abff08f4813c @ abff08f4813c @j4vcdedmiokf56h3ho4t62mlku.srv.us

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11 mo. ago

Hey, no worries. Glad we got that clarified though - I was sweating buckets.

Hey, I wasn't disputing that you voted for Harris - my "lecture" was to convince others in your situation that there's hope that Democrats will stop "supporting genocide" as you put it, after Harris wins.

No, that's return rate. So we know at least 52% in the county got theirs, because they returned it and it was received. And statewide we know at least 67% got theirs, because they returned it and it was received.

Some (hopefully small) number of voters might have gotten their ballot but then ignored it or threw it away - or mistakenly spoiled it somehow (mistook it for a napkin at dinner time).

Others might have returned their ballots and then they got lost in the mail on the way back.

So the return rate isn't completely indicative of how many failed to get sent out.

We don't know for sure how many failed to be sent out, but it's reasonable to assume the number is high, due to the large disparity between the statewide return rate and the county return rate.

To be fair, it's Harris on the ballot, not (Bill) Clinton.

And, to her credit, Harris said this, https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/harris-appears-to-agree-with-protester-accusing-israel-of-genocide-what-he-s-talking-about-it-s-real/ar-AA1szCVt

This gives me optimism that post-election, Harris will allow her views to evolve in the right direction here.

Remember when Obama was against same-sex marriage? https://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-still-opposes-same-sex-marriage/ But he was open to having his mind changed, and eventually he did, https://www.cnn.com/2012/05/09/politics/obama-same-sex-marriage/index.html

This is what we need to aim for with Harris

He's trying to make the pro-Netanyahu case to them

Israeli forces have to kill tens of thousands of Palestinians because they are allegedly human shields for Hamas.

I.e. Hamas is evil and it's their fault that Israeli bullets ended up inside of innocent Gazians. There is an element of truth to this, but as the article points out,

It should be noted that the Israeli military has recently been accused of using Palestinian civilians as human shields in their Gaza operations.

The only good thing about this is that it makes Harris look more moderate by comparison.

I have a feeling that this was a mistake. More details needed, but

He registered to vote on Sunday by using his University of Michigan student identification and documents establishing residency in Ann Arbor, according to Benander.
later contacted the local clerk’s office requesting to get the ballot back, Benander said.

Probably he thought he was voting for the student body president or something similar. Or he thought he was voting in a poll sponsored by the university rather than a real ballot for the real US election (akin to https://deadline.com/2024/10/winner-nickelodeons-kids-pick-the-president-poll-kamala-harris-1236159880/ where kids "vote" but it's just a poll).

Also,

The student signed a document identifying himself as a U.S. citizen

But maybe he didn't understand what he was signing due to the language barrier? Maybe he somehow got rushed into signing it (because he was late for class) and only realized what he'd done after he got a chance to read his copy the next day or something?

I've heard stories about DMVs just taking your word for it and marking a checkbox. I guess this is different because he actually signed, but even so...

Finally,

later contacted the local clerk’s office requesting to get the ballot back, Benander said.

I.e. he realized his mistake and tried to correct it. Which is was brought this case to everyone's attention. Guy tries to do the right thing in the end, and ends up arrested.

I've not seen anything to suggest that the candidate wants to personally observe things.

Rather, as per the St Louis Post,

Travis Allen Heins, of St. Peters, filed for the injunction on Wednesday, saying that official "watchers" or "challengers" were wrongly being kept from observing inside polling places during early voting in St. Charles County.
His suit requests that early voting not be allowed to continue without watchers or challengers. Such observers had been disallowed by Bahr, because he said they're only allowed in when ballots are being prepared for counting, or being counted, on election day.

I.e. he's fine with meeting all the requirements you list, but he wants the observers to be able to observe the early voting tabulation on the days of early voting, not just the checks or tabulation that happens only starting on election day.

Well, for example, Texas, https://www.kvue.com/article/news/politics/vote-texas/missed-registration-vote-deadline-texas-voting-poll-election/269-aa6d8af1-7819-4493-ab71-adaec1f02325

The deadline to register to vote in Texas was Oct. 7. If you missed the deadline, you won't be able to vote.

To be fair this is a reasonable request. Already parts of the process allow for "challengers" from parties to observe. He just thinks there's a gap missing and an additional part of the process should be covered.

I don't know the candidate at all, but from the referenced St Louse Post Dispatch ( https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/government-politics/early-voting-to-continue-thursday-in-st-charles-county-official-says-despite-court-order/article676c7a2c-971b-11ef-bab2-436acacb7089.html / https://archive.is/Mo5WA ) it sounds like he's actually quite reasonable. After all,

He told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch that he has no suspicion of wrongdoing and simply wants to be able to observe.

The only thing is that I wish he had done so earlier, say a year and a half ago. Then there would have been enough time then to fix this and get things approved without needing to stop anyone from early voting as the injunction he requests requires.

Hard to say for sure. I'd put this as a "maybe" or "toss-up" - in any case the odds are better to convince her than the other guy so...

I'm pushing for the 127 DC States plan, https://www.vox.com/2020/1/14/21063591/modest-proposal-to-save-american-democracy-pack-the-union-harvard-law-review , wherever I can. Getting this through successfully is probably the best chance to replace FPTP at the national level, including for Presidential elections.

First, that fits Harris.

Second, the two party system currently means only these who have a realistic chance of winning. So there's no alternative except to waste a protest vote.

