The Political Thread

[Artemis]

4 hours ago, Caya said:

Or, he might just be an awful president. Unless, for instance, you consider Forbes to be left-wing ( https://www.forbes.com/sites/tommybeer/2020/09/20/trump-threatens-to-issue-executive-order-preventing-biden-from-being-elected-president/ ), or the Coronavirus to have a liberal bias ( https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/situation-reports/20200914-weekly-epi-update-5.pdf?sfvrsn=cf929d04_2, US numbers on page 13, Europe on 16ff ).

Just FYI, Forbes.com is different than Forbes.  Articles on Forbes.com will reflect the political leanings of whoever authored them (which in my own experience is more often left-leaning than not, but that's relative).

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Fans of the Forbes magazine may not realize that Forbes.com has very little to do with the official publication. The articles on Forbes.com are not written or even edited by the writers of the magazine. Instead, they are contributed by writers from around the world. Contributors to the website write their own articles and submit them in exchange for royalty payments. None of the facts within the articles are checked and editors do not modify the contributions in any way. Incredibly, Forbes remains one of the most popular business news websites despite this lack of overall quality control.

[Link]

That aside, this is actually a decent example of what I meant by the 'skewing and spinning' prevalent in journalism.

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Prominent Democrats have expressed serious concerns that Trump may refuse to leave office should he lose the election in November. When asked by Fox News' Chris Wallace in July, if he would accept the election results, Trump said, "I have to see. Look, you — I have to see. No, I'm not going to just say yes. I'm not going to say no, and I didn't last time, either."

He wasn't talking here about refusing to relinquish the presidency.  He was saying that if he loses the election, he may remain skeptical that the election wasn't rigged or stolen.  Whether you think that's a silly conspiracy theory or not, it's still just an opinion, and a far cry from digging his heels into the Oval Office like a mule and clinging to his desk as we try to drag him out.

I find something like this in almost every piece of news I come across, in print or on screen.  They cherry-pick a statement, remove the context, reframe in another context, and add ominous language like "threatened" and "attacked" to scare people.

To use another, perhaps better-known example: Last June, the NY Times changed one of its headlines from "As Chaos Spreads, Trump Vows to 'End It Now'" to "Trump Threatens to Send Troops into States", after receiving backlash from liberal publications and politicians for making the headline sound too favorable to Trump.  They'd changed another one after backlash the year before, from "Trump Urges Unity Vs. Racism" to "Assailing Hate, But Not Guns".  And in March, when the stimulus bill was being discussed and receiving pushback from mostly Democrats, they changed a headline three times when the Democrats complained that it didn't sound favorable enough to them.  ("Democrats Block Action on $1.8 Trillion Stimulus" > "Democrats Block Action on Stimulus Plan, Seeking Worker Protections" > "Partisan Divide Threatens Deal on Rescue Bill".)

That's more than author bias; that's psychological manipulation, and I'm not a fan.

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At one point in the speech, Trump seemingly threatened to attempt to ban Biden from being elected President of the United States.

"You can't have this guy as your president," Trump argued. "You can't have — maybe I'll sign an executive order, you cannot have him as your president."

The problem here is that everything he says is taken entirely too seriously.  It's my impression that he was quipping.  It doesn't come across very well, especially in writing.  But this is his sense of humor; he jests about his position of power.  Just like that Twitter video he posted about being president "4eva".  It's like if you (general you) had a king who constantly made "Off with their heads!" jokes about people he didn't like, and the newspapers printed, "KING THREATENS TO EXECUTE HIS OPPONENTS".  He doesn't mean it.  He doesn't actually plan to block Biden with an executive order (as if he could), any more than he plans to rule America through Year 90000 and for all eternity, lol.  It may be done in incredibly poor taste, but that doesn't make it a threat.

Now, to be clear, I'm not saying he's not an awful president.  Just that we can't take everything we read at face value.

 

[Caya]

Trump is a classical example of Schödinger's Douchebag (link, but careful as this leads to Urban Dictionary: https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Schrödinger's Douchebag ), a guy who throws out controversial statements and then claims he was only joking if they get a negative reaction. Any comments as to his handling of Covid-19 and/or the Republicans' turnaround on the death of a Supreme Court Justice in an election year, btw?

