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And now, a public service announcement about democracy
- Thread starter Quagmire
- Start date
That was an interesting video. But did she have to use so many cuss words?
Still, the video makes some cogent points, although one thing I might take exception with is the point she made at the end of "once it's gone, it's gone" (about democracy). I don't see it as being any kind of permanent situation; it's more like a pendulum going back and forth. Things ultimately change with the passing of generations, so it's not like it's over. A great man once said "It ain't over 'til it's over."
Heyo
Veteran Member
Well, you may get it back, but not without a fight that will cost lives. Getting democracy (back) is a lot more expensive than keeping it. Keeping it is as easy as showing up to vote.
The claims are to me mostly true but not necessarily in every detail. Overall though, yes, that's what's happening.
In another thread I referred to the American 2024 election as a Seldon Crisis election. For those that don't know Asimov's Foundation Trilogy, this is a crises where everyone's future is at stake. The OP video reinforced that for me. It's clear to me that MAGA wants an authoritarian government like the ones in the video. Harris is far from being a saint, of course, but she's opposed to that end and that's more than enough for me.
But I'll go a bit deeper. Why is all of this going on now and includes the horror in the Middle East, Russia's war against Ukraine and all the other under-reported wars currently being fought? That's another eason why "Seldon Crisis" works for me.
The US was created with some wonderful ideals that we've done a horribly ****ty job of living up to for far too long. We can make a choice to stand for something better than what the OP video shows. We have the potential to be, using Reagan's phrase "a shining city on a hill" - a successful model for others.
One of my 60's songs put it this way in part but still a most cogent and immediate part. Which way will we ultimately help becoming reality?
The battle outside ragin'
Will soon shake your windows
And rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin'
Probably just as well you don't watch this one then:
A most interesting vid, although I am with @Stevicus on the swearing. I'm just not a fan -- English is so rich there are much more powerful ways of expressing your feelings than f-bombs.
I am also with @Heyo, that democracy lost will be hideously difficult to get back. Look what it cost Germany after WWII, and that was while the country was basically under the control of other democracies.
What the more strident members of the Republican Party (Heritage Foundation and Federalist Society, among many others) are truly working for is to make the election of anything other than conservatives (read Republicans) impossible. And when it is impossible for the public to choose their representatives, that is the end of democracy. Everything after that, as in so many of the countries in the video, are simply sham elections with pre-determined outcomes.
I am not saying this lightly, and the evidence is there for all to see. Dozens and dozens of very able historians and thinkers are shouting warnings as best they can, but we all know that the public only has time for photo ops and buzz words. Asking the hard questions is hard work, and not (I think) something the majority of voters actually do.
So yes, democracy is really and truly threatened, not just in the U.S. but around the world, and it will take a very, very vigilant public to save it -- in other words, verging on a near miracle.
And by the way, if (let us pray) Harris wins and there is a flip in the House and the Senate is retained, the very first thing I would like to see happen is to amend election laws seriously, including making gerrymandering impossible and seriously overhaul election finance laws by imposing non-partison commissions to run those things.
I know a lot of Americans will object, saying "shouldn't political parties have a say in running elections?" I say a definitive "NO!" If the running of the election is truly fair, then -- and only then -- does the actual electorate get a say in which candidates and party they elect.
I am also with @Heyo, that democracy lost will be hideously difficult to get back. Look what it cost Germany after WWII, and that was while the country was basically under the control of other democracies.
What the more strident members of the Republican Party (Heritage Foundation and Federalist Society, among many others) are truly working for is to make the election of anything other than conservatives (read Republicans) impossible. And when it is impossible for the public to choose their representatives, that is the end of democracy. Everything after that, as in so many of the countries in the video, are simply sham elections with pre-determined outcomes.
I am not saying this lightly, and the evidence is there for all to see. Dozens and dozens of very able historians and thinkers are shouting warnings as best they can, but we all know that the public only has time for photo ops and buzz words. Asking the hard questions is hard work, and not (I think) something the majority of voters actually do.
So yes, democracy is really and truly threatened, not just in the U.S. but around the world, and it will take a very, very vigilant public to save it -- in other words, verging on a near miracle.
And by the way, if (let us pray) Harris wins and there is a flip in the House and the Senate is retained, the very first thing I would like to see happen is to amend election laws seriously, including making gerrymandering impossible and seriously overhaul election finance laws by imposing non-partison commissions to run those things.
I know a lot of Americans will object, saying "shouldn't political parties have a say in running elections?" I say a definitive "NO!" If the running of the election is truly fair, then -- and only then -- does the actual electorate get a say in which candidates and party they elect.
Yes, possibly. As Jefferson once put it, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."
anna.
colors your eyes with what's not there
Look what happened/ is happening in Georgia. Just one state. It's truly alarming.
