Category Archives: Politics

Goodbye Voting Rights

The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear a case challenging a key component of the Voting Rights Act next week.  Given the current makeup of the Court, his does not bode well for free elections.

At issue is Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act is the section that gives muscle to the Act.  There are certain states and certain counties in those states which shall remain nameless (*cough* The South *cough*) which have an unfortunate history of disenfranchising people who, shall we say, are a shade darker than the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.  Section 5 requires those states/counties to seek Federal approval (preclearance) before making changes to election laws.  This can, at times, be a significant burden.  Simple things like changing polling places to across the street requires Federal approval.  But because of the counties’ history of changing polling places to across the county, these things need to be done.

There are recent examples of state laws being rejected because of Voting Rights Act violations.  South Carolina’s Voter ID law for instance.  The number of rejects has certainly dropped significantly since enactment, though.  But that isn’t the point.  The entire Voting Rights Act has been deemed Constitutional in the past.  The current Court, though, is only in favor of precedent if it fits within their narrow world view.  And their narrow world view is likely to ignore Constitutionality and precedent and say to the world that things are better now and those states and counties no longer have to seek preclearance.

I am somewhat sympathetic to complaints that it is unfair to single out certain states and counties for preclearance.  Can their past sins ever be legislatively forgiven?  If we lived in a fair world, the answer would be yes.  But this is far from a fair world which is why we need the Voting Rights Act in the first place.

This past election cycle has shown that preclearance is still a good idea.  I think the ideal outcome would be to rule preclearance Constitutional, but the singling out of certain states and counties Unconstitutional.  The result would be to force all states to request preclearance before changing voting laws.  This would certainly be unwieldy at first.  That could be fixed by a 21st Century Voting Rights Act that deals away with the bothersome portions of preclearance like moving a polling place across the street.

February 13th, 2013: Slavery Finally Banned In Mississippi

No, that is not a typo.  It turns out that, due to an oversight, Mississippi has never actually ratified the 13th Amendment banning slavery.  Better late than never?

I find it very hard to believe that this was an actual oversight, but I’m willing to give it the benefit of the doubt.  Still, Mississippi didn’t actually vote for ratification until 1995.  1995!  How is that even possible?  I wonder if each year until 1995 there was someone that said, “Maybe we should finally ban slavery?”  And the overwhelming response was, “Dude, too soon!  Too soon!  Our wounds are still healing!”

More proof of a post-racial America.

A Very Good Question

This is what Senatorial grandstanding should look like:

 

You go, girl!  We have an incredibly perverse system where companies can rake in tens of billions of dollars in profit while breaking the law and then pay a few billion in a settlement.  There is zero incentive for a company that has already proven that they will break the law to stop breaking the law.  It’s like telling a kid to go to their room when their room contains a full entertainment center and they spend most of their time there anyway.

Elizabeth Warren is quickly becoming one of the people I would want in my neighborhood.  A list that is sadly bereft of women at the moment.  Shame on me.

Highlights From The State Of The Union

Last night’s State of the Union Address was mostly boilerplate Democraty feel good circle-jerky material, but there were some interesting highlights.

  • The announcement of a bipartisan panel to investigate voting irregularities that led to long lines at the polls.  No one should have to wait six hours in line to vote.  Of course, much of this can be tied to Republican governor shenanigans (I’m looking at you, Scott Walker), but there were other issues as well.  It will be interesting to see what comes of the commission.
  • Universal pre-school!  This would be huge if Obama can pull it off.  Kids that age are sponges soaking up everything around them.  Getting them into a learning environment just a year earlier than they are today will have enormous implications to every avenue of social justice.
  • Raising the minimum wage to $9.00.  A somewhat better living wage for all!  People complain that it will cost jobs, but there is zero evidence to show this and some evidence that shows the opposite.  Counter-intuitive, I know, but it’s true.
  • Tying governmental scholarships, in part, to affordability of education.  This is a great idea.  There is some decent evidence that some of the meteoric rise in college tuition is due to the availability of governmental money.  Telling colleges that they have to be affordable is a great way to rein in costs.

I hope all of the above get a vote this year.  They are a good mixture of sound investments in the future and immediate economic gains.

The Law Is What The Kings Say It Is

I loves me some Ta-Nehisi Coates.  Earlier this week, he was talking about Obama’s new Orwellian white paper that authorizes drone strikes on American citizens.  The title of this posts is Mr. Coates’ final thought on the subject.

The domestic policies of Obama and Bush are vastly different.  Obama has done a pretty darn good job on the domestic front whereas Bush’s lower taxes and higher spending caused a recession.  As far as foreign policy goes, though, Obama is likely even worse than Bush was.  That is not an easy accomplishment.

Now we have this white paper that gives the President almost carte blanche in the killing of American citizens.  Obama has already targeted and killed two citizens that we know about.  Anwar al-Aliki and Samir Khan.  Neither were charged with any crimes.  Neither were considered high ranking members of al-Qaeda.  From what I can find, neither were considered to be actively plotting the deaths of Americans.  What they were good at was spreading propaganda.  So apparently, the U. S. government can now kill you for spreading propaganda.

I am not under any delusions that these people weren’t bad guys.  They almost certainly were.  That does not give our government the right to kill them in a non-combat area without due process.  The President should, at minimum, be required to publicly present all evidence in court before being allowed to target a U.S. citizen.  There is no such thing a state secrets if you think a citizen is worth killing.  If the secrets are worth keeping, the citizen is worth keeping alive.  Simple as that.

Not following our own laws is just fodder for al-Qaeda recruitment.  There are enough lies told about the U.S. that end up being effective recruitment techniques.  Do we really want to keep handing them truths?  I’m sure, though, that they just hate us for our freedoms.

Democrats Say Stupid Stuff Too

Today’s episode of Democrats Say Stupid Stuff Too is brought to you by Governor Pat Quinn of Illinois.  In his most recent State of the State address, he said the following: “Nobody in Illinois should work 40 hours a week and live in poverty. That’s a principle as old as the Bible.”

I believe it was the fifth commandment.  Thou shall not work forty hours a week and live in poverty.  Or was it the third beatitude?  Blessed are those that work 40 hours a week, they shall not live in poverty.  I forget.

I have to say, it’s kind of refreshing to be writing about a Democrat saying stupid stuff about the Bible.  But that’s what makes the Bible so great.  Anyone can make up any BS you want and point to some obscure passage to validate your point while completely disregarding every contradicting passage.

The sad thing is that Quinn is right.  Nobody should be able to work 40 hours a week and still live in poverty.  That’s not a principle as old as the Bible, though.  It’s a fairly new principle, given our history.  And it has nothing to do with the Bible.  It has everything to do with common decency.

So preach on, Governor Quinn!  Do what you can to reduce massive inequality to mere huge inequality.  But please, leave the Bible quoting to the professionals.  And by professionals, I mean nobody.  Because it’s just a book with some really cool ideals thrown in with a whole bunch of crazy shit.  And just like Satan in the Bible, people tend to quote it as a means to justify their ends.  See?  Even I can do it.

Huzzah! The Worst Democratic Senator Is Retiring

Tom Harkin (D-IA) is retiring and will not seek reelection in 2014.  This is good news for science.  The Republicans get all the publicity for their wacky “scientific” theories and complete disassociation from reality, but you’d be hard pressed to find an individual who did more harm to actual people than Tom Harkin.  He has used his position to promote the worst of “alternative” medicines.  (You know what they call alternative medicine that has been proven to work?  Medicine. – Tim Minchin)  He also was a major backer of creating the National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) within the NIH giving alternative medicine a undeserved prestige by associating it with an organization that does good science.  He then was critical of the agency when it went on to disprove many of the “alternative” medicines that Harkin endorses.

So good riddance, Senator Harkin!  Science will be much better off without you.

Lurching Toward Anarchy

A Federal Appeals Court ruled on Friday that President Obama’s recess appointment of three National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) members was unconstitutional.  If this is actually upheld, we will be declaring ourselves ungovernable.

Here’s some backstory.  The NLRB is a five person panel that mediates unfair labor practices and conducts union elections.  In order for the NLRB to make decisions, at least three board members must be in attendance.  By the end of 2011, due to term expirations, there were only two members left on the board.  Republicans filibustered the President’s three nominees effectively making the NLRB useless since it couldn’t call a quorum.  Republicans, using a technicality,  also refused to recess the Senate for the Christmas holidays which should prevent President Obama from making recess appointments.  Despite that, Obama declared that the Senate was actually in recess and made three recess appointments to the NLRB.  The NLRB now had the quorum it needed to conduct business and it has been doing so ever since.  The Federal Appeals Court’s ruling said that Obama’s appointments were unconstitutional.

If the Appeals Court ruling stands, every decision the NLRB has made in the past year will be invalidated.  Every case that was decided will have to be redone on top of all the new cases that come before the board.  Assuming, of course, that Republicans will actually allow a vote for new board members.  Which is suspect.  This effectively makes unions useless.  Which was probably the plan all along.

More Stuff, Less Time

One of the major complaints that come from people who are in favor of cutting welfare is that the poor have too much stuff.  After all, almost 100% of really poor people have a refrigerator.

It’s easy to make fun of idiotic attacks like that.  Really easy.  But, like all effective attacks, there is a sliver of truth to it.  Poor people do have more stuff.  Mostly, this is because the middle class has more stuff.  And the middle class has more stuff because the cost of stuff really hasn’t gone up much even as the purchasing power of the middle class has stagnated.  The middle class gets a new refrigerator and the poor get a still functioning old refrigerator for dirt cheap.

What is hidden in all of this is the one thing that we haven’t figured out how to recycle.  Time.  Specifically, family time.  The total hours of time worked per family has increased steadily in the United States.  As Paul Krugman points out, you may be tempted to say that is to be expected with more women joining the work force.  Europe has pretty much the same employment rates as the U.S., though, and their total hours worked has dropped steadily.

So we now have a middle class that has slightly more stuff than they used to be able to have but at the expense of much less family time.  You would think that the party that attempts to claim a monopoly on “family values” would want to address an issue as important as this.

What Is In The Drinking Water Of The Southwest?

Strange, horrible things are afoot in our beloved Southwest States.  Politicians are attempting to pass some really poorly written bills or they are trying their best to keep women and atheists down.

First up, New Mexico.  There, a Republican lawmaker has introduced a bill that would make it illegal for a woman who was raped to get an abortion.  That is, sadly, not surprising.  Stuff like this bill are happening more and more.  What is surprising is the reasoning.  You see, having an abortion would be tampering with evidence.  There’s no other way for the state to know a woman was raped unless she can bring the baby to term apparently.  The representative in question, Cathrynn Brown, claims that the bill is actually meant to deter sex offenders.  Because no rapist wants to have to take care of a rape-baby I guess.  I’m sure they’re totally able to think that far into the future.  She’s doing this to bring men to justice!  This is SO going to protect women!  Look at you women being all protected and stuff!

Next, we have Arizona.  Ah, Arizona, the new place for crazy.  A bill was proposed there by a Republican law maker that would require every graduating high schooler to recite an oath before getting their diploma.  Here’s the oath:

I, _______, do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge these duties; So help me God.

Yeah, that’s right, under this bill high schoolers will be required to swear an oath to god in order to graduate.  Eff you, atheists!  You probably don’t believe in the Constitution anyway.  As Hemant Mehta mentions in the above link:

It’s bad enough the Republicans are demanding loyalty of the kind normally reserved for members of Congress and beyond — but there’s also no way I would say those last four words, and the current text of the legislation does not allow for any alternatives.

In other words, if this bill were to become a law, atheists would either not be allowed to graduate… or they would be forced to lie so they could graduate. Neither option is acceptable.

Amazing.