[Artemis]

1 hour ago, Caya said:

Any comments as to his handling of Covid-19 and/or the Republicans' turnaround on the death of a Supreme Court Justice in an election year, btw?

From what I know (which is admittedly not a whole lot), I’m fine with his handling of the pandemic.  I think he’s done about as well as anyone would have.  I first heard about it in late January and he was already talking about closing the borders to protect people, while Democrats and the media were calling that “xenophobic” and “hysterical”, among other things.  Now they’ve done a 180 and are spinning it like he didn’t act soon enough.  (They did the same thing when he called it the “Chinese/Wuhan virus”, crying “racism” when they themselves had already been using the term for weeks.)  He started pushing for a vaccine almost as soon as he possibly could, as far as I could tell.  I don’t really know what else he could have done.  There’s so much to untangle with the coronavirus though, between all the changing data and varying claims by “experts”.  It’s a daunting subject I’m not sure I want to delve far into, lol.

As for the Supreme Court Justice, I’m waiting to hear more.  It’s too new and I haven’t been paying close enough attention to listen for accuracy.  If true, then it’s hypocritical at best.  But as shown above, I’d expect no less from a politician.

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

4 hours ago, Artemis said:

I’d expect no less from a politician.

People in general (or at least Americans in general, which is where I've had most of my experience) seem to ignore that inevitable aspect of politics, the involvement of politicians.  Trump is a politician.  Biden is a politician.  Same for Bill Clinton, Dubya, et al.  They all say outrageous things to get people's attention, to make their opponent look bad, to make themselves look good, etc., etc., etc.

And it's oh so easy to excuse the candidate you favor for his outrageous statements, while damning his opposition for theirs.

(And now we have to deal with candidates who have Twitter accounts....)

 

 

[besleybean]

This is not going to be a popular opinion!

I actually get a tad frustrated at people constantly giving politicians such a hard time.

It seems to me that other groups get let off far too easily.

[Artemis]

27 minutes ago, besleybean said:

This is not going to be a popular opinion!

I actually get a tad frustrated at people constantly giving politicians such a hard time.

It seems to me that other groups get let off far too easily.

I can definitely understand that opinion.  However I think it's only natural to have higher expectations from the people we elect to govern us.  Other groups might be just as deserving of scrutiny, but not many have as much power over our lives.  A lot of people (misguidedly, imo) put a lot of hope into their politicians and are continuously let down.

 

[besleybean]

It does of course depend on the politician!

But I feel at least some of them do  enter the profession for the right reasons and actually work very hard.

[Artemis]

Yes, I'm sure some do. 

 

[Caya]

@Artemis : thank you for your answer.  

5 hours ago, Carol the Dabbler said:

They all say outrageous things to get people's attention, to make their opponent look bad, to make themselves look good, etc., etc., etc.

So I keep hearing, and I am aware that "a pox on both your houses" seems to be an ingrained American trait, but your two main parties sure don't look the same from here. Yes, I know, supposed liberal media bias; so let's for now ignore the existence of Fox News and friends and have some numbers instead, though I'm open to (and happy about) any suggestion for reasonably objective (which, in itself, is open to debate, I am aware of that) comparison. Sorry in advance for the huge-ass picture, too (I left it in small display so it doesn't completely clutter this thread - you gotta click on it three times and then it becomes readable).

[Artemis]

12 hours ago, Caya said:

So I keep hearing, and I am aware that "a pox on both your houses" seems to be an ingrained American trait, but your two main parties sure don't look the same from here. Yes, I know, supposed liberal media bias; so let's for now ignore the existence of Fox News and friends and have some numbers instead, though I'm open to (and happy about) any suggestion for reasonably objective (which, in itself, is open to debate, I am aware of that) comparison.

I hope you don't mind if I respond to this too. 

I can understand how it looks at a glance, but presenting complex and nuanced issues that way is vastly oversimplifying.  It's hard for me to explain, so I hope it's okay if I just quote some posts from this discussion thread of the picture.  (There are plenty of varying perspectives and more debate if you're ever inclined to read through some of the reddit threads about it.)  I don't know if it will clarify enough, but maybe it will give you an idea of why there is so much dissension around these issues and how it's not quite so cut-and-dried.  Personally it's hard for me to say there's a clear right or wrong here.

 

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[...]

