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The New York Sun’s Alicia Colon observes assumed voting:
A funny thing happened when I went to vote in the primary election. I signed in at my district’s desk and a poll worker printed my information on a green card. She gave the card to another worker, who adjusted some mechanism on the side of the voting booth. I entered the booth and soon discovered I could not push down the lever for my candidate. When I asked for assistance, the poll worker checked the lever and said with a shocked tone: “You’re a Republican?”
The shock spread to all the women at the table, who apologized profusely for their supposition. Unfortunately, they said, I would have to fill out a paper ballot or wait for a Democrat to come in and use the booth, as it was already primed for Democrat voters. I wasn’t in a rush and so elected to wait, but voting was very, very light. Eventually, a black woman in a wheelchair entered the area and the poll workers breathed a sigh of relief. The woman signed her name, the poll worker filled out a green card, and — oh, no. The woman was a Republican, too.
Via NY State Assembly candidate Yvette Velázquez Bennett, who notes that Colon is “echoing something I’ve learned about in my district. I am finding more and more conservative minded minority Democrats.” In other US election developments, Texan gubernatorial musician Kinky Friedman rejects racism claims:
Gary L. Bledsoe, president of the Texas State Conference of NAACP Branches, asked Friedman to apologize in a Friday letter. Friedman said he would “absolutely never” apologize.
“The NAACP, I don’t even want to talk about them. They’re offended about just about everything,” Friedman said.
I’ve met Kinky a couple of times. He isn’t racist at all. Certainly not anywhere near as racist as New York City poll workers who assume all black women vote Democrat.
I’ve worked very closely with African-Americans in the past and it is my impression that they are (huge generalization here) pretty small-c conservative, especially on social issues.
I’m reminded of Irish Catholics in the early and mid-20th century such as my grandparents who could be very conservative and still support the New Deal.
It didn’t used to be such a contradiction until the McGovernites infested the Democratic Party circa 1972.
In primaries in NY apparently you can’t vote for the other party’s slate (states vary on this). Allowing it introduces a sabotage stragety, producing the most horrible candidate for the other party. It’s really bad when both sides do it. I’d have a theory that this is what in fact happens, except you get bad candidates in all states.
To assume a Black is a Democrat works 90% of the time, so it’s not exactly racism. If you add ``because they’re stupid,’’ then you get racism. If you add ``because the party serves their interests’’ then it isn’t
Kinky ought to apologize for denigrating Mother Teresa though.
Ancient transcription from before I had Real Encoder http://rhhardin.home.mindspring.com/transcription.kinky.txt
``a mouthpiece for the Vatican’’
re: Kinky’s controversial interview—one local radio newsdummy reported that “Kinky used the N-word twice…”
Another radio station actually, you know, played the tape, in which the N-word kinky used (he was mocking a hypothetical racist) is “Negro”. So I’m wondering, when did the old-fashioned but non-incendiary word “negro” become The N-Word? I seem to recall another N-Word out there that rappers use a lot.
Posted by Shaky Barnes on 2006 09 24 at 11:22 AM • permalink``Kinky didn’t go to PC school. If he knew he was going to run for governor, there’s a lot of things he would have done differently.”
Oh, I hope not.
Posted by Sonetka's Mom on 2006 09 24 at 11:31 AM • permalinkI remind everyone that during the US Civil War, the Democrats voted against waging the war, and then voted against the law enabling Emancipation Proclamation (i.e. the end of slavery).
In the 50s more Republicans voted for civil rights legislation than Democrats.
LBJ’s (Democrat) “Great [Racist] Society” has beaten an entrepreneurial spirit out of the black community, reducing them to welfare slaves.
Is it any wonder that when someone like Mike Steele in Maryland leaves the Democrat’s plantation they throw Oreo cookies at him (black on the outside, white inside).From the article:
Friedman spokeswoman Laura Stromberg said sales of his merchandise skyrocketed Thursday and Friday compared with an average day.
Heh. I’m probably going to vote for the guy anyway, but if I hadn’t pretty well decided already this might have tipped the scales. Anything that gets the vote-gang overseers to frothing at the mouth is OK by me.
