American Politics Thread VI: Can't We All Just Get Along?

[The Federal Government of Iowa]

Absolutely not. But it is an absolute fallacy that policy that is crafted with the intent of making elections more secure and applies to everyone equally is racist and an attack on Democracy.

The problem is, just because a policy might be targeted equally does not mean that it will have equal results for everyone.

So? No policy ever has or ever will end up with equal results, equal results is a foolish standard that just promotes discrimination in one way or another. As long as policies are implemented equally, there should be no problem with them on the kind of level these Democrats are taking it. They might disagree with that policy, and that's perfectly ok, but to pretend that unequal results are racist and continue to abuse the House rules in Texas to prevent a vote is just stupid.

Now I'm sorry I won't be here to answer you guys any longer but I have to go to work, cheers!

[The Federal Government of Iowa]

Absolutely not. But it is an absolute fallacy that policy that is crafted with the intent of making elections more secure and applies to everyone equally is racist and an attack on Democracy.

It doesn’t affect everyone equally any more than banning disabled access ramps for buildings affects everyone equally. Sure, it applies to everyone, but that doesn’t make its effects fair or equitable for the people who actually live under the system.

Besides, the idea that these measures are actually in the name of security, when actual cases of voter fraud do and always have measured in the dozens per election, is pretty funny.

Nobody should react negatively to wanting to make elections safer, why wouldn't you want them to be safer regardless of previous cases? You wouldn't. I find your last point to be completely irrelevant.
As for your first point, being disabled is often an immutable physical characteristic that cannot be changed, therefore should not be discriminated against. It would be morally right to make their lives a bit easier and install access ramps. If you're somehow suggesting that, say, black people are incapable of providing voter ID or finding the right voting station is inherently stupid and, frankly, racist.

[The Caleshan Valkyrie]

The problem is, just because a policy might be targeted equally does not mean that it will have equal results for everyone.

So? No policy ever has or ever will end up with equal results, equal results is a foolish standard that just promotes discrimination in one way or another. As long as policies are implemented equally, there should be no problem with them on the kind of level these Democrats are taking it. They might disagree with that policy, and that's perfectly ok, but to pretend that unequal results are racist and continue to abuse the House rules in Texas to prevent a vote is just stupid.

Now I'm sorry I won't be here to answer you guys any longer but I have to go to work, cheers!

'Well, I guess those fuckers in wheelchairs should have thought better of their actions before they got themselves bound to a wheelchair. They can just walk up those fucking steps like everyone else. And them blind folk can just read the signs like everybody else. Those stairs and signs work fine for me, and it will damn well work fine for them too!'

This is functionally what I'm hearing from you.

[The Black Forrest]

The problem is, just because a policy might be targeted equally does not mean that it will have equal results for everyone.

So? No policy ever has or ever will end up with equal results, equal results is a foolish standard that just promotes discrimination in one way or another. As long as policies are implemented equally, there should be no problem with them on the kind of level these Democrats are taking it. They might disagree with that policy, and that's perfectly ok, but to pretend that unequal results are racist and continue to abuse the House rules in Texas to prevent a vote is just stupid.

Now I'm sorry I won't be here to answer you guys any longer but I have to go to work, cheers!

Your statement contradicts your previous statement.

As Gallo mentioned “disparate impact" is what is going on here. These measures have next to nothing to do with election security in the traditional sense.

Election security to the republicans means making voting hard for those that aren’t going to vote for them anyway. There is no wide scale election fraud. There are fraud cases sure. The problem is they fall well within the margins of error.

Even the ex-president bemoaned mail in balloting as ripe with fraud. Oregon and Colorado has used it for a couple decades. About 36 million or so votes. The amount of wide scale fraud in that peiod of time? A grand total of 22 votes,

[The Black Forrest]

It doesn’t affect everyone equally any more than banning disabled access ramps for buildings affects everyone equally. Sure, it applies to everyone, but that doesn’t make its effects fair or equitable for the people who actually live under the system.

Besides, the idea that these measures are actually in the name of security, when actual cases of voter fraud do and always have measured in the dozens per election, is pretty funny.