A few things:

First: When people say 'both parties are the same', in the vast majority of cases (but certainly not all) the speaker is referring to something along the lines of 1) craven 'team politics', 2) corporatism, 3) and the frothing 'I'm a good guy and everyone else is evil' mentality that both sides seems to be dripping with these days. TL;DR: when people say 'both parties are the same', it has nothing to do with political ambivalence; its a deep expression of disgust with the behavior of both parties and their supporters in particular. Irrespective of your political beliefs, this is a very valid criticism of the outer wings of both parties and their supporters. Screaming partisans make everything they touch toxic.

Secondly: This is a big exercise in demonstrating that Reddit has zero idea how congress works behind the scenes. These votes were 'whipped' into existence long before the vote actually happens; and exactly none of reddit will know what a majority/minority whip is without googling it. Furthermore, a huge bulk of bills passed by the House are largely symbolic, knowing that the Senate won't pass it (and vice versa) - this is called a political cover and its just part of how congress works.

Thirdly: A lot of these are cloture votes and are largely symbolic. In my opinion, its very intellectually dishonest to include a cloture vote b/c the outcome prior to vote (eg after the whip has its count) is meaningless to the extent that there isn't a supermajority. It just doesn't matter how you vote.

Fourth: This is a list of bills with 'warm and fuzzy' names - OP is (intentionally?) not linking to the body of the bills, nor is he providing holistic analysis. For example, the DISCLOSE Act had deep constitutional issues and many very smart people believed it to be objectively illegal:

"The main policy push on the DISCLOSE Act, seems to be forcibly requiring groups engaged in political speech to reveal all of their backers, not just those who are contributing to support the ads. This, too, seems to have major constitutional problems, as anyone familiar with NAACP v. Alabama can attest (government does not always compel disclosure of group membership for noble reasons)."

Going through every single one of these bills, you can find very level-headed analysis indicating that 1) these bills may not as '110% good' as OP wants you to believe and/or that a better option may have been out there. This is just incomplete and bad analysis.

And lastly: And we aren't even going into the 'rider' provisions that make some seemingly great bills completely toxic when viewed in their totality. Look at the bill text not just the name: there was nothing patriotic about the PATRIOT ACT.

[...]

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When people say that the parties are the same, they don't mean that they vote along issues the same way. They mean that they use the same tricks and gimmicks to hold onto power and solicit votes and funding.

For example, all these bills here. I was only able to poke into what a few of them actually say or do or require, but a very common tactic is to name your bill in some way that makes it sound like it only has upsides, with no cost or burdens beyond the title of the bill. You can imagine Republicans putting together something called, protect our hero veterans bill, and then seen Democrats vote against it. Well, obviously Democrats hate our hero veterans! But perhaps if you actually read the bill, the funding for it comes out of public education. Or it is worded in some kind of way that veterans in blue states don't get as much of a benefit as those in red States.

That is just an example, but it is closer to what people mean when they say the parties are the same.

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Look at Lily Ledbetter. House Democrats voted for it, but Senate Democrats voted against it. That tells me there was some sort of poisoned pill in the Senate version that Dems couldn’t stomach.

[...]  It’s an age old practice. Democrats introduce the “Every Child Deserves Medical Care Act” but then add an amendment saying that the government should subsidize abortions. Republicans vote against the bill because of that rider and Democrats turn around and say, “See? Republicans don’t care if children have healthcare!” The GOP does this against the Democrats too. They introduced the “American SAFE Act In late 2015 to keep the country safe from terrorists. It actually passed with a bipartisan supermajority in the House. Then Trump came out for his travel ban and Democrats ditched it because the bill would add extra vetting steps for refugee admissions. The GOP turned around and criticized Dems for “not wanting to keep America safe.”

The real fools in this scenario are the people who eat all this up. A one sentence summary will never be able to sum up bills that are hundreds of pages long and chock full of all manner of amendments and riders.

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Last time I saw it, I saw someone claim the first link they clicked on, if you read it, the Republicans voted against the measure because something was added with absolutely no correlation to the original bill.  This was the post:

I picked “student loan affordability act” at random, and read the bill. Evidently, you and the original poster did not,

Section 1: Student Loan Affordability

Section 2: Student Loan Affordability

Section 3: Student Loan Affordability

Section 4: Student Loan Affordability

Section 5: Oil Wells! What!