This year, Kemp signed a new law allowing any citizen to present a list of voters they believe must be purged from the rolls; one person, Marjorie Taylor Greene ally and Republican activist Pam Reardon, submitted a list of 32,000 voters, and the Chairman of the Ft. Benning area GOP, Alton Russell, challenged over 4,000 voters. A total of 149,000 voters were challenged by a handful of white Republican activists.
This week Georgia rolled out a new website where people can let the state know they’ve moved (or their relative has died) and cancel their voter registration online. It’s super easy; you just plug in your information and, poof, your voter registration vanishes.
The problem with the new “cancel my registration” site is that bad actors, if they know a person’s name, address, DOB, and either Social Security or drivers’ license number, can simply go in and cancel other people they don’t want voting.
For an hour Monday, the entire Georgia voter database — including names, addresses, dates of birth, and Social Security and drivers’ license numbers — was publicly posted on that very site. Oops, Kemp said! Anybody could download it and share it with others, including Republican activists who might want to keep on purging Democratic voters.
A breathtaking scam: Inside Georgia's newest voter suppression tactic
Republicans in Georgia have been champions at pioneering new ways to disenfranchise Democratic voters. Their latest scam is breathtaking. First, the background. When Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp was Secretary of State — the state’s top elections official — and running against Stacey...
www.rawstory.com
The Background:
When Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp was Secretary of State — the state’s top elections official — and running against Stacey Abrams for Governor in 2018, Abrams’ organization had registered 53,000 people (70% African American) to vote. Kemp put those registrations on hold so they couldn’t vote in the 2018 election, which he won by 54,723 votes.
But that was just the beginning for Kemp. By the year prior to the 2018 election he’d purged a total of 1.4 million voters from the rolls, claiming he was just removing people who’d died or moved. On a single night in July 2017 he removed half a million voters, about 8% of all registered Georgia voters, an act The Atlanta Journal-Constitutionsaid “may represent the largest mass disenfranchisement in US history.”
Investigative reporter Greg Palast hired the company Amazon uses to verify addresses and ran the names and addresses of those 534,000 people Kemp purged that July day through their system: 334,000 of them, most Black, had neither died nor moved. But they’d sure lost their right to vote.
Then Kemp shut down 8 percent of all the polling places in Georgia just before the election, the majority — recommended as a “cost saving move” by a white consultant Kemp had hired — in Black neighborhoods. Did I mention that he “won” that election by only 54,723 votes?
In 2020, when Stacey Abrams again challenged Kemp for the governorship, Kemp’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (pronounced “Raff-ens-purger”) purged another 309,000 voters from the rolls; Palast hired the company again and found that 198,351 of them had neither died nor moved.
@anna., if all this is correct (I haven't taken the time to fact check) it is truly astonishing. What makes it so utterly, utterly vile is that on the basis of a mere accusation by someone like MTG, a perfectly innocent, unknowing voter is now considered guilty until he or she prove themselves innocent.Look what happened/ is happening in Georgia. Just one state. It's truly alarming.
This year, Kemp signed a new law allowing any citizen to present a list of voters they believe must be purged from the rolls; one person, Marjorie Taylor Greene ally and Republican activist Pam Reardon, submitted a list of 32,000 voters, and the Chairman of the Ft. Benning area GOP, Alton Russell, challenged over 4,000 voters. A total of 149,000 voters were challenged by a handful of white Republican activists.
This week Georgia rolled out a new website where people can let the state know they’ve moved (or their relative has died) and cancel their voter registration online. It’s super easy; you just plug in your information and, poof, your voter registration vanishes.
The problem with the new “cancel my registration” site is that bad actors, if they know a person’s name, address, DOB, and either Social Security or drivers’ license number, can simply go in and cancel other people they don’t want voting.
For an hour Monday, the entire Georgia voter database — including names, addresses, dates of birth, and Social Security and drivers’ license numbers — was publicly posted on that very site. Oops, Kemp said! Anybody could download it and share it with others, including Republican activists who might want to keep on purging Democratic voters.
A breathtaking scam: Inside Georgia's newest voter suppression tactic
Republicans in Georgia have been champions at pioneering new ways to disenfranchise Democratic voters. Their latest scam is breathtaking. First, the background. When Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp was Secretary of State — the state’s top elections official — and running against Stacey...
The Background:
When Georgia’s Republican Governor Brian Kemp was Secretary of State — the state’s top elections official — and running against Stacey Abrams for Governor in 2018, Abrams’ organization had registered 53,000 people (70% African American) to vote. Kemp put those registrations on hold so they couldn’t vote in the 2018 election, which he won by 54,723 votes.
