To this point, why aren't we requiring the same test and intellect component of those who want to run for office? Even just a simple civics test about the Constitution because I'm pretty sure the current (but not for much longer) POTUS has no idea as to what is contained within the Constitution considering he has repeatedly insisted the office of POTUS has more power than the legislative and judicial branches...smart people who read just a little know this is not true.
Challenging the election.
- Thread starter TUMe
- Start date
I would support this, not anything that Aston mentioned -- although I suspect, or at least hope, it was in jest at aTUfan's ridiculous demands. Because Aston's changes are what southern whites wanted, and sometimes successfully did, put into place to prevent black people from voting.
If we want quality results in our elections, then civics and social studies need more attention in school. I know for me, those courses were a joke in terms of rigor and learning.
I'm a Republican but strongly believe that voting should be made as easy as possible to allow the most people to vote. I also believe election days should be national holidays. I know, I know, neither statement are "conservative" or "republican" stances.
No. I want every authorized persons to vote and for that vote to be counted correctly.
I don't want:
people voting multiple times.
Dead people voting.
Illegals voting.
Ballot harvesting.
Questionable counting
I actually agree with you. Where do you draw the line is the biggest question. There certainly used to be a line. You had to be a property owner... meaning you were more likely to have a vested interest in the country’s success and you had the financial and logical capability to manage your property. I don’t necessarily think that’s the optimal way to judge who is capable of voting... but if our goal is to make the country as successful as possible, objectively, everyone shouldn’t be voting.
I think the distinction here is that when poll literacy tests were outlawed, we weren’t providing everyone with equal opportunity to learn the necessary information and the test weren’t designed fairly.
Today, with ensured elementary education and mass communication, the means to ensure every voting member is “up to snuff” enough to make an educated decusion should be more achievable and proper.
Voting and taxation are not linked. You have to pay taxes in states that you worked in even if you are not a resident and can’t vote there. Taxes are contributions to the community that also makes tangible contributions to your quality of life. It has nothing to do with your decision making in that community.
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It was partially in jest, because I know most people see it similarly to long outdated literacy tests which are taboo . I think the idea behind literacy tests as far as insuring an educated electorate were legitimate, but their use as a means to target an intentionally poorly educated (and simply mistreated) portion of the population was despicable. In the perfect country every person regardless of ethnicity or religion, sex, etc... would have the same availability of basic knowledge on civics, history, and current events at home and abroad. The fact that we’re in an Information Age where all of that is available (though not yet as conglomerated as it should be) should afford everyone an equal opportunity to learn what’s necessary to make an educated decision.
The problem with literacy tests in the south wasn’t that they were disenfranchising voters it was that they were doing so when the voters did not have an equal opportunity to gain the knowledge necessary to pass them. (Also that they were constructed in such a way as to target