Nobody should react negatively to wanting to make elections safer, why wouldn't you want them to be safer regardless of previous cases? You wouldn't. I find your last point to be completely irrelevant.
As for your first point, being disabled is often an immutable physical characteristic that cannot be changed, therefore should not be discriminated against. It would be morally right to make their lives a bit easier and install access ramps. If you're somehow suggesting that, say, black people are incapable of providing voter ID or finding the right voting station is inherently stupid and, frankly, racist.

There is a test you can do when you hear a republican jabbering on about voter id. Tell them the government should pay for these ids and see what the response will be.

[Galloism]

So? No policy ever has or ever will end up with equal results, equal results is a foolish standard that just promotes discrimination in one way or another. As long as policies are implemented equally, there should be no problem with them on the kind of level these Democrats are taking it. They might disagree with that policy, and that's perfectly ok, but to pretend that unequal results are racist and continue to abuse the House rules in Texas to prevent a vote is just stupid.

Now I'm sorry I won't be here to answer you guys any longer but I have to go to work, cheers!

Your statement contradicts your previous statement.

As Gallo mentioned “disparate impact" is what is going on here. These measures have next to nothing to do with election security in the traditional sense.

Election security to the republicans means making voting hard for those that aren’t going to vote for them anyway. There is no wide scale election fraud. There are fraud cases sure. The problem is they fall well within the margins of error.

Even the ex-president bemoaned mail in balloting as ripe with fraud. Oregon and Colorado has used it for a couple decades. About 36 million or so votes. The amount of wide scale fraud in that peiod of time? A grand total of 22 votes,

I'd also like to point out that the hypothetical benefit of fraudulently voting is next to nothing unless you do it in some kind of grand massive scale (which you almost have to be a poll worker or supervisor to do and act in a conspiracy with others - which these "voting security" measures don't actually address in any way).

Add to that, the penalty for getting caught is extremely high.

Put it to you this way: would you steal a jelly doughnut if the penalty for getting caught was 10 years in prison? Presume you like jelly doughnuts.

[The Caleshan Valkyrie]

Nobody should react negatively to wanting to make elections safer, why wouldn't you want them to be safer regardless of previous cases? You wouldn't. I find your last point to be completely irrelevant.
As for your first point, being disabled is often an immutable physical characteristic that cannot be changed, therefore should not be discriminated against. It would be morally right to make their lives a bit easier and install access ramps. If you're somehow suggesting that, say, black people are incapable of providing voter ID or finding the right voting station is inherently stupid and, frankly, racist.

There is a test you can do when you hear a republican jabbering on about voter id. Tell them the government should pay for these ids and see what the response will be.

Actually, that brings up a question:

If the Democrats added a component to the For the People Act that started requiring voter ID, but also included funds to pay for some means to ensure that those IDs were free of charge and provide some means of getting such IDs out to people with some degree of expediency, would the Dems be able to punch it through the Senate with Reconciliation, since it would affect the budget?

[The Black Forrest]

There is a test you can do when you hear a republican jabbering on about voter id. Tell them the government should pay for these ids and see what the response will be.

Actually, that brings up a question:

If the Democrats added a component to the For the People Act that started requiring voter ID, but also included funds to pay for some means to ensure that those IDs were free of charge and provide some means of getting such IDs out to people with some degree of expediency, would the Dems be able to punch it through the Senate with Reconciliation, since it would affect the budget?

Watching McConnell through the years? Not really.

You see usually when there is an effort to fix something. A problem was identified. The republican voting security measures are a solution in search of a problem.

[The Caleshan Valkyrie]

Actually, that brings up a question:

If the Democrats added a component to the For the People Act that started requiring voter ID, but also included funds to pay for some means to ensure that those IDs were free of charge and provide some means of getting such IDs out to people with some degree of expediency, would the Dems be able to punch it through the Senate with Reconciliation, since it would affect the budget?

Watching McConnell through the years? Not really.

You see usually when there is an effort to fix something. A problem was identified. The republican voting security measures are a solution in search of a problem.

What I mean is that if they kept all the stuff in the For the People Act, like all those mandates and such, and included the bit on the ID AND also stuck in government funding to facilitate getting those IDs to people, would they be able to use Reconciliation for it since it affects the budget? Would that not allow them to push it through whether Mitch likes it or not?

