Bear Pit: now the sole domicile of politics at LuLa

[dreed]

• It retains absentee voting, but voters will have to present state-issued ID and have less time than last year to request and return their ballots.

This amounts to voter suppression which you are clearly in favour of. The evidence for this is widely documented.

• They will have fewer drop-boxes than last year, but before the pandemic they had none at all.

This amounts to voter suppression (by way of making it more difficult to each drop-boxes) which you are clearly in favour of.

• Of the bill’s ban on anyone other than poll workers giving water to voters, the ban only applies within 150 feet of a polling place or 25 feet of a voter, and allows poll workers to set up “an unattended receptacle” from which thirsty voters can serve themselves.

This amounts to poll workers being able to decide who does and does not get a drink of water whilst lined up to vote. This will lead to voter suppression (as people leave the line due to dehydration) that you are clearly in favour of.

[John Camp]

I'm speaking only for myself and not on Mr. Camp's behalf; but, I can say with complete confidence that NOTHING even remotely resembling the accusations above have been stated or implied by anything that I have written or anything seen in Mr. Camp's posts.

Where do you find anything resembling calling "Georgians racist" or "calling them Jim Crow laws"? You don't. It's flat out fiction created from your imagination.

Your habit of FALSE accusations aimed at participants posting here is beyond the pale and should be an embarrassment to you. It's very unfortunate that they are not of any particular concern to you. It's rather sad, actually.

* To John Camp: Please accept my apology in advance if I have taken excessive liberty by including your name in this reply. I did so only because we were both quoted by Alan. I'll be happy to remove any mention of your name if you would prefer it.

I'm okay with that.

What the Republicans in Georgia are doing is something like Jim Crow, but more subtle. Jim Crow suppressed the black vote with literal threats. What the Republicans have done is taken aim at the poor people of Georgia (many, but not all of them black) because Biden got most of his support from people who were less-well-off. They understand that with all of Trump's fraud, obvious fascist tendencies, and mental instability, he lost only by a tiny fraction of the vote -- Biden won by a margin that amounted to roughly 1/500 of the vote. So they don't have to bar the door to blacks and the poor, all they have to do is discourage a tiny fraction of the Democratic turnout. If, say, 1/400 of the Biden vote for some reason doesn't make it to the polls, the bigots win. The new law only allows one drop box for counties with population less than 100,000, which, of course, are poor rural counties. You might have to drive some distance to get there, and not all the poor have cars. That all by itself could make a difference.

[Alan Klein]

I'm okay with that.

What the Republicans in Georgia are doing is something like Jim Crow, but more subtle. Jim Crow suppressed the black vote with literal threats. What the Republicans have done is taken aim at the poor people of Georgia (many, but not all of them black) because Biden got most of his support from people who were less-well-off. They understand that with all of Trump's fraud, obvious fascist tendencies, and mental instability, he lost only by a tiny fraction of the vote -- Biden won by a margin that amounted to roughly 1/500 of the vote. So they don't have to bar the door to blacks and the poor, all they have to do is discourage a tiny fraction of the Democratic turnout. If, say, 1/400 of the Biden vote for some reason doesn't make it to the polls, the bigots win. The new law only allows one drop box for counties with population less than 100,000, which, of course, are poor rural counties. You might have to drive some distance to get there, and not all the poor have cars. That all by itself could make a difference.

Vote by mail.  You can do that in ten minutes.  Drop the ballot in your mailbox in front of your house.  You don't even need a stamp.

[jeremyrh]

I'm speaking only for myself and not on Mr. Camp's behalf; but, I can say with complete confidence that NOTHING even remotely resembling the accusations above have been stated or implied by anything that I have written or anything seen in Mr. Camp's posts.

Where do you find anything resembling calling "Georgians racist" or "calling them Jim Crow laws"? You don't. It's flat out fiction created from your imagination.

Your habit of FALSE accusations aimed at participants posting here is beyond the pale and should be an embarrassment to you. It's very unfortunate that they are not of any particular concern to you. It's rather sad, actually.

* To John Camp: Please accept my apology in advance if I have taken excessive liberty by including your name in this reply. I did so only because we were both quoted by Alan. I'll be happy to remove any mention of your name if you would prefer it.

Maybe his parents didn't bring him up properly to know the difference between right and wrong. Either way, there's no point in discussing with Lying Klein.

[TechTalk]

Vote by mail.

The Postal Service, yet another institution in which the radical right has tried to destroy any faith or confidence, along with government in general and democracy most recently.

[PeterAit]

Apparently, Peter, you missed my earlier post #9587 showing a couple of ballot fraud convictions in Pennsylvania.  I'll repeat them below for your convenience.  I don't understand your second complaint.  There are many people who have died or moved who should be removed (purged) from the voter rolls where they moved from as they can no longer vote in those election districts.  This prevents mail-in ballots from being sent out to people, dead or alive,  who should not get them. 

