There Is No Compromise On Civil Rights If You Want My Vote

image of Democrat Heath Mello, running for Mayor of Omaha, NE is not a progressive
Democrat Heath Mello, running for Mayor of Omaha, NE is not a progressive

Sometimes I dislike people who focus on one single issue to decide if they will vote for a particular candidate. For example some friends of mine refused to vote for President Obama in 2012 because he used drones in the ‘war on terror’ that occasionally hurt innocent people. In 2016, some friends wouldn’t vote for Hillary because of mutual support from bankers on Wall Street (among other single issues others used). Civil rights aren’t just a policy issue or something to overlook in a candidate for the ‘greater good’. If you call yourself progressive, you either support civil rights or you don’t and if you don’t I won’t vote for you.

If a political candidate, claiming to be progressive, said she didn’t think black people should have equal rights, that person most likely wouldn’t get elected. That’s how I feel we should treat a candidate who doesn’t think women should have reproductive rights.

Continue reading “There Is No Compromise On Civil Rights If You Want My Vote”

A Rational Way To Resist Trump

best image of Donald Trump

You know I wasn’t happy with the election of Donald Trump and the fact that the Republicans now control the House, Senate, and White House. I didn’t vote for any of them and I know none of them will have my concerns in mind when they start their agenda. However I won’t be telling people Trump ‘is not my President’. I don’t think it’s helpful to copy the Tea Party playbook lock stock and barrel. We need a more rational way to resist Trump and fight hard for our progressive agenda in which a majority of people agree.

The fact is a majority of total voters voted for Clinton but Trump won the electoral college votes. Of course there is some debate how ethical that win really was, but barring some last minute super-duper legal maneuver or a ‘smoking gun’, Trump will be taking the oath of office on January 20th. I will still have fun telling my conservative friends that Hillary won the election by almost 3 million votes.

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Viral Rant Highlights The Need To Speak Up When Confronted With Racism

Screencap from racist rant video
Screencap from racist rant video

Millions have seen the viral video of a white woman’s racist rant toward two Latina women at a Kentucky store. During the whole video, I didn’t once hear or see anyone in the crowd telling the woman to stop her rant. It actually bothered me just as much as the actual racism because when we let the racism happen without interfering then we seem to be enabling the racism and inviting more of it in the future.

I won’t post the video but you can go to the NBC News website for their story and they include a segment of the video.

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More Proof Ohio Republicans Really Don’t Want You To Vote

image of people voting

Introduced Monday, March 14th, Ohio SB 296 would require people petitioning a court to extend the hours of a polling location(s) past the official closing time to pay a cash bond equal to the cost of keeping the polling place(s) open. Yes, a poll tax would charged to make sure everyone in line can vote. Then to add insult to injury the law would make you cast a provisional ballot if it is after official voting hours.

SB 296 seems to start out great by creating “overtime” pay for election officials at polling places if they are kept open past the official closing time.

(K)(1) Prior to the day of an election, the board of elections shall prepare and file with the office of the secretary of state an estimate of the hourly cost of keeping a polling place in the county open after the time for the closing of the polls pursuant to a court order issued under section 3501.321 of the Revised Code. The estimate shall include the cost of compensating the precinct election officials who are assigned to a polling place at the rate specified in division (H) of section 3501.28 of the Revised Code. The secretary of state shall make the estimate available on the secretary of state’s official web site not later than the time for the opening of the polls on the day of the election.

(H)(1) A precinct election official who works in a polling place after the time for the closing of the polls, as specified in section 3501.32 of the Revised Code, as a result of a court order to keep the polling place open after that time shall be compensated at a rate of twenty-two dollars and fifty cents per hour for the period worked as a result of the court order.

S. B. No. 296 as introduced 03/14/2016

The law also allows for Cost of living adjustments each year! That’s usually something Republicans hate to do when tax dollars are involved.

Then the other shoe falls. 

The reason to create the “overtime” pay and to figure out the costs of keeping the polling place open past the official closing time is because the law would require people who petition a court to extend polling hours would have to put up a cash bond equal to the costs of running the location(s) after hours.

Sec. 3501.321. (A)(1) A person who seeks an order that one or more polling places in a county remain open past the time for the closing of the polls, as specified in section 3501.32 of the Revised Code, shall file a petition in the court of common pleas of that county. Upon filing the petition, the petitioner shall serve notice of the petition upon the secretary of state and the attorney general. Except as otherwise provided in division (A)(2) of this section, the petitioner also shall post with the clerk of the court a cash bond in an amount equal to the cost of keeping the relevant polling places open for the requested period of time, as estimated by the board of elections in accordance with division (K)(1) of section 3501.17 of the Revised Code.

This would be like a poll tax to extend the polling hours for reasons outside the control of the voter.

Reasons to extend polling hours can include running out of ballots, long lines due to a lack of voting booths, a bad traffic accident that would keep people from getting to the polling place on time, technical issues with the voting equipment, and problems with registration.

The law also states if you had the bond waived and succeeded in your petition, you and any others included in the petition would be the ONLY ones allowed to vote at that polling location held open.

The bond requirement reminds me of the extra charges a utility charges to restore service after hours if you have your service disconnected. The extra fees are to discourage you from letting your service be disconnected. The GOP wants to discourage you from petitioning the court to hold open polling places.

Then so as to really make a petition action less likely to occur, the Republicans include this:

(C) An elector who appears in a polling place to vote after the time for the closing of the polls pursuant to a court order shall cast a provisional ballot under section 3505.181 of the Revised Code.

BOOM!

That means that should a court order extend polling hours, any votes cast after hours won’t be counted election night, if at all. In Ohio, provisional ballots are held for 10 days and if not needed to decide a race, are tossed in the trash.

The state would also be allowed to appeal the extension and if the court then decides the polling place shouldn’t have stayed open, those provisional ballots would be trashed even if needed to decide a race.

This law reminds me of the TRAP laws being used on clinics that provide abortion services. Yes you can still get an abortion but the regulations are so onerous you are extremely limited on finding a provider to get one.

SB 296 doesn’t keep you from voting, per se, but the new regulations make it less likely your vote would count because of something out of your control at the polling place on election day and the Republicans are hoping you will give up trying to vote if there are problems.

If that isn’t undemocratic I don’t know what is?

If You Ignore The Real History About The Confederate Flag Then You’ve Lost Any Argument

image of The Flag of Racism
The Flag of Racism

An old saying goes that you are entitled to your own opinion, but you are not entitled to your own facts. The storm surrounding the confederate battle flag is a good case study for the saying. This is not about an attack on freedom of speech and if you ignore the real history about the confederate flag then you’ve lost any argument about it.

I don’t have much time to waste on people who try to “whitewash” southern history to make it seem like the south didn’t lose the civil war and that the confederate flag is just a symbol of southern heritage.

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