I'm guessing it's more complicated, because I'd think they'd have done something like that already, if it were so easy.

[Omniabstracta]

It doesn’t affect everyone equally any more than banning disabled access ramps for buildings affects everyone equally. Sure, it applies to everyone, but that doesn’t make its effects fair or equitable for the people who actually live under the system.

Besides, the idea that these measures are actually in the name of security, when actual cases of voter fraud do and always have measured in the dozens per election, is pretty funny.

Nobody should react negatively to wanting to make elections safer, why wouldn't you want them to be safer regardless of previous cases? You wouldn't. I find your last point to be completely irrelevant.
As for your first point, being disabled is often an immutable physical characteristic that cannot be changed, therefore should not be discriminated against. It would be morally right to make their lives a bit easier and install access ramps. If you're somehow suggesting that, say, black people are incapable of providing voter ID or finding the right voting station is inherently stupid and, frankly, racist.

I mean, I’m sure it’s easy to tell all those people who work on Tuesdays to use up one of their precious few sick days to go vote. Or to tell all those people who can’t afford to take time out of their day to wait four hours in a DPS line to pay their own money for a voter ID to just find the time. Or to tell the millions of people who live in counties where there’s one polling place for tens of thousands of residents or for miles around to just move somewhere else. Or tell the people who are actually, literally disabled to hustle up and make it to the ballot box like everybody else.

You could certainly do all those things, and in doing so somehow convince yourself that erecting barriers to voting is somehow a good thing. I don’t understand why you’d do that, nor why you might assume the people I have in mind when I say I want easy access to voting are automatically black (in your, definitely random example choice of group, that is totally not at all projecting), but you do you.

[Conservative Republic Of Huang]

The problem is, just because a policy might be targeted equally does not mean that it will have equal results for everyone.

So? No policy ever has or ever will end up with equal results, equal results is a foolish standard that just promotes discrimination in one way or another. As long as policies are implemented equally, there should be no problem with them on the kind of level these Democrats are taking it. They might disagree with that policy, and that's perfectly ok, but to pretend that unequal results are racist and continue to abuse the House rules in Texas to prevent a vote is just stupid.

Now I'm sorry I won't be here to answer you guys any longer but I have to go to work, cheers!

Imagine if a law were passed that targeted people with the name "Jamal," or people who wear do-rags. Now, anyone of any race can be named Jamal in theory. Anyone of any race can wear do-rags. But the fact is, the policy disproportionately targets certain races because certain races have higher proportions of people with that name or article of clothing. Is that racist, even if somehow the intent is not?

[San Lumen]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsole ... -election/

Trump is claiming that the election in Virginia will have been rigged if Republicans lose.

[The Temple of the Computer]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/07/12/trump-sows-doubts-about-upcoming-virginia-governors-election/

Trump is claiming that the election in Virginia will have been rigged if Republicans lose.

In other more important news, the sky is still blue.

[San Lumen]

https://www.virginiamercury.com/blog-va ... o-skip-it/

Virginia Bar Association cancels debate after Youngkin chooses to skip it. Refusing to debate your opponent is never a winning strategy.

[Catarapania]

Nobody should react negatively to wanting to make elections safer, why wouldn't you want them to be safer regardless of previous cases? You wouldn't. I find your last point to be completely irrelevant.
As for your first point, being disabled is often an immutable physical characteristic that cannot be changed, therefore should not be discriminated against. It would be morally right to make their lives a bit easier and install access ramps. If you're somehow suggesting that, say, black people are incapable of providing voter ID or finding the right voting station is inherently stupid and, frankly, racist.

There is a test you can do when you hear a republican jabbering on about voter id. Tell them the government should pay for these ids and see what the response will be.

So long as we only issue one ID per social security card, I'd be all for that.

[Jeriga]

Man this thread is wild. From purposely starving children to thinly veiled racism, we've got it all in the last 3 pages.

[Tarsonis]

Man this thread is wild. From purposely starving children to thinly veiled racism, we've got it all in the last 3 pages.

The starving kids thing was a DOS

[Auristania]

Voter ID is completely useless. In both USA and UK, voter fraud is done with postal votes. If postal vote fraud were ever dealt with, then the fraudsters might try in person voter fraud and ID might then be useful, but I ain't holding my breath.