You are drawing the wrong conclusions from these convictions. They are examples of ATTEMPTED fraud, not actual fraud, seeing that they were detected and, if it was deemed necessary, the election redone. They show that the system works. And it's a serious non sequitur to argue, as you have, that there must be a lot more fraud going on that we don't know about. To argue that X must exist because there's no evidence of X, well, gimme a break.

We had a major case of attempted fraud here in NC in the 2018 congressional race. An operative working for the GOP candidate was fiddling with absentee ballots and was detected when the elections people noticed that the absentee votes from a particular district were running 61% for the GOP guy while only 19% of voters in that district were registered GOP. So yet again, attempted fraud is caught.

I can agree, however, that mail-in ballots should not be sent automatically to all registered voters. But the process for getting one needs to be clear, simple, and well-publicized.

[kers]

There are more elections for other positions.  Election laws affect all voting for governors, Senators, Legislators, Councilmen, Judges, Congressmen, Sheriffs, schools officials, Mayors, etc.  Frankly, it's probably these that have more fraud.  But who knows?  Most fraud goes undetected. 

Here are election fraud in California that resulted in convictions.  We can only guess at how many crooks didn;t get caught.

California Only (there are 49 more states)
2021-2 convictions (so far)
2020-8   "
2019-3   "
2018-1   "
2017-3   "
2016-6   "
I stopped counting.  See the link.
https://www.heritage.org/voterfraud/search?combine=&state=CA&year=&case_type=All&fraud_type=All
....

And what to think of Trumps phone call to the governer of Georgia to 'recount' in his favor?
That was the worst recent example...
We are not talking about 1 or two votes here, but a whole state... done by a sitting President; one you seem to support.
That is : You and the republicans in Georgia that are so keen on fair elections that they make it more difficult for people to vote.

[Alan Klein]

You are drawing the wrong conclusions from these convictions. They are examples of ATTEMPTED fraud, not actual fraud, seeing that they were detected and, if it was deemed necessary, the election redone. They show that the system works. And it's a serious non sequitur to argue, as you have, that there must be a lot more fraud going on that we don't know about. To argue that X must exist because there's no evidence of X, well, gimme a break.

We had a major case of attempted fraud here in NC in the 2018 congressional race. An operative working for the GOP candidate was fiddling with absentee ballots and was detected when the elections people noticed that the absentee votes from a particular district were running 61% for the GOP guy while only 19% of voters in that district were registered GOP. So yet again, attempted fraud is caught.

I can agree, however, that mail-in ballots should not be sent automatically to all registered voters. But the process for getting one needs to be clear, simple, and well-publicized.

The convictions I posted were not attempted fraud but actual fraud.   There are many more who aren't being caught.  But the point is, if the laws were not in place, there would be a hundred times the amount of phony voting.

What the Democrats want to do is do away with most of these laws so they can finagle under the guise they're all for enfranchisement.  Meanwhile, Democrat Senator Schumer of New York State says he'd welcome the All-Star baseball game to played in NYC instead of Georgia while NYs election laws are similar as Georgia's.  It's all politics.

I agree that purging voter rolls should be clear, simple, and well-publicized. 

[Alan Klein]

And what to think of Trumps phone call to the governer of Georgia to 'recount' in his favor?
That was the worst recent example...
We are not talking about 1 or two votes here, but a whole state... done by a sitting President; one you seem to support.
That is : You and the republicans in Georgia that are so keen on fair elections that they make it more difficult for people to vote.

Trump should not have made the call.  But you're conflating issues. Having reasonable laws to prevent election fraud makes sense and have been enacted in most states.  Protecting the whole process from fraud and allowing all people who can vote to be able to vote go hand in hand. Reasonable rules protect both purposes.

[Robert Roaldi]

On a slightly different topic, because health care has come up for discussion on these pages, I refer you to an interesting Freakonomics podcast about reforming US Health Care, https://freakonomics.com/podcast/healthcare-costs/. It addresses the issue in various ways, it's a very interesting and wide-ranging discussion.

[BernardLanguillier]

https://www.google.co.jp/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/business/yellen-global-minimum-corporate-tax-rate.amp.html

Very brave move from the Biden administration!

Had Trump been what he claimed he was that’s what he should have done for the little people he was claiming to try to protect!

Cheers,
Bernard

[Alan Klein]

https://www.google.co.jp/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/business/yellen-global-minimum-corporate-tax-rate.amp.html

Very brave move from the Biden administration!

Had Trump been what he claimed he was that’s what he should have done for the little people he was claiming to try to protect!

Cheers,
Bernard

Asking foreign countries to raise their taxes on business so America isn't at a competitive disadvantage when Biden raises America's business taxes is brave?  What a strange and idiotic idea. Foreign leaders must be laughing all the way to the bank.  Yellon sold herself out so she could be Treasury Secretary.  She's ignoring everything she ever learned about economics and lost all commonsense.

[Chris Kern]

Asking foreign countries to raise their taxes on business so America isn't at a competitive disadvantage when Biden raises America's business taxes is brave?  What a strange and idiotic idea. Foreign leaders must be laughing all the way to the bank.  Yellon sold herself out so she could be Treasury Secretary.  She's ignoring everything she ever learned about economics and lost all commonsense.