Section 6: A clause to ensure that the financial effects of this bill did not go on record on the PAYGO scorecard.

[...]

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Voting how the Republicans voted on a lot of these items is not objectively bad. This doesn't show much and leaves out a lot of nuance regarding each of these items. For example, I'm all for an open internet but I also have concerns with allowing the Federal government do it. I would rather the market do it. I know, I know, there are arguments on the other side! Those arguments are valid too. Neither side is objectively right. Money in politics on the Republican side is a free speech debate and I think there are valid arguments on both sides. Posts like this are just overloading people with data that seems obvious based on how it is framed. This type of argument is not helpful to the debate and ignores a lot of information.

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The “both sides are the same” hypothesis isn’t saying “they agree on everything.” It’s saying “both parties are sold out to certain groups and a bill will pass or fail based on how that group wants them to vote, even if both parties claim to fight over the issue.”

The Patriot Act is a perfect example. For one, President Obama opposes domestic surveillance as Senator Obama (you could actually make a list of thing Obama changes on once he got power by itself, much of which Republicans would’ve loved had he not been a Democrat). The 2006 Patriot Act reauthorization saw little opposition. The 2011 reauthorization saw HUGE Democratic opposition, including Nancy Pelosi. It passed. And by 2015 Nancy and most Democrats has changed their tune, and the Patriot Act passes again with almost equal bipartisan support, but more Republican opposition than before.

Mitch McConnel made the same flip flop himself from 2014 to 2015. The 2014 USA Freedom Act saw he and the Republicans fight it. By 2015 that exact bill was passed with his support. Keeping in mind that 60 votes were needed in the Senate in all of these instances, and no party had a 60 vote majority in any of them.

Further evidence (I can't do OPs fancy linking on the phone so you’ll just have to go with it and fact check what you wish):

Republicans won the house in 2010 and have made a huge campaign point out of repealing Obamacare. With a majority in Congress and the Presidency, they’ve failed at full repeal OR replacing it with any of their own plan.

It’s often said that Republicans are in Wall Street pockets where Democrats fight for the little guy. TARP bailouts of Wall Street passed in 2008 with massive Democratic support, including Hillary Clinton.

SOPA and PIPA were assumed to be easy Bill passages with bipartisan support until people lashed out enough to kill the bill without a vote, but don’t think it wasn’t with massive support from both sides. SOPA has 14 Democratic cosponsers. Notable supporters from each side were: Barbra Boxer, Diane Feinstein, Bob Corker, Lindsey Graham, Chuck Schumer, John McCain....I could go on.

So it’s a huge oversimplification to say “both parties are the same” because it doesn’t get to the heart of the issue: both parties are sold out to special interests. Of course they disagree on a lot of things, but there’s just a way things will go on several MAJOR issues and it doesn’t matter how much they campaign about “limiting government” or “civil liberties” or anything like that, when the vote comes they’ll justify their support.

Although I should also include in the “they’re both the same” mentality, that sometimes it just means “they’re both going to f*ck it up. Doesn’t matter which party is in charge, they’re going to screw up.”

I notice nowhere in the list are regime changes, US-backed coups/destabilization, or foreign military intervention....because (shocker) they're pretty much the same there.

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Right so I looked at this list and looked at it as devils advocate to see why republicans would vote the way they did, so I took the top one (net neutrality) and did some research on it. On the surface, which the average joe is gonna look at, it looks like "Republicans are evil, they want to vote to do away with net neutrality", and that was their primary goal... I thought surely it can't be that clear cut, so here's my findings. (Just a note I'm from the UK)

What the vote also meant:

It wasn't just a vote to abolish net neutrality, it was a vote to see who maintains regulatory jurisdiction over ISP's privacy practices, the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) or the FCC (Federal Communications Commission). The Title II act if passed would hand over privacy jurisdiction to the FCC and remove it entirely from the FTC due to re-categorisation of ISP's as companies which went hand in hand with the FCC's proposals... this wouldn't just give control over broadband and internet use, they would also gain control over privacy as well.

What they voted for:

Republicans voted in favour of FTC jurisdiction repealing the FCC order adopting privacy rules for ISP's. The knock-on effect was that they also had to vote against a congressional resolution that would give back the FCC's jurisdiction over other terms of service (basically net neutrality). This was a SIDE EFFECT of their vote, and not the main purpose of their vote, their main purpose was privacy.

