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Total Members Voted: 11

Voting closed: February 15, 2022, 10:51:36 AM

[barton]

The real problems with GA bill is the change in who has power over electoral processes.

Critics say some of the initiatives attempt to clear the way for partisan actors to take control of election administration, as Trump unsuccessfully urged Republicans to do in the fall.

On Thursday, Gov. Brian Kemp (R) of Georgia signed the most far-reaching effort yet into law — a sweeping voting measure that undercuts the power of the secretary of state and local election boards. The new law removes the secretary of state from serving as chair of the State Board of Elections, giving the legislature the authority to appoint a majority of the members, and authorizes the state board to suspend local election officials...   

If these measures had been in place in 2020, critics say, the state board could have tried to interfere when the secretary of state, Republican Brad Raffensperger, certified Democrat Joe Biden’s victory in the state and rejected Trump’s unsubstantiated claims that the election was stolen.

Raffensperger emerged as a staunch defender of the integrity of Georgia’s vote, even as Trump repeatedly attacked him and cajoled him in an hour-long conversation in January, urging him to “find” the votes to reverse Biden’s win in the state...   

Separately, the new power to suspend county election boards could give state officials unprecedented influence over all manner of election decisions, including the acceptance and rejection of mail ballots, early-voting hours, poll-worker hiring and the number of polling locations, critics say... 

Excerpted for the paywall blocked.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/republicans-election-control/2021/03/26/064fffcc-8cb4-11eb-a730-1b4ed9656258_story.html

I will reply to cogent fact-based replies that address specific points excerpted above.  Thanks.

[barton]

There is no such thing as Islamophobia. Bigotry and racism exist, of course—and they are evils
that all well-intentioned people must oppose. And prejudice against Muslims or Arabs,
purely because of the accident of their birth, is despicable. But like all religions,
Islam is a system of ideas and practices. And it is not a form of bigotry or
racism to observe that the specific tenets of the faith pose a special
threat to civil society. Nor is it a sign of intolerance to notice
when people are simply not being honest about what
they and their co-religionists believe.
— Sam Harris.
https://www.foundalis.com/rlg/Proud_Islamophobe.htm

nicely done?

Does Harris bother to differentiate between Sunni and Shia?   Between those who actually embrace Jihad and those who endorse a secular pluralistic society?   

Answer Oily's question:  do you consider all your Christian friends to be trapped in a first century belief matrix?  Once you mull the answer to that,  you may see why prejudice (we don't have to call it racism,  fine) against Muslims is a real problem.   

[LarryBnDC]

There is no such thing as Islamophobia. Bigotry and racism exist, of course—and they are evils
that all well-intentioned people must oppose. And prejudice against Muslims or Arabs,
purely because of the accident of their birth, is despicable. But like all religions,
Islam is a system of ideas and practices. And it is not a form of bigotry or
racism to observe that the specific tenets of the faith pose a special
threat to civil society. Nor is it a sign of intolerance to notice
when people are simply not being honest about what
they and their co-religionists believe.
— Sam Harris.
https://www.foundalis.com/rlg/Proud_Islamophobe.htm

nicely done?

Like most gun owners, I understand the ethical importance of guns and cannot honestly wish for a world without them. I suspect that sentiment will shock many readers. Wouldn’t any decent person wish for a world without guns? In my view, only someone who doesn’t understand violence could wish for such a world. A world without guns is one in which the most aggressive men can do more or less anything they want. It is a world in which a man with a knife can rape and murder a woman in the presence of a dozen witnesses, and none will find the courage to intervene.

Sam Harris

Yeah.

Fuck that guy.

https://samharris.org/the-riddle-of-the-gun/

[barton]

Harris is generally critical of dogmatic religions,  especially the Christian Right.  His other philosophic writings are often pretty interesting, and well argued.   I just think he oversimplifies Islam.   Few would really disagree with his critique of fringe Islamic groups that abuse and oppress women,  send young people out in suicide vests, and want to impose theocracy.   Those groups are a threat to civilization, democracy and free thought.   But he's wrong in asserting that Islam is "all fringe and no center. "  That's where he really goes off the rails IMO.

[barton]

His world without guns argument is weak.   It's a type of Strawman argument.   Societies without private ownership of guns still have policing forces that access guns when they are needed.   And unarmed people often intervene,  because there are courageous people among every group. 

[REDSTATEWARD]

The real problems with GA bill is the change in who has power over electoral processes.

Critics say some of the initiatives attempt to clear the way for partisan actors to take control of election administration, as Trump unsuccessfully urged Republicans to do in the fall.