Regards,
RicI love America, and Americans, but when I hear things like this I’ve just got to ask: Just what the f**k is up with your voting system?
Posted by rick mcginnis on 2006 09 24 at 12:36 PM • permalinkDon’t know if you Aussies are aware of the Black Left’s animosity toward Jews in general in the USA. Jessie Jackson used to refer to New York City as “HymieTown” until he was busted on it.
Kinky’s most famous work is a tune describing a bar fight between the local “jewboys” and rednecks. “They Ain’t Makin’ Jews Like Jesus Any More” points out that real Jews don’t “turn the other cheek” like Jesus urged Christians to do.
All in good fun, like all his work. I don’t remember who wins, but it does contain the real N-word, as uttered by the redneck contingent.
Posted by Harry Bergeron on 2006 09 24 at 12:46 PM • permalinkWe’re likely not far off from the day when the only vote that counts is for either lynching or tar and feathering.
No. That’s how the Democrats kept their stranglehold on the South during and after reconstruction. When a Republican candidate would win—often a black—they’d throw a riot to either run the victor out of the state or out-and-out lynch them. The Klan was the “militant wing” to the Democrats “political wing”, and it was often impossible to distinguish between the two.
Posted by Rob Crawford on 2006 09 24 at 12:46 PM • permalinkrick,
What’s confusing you also confuses a lot of Americans. Non-Americans probably haven’t a hope… let’s see if I can make it brief.
OK, we have winner-takes-all (sometimes called “first past the post”) in almost all elections. Structurally, this drives the whole system toward at most two serious parties. But the United States is ‘way too big and too diverse for that to actually work. What has grown up over the years is, for all practical purposes, two separate, individual parliamentary systems, which we, in a perverse display of bad language use, call “political parties”. They aren’t, not in the sense that Labour or the Tories are parties.
Each American “party” spends a lot of time logrolling and influence-grabbing, with the factions within the party scrambling for power. If you look at what goes on within the Democratic or Republican National Committees, it looks a whole lot like what goes on in the background of Parliament. When the national election comes the voters have a strong tendency to go with one or the other, that is, to select the already-existing coalition whose policies they tend to prefer.
It’s messy, complicated, self-contradictory, and often perverse; that is, it reflects the underlying political orientation of Americans almost perfectly. But to an outsider it’s got to be hideously opaque, and lots of Americans don’t “get it”.
Regards,
RicRick Perry is an empty suit with pretty hair, Chris Bell is just an idiot, and Carol whatever-her-last-name-is-this-week is a strident harpy. That leaves the Kinkster.
Besides, Kinky already said that if he wins, he’s going to appoint Willy Nelson as Railroad Commissioner or somesuch thing, which in view of Willie’s latest brush with the law would just be awesome!
11. A question many of us Americans ask ourselves, Rick. I think I’d just prefer a show of hands, although it might take a while to count ‘em all.
3. I agree with JDB. Most African-Americans do seem to be small ‘c’ conservatives, and not always just on social issues. Although the liberal welfare system has provided many incentives for people to stay on the dole, by and large you don’t see big-ticket collectivist ideologies like communism making significant inroads in black communities. I find the entrepreneurial spirit to be very much in evidence in this demographic, outside of some areas, mostly urban, where the social pathologies of crime, drug use, weak family structures and poor educational opportunities form a tragically large barrier to a happier and more productive life.
#15 texasred—
Rick Perry is an empty suit with pretty hair, Chris Bell is just an idiot, and Carol whatever-her-last-name-is-this-week is a strident harpy. That leaves the Kinkster.
IOW another routine slate of Texas candidates in the fine tradition of Ma&Pa; Ferguson, Price Daniel, J.S. Hogg, and “Pappy” O’Daniel. I’m really surprised Friedman hasn’t revived a sure-fire campaign aid, the Light Crust Doughboys.
There’s always the danger that he’ll turn out to be more Ventura than Schwarzenegger, but it’s worth the risk. Texans like their politics to be entertaining.
