Democracy Dies In Daylight

[calgor]

U.S. Senator Manchin says he will oppose voting rights bill pushed by colleagues
https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-sena...ce=twitter

[InbetweenDreams]

I think mail in ballots are fine as long as they're handled properly so I don't see what the issue really is other than unfounded claims of voter fraud. A year ago the debate on here got pretty hot. What I will say Democrats want to get rid of the filibuster because it convenient, if the tables were turned I would expect Republicans to want to do the same, just political theater...

[calgor]

I think mail in ballots are fine as long as they're handled properly so I don't see what the issue really is other than unfounded claims of voter fraud. A year ago the debate on here got pretty hot. What I will say Democrats want to get rid of the filibuster because it convenient, if the tables were turned I would expect Republicans to want to do the same, just political theater...

In the mean time while Manchin plays statesman virtually every state with a republican controlled legislature is passing new laws to make it more difficult for people to vote, not coincidentally laws which likely will impact democrats more than republicans.

[InbetweenDreams]

Exactly. Political theater can be pretty dangerous. Unfortunately, despite all the outrage, I don't expect anything good to happen. As long as our politicians are shills for billionaire donors and international corporations you can't really expect to be fairly represented.

[calgor]

@InbetweenDreams I'm the last person to defend politicians, but it's hard to deny things were going in the right direction in the last election. Here in Pennsylvania we had no excuse mail in balloting for the first time, and not a moment too soon given the pandemic. Ironically it was republicans who wrote the bill in exchange for eliminating straight ticket balloting. Now that they see what they did they're trying everything possible to throw a few monkey wrenches in the works.

[InbetweenDreams]

I can't say I know if NC did anything special but I believe mail-in voting was in place for a while. Sometimes good things do get done and perhaps I'm cynical but I wonder what all had to be stuffed into these bills in order to get something good done.

[calgor]

@InbetweenDreams LOL. Has a politician ever done anything from purely altruistic intentions? Like the old saying goes, legislation is like sausage making. You really don't want to know how the final product was made.

[InbetweenDreams]

Hmm kind of like how there is a certain amount of rodent in peanut butter...


I suppose there are politicians that are honest but they usually don't stay that way.


God I hate Rand Paul, just the sight of him and I wonder how the fuck does Kentucky elect these examples of human excrement?

[calgor]

@InbetweenDreams I don't doubt that many of them initially go to Washington thinking they will be different. Unfortunately they soon learn it's virtually impossible to accomplish anything without "compromise". Regarding the likes of Rand Paul, it is indeed a mystery. Ultimately the blame has to go to the people who vote for them. My only explanation is their animosity towards people who are different from them when mixed with a large dose of gullibility will work every time.

[Chase]

See, this is why "moderates" aren't the answer. If a far right nutter butter wants to lock up all politicians who certified Biden and the Democrats don't, what's the "moderate" or "middle-ground" or even "compromise" to that? Lock up half of them?

Republicans have been blatantly cheating in elections. One was even in charge of certifying the very election he was running in (see this link) - and he coincidently threw out a bunch of votes that leaned towards his opponent. What's the "moderate" position to this? Let half of them cheat?

"Far left" Dems like AOC aren't what's causing the demise of the Democratic party. It's these so-called moderates who allow the Republicans to continually shift father and farther to the right, and in doing so, make the Democrats shift farther to the right as well.