But that was just the beginning for Kemp. By the year prior to the 2018 election he’d purged a total of 1.4 million voters from the rolls, claiming he was just removing people who’d died or moved. On a single night in July 2017 he removed half a million voters, about 8% of all registered Georgia voters, an act The Atlanta Journal-Constitutionsaid “may represent the largest mass disenfranchisement in US history.”
Investigative reporter Greg Palast hired the company Amazon uses to verify addresses and ran the names and addresses of those 534,000 people Kemp purged that July day through their system: 334,000 of them, most Black, had neither died nor moved. But they’d sure lost their right to vote.
Then Kemp shut down 8 percent of all the polling places in Georgia just before the election, the majority — recommended as a “cost saving move” by a white consultant Kemp had hired — in Black neighborhoods. Did I mention that he “won” that election by only 54,723 votes?
In 2020, when Stacey Abrams again challenged Kemp for the governorship, Kemp’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (pronounced “Raff-ens-purger”) purged another 309,000 voters from the rolls; Palast hired the company again and found that 198,351 of them had neither died nor moved.
I have a really, really serious question to ask about this -- how do these alleged Christians live with themselves? Surely they know, if their religion is correct, their names have already been stricken from the Book of LIfe!
Once again, I have to say it -- these are pretend Christians: they do not believe what they say the believe. Not even close.
anna.
colors your eyes with what's not there
You'll find plenty of support for it in a fact check. There's a lot of current info on the fiasco happening now with the website that displayed all the sensitive info needed to purge a voter without their knowledge. And a lot of support for the previous incidences of suppression, here a short excerpt from one such source:
On Election Day 2018, James Baiye II drove to Lucerne Baptist Church in the same suburban Atlanta neighborhood where he'd been registered to vote for most of his adult life. He dropped his brother and elderly mother at the front door, parked the car and got in line. Though he'd been registered for years, the 31-year-old African American hadn't been a frequent voter. He'd spent a few years playing football at a junior college in North Carolina. In 2012, Baiye says, he requested an absentee ballot but there's no record of it in the state's voter file. In fact, he hadn't cast an in-person ballot since 2008, when Barack Obama first ran for president.
This year was different. He'd become excited about candidacy of Stacey Abrams, the Democrat who was vying to become Georgia's first African-American governor, and the nation's first-ever black woman to lead a U.S. state. It wasn't Abrams' race that swayed Baiye, he said, but rather her pledge to run the government differently. "A lot of being there for the people," he said. "I just wanted to see her succeed."
But when Baiye finally reached the front of the line, there was a problem. Poll workers couldn't find his name on their list of registered voters. This was puzzling: Baiye is a citizen, he wasn't a felon, and he hadn't moved.
What Baiye didn't know was he'd been caught up in one of the most hotly debated campaign issues in Georgia. It turned out that a year earlier Baiye had been removed from the voter rolls in a purge led by the office of Republican Secretary of State Brian Kemp, who was running for governor against Abrams.
On a single day in late July 2017, Kemp's office had removed from the rolls 560,000 Georgians who had been flagged because they'd skipped one too many elections. Abrams would later call the purge the "use-it-or-lose-it scheme." An APM Reports investigation last year estimated 107,000 of the people purged under the policy would otherwise have been eligible to vote last year, just like Baiye.
. . . .Baiye, a native Georgian who now does security work, heard all the chatter about voter suppression leading up to Election Day. In the final month of the campaign, voting rights advocates took Kemp to court over an "exact-match" policy that held up 53,000 pending registrations, mostly of people of color, many over small typos, like a missing apostrophe or hyphen. The prior month, all but two polling places in a rural, predominantly black county were targeted for closure. The county eventually backed off the poll closures, though a new plan has since resurfaced that would affect fewer black voters.
How a massive voter purge in Georgia affected the 2018 election
State officials claimed that people removed from the voter rolls for inactivity had likely died or moved away. But an APM Reports investigation found tens of thousands who hadn't — and still wanted to vote.
As for the religion - there are people whose politics has become so entwined with their religion they can't separate the two.
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Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Guess one has to sharpen their bayonet.
Heyo
Veteran Member
And pitchforks. The bayonets are usually on the side of the tyrants.
I found it jarring which was, perhaps, the point. I also suspect that is might be viewed more positively my a much younger generation. Net-net, I'm a fan.
It's kind of surprising to me to hear so many people around me saying the F-word so casually, including 70-somthing and 80-something women. I don't mind it. In fact, it's kind of funny to me.
Thanks for that bit of culture. My words would have been tipping point.
I don't consider them pretend Christians. They're hypocrites, but that doesn't make one no longer a Christian. They're the worst of Christianity, but not uncommon now and still Christians to me and to themselves.