Why did they vote this way:

If the FCC were granted authority to regulate ISP's, neither the FTC or the FCC would have clear jurisdiction to regulate ISP's privacy practices as the FCC have no set policies in place for this at the moment, or the power to enact them the same as the FTC. Currently the FTC monitors the privacy practices of ISP's as they're classified private companies, and the FTC regulates privacy practices of ALL private companies. The FCC only has privacy jurisdiction of companies classed as common carriers. The Title II act the FCC proposed would re-classify ISP's as common carriers for NN purposes, but the privacy CRA (Congressional Resolution Act) also severely limited the FCC's ability to then regulate ISP's privacy policies to the extent that the FTC can, this also means the FCC wouldn't have the same power to impose new rules to make privacy limitations the same.

Basically they didn't want to hand over privacy regulation to the FCC as they believe they're not in a position or state to manage/regulate the privacy policies of ISP's as effectively as the FTC, which also manages large private company (non-ISP) privacy practices, and the Title II act would re-categorise ISP's as common carriers rather than private companies that would remove all FTC jurisdiction. The didn't "vote to do away with net neutrality", the vote had to be all or nothing and they felt leaving privacy with the FTC was the best option outweighs imposing vague regulation on the FCC side.

I guess this is where the waters get muddy, there's potential that the price of net neutrality is severely reduced privacy regulations of ISP's, or the the other way is your privacy is locked down but browsing habits dictated. It seems the republicans cared more about your privacy in this particular vote rather than handing it to the FCC and Ajit Pai.

People need to realise just how devious these policies can be, and how politicians can use them to demonize the opposition. "Here's a vote to give kids free candy for life!*" (small print *and also chop off their thumbs) -people vote no- MY GOD THESE PEOPLE HATE KIDS AND DON'T WANT THEM TO HAVE FREE CANDY!!

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[Hikari]

The President did a number of things wrong in his handling of the pandemic, but the Democrats get the luxury of saying that they would have handled it differently, without having to prove it.  There is no knowing that a Democratic President would have done much different on some of the big issues.

Mr. Trump has a handicap particular to him, though, which is Narcissistic Personality Disorder.  This makes him constitutionally incapable of admitting fault, admitting that he doesn't know everything or allowing anyone else to be 'the expert'.  He cannot tolerate dissenting opinions, which he perceives as challenges to his authority.  And he is obsessed with his image, and his idea of what makes a man or a leader comes out of a childhood and a lifetime steeped in toxic masculinity.  Had he been able to put aside his ego enough to do two very simple things, he would have demonstrated more leadership and I'd be happier with him.

1.  Listen to his advisors, including Dr. Birx and Dr. Fauci and let them run the coronavirus briefings instead of him always butting in.  

2.  Modelled mask-wearing far sooner to his constituents and the American public in general and promoted the idea that 'Real men wear masks'.  

The so-called health experts have a hefty share of the blame for the confusion around masks.  I'm looking at the CDC, Fauci & Surgeon General Jerome Adams.  Had they pushed them much sooner, we may not have had to go to such restrictive lockdowns.  It's too late; Pandora's box is open and there's no closing it.  Covid, like flu, is with mankind forever.  But had the President immediately and stoically embraced mask-wearing and promoted it to the American public and most especially his fan base, I do not think the issue would have become as politicized as it has.  He has fueled t his fire by jeering at mask wearers, refusing to wear a mask, bullying his subordinates into not wearing masks--when he had a chance to display leadership, and he blew it.

[T.o.b.y]

There was lots of uncertainty concerning face masks here in Germany as well, but I must say I think it was communicated better to the general public because neither politicians nor experts claimed to have any certainty that didn't (and, tbh, doesn't) exist. Instead, they went from "based on current information, face masks are probably not useful for the general public" to "based on newer information and experiences in other countries, we have changed our minds and are now recommending the use of face masks on public transportation and inside closed spaces". 

It seems to me that there's more transparency over here. Other Germans would probably disagree, there have been protests against masks and other restrictions and a portion of the population definitely believes there's some kind of conspiracy going on, but they're a minority and overall, I don't get the impression that the pandemic is quite as politicized over here as in the US, for example. 