Regards,
RicIt would be refreshing to have someone like Kinky in office, if only to hear the unvarnished truth spoken once in a while, instead of all this PC codespeak. I hope he doesn’t end up apologizing to the NAACP. They are offended by everything (remind you of anyone else?). And many of the Katrina evacuees are crackheads and thugs, why do they think the crime rate in NO went down? Just because so many of them are black is immaterial except to people looking for an excuse to be offended.
#19 Allowing non-party members to vote in a party primary is just about the most fundamentally stupid and unfair idea conceivable.
Actually, given our two-party system, it’s absolutely the smartest and fairest idea conceivable.
I am a Republican. Until this last election, I lived in Cynthia “Nutjob” McKinney’s district, which was a Democratic lock.
If I couldn’t vote cross-party, I effectively would have had no vote whatsoever for my representative. The Democrats would have selected their candidate and voted her in without my having any say at all. Tyranny of the majority, indeed!
As it was, I got to help send Denise Majette to Congress the last time we booted Cynthia. Still a Democrat, but a much better representative of the district as a whole.
#18, Ric Locke—
Agreed. I suspect that Friedman, with his penchant for “satire” that manages to offend just about everyone, would turn out to be more Ventura. But he would certainly be entertaining. And it’s not like the governor of Texas has any actual powers to speak of. Texas’ theater of the absurd
Just what the f**k is up with your voting system?
I’m taking Rick’s question to be more about the actual mechanical voting devices. Well, after the Hanging Chads of 2000 we were criticised for not making the investments to give minorities computerized voting systems. (Nobody much cares about what white people are voting with.)
Now we’ve made lots of investments to roll out those computerized voting systems, and so now we’re told that that’s all just part of the Bushitler plot to deprive minorities of the vote by hacking into their machines. So I think we just can’t win.
Posted by Shaky Barnes on 2006 09 24 at 02:57 PM • permalinkKinky gives me H Ross Perot willies - but Im PO’d by Perry and cant stand the mincing of Bell and Carole Keaton-Rylander Strayhorn Whatever. I’ll probably wait until the last minute to decide and vote my feeeeeeeeelings….at least that way I can genuinely regret my decision, and not suffer too much disappointment.
Light Crust Doughboys - ROFL! - Now if Kinky DID add those good ol’ boys to the campaign mix, it would be sumpin’...Saw them at a music festival at Washington on the Brazos a couple of years back…may I recommend a little trio called “Back at the Ranch” as well?
As for Ma and Pa Ferguson, my FIL said they twern’t no relation HE’d ever lay claim to…I call them the Proto-
Clintons…Posted by Sharon_Ferguson on 2006 09 24 at 03:00 PM • permalinkRe #19:
Allowing non-party members to vote in a party primary is just about the most fundamentally stupid and unfair idea conceivable.
Washington State allows you to vote only a straight party ticket for primaries…..but you can vote for any party that you want to. I find this to be a reasonable compromise between your attitude, Dave, and mine, which is exactly the opposite of yours.
VKI expressed it best in #21 as to why I feel that way.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 09 24 at 03:03 PM • permalinkAllowing non-party members to vote in a party primary is just about the most fundamentally stupid and unfair idea conceivable.
We have a situation in Milwaukee whereby the winner of the Democratic primary for city or county office simply will win the office. In the most recent primary, the Sheriff’s race was between the incumbent, a black conservative, and a brainless white tool of the donut eaters union. In the race for District (prosecuting) Attorney, the race was between a mediocre but competant assistant to the outgoing DA, and a leftie moonbat who blamed a gang shooting on rogue police. Republicans crossing over in Milwaukee may have determined the outcome of the Republican Sate’s Attorney primary, but we collectively decided that saving our own county was more important than that other small difference.
Excuse me, but shouldn’t Democrats be allowed to select their preferred candidate, and Republicans be allowed to select their preferred candidate, without interference from non-party members? If you don’t like the resulting candidate, then don’t vote for him in the general election. If you live in a heavily Democratic district that would nominate a moonbat without your Republican/conservative interference, then there are three options:
1) Move.
2) Do some work to strengthen your local Republican party.
