize me on substance not grammar.
You and NCMaureen are the ones who changed the subject, Lonesome and my first comment made note of that. I never called you any name other than your handle. You're being evasive and laying down ground rules that I've never broken in the first place and I refuse to accede to your silliness. When you're ready to discuss the challenges I offered, I'm ready at any time. Now MadaboutMD is changing the subject yet again, asking me to respond to matters I never raised except on very obvious one -- the fact that Republican state legislatures have passed laws making it harder to vote and/or empowering state legislatures to reverse the will of the voters. Any informed citizen should know about these outrageous challenges to our democracy:
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-december-2021
https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-may-2022
Why is making it hard to vote a bad thing? Don't we all want free and fair elections? Doesn't that require security? "Making it hard" is a feeling. I don't think it's hard to show my ID. I moved from one state to another in spring 2020. Our family of four drivers went to the DMV in the midst of COVID---as in May 2020. Was it "harder" because of COVID? Well, yes, we had to get four back to back to back to back appointments and my husband had to take the day off of work (he's essential), but like everything in life, you just do it. So I had the proper ID to establish residency in my new state in order to vote some 6 months later. And we did, without a problem. "Harder" is a feeling. Your links are actually kind of funny at how biased the words are from the top.
I mean, Richard, if you think life isn't going to be hard sometimes, you should wake up from the dream your living in. Did you watch the video from Matt Orfalea that I posted to you to see the Dems who FIRST called the 2016 election rigged, interfered with and ILLEGITIMATE. I almost forgot, Stacey Abrahms is running for a second term as governor of GA because she never conceded the first time!
You need to give this feeling stuff a break. Life is hard when you are living in the inner city and every one around you has an illegal gun and you have no way to defend yourself legally. That's hard!
Not a serious response, madaboutmd. You challenged me to offer evidence that more than 20 states have passed laws making it more difficult to vote, some of them empowering state legislatures to overrule the will of the voters. I provided that evidence and the laws passed do far more than require photo ID. You responded with a verbose, rambling comment suggesting that there's nothing wrong with making it hard to vote since we all want clean and fair elections. We already have clean and fair elections. More than 60 judges from both parties, some of them appointed by Trump have reviewed the "evidence" of voter fraud in our last election and found them unworthy of serious consideration. Numerous audits, including some by pro-Trump groups like Cyber Ninjas have turned up nothing. In fact, they found that Biden's margin of victory in Arizona was wider than the official total.
If you're serious about protecting our democratic procedures and voting rights, consider this article from the Harvard Law Review:
"This Essay describes the path to this unexpected moment of democratic peril in the United States. Part II explains the three potential mechanisms by which American elections may be subverted in the future. Part III recommends steps that can and should be taken to minimize this risk. Preserving and protecting American democracy from the risk of election subversion should be at the top of everyoneтАЩs agenda. The time to act is now, before American democracy disappears."
https://harvardlawreview.org/2022/04/identifying-and-minimizing-the-risk-of-election-subversion-and-stolen-elections-in-the-contemporary-united-states/
I was responding to Sean and MCMareen. I asked you for civil discourse and you turned me down. I don't think you responded with facts. You responded with generalities. I will give you actual historical facts that I can back up refuting your post but I guess it will never be. You sound pretty angry which is typical of my experiences with the left.
Please show me any part of my commentary that is outside the bounds of civility. I responded to you with facts -- state legislatures across the country have passed new laws restricting voting, access to polls, and bills that empower legislatures to overturn the will of the voters. You have not refuted those statements because they're factually true. I could have added that far-right MAGA groups have harassed, intimidated, and threatened election officials from both parties in several key states. Please show me evidence of a similar nature supporting your contention that the left threatens democracy. I don't expect a reply because you're already making excuses for withdrawing from the exchange. Am I angry? You bet I am. I'm angry with anyone who threatens our democratic electoral process. Does that prevent me from participating in a civil discussion? Of course not. Anyone who's not concerned about the threats to our democracy and angry with those who are willing to participate in seditious acts to undermine it is either an enemy of democracy or too deluded to acknowledge the threat. Show me your hand, Lonesome, or acknowledge that it's time to fold 'em.
I showed you the conditions in which I would debate you and you changed the subject.
Accede to my conditions which aren't strenuous and I will debate you.
You sound angry to me. It seems to me most people on the left are.
I have been civil and factual. You've been evasive and conditional. It sounds to me like you have nothing to say. Anytime you'd like to document your allegation that the left threatens American democracy, I'm all ears. I have not changed the subject. I have made a statement challenging your statement in a direct and civil manner. I await your response.
I take that as a no. You will not debate on my terms which I think are reasonable.
Just agree and let's have at it.
And to have the rubble absorbed into a one world government. Which will mean Chinese rule for us in the US.
If we don't stop the Chinese now, in a generation we will all be speaking Mandrin. China is bent on world domination.
I am actually far more concerned about Chinese Imperialism, because their soft power on the West Coast has grown at a frightening rate, and they've already shown they can feed our federal authorities crafty lies to get them to wreck our country on the inside.
That's a far bigger concern than Ukraine.
I agree.
I majored in Chinese and it's a pretty cool language, actually. If we all could speak and read Chinese, it might make us all a bit more civilized and cultured.
But the Communist regime of China is another beast altogether. Monsters.
I can't agree with you. The history if China swims in blood, poverty and famine.
China has had all those things... but it has also had centuries of peace and prosperity that fostered economic expansion and stunning cultural achievements.
I'm not some shill for China; but having studied the history, culture, and language (and having lived in Taiwan), I do have a deep appreciation for it.
So does the history of Western Europe and the United States until WWII.
The subject was China not the West. Instead of addressing the subject you do what the left often does. Instead addressing the subject, they change the subject and that change is often ant western democracies.
Does the West have a bloody history. Of course, they do but we have changed. China hasn't and to prove this please gave me a list of all the death camps that now exist in the Western Democracies.
I did address the subject of this thread, which is not just China, but China and the West. You argued that "the history of China swims in blood, poverty, and famine." I pointed out that ours did, too, until WWII changed that.
We're both right. China and the West had the same bloody history, but the world wars changed our trajectory for the better and, I hope, forever.
Thanks to Mao, China's trajectory became worse, with death and "re-education" camps for any minority that annoys its party leadership. China's brutality continues to this day.
For the record, Western democracy is the best invention for the care of human needs and spirit since fire and the wheel.
but civilized blood, poverty and famine with a "cool" language. I do think we would be better off understanding it but that will not happn