On Thursday, Gov. Brian Kemp (R) of Georgia signed the most far-reaching effort yet into law — a sweeping voting measure that undercuts the power of the secretary of state and local election boards. The new law removes the secretary of state from serving as chair of the State Board of Elections, giving the legislature the authority to appoint a majority of the members, and authorizes the state board to suspend local election officials...   

If these measures had been in place in 2020, critics say, the state board could have tried to interfere when the secretary of state, Republican Brad Raffensperger, certified Democrat Joe Biden’s victory in the state and rejected Trump’s unsubstantiated claims that the election was stolen.

Raffensperger emerged as a staunch defender of the integrity of Georgia’s vote, even as Trump repeatedly attacked him and cajoled him in an hour-long conversation in January, urging him to “find” the votes to reverse Biden’s win in the state...   

Separately, the new power to suspend county election boards could give state officials unprecedented influence over all manner of election decisions, including the acceptance and rejection of mail ballots, early-voting hours, poll-worker hiring and the number of polling locations, critics say... 

Excerpted for the paywall blocked.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/republicans-election-control/2021/03/26/064fffcc-8cb4-11eb-a730-1b4ed9656258_story.html

I will reply to cogent fact-based replies that address specific points excerpted above.  Thanks.

Perhaps a tutorial on the Elections Clause of the US Constitution would help you.
To address your misguided post.
The Elections Clause does not confer the power to regulate congressional elections on states as a whole, but rather the “Legislature” of each state.
SCOTUS has said  “Legislature” includes any entity or procedure that a state’s constitution permits to exercise lawmaking power.

[facilitatorn]

http://m.dailykos.com/stories/2021/3/26/2023025/-MI-GOP-Chair-calls-Whitmer-Nessel-Benson-Three-Witches-talks-about-assassinating-officials

The Michigan republican party is purely a terrorist organization. It serves no other purpose. It must be defunded and degraded, like ISIS before it, immediately.

[facilitatorn]

http://constitution.congress.gov/browse/article-1/section-4/

Article I

Section 4
Clause 1
The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations, except as to the Places of chusing Senators.

HR1 and the John Lewis Act are both well within constitutional framework for Congress governing elections that occur in the states. Fascist crackers are all that stand in the way.

[kidcarter8]

Senate Republicans who visited the U.S.-Mexico border on Friday demanded that the Biden administration restore a Trump-era policy that requires migrants who cross the frontier to go back to Mexico to file for asylum and wait there while their claims are filed

[josh]

Senate Republicans who visited the U.S.-Mexico border on Friday demanded that the Biden administration restore a Trump-era policy that requires migrants who cross the frontier to go back to Mexico to file for asylum and wait there while their claims are filed

They can demand it until they are blue in the face, but they have no leg to stand on.

The Trump administration and CPB under Trump violated the Constitution, US treaties, and international law on asylum seekers so many times in so many ways as to be absurd and those self-same GOP senators stood by as Trump did it.

So did you.

[bambu.]

Kid is our Ted Cruz.

Red is our Ron Johnson.

Bambu is our Tubberville, bless his heart.

Tommy Tuberville?
He seems like a nice man, as well as a good coach.

[LarryBnDC]

Kid is our Ted Cruz.

Red is our Ron Johnson.

Bambu is our Tubberville, bless his heart.

Tommy Tuberville?
He seems like a nice man, as well as a good coach.

“Educated fool: from uneducated school.”

[facilitatorn]

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/advocacy-groups-target-georgia-companies-campaign-restrictive-voting/story?id=76509179

MLB all-star and Masters already looking hard at taking their business elsewhere.

It’s going to come down to global boycotts to realign multinational corporations against Russian style plutocratic bully boy autocracy like they are rabidly advancing in Georgia right now.

[facilitatorn]

Senate Republicans who visited the U.S.-Mexico border on Friday demanded that the Biden administration restore a Trump-era policy that requires migrants who cross the frontier to go back to Mexico to file for asylum and wait there while their claims are filed

They can demand it until they are blue in the face, but they have no leg to stand on.

The Trump administration and CPB under Trump violated the Constitution, US treaties, and international law on asylum seekers so many times in so many ways as to be absurd and those self-same GOP senators stood by as Trump did it.

So did you.

To be fair, Kid doesn’t do fuckall. He does cheerlead for the pinheaded pricks who do the day to day hands on violation of our constitution.

[facilitatorn]

Kid is our Ted Cruz.

Red is our Ron Johnson.

Bambu is our Tubberville, bless his heart.

Tommy Tuberville?
He seems like a nice man, as well as a good coach.

When you started regretting the giant L you tattooed on your forehead, I don’t think you did yourself any favors by painting it over in the most garish red. We still see you. It’s still as easy to understand and impossible to look past.