3) Let the moonbat be nominated, and win. When his moonbattery ruins your town, then Democrats will be discredited, which will help you with #2.
If you live somewhere where the political make-up makes your general election vote futile - well, tough darts. My vote for a Republican representative is wasted every year. But I don’t feel like I have the same right to decide the Democratic nominee as a dedicated Democratic party member does. That seems fundamentally obvious to me.
Certainly not anywhere near as racist as New York City poll workers who assume all black women vote Democrat.
Tim, this is the progressive, modern, inclusive Democratic Party. Look at their excellent relations with the Congressional Black Caucus during the Cold Cash Jefferson Affair and the tolerant outreach towards bloggers of color they showed during the recent Clinton bloggerfest.
In short, you forgot to add the fine Democratic phrase “...if they know what’s good for them.”
Dave S. —Evicting the opposition (your choice 1) is perhaps not what the Founding Fathers had in mind.
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2006 09 24 at 04:21 PM • permalinkWashington State allows you to vote only a straight party ticket for primaries…..but you can vote for any party that you want to.
True, TRJ, but did you remember to check that little box which let them know which party you were voting for? They’ve had to disqualify 1000s of ballots because people didn’t do that.
BTW, I hate mail-in voting. I moved from OR to WA and can’t get away from it.
I’m beginning to hold the opinion that the only way is to do away with all parties and make all the contenders for an election fight it out, to the death, in a pit.
Benefits.
1. Only those seriously wanting the job will jump in.
2. The winner is much more liable to actually have some iron in his spine and not be a pantywaist, panzy-ass piece of cowardly snail slime.
3. Some decent entertainment, at least for the duration of the fight.Oh, and we need a special tax just for congress critters. For every piece of legislation a congress critter initiates, his tax rate goes up 10%. For every piece of legislation a congress critter initiates, signs on to, or votes in support of, his tax rate doubles.
All tax increases cumulative and permanent and inheritable for 10 generations.
All tax increases to be accumulated over the entirety of a congress critters career as a congress critter and not just for a single fiscal year.Oh yeah, almost forgot. Any money a congress critter approves for spending in anything other than what is expressly called for in the Constitution, comes out of that congress critters own pocket. Over drafts also inheritable until paid. With interest.
Surely you’re not talking about the original Light Crust Doughboys? The excellent western swing outfit from the 1940’s and ‘50’s? Is somebody booking old acts via unauthorized use of the Tardis again? If so, I’d like to sign up Bob Wills and his band for a little get-together I have planned around Thanksgiving.
I don’t feel like I have the same right to decide the Democratic nominee as a dedicated Democratic party member does.
Is it really a good assumption that they’re “dedicated” party members, at least as far as the two big parties are concerned? I mean, the American political party system obviously works differently than in most (all?) parliamentary democracies, in so far that elsewhere, being a “party member” means being a dues-paying member to what are usually registered associations of some type (depending on the specific legal setup in a given country). That does lead to relatively dedicated party members since only the committed will take the step to sign up with a party, but the American system where you simply register to vote and simultaneously you “become a member” for the Evil Party or the Stupid Party? Eh, I don’t see it.
I actually agree with your point…but it seems to me that your (and my) frame of reference is more suited to places where parties operate as associations rather than quasi-public entities.
Anyway, my cultural bias also doesn’t really allow me to understand the American compulsion to identify with a party (i.e. saying “I’m a Republican” or even “I’m a registered Republican” rather than simply “I’m a conservative/libertarian/paleo-con/whatever”)...if I was a conservative trapped in moonbat hell with party-only primaries, I’d simply register as a Democrat if I wanted to influence their primaries. Who cares what the stupid voter registration says once the general election rolls around? /shrugs
Anyway, in a less ranty vain…who pays for party primaries in the U.S.? Are the costs shouldered by the parties themselves, or mainly by the taxpayer like general elections?
I could not push down the lever for my candidate.
WTF - we do it the old fashioned way here in Oz, you know, bit of paper, lots of boxes, and a pencil. Tick you box with pencil in your hand, fold the bit of paper up, and put in a big cardboard box. No waiting for a lever to change.
A lever?