Is there a moderator in the house?  It appears this thread has been usurped by a gibberish 'bot.

[dreed]

An explanation, on twitter, of why the new Georgia laws are bad:

 https://twitter.com/douglasblackmon/status/1378824597282435073

If that had been the law in November, a state board controlled by the Republican legislature would have been able to do exactly what President Trump illegally wanted—firing election officials in counties, like Clayton, Dekalb and Fulton, that voted big for Biden...

...And then sending in carpetbaggers to declare fraud where there was none, and fraudulently throw out thousands of African-American votes.

Summary:

They lost because the election correctly reflected that by a tiny margin, the majority of people in Georgia didn’t want Trump, Perdue or Loeffler. That’s the only reason Georgia’s election law was changed—to make it possible to prevent an outcome the ruling party dislikes.

[BernardLanguillier]

Asking foreign countries to raise their taxes on business so America isn't at a competitive disadvantage when Biden raises America's business taxes is brave?  What a strange and idiotic idea. Foreign leaders must be laughing all the way to the bank.  Yellon sold herself out so she could be Treasury Secretary.  She's ignoring everything she ever learned about economics and lost all commonsense.

Talk about self-defeating strategies... instead of admitting that Biden is coming up with one of the most valuable proposals in the last 20 years, you'd rather continue to let Amazon escape tax payment forever... in the US and elsewhere. Don't get me wrong, I believe that the Gafa are great companies that have been delivering tremendous innovation... I just don't think their size should grant them any right to not contribute to society through taxation. Because they do benefit from roads, planes, infrastructure and defense that your tax money is funding. That my tax money is funding.

Why would any government who's official isn't corrupt fight this proposal? Governments are supposed to work for their citizens and every normally intelligent person should be able to understand that it's in their own interest to ensure that very large companies generating tens of billions in revenue cannot be let to escape taxation where they generate money any longer. Obviously Ireland and a few other fiscal paradises will not like it. Who cares.

Mind boggling stuff really. Alan, you are beyond belief.

Cheers,
Bernard

[Alan Klein]

Talk about self-defeating strategies... instead of admitting that Biden is coming up with one of the most valuable proposals in the last 20 years, you'd rather continue to let Amazon escape tax payment forever... in the US and elsewhere. Don't get me wrong, I believe that the Gafa are great companies that have been delivering tremendous innovation... I just don't think their size should grant them any right to not contribute to society through taxation. Because they do benefit from roads, planes, infrastructure and defense that your tax money is funding. That my tax money is funding.

Why would any government who's official isn't corrupt fight this proposal? Governments are supposed to work for their citizens and every normally intelligent person should be able to understand that it's in their own interest to ensure that very large companies generating tens of billions in revenue cannot be let to escape taxation where they generate money any longer. Obviously Ireland and a few other fiscal paradises will not like it. Who cares.

Mind boggling stuff really. Alan, you are beyond belief.

Cheers,
Bernard

When Biden raises taxes on corporations doing business here in America, why would Ireland, China, or any other country want to raise their corporate taxes to match America's on companies doing business in their countries?  That would discourage companies from moving there and hiring their workers and paying their taxes to them.  I understand why  Biden and Yellen want them to do this, to reduce corporate flight overseas and reduce capital investment there as well.   But how are they going to convince them (these countries) to hurt themselves?

[Alan Klein]

An explanation, on twitter, of why the new Georgia laws are bad:

 https://twitter.com/douglasblackmon/status/1378824597282435073

If that had been the law in November, a state board controlled by the Republican legislature would have been able to do exactly what President Trump illegally wanted—firing election officials in counties, like Clayton, Dekalb and Fulton, that voted big for Biden...

...And then sending in carpetbaggers to declare fraud where there was none, and fraudulently throw out thousands of African-American votes.

Summary:

They lost because the election correctly reflected that by a tiny margin, the majority of people in Georgia didn’t want Trump, Perdue or Loeffler. That’s the only reason Georgia’s election law was changed—to make it possible to prevent an outcome the ruling party dislikes.

Georgia rules are little different than New York's and other states. Democrats are creating this phoney Georgia issue as the rationale to pass HR1, a federal law working it's way through Congress.  It will do away with all ID and other checks to prevent fraud in all 50 states. Then democrats will be free to legally ballot harvest and personally help people fill out ballots to mail in. 

[Alan Klein]

Is there a moderator in the house?  It appears this thread has been usurped by a gibberish 'bot.

I'm surprised Chris you resorted to a personal attack rather than explaining why you disagree.  Have you joined that crowd too?

[Robert Roaldi]

It's not often that good prose sneaks into a news report, https://www.politico.com/news/2021/04/06/trump-matt-gaetz-lifeline-479126.

I love the line, ".... a grenade whose pin has already been pulled ..."

[Robert Roaldi]

I'm surprised Chris you resorted to a personal attack rather than explaining why you disagree.  Have you joined that crowd too?

That wasn't a personal attack, it was an editorial comment. The thing about free speech is, others are also free to criticize what you say, goes with the territory.