Likewise, my wallet was stolen once in my lifetime. If they have ID laws, my wallet will be stolen every 4 years.

[Catarapania]

Voter ID is completely useless. In both USA and UK, voter fraud is done with postal votes. If postal vote fraud were ever dealt with, then the fraudsters might try in person voter fraud and ID might then be useful, but I ain't holding my breath.

Then wouldn't it make sense to restrict postal votes where doing so would not have too much of a disparate impact?

[Kowani]

looooool

With Republican-backed voting bills moving rapidly through a special session of the state Legislature, Texas Democrats are planning to make a break for it — again.

At least 58 Democratic members of the state House of Representatives are expected to bolt from Austin on Monday in an effort to block the measures from advancing, a source familiar with the plans told NBC News. The unusual move, akin to what Democrats did in 2003, would paralyze the chamber, stopping business until the lawmakers return to town or the session ends.

The majority of the members plan to fly to Washington, D.C., on two private jets chartered for the occasion and use the time there to rally support for federal voting legislation, the source said. Others will make their own way.

The lawmakers risk arrest in taking flight. Under the Texas Constitution, the Legislature requires a quorum of two-thirds of lawmakers be present to conduct state business in either chamber. Absent lawmakers can be legally compelled to return to the Capitol, and the source said Democrats expect state Republicans to ask the Department of Public Safety to track them down. “It's really exciting to see Democrats taking a bold move with this potential walkout,” Carisa Lopez, political director for civil liberties group Texas Freedom Network, said.

House Democrats already staged one successful walkout to defeat election legislation prioritized by Republican Gov. Greg Abbott. Members quietly left the House floor in the final minutes of the regular legislative session that ended in May, breaking quorum and forcing Republicans to adjourn without passing the key agenda item. But that victory was always likely to be short-lived, as Republicans control both legislative chambers. Abbott kept his vow to call a special session, which began July 8.

Republicans didn't waste time. Lawmakers advanced a pair of voting measures — House Bill 3 and Senate Bill 1 — Sunday after marathon committee hearings in both chambers, with the House hearing lasting nearly 24 hours. Both panels featured members of the public waiting hours to give testimony in the middle of the night. Floor votes were expected to take place as soon as this week. Both bills would add new identification requirements for mail voting, ban some early voting options and create new criminal penalties for breaking election code while empowering partisan poll watchers.

To block the currently pending legislation, the Democratic lawmakers would have to remain away through the end of the special session, which can last as many as 30 days under the state’s constitution.

And they're off!

[Illu-chi]

I'm confused what every on is talking about. Is this it?

https://legiscan.com/TX/text/HB6/id/234 ... duced.html

[Kowani]

Watching McConnell through the years? Not really.

You see usually when there is an effort to fix something. A problem was identified. The republican voting security measures are a solution in search of a problem.

What I mean is that if they kept all the stuff in the For the People Act, like all those mandates and such, and included the bit on the ID AND also stuck in government funding to facilitate getting those IDs to people, would they be able to use Reconciliation for it since it affects the budget? Would that not allow them to push it through whether Mitch likes it or not?

I'm guessing it's more complicated, because I'd think they'd have done something like that already, if it were so easy.

No. Byrd Rule means it can't merely be "incidental" to the budget. So the voter ID program would get through under your scheme, but almost everything else would get scrapped.

[Sincluda]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/07/12/trump-sows-doubts-about-upcoming-virginia-governors-election/

Trump is claiming that the election in Virginia will have been rigged if Republicans lose.

Haha haha he’s literally just gonna forecast an if/then, huh? I mean, I’m not surprised.

[Kowani]

I'm confused what every on is talking about. Is this it?

https://legiscan.com/TX/text/HB6/id/234 ... duced.html

No.
The House version is this one, the Senate Bill this one.

Yours is from the previous session and has seen some changes to make it slightly less horrific

[HISPIDA]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/07/12/trump-sows-doubts-about-upcoming-virginia-governors-election/

Trump is claiming that the election in Virginia will have been rigged if Republicans lose.

Haha haha he’s literally just gonna forecast an if/then, huh? I mean, I’m not surprised.

Do you really think Trump knows how to code?