I live in a ‘hell will freeze over’ Labour seat here in Melbourne. A couple of years ago an elderly Italian gent was struggling with the boxes on the paper. He asked me for help. I asked him who he wanted to vote for, he said Labour (I’m Liberal). So I filled it out for him. Now,
a) how did I fill it out - labour or liberal vote?
b) if the reverse happened, how do you think a labour supporter would have filled it out?
Dave S. —Evicting the opposition (your choice 1)
If you move by choice because an area is politically undesirable to you, that’s eviction? Rich, you’re usually more respectful of the meaning of words than that.
I see the other side of this, but I cannot condone it. There is a reason for parties - they represent their members’ political philosophy and facilitate the organization and mobilization to elect officials who will carry out those philosophies. So let Democrats choose Democrats, let Republicans choose Republicans, and if you don’t like either, organize your own party. That gives the electorate clear choices, not a dishwatery Jack Johnson vs John Jackson middle-of-the-road yawnfest.
I’m with Rick M @ #11:
I love America, and Americans, but when I hear things like this I’ve just got to ask: Just what the f**k is up with your voting system?
Like…. how do you ‘prime’ a voting machine for Democrat voters (no jokes please)?
Like spyder said - low tech is good - list of candidates, pencil, tick (or number). And they allow party ‘how to vote’ cards to be distributed outside the pollingn places for those folks who can’t number 1 to 10.
Of course there used to be the infamous NSW ‘table cloth’ senate voting papers with dozens of candidates, but that’s another story.
Posted by Stop Continental Drift! on 2006 09 24 at 05:45 PM • permalinkDave S—I’m more respectful of words, but not of Democrats. That’s basically—and often literally—how it works here in California.
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2006 09 24 at 05:54 PM • permalinkGrimm and others,
My modest proposals for reform of the System:
Amendment [X]: Representative districts of or within the United States shall, to the extent possible given superior boundaries and natural barriers to communication, be contiguous and convex, and shall have an aspect ratio less than five; and, if it can be shown that an arrangment exists which better meets the requirements of this Article and of Article I, or that considerations of Party or ethnic makeup were taken in drawing the Districts, the Districts shall be redrawn, and no person elected from any such District shall again stand for office of or within the United States, until an election of Representatives shall intervene.
Amendment [X+1]: Every person who shall complete sixteen years in any single office, or three full terms if a Senator, shall be executed by firing squad, early in the morning, facing East.
Amendment [X+2]: All monies collected within the District of a Representative, by taxes, excises, fees, or otherwise, shall, after being assessed proportionately for the salaries of Judges and the Constitutional Officers of the Executive, become the property of the Representative of that District, in fee simple, to be spent or saved at the sole discretion of the Representative, without let, hindrance, or regulation; and no Law shall be held valid, unless the Representatives shall of their own resources fund its enforcement.
—-
Whaddaya think? It takes all three together to make it work, though.
Regards,
RicA lever?
I believe the levers simply run a card-punch machine. You flip the appropriate levers, pull a big lever, and the voting machine punches the holes in a card.
Not ideal; I prefer the “fill in the bubble” optical scanner types. Gives you a paper trail, easy to use, and every American who’s either been through the public school system or taken the college entrance tests has experience with it.
Posted by Rob Crawford on 2006 09 24 at 06:00 PM • permalinkRic:
There’s some good stuff in there, except the money part at the end. There needs to be a definit upper limit on what can be collected otherwise they’ll just keep collecting.I’ve rethunk my “put em all in a pit” contest concept.
Now I’m leaning more toward put em all in a pit with a bear. When ever the bear wins, the office remains vacant.
Seriously tho, isnt it about time we call the legislative thing done? Now we’re into writing laws about laws that have had laws written about them concerning the laws already written.
And we’ve got a “fill in the blank here appreciation day for every damn thing that can be appreciated, and some stuff that shouldnt be even tolerated.When’s enough enough?
Grimmy - #31
I like your thought. I live in Queens, NY and on all the trash barrels around this area are signs that this is paid for by Sen x or congressman Y or state legislator z. I have always wanted to ask them to show us the receipt where they paid for these items. What it means is that they sponsored the legislation that paid for them, not that they paid for them but that is not what the signs say. They also paid for the senior center equipment and the playground equipment. There are signs there as well. One would think that all the politicians are made of money that they can afford all this stuff.
I lived in an area where the political climate for republicans was so bad that when a restauranteur refused to serve Rudy Giuliani when he was mayor because of his policies it was reported in the local paper and there were a lot of people who ate there just because of that.
Don’t even think of when I lived in Manhattan on the Upper West Side. I think I must have been the only republican for a mile around when I lived there. Such a difference from where I grew up out in the farm country of Ohio. The only democrat who had ever carried that district was FDR and he only did it in 1932. His other 3 terms the district voted for the republican. They had a mock election in the high school and the vote total was 1296 republican and 4 democrat. The district also had very low unemployment and the only people who ever went on welfare and unemployment were those who were desperate and they got off it as soon as possible. What a difference!! Now that I am retired I will be moving back there as soon as possible. People there have some sense.
Grimmy,
The function of [X+2] is to give the Congresscritters a sense of whose money it is they’re spending; that is, their very own. If they want [XXX] Appreciation Week, they get to write a check for same. If they want to bribe Halliburton or the ACLU, they get to open their own personal wallets. If they want to fund a vote gang and its overseers, fine, but it’s gonna cost ‘em, and if they want a Bridge To Nowhere they either pay for it themselves or have to convince the others to chip in.
I don’t necessarily say it’s better than the present system, but I’m damn sure it isn’t worse.
Regards,
RicCalifornia - and 99% of all US states- has been carved into bizarre shaped voting districts and some counties/parish/cities are cleaved into patterns best described as political Rorschach test cards. Even in a California, a state controlled by Dems, there are Republican locked voting districts which can be found running north to south within the central valley and portions of the mountain counties.
Open or closed primary voting has been rendered moot by Republicans and Democrats gerrymandering politically secure voting districts.
Not one state legislator lost their seat during the last election cycle - in a state of over 29 million people. The two dominate political parties have stolen my vote and I want it back.
Dave S: I don’t know if you were being serious or not, but surely your suggestions are ridiculous.
That aside, I don’t see anything wrong with restricting people in primaries to voting for only their own party’s candidates. That’s what primaries are for—it strikes me as kind of stupid to let Democrats pick the Republican candidates or vice-versa. That’s how we do it in Florida. And then when the actual election rolls around, we can vote for whoever we goddamn please, even the party candidate who wasn’t chosen, or even the other party’s candidate. BUT—that wasn’t the point of the above article anyway; the point was people weren’t even verifying the party of the people who were voting—they were just assuming party membership based on race and sex, which is everything all those much-vaunted anti-discrimination laws were supposed to prevent.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2006 09 24 at 06:25 PM • permalinkI love America, and Americans, but when I hear things like this I’ve just got to ask: Just what the f**k is up with your voting system?
The Constitution generally leaves the states alone when it comes to the mechanics of voting (with apologies to the Civil War). It really only gives the barest outlines.
The key to fairness has always been to allow the greatest number of people to have the franchise. “Stolen” elections are rare to non-existant (2000 wasn’t stolen), and if caught, the candidate goes to jail and his party gets slammed in the next election.
So what you have after 200+ years is a hodgepodge of rules at the state and local level which each party has enacted (when they were in) to basically try and screw the other party. It seems eminently unfair in the short term, but evens out in the long. Check out gerrymandering for what I mean.
Each party breaks the rules when they can, and the other party doesn’t put up too much of a fuss because they’ll want to do the same thing when they are in. Where I live in the great state and criminal enterprise of New Jersey is the prime example.
This is the price we pay for a peoples government. It ain’t perfect, it’s not always fair, but it works well enough that the opposition party doesn’t have to hide in the hills, and they work harder next time. Both sides know this.
It helps that the average politician is respected about as much as a child molester. Their only interest is power, but to get that power they can’t grab it, they have to be elected to it.
What we are trying to do now is stop the slide to the left which started with FDR. It seems to be working, but America is still more progressive than it has been in it’s history.