 

[Hikari]

11 minutes ago, T.o.b.y said:

There was lots of uncertainty concerning face masks here in Germany as well, but I must say I think it was communicated better to the general public because neither politicians nor experts claimed to have any certainty that didn't (and, tbh, doesn't) exist. Instead, they went from "based on current information, face masks are probably not useful for the general public" to "based on newer information and experiences in other countries, we have changed our minds and are now recommending the use of face masks on public transportation and inside closed spaces". 

It seems to me that there's more transparency over here. Other Germans would probably disagree, there have been protests against masks and other restrictions and a portion of the population definitely believes there's some kind of conspiracy going on, but they're a minority and overall, I don't get the impression that the pandemic is quite as politicized over here as in the US, for example. 

 

In the beginning, which for us was March-April over here, the official recommendation was that masks were 'useless' for the general public.  You should wear one if you were ill, but they were not recommended for healthy people.  At that stage, they were trying to preserve vicariously low PPE stocks for first responders and healthcare workers who were having to resort to wearing bandanas and garbage bags.  The hoarding situation with certain short-supply items like toilet paper was already extreme, and people were getting busted with garages and sheds full of PPE and sanitizers which they were selling online at gouging prices.  

I understand the impetus behind discouraging the hoarding of PPE, but in my opinion it was a fatal error to discourage mask-wearing altogether.  Because within a few months nearly all areas had to reverse themselves and mandate mask wearing, and these scientific professionals just looked like idiots.  My own state governor was one of the first nationwide to impose lockdown measures & pretty early on he tried to impose a mask mandate statewide, only to retract that order the next day, having received an earful of dissent from his constituency.  'Dissent' is a polite term . . .before too long both the governor and his Dept. of Health director Dr. Amy Acton would receive numerous threats of violence upon their person & their family members and have belligerent protestors camped outside of their  homes.  Such unrelenting harassment led Dr. Acton to step down, and her designated replacement, another female physician, accepted the job and then resigned before she even started, probably spooked by the unrest here.  At least to my knowledge, unmasked protesters did not storm the statehouse in Columbus with semi-automatic weapons, as they did for Gov. Gretchen Whitmer to the north in Michigan.  It's ugly and it is still as divided as ever.

Just in the last few days the CDC has issued another set of revised guidelines saying that they have a 'new understanding' of how the coronavirus spreads.  It's definitely aerosolized.  I'm no science major, but I could have said, Well, duh.  We have known since the beginning that this is a respiratory illness.  We have had a century now to get a handle on the influenza family of coronaviruses.  This one may be 'novel' but so far it has behaved like other viruses in its mode of transition.  Therefore, they should have stressed the mask wearing from the earliest days.  Instead of pushing masks early and often, they had people spending many fruitless hours quarantining their Amazon boxes and washing their groceries.  The emphasis was in the wrong area, largely to make people feel more in control, I think.  It is far easier to sanitize packages and wash your hands then to combat invisible particles floating through the air.  So I cannot blame the President entirely for his resistance to masks and his disregarding of scientific evidence when even the 'top infectious disease experts in the world' couldn't agree on what the risks were and kept flip-flopping in their advice.  It is crystal clear to me that the scientists and the political leaders are now following a course that reopens the economy at the expense of the public health, but that's because the people have spoken by their actions that they'd rather have the choice to go to bars and take their chances with the virus.  Only, many of the people who get sick and die won't be the ones who took the risk in the first place.

I can, and do, blame Mr. Trump for dismantling, in January 2019, a year before this current health crisis, the very task force/agency at the federal level designed for pandemic response.  That was a boneheaded move.

It stands to reason that that which cannot harm may potentially help, and that's the case with face masks.  They have been proven to reduce transmission, by science, not just anecdote.  If they did not work, then we wouldn't be seeing states and counties reducing their spread enough to go from Level Red Alert to Levels Orange or Yellow (in descending order of badness) within just 2-3 weeks of mandated mask usage.  It's not 100% impregnable and a minority of wearers do experience breathing issues that make mask wearing inadvisable for them--but they do work, in the same way that if  you have an open cut, you are better off wearing a band aid to prevent infection than not.

[Van Buren Supernova]

Curiosity got the best of me, from all those reactions from other countries, so I watched it.

I feel like I was watching primary school's playground bickering.