Agreed. Things look grim for democracy. Its enemies seem to be everywhere, making the decisions, and eroding safeguards.
Between that and climate change (speaking of tipping points - we've already passed that and are well into the suffering stage), this is looking like it's going to be a bad century with a lot more suffering, death, and unhappiness for many.
The good news is that these things won't lead to human extinction, and the surviving remnant will have a chance to build the world again as they did after the Black Plague in Europe, which created a lot of opportunity for previously marginalized people. Man can learn from this and build a better world than the one we have now.
In the meantime, for people like us, the world will only be getting worse until we're gone from it, although not necessarily our local part of the world. You're in Canada and I'm in Mexico, and things seem fairly stable in both countries. But I'm American, and it pains me to see the country I used to love and respect become what it has.
But not as much pain as one might think. I've pretty much completed the grieving process and arrived at acceptance. I have little emotional connection any longer, a process a lifetime in the making beginning with realizing that as an atheist, I was not among the "we" that trusted in God and according to the Pledge, lived under one.
Then came the quote from Bush Sr., "No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered as patriots. This is one nation under God."
Then I was purged from the voting rolls in two consecutive elections in Missouri. By that time, my heart wasn't with America anymore, and we made plans to leave it for good, a decision that I consider better and better every year.
Like you, I'm an outsider now looking in, and I prefer that. Nothing the Supreme Court does affects me or the people around me. White supremacy and theocracy aren't things here, and religion hasn't been weaponized. There isn't strife and grievance everywhere you look, or tantrumming, or the entitlement, or the lack of empathy and community spirit that characterizes so much of the American population. I'm expecting to live out my remaining years in relative tranquility and comfort, but nothing is for certain there.
We just had our first brush with climate change this year - a heat dome causing weeks of temperatures in the mid-90's F (35 C) and causing many to go out and buy and run mini-splits, which creates a strain on the power infrastructure.
So, yesterday, we had solar charged storage batteries installed to make us a little more grid independent and allow us to continue cooling the house (intermittently; AC drains the batteries relatively quickly) while keeping the refrigerator cold, the lights on, the pumps pumping water, and to use our computers and TVs for 18 hours during power outages, and able to recharge them without help from the utility. Hopefully, they recharge during the day even when being used, but I don't know yet.
The good news is that these things won't lead to human extinction, and the surviving remnant will have a chance to build the world again as they did after the Black Plague in Europe, which created a lot of opportunity for previously marginalized people. Man can learn from this and build a better world than the one we have now.
In the meantime, for people like us, the world will only be getting worse until we're gone from it, although not necessarily our local part of the world. You're in Canada and I'm in Mexico, and things seem fairly stable in both countries. But I'm American, and it pains me to see the country I used to love and respect become what it has.
But not as much pain as one might think. I've pretty much completed the grieving process and arrived at acceptance. I have little emotional connection any longer, a process a lifetime in the making beginning with realizing that as an atheist, I was not among the "we" that trusted in God and according to the Pledge, lived under one.
Then came the quote from Bush Sr., "No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered as patriots. This is one nation under God."
Then I was purged from the voting rolls in two consecutive elections in Missouri. By that time, my heart wasn't with America anymore, and we made plans to leave it for good, a decision that I consider better and better every year.
Like you, I'm an outsider now looking in, and I prefer that. Nothing the Supreme Court does affects me or the people around me. White supremacy and theocracy aren't things here, and religion hasn't been weaponized. There isn't strife and grievance everywhere you look, or tantrumming, or the entitlement, or the lack of empathy and community spirit that characterizes so much of the American population. I'm expecting to live out my remaining years in relative tranquility and comfort, but nothing is for certain there.
We just had our first brush with climate change this year - a heat dome causing weeks of temperatures in the mid-90's F (35 C) and causing many to go out and buy and run mini-splits, which creates a strain on the power infrastructure.
So, yesterday, we had solar charged storage batteries installed to make us a little more grid independent and allow us to continue cooling the house (intermittently; AC drains the batteries relatively quickly) while keeping the refrigerator cold, the lights on, the pumps pumping water, and to use our computers and TVs for 18 hours during power outages, and able to recharge them without help from the utility. Hopefully, they recharge during the day even when being used, but I don't know yet.
Your "digression" saddens me. Those "tipping points" that we're passing (or we've passed) exist because climate change is going to be expensive to fix, and we don't want to pay the price (but somebody will have to, along with other debt we've passed along), and democracy because it isn't giving some people what they think they want -- which is the right to deny the benefits of democracy to those we disapprove of. The price for the latter will have to be paid, too, and that price is that democracy's enemies will be the first to miss it, when it is gone.
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