Agreed. I also don't quite buy the premise of the article - see https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/28/us/politics/kamala-harris-donald-trump-2024-election.html / https://archive.is/EwIkC for the positive vibes and optimism that Harris's own campaign is seeing by going this route.

This is wrong and has been debunked many times.

See for example https://www.thoughtco.com/republic-vs-democracy-4169936 or https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/11/yes-constitution-democracy/616949/ (archive: https://archive.is/FbuL5 )

Granted, some specific decisions like the EC could have gone better. But overall, the US is a democracy - specifically a representative democracy.

In fact, to say otherwise is a major GOP talking point. For example (from the Atlantic article),

Republicans such as Senator Mike Lee of Utah have taken to reminding the public that “we’re not a democracy.”
It is quaint that so many Republicans, embracing a president who routinely tramples constitutional norms, have suddenly found their voice in pointing out that, formally, the country is a republic.

Of course the counter example is a theocratic republic. A living example? The Islamic Republic of Iran.

Iran citizens living in Iran vote for their President, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024Iranianpresidentialelection#Opinionpollingandforecasts

They also vote for their version of "member of Congress" (ok so they don't call it Congress), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ElectoraldistrictsofIran & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IslamicConsultativeAssembly#Constituencies

But while the President of Iran is the head of government there, he's second to the divinely appointed supreme leader, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SupremeLeaderofIran (in practice the SL appoints members to a Guardians Council, who vet approve members of the Assembly of Experts, who reappoint the SL - a bunch of silly layers for the SL to basically elect himself) - so this is a republic where folks technically have their representatives but the power lies elsewhere.

Exactly. The most common rebuttal I've heard to this is that the word "democracy" doesn't appear in the U.S. Constitution. However, other ideas like "freedom of religion" and "separation of powers" also do not appear as exact quotes in the Constitution.

Instead, the concept embodied by these phrases do exist and are written into the very fabric of the Constitution.

Here's a link which explains it best: https://www.thoughtco.com/republic-vs-democracy-4169936

The United States, while basically a republic, is best described as a “representative democracy.”

Also, back in the founders era, they would have understood democracy to mean what we today consider direct democracy. They thought that was too messy (to have every citizen vote on every new law etc) which is why went with a slightly different model. So they went with representative democracy instead of direct democracy. Even the Electoral College technically fits with this definition - we use the statewide popular vote (direct voting) to pick our representatives, the electors, who will represent us in the vote for the US President and VP. (Except for the two states that do it by district and split their EC votes, but in that case it's the district wide popular vote that picks the representative.)

The problem here is that it seems some coercive measures were used (e.g. being threatened with unaffordable hotel bills) which probably got at least some workers to canvas for a candidate whom they didn't support. (It also explains why some felt compelled to cheat, though in this instance I wasn't really feeling bad about it either way.)

Ultimately this is what we want though - CItizens United (2010) meant big money was able to get into play. So it's good when that big money for MAGA instead ends up wasted like this - less money for the other side to competently defeat Harris.

I had no idea about this but it makes perfect sense. Especially if it done in the days before the internet was common (like 80s or earlier) - then probably would have been a cumbersome and delay-filled process to verify you actually got registered.

Thank you for your service on correcting misinformation!

One thing to remember is that the bar for the SC to explain themselves is low. It's probably much higher in the court of public opinion than it is in .. you know, actual courts. (Since the lower courts have to follow their words and not the other way around.) When they do speak, there's very little that can stop them.

They could have said something like, "We find that the mere option of same-day voting registration being available is enough to satisfy the intent of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act and thus the 90-day rule should be treated as not being violated."

That would have opened the doors for Republican States to purge their rolls the same way as Virginia has, while enacting same-day voting registration on paper (thus providing the option) - but combined with ridiculous ID rules that make it next to impossible to actually do so.

Or worse, they could have said "We find that a non citizen voting is in fact unconstitutional, and for that reason we overturn this part of the 1993 National Voter Registration Act - the 90 day rule may no longer be enforced."

Even if he didn't vote illegally prior to becoming a US citizen (and I suspect he wouldn't have even if he had known about it, since that sort of thing can actually prevent you from becoming a US citizen, see https://forums.immigration.com/threads/voting-before-naturalization-can-cause-you-problems.280618/ )

It's still very and deeply ironic that he's obsessed with finding crimes involving voting/voters (such as voter fraud) in the present day while he's committing crimes involving voting/voters today (that whole Penn lottery thing).

So heavy checkmark and enjoy your upvote!

So an hour later, while logged out (in incognito mode) I am seeing your post on https://slrpnk.net/c/woodworking@lemmy.ca and can find it on your home instance directly at https://slrpnk.net/post/14701745 - this is in addition to seeing it on https://lemmy.ca/c/woodworking and directly on the magazine's instance at https://lemmy.ca/post/31909201

Also, the post likewise shows up for me when I view your profile on either your home instance at https://slrpnk.net/u/technomad or on the magazine's instance at https://lemmy.ca/u/technomad@slrpnk.net (and again, that's logged out and in incognito mode).

Finally, I see your post on lemmy.world in the same three places - the magazine https://lemmy.world/c/woodworking@lemmy.ca , your profile https://lemmy.world/u/technomad@slrpnk.net , and the direct post itself https://lemmy.world/post/21403325

Sometimes posts from lemmy.world take up to three days to federate to my instance, so an hour isn't too bad really.