[besleybean]

To the U.S: Please do the right thing.

Love from: The Rest of The World.

[Artemis]

6 hours ago, Van Buren Supernova said:

I feel like I was watching primary school's playground bickering.

...

 

 

[Van Buren Supernova]

Guys, I don't even want big fat kiss from Sherlock.

If I'm this stressed of watching idiots, I wonder if Sherlock would have heart attack if he knew what is going on in this world.

 

Errrmmm, America, why when I was working with measly salary I paid more tax than your president?

[J.P.]

Sherlock would fly to Antarctica to study 457 arts of snow and talk to pengwings.

[Artemis]

In the mail today:

"Voting Report Card for [Artemis]

Dear [Artemis],

Public records indicate that you are eligible to vote in 2020.  Who you vote for is private, but whether or not you vote is public record.

We will be reviewing these records after the election to determine whether or not you joined your neighbors in voting.  While we have hidden the name and street number of your neighbors to protect their privacy, these are their true voting records.

We may call you to ask about your voting experience and will update this chart for the next election.  If you do not vote this year, while we will be disappointed, we'll be interested to hear why not.

We hope you find this information useful."

I hate everything about this vaguely threatening letter, lol.

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

[Artemis]

Indeed.

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

Was it signed, or did they just tie it around a brick and throw it through your window?

 

[Hikari]

On 10/23/2020 at 9:31 PM, Artemis said:

In the mail today:

"Voting Report Card for [Artemis]

Dear [Artemis],

Public records indicate that you are eligible to vote in 2020.  Who you vote for is private, but whether or not you vote is public record.

We will be reviewing these records after the election to determine whether or not you joined your neighbors in voting.  While we have hidden the name and street number of your neighbors to protect their privacy, these are their true voting records.

We may call you to ask about your voting experience and will update this chart for the next election.  If you do not vote this year, while we will be disappointed, we'll be interested to hear why not.

We hope you find this information useful."

I hate everything about this vaguely threatening letter, lol.

 

I requested my absentee ballot back in August, when Trump was threatening to dismantle the Post Office and received it the first week in October.  I mailed it on October 6 and via TrackMyVote.com, I saw that it was processed by my board of elections on October 13th.  For the last 2-3 weeks, I have received *daily* multiple texts of 'BALLOT NOT RECEIVED!' and also flyers in my mailbox proclaiming same.  (Addressed to me OR 'Current Occupant', lol).  Still, if I were a senior citizen with memory issues, these would be upsetting because I might think they were real. 

I have been voting absentee regularly for about 10 years now.  My work schedule makes it challenging to get to the polls and my precinct has moved 3 times since then.  I have NEVER received any 'reminders' like this about my non-counted ballot before, never mind several a a week over the period of weeks.

I ignore everything and pitch/delete.  The stench of desperation from both sides is sickening  . . .but bullying citizens like this is inexcusable.  We do not live in a state-controlled regime but it's moving that way.  The Founding Fathers are rolling in their graves.

[Carol the Dabbler]

3 hours ago, Hikari said:

I mailed it on October 6 and via TrackMyVote.com, I saw that it was processed by my board of elections on October 13th.  For the last 2-3 weeks, I have received *daily* multiple texts of 'BALLOT NOT RECEIVED!' and also flyers in my mailbox proclaiming same.  (Addressed to me OR 'Current Occupant', lol).  Still, if I were a senior citizen with memory issues, these would be upsetting because I might think they were real.

Oh good heavens yes!  But what are you "supposed" to do, according to these texts and flyers?  Do they merely urge you to get your ballot in the mail -- or do they want your social security number?

I thought I had posted this already:  The letter Artemis received may actually be "legitimate," but only in the sense that it does not appear to be an attempt to collect social security numbers, credit card numbers, etc.  When I searched on "Who you vote for is private, but whether or not you vote is public record," Google revealed that many letters with *very* similar wording have been sent in recent years to voters in various states by various groups -- some known and some not -- apparently attempting to increase voter turnout by threatening to expose the recipient's voting record.  This does seem to increase voting, but perhaps by the "wrong" voters -- in cases where the letters were sent in support of a specific candidate or ballot measure, the candidate lost and the measure failed.

So I suspect they're mostly just p*ssing people off.

 

[T.o.b.y]

So... How's everybody doing during this madness?