Ric:
I know we’re all just goofin but I thought your ideas were actually pretty interesting. All I meant as an add would be to have a max allowable upper limit on how much of a citizen’s paycheck can be taken when the total mix of fees, taxes, surcharges, etc etc were added up. Imho, anything that crosses over the line for a total allowable take by a gov does more harm than good.
Throw in the pit and the bear and I’d back ya :)
Need that pit and bear tho. Maybe a lion or wolverine too. The idea of seeing politicos and politico wannabees bleeding out from their battles for office just….makes me all warm and fuzzy.
Grimm,
I’ve been trying for years to come up with a realistic way to limit taxation. No such exists. Your ten percent limit sounds good on the surface, but all the taxers have to do is change some definitions—only tax businesses, for instance—and the limit isn’t there any more.
The hard term limit is the best possible, I think.
Regards,
RicWhat’s wrong with just making a congressional district for every 100,000 people or so? 435 is just where we stopped expanding the House in the 1920s-nothing magical about it. I suspect that it might be harder to gerrymader smaller districts because third parties would have a better shot at getting elected since they might not have to spend as much as in larger districts. Give each congresscritter a total of $500K for salary and staff salary and build some more office buildings-downtown DC is lousy with them anyway.
spider : Re #35:
And in Canberra, they’d just go to an e-voting booth which would provide translations in Italian.
Over headphones if need be, so even people who are blind can vote in secret and without interference.
Oh yes - the source code for the program is available on the web, no “trade secrets”. No special hardware.Is the system absolutely secure? Nope. Just more secure than the average ballot box, for paper votes are notoriously vulnerable to ballot box stuffing etc.
#51 - yes - about as secure as the slot machines in vegas, audited by the same guys who audited the ACT system. about as secure as the victorian police LEAP database. about as secure as motor registration records in NSW. about as secure as banks generally (stifled sniggering). give me a paper system & eagle-eyed scrutineers any day. oh - and people who have language difficulties or disabilities are currently allowed to take someone along to help them vote the way they want to
Ric, pass an amendment to limit the total tax take to a percentage of the GDP (national for national taxes and state for state taxes) but you can divide up the taxation itself any way you want. That is, you cap the total take at a percentage but not what or who is taxed. Sure they’d try to jimmy the system, but it would be hard to mess with it more than a little. And you could add that if the percentage is exceeded in one year it has to be made up immediately in the following year.
And Dave S, the problem (I’m assuming that either you’re not an American or that you haven’t studied our parties) is that: 1) we do not have a Responsible Party System; 2) we don’t really have a party system at all—if anything we have 2 parties in each of 50 systems, and; 3) parties are not an official part of our government anyway.
There’s way more, but this makes it silly to restrict very substantially the ability of any system to vote in any primary. In fact, unless they changed it recently, California allowed all voters to vote for *all* parties in the primary. It’s called a ‘blanket primary.’
Posted by JorgXMcKie on 2006 09 24 at 11:25 PM • permalinkTrainer #47
Thanks for the wiki link, I was able to make a few adjustments to the section on gerrymandering in Northern Ireland, gotta set the record straight you know.
Posted by Harry Flashman on 2006 09 24 at 11:39 PM • permalinkI’ve heard this “Blacks are generally conservative” trope before. Somehow it never translates to their voting. You’d think the party of Abraham Lincoln, Jackie Robinson and Everett Dirksen would win out over the party of Dred Scott, Jim Crow and Robert KKK Byrd at least with more than 10% of the black electorate, but apparently Dubois continues to speak with authority from the grave.
Posted by Vanguard of the Commentariat on 2006 09 25 at 12:23 AM • permalink#53: so nice to be dealing with trusting children.
Who keeps the GDP stats? Who has the capacity to check them, and the legal right to say they’re wrong? And you should talk to an economist or two about just how certain they are, at any rate.—One significant figure. At best. The Russians lied about theirs for forty years.
No. Once the power to tax has been ceded there is effectively no limit on it if the tax collectors don’t want to adhere to it. The only safeguard is to elect people who are at least somewhat trustworthy, or at least embarrassable, and (my opinion) change them regularly as the system corrupts them.
#55 Black people in America other than the members of the welfare class tend to be socially conservative. This does not mean they vote politically conservative. Many do, in fact, vote Republican, as Ms. Colon discovered, but by no means a majority. Members of the welfare class vote as directed, pretty much, and where not directed tend to vote for the party that promises the fattest dole. This fact is currently causing anguish in South Louisiana, where the rock-solid Democratic seats in and around New Orleans are endangered by the fact that many of the voters are well settled in elsewhere and have no intent of moving back. The other residents of their new homes tend not to be particularly grateful for the vote of support.
Regards,
RicPW asked:
Anyway, in a less ranty vain…who pays for party primaries in the U.S.? Are the costs shouldered by the parties themselves, or mainly by the taxpayer like general elections?
The taxpayers foot the ballot bill, PW. The intent of the primary is to filter out candidates for each party (anyone meeting the qualifications can file) so that the general elections are down to one name per party, per position.
The process does save in fewer run off elections….there are some real lulus signing up for an election every year; the qualifications say nothing about insanity.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 09 25 at 01:03 AM • permalinkDave s—I do understand your concerns, but let me point out, however so gently, that, in effect, most people can already vote for candidates in the other party.
How? In most states, you sign up as a member of the other party. Or, as in Washington State, you make a choice amongst 3 ballots, check a little box, and mail it in. It’s just that this is an either-or situation for any single primary election.
To quote the old adage, “A difference that makes no difference is no difference.” I can vote on the Democrat ballot for one primary, and Republican the next. No moving required, so your option is obsolete out of the chute.
The ONLY change with one-party-per-primary-election is that you can’t vote for more than one party, the way it used to be.
Is this change an improvement? I can’t see that it is. Perhaps I’m wrong about that…..but it’s clear that we’ve only lost the convenience of multi-party voting in primaries.
Jorge addresses this problem from a different direction…..we have over 100 parties in the US, not two. The “xxx National Committees” are more of a confederation than a single party. The term “log rolling” was applied to politics for a reason.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 09 25 at 01:06 AM • permalinkBTW, Jorge, I don’t think California has a blanket primary anymore…..I could Google it, but I’m lazy tonight. Anyone else want to confirm/deny this?
But I can clearly state that Washington State did away with the blanket primary just a few years ago. I think it was part of a national trend away from blanket primaries. I do know that it PO’ed me to no end.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 09 25 at 01:09 AM • permalinkre #29, deblucar…..I’m embarrassed to admit that I don’t remember checking that box. It’s possible that my ballot was disqualified.
Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 09 25 at 01:10 AM • permalinkWhat’s up with the American voting systems?
Simple. We have a two party system. One believes in rigging voting machines and letting anybody, including dead people, felons and unregistered voters cast votes, but not soldiers voting by absentee ballots. If they still don’t win they go to court and demand recounts until they do.
The other is the Republican Party.
Kinky Friedman:
I remember a couple of his songs:
“Get your biscuits in the oven and your buns in the bed”
“Drop kick me, Jesus, through the Goalposts of Life”
You’ve gotta love him.
Paco, I think it’s the same Light Crust Doughboys although some original members obviously aren’t around anymore. I’ll always prefer the Bob Wills with the Texas Playboys from my hometown of Waco. Did you know that Dennis Quaid is making a Spade Cooley movie due for release this year? It’s called Shame On You.
I don’t think racism had that much to do with this. Because I had the same experience, and I’m neither hispanic nor black. But, like most NYCers, I live in an area with very few Republicans, plus there was only one contest on the R side (for the privilege of getting creamed by Hillary in November). I voted at about 2pm, and I was the first Republican they’d seen all day. The poll worker didn’t even realise there was a Republican primary.
I didn’t have to vote on paper, though, because I noticed the worker’s mistake before he finished filling in the card. He was filling in the green card, and pointed out to him the stack of pink cards that were on the table, still wrapped in the rubber band in which they’d come.
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Is that the same Kinky Friedman who led the East Texas Jewboys - my favorite C&W band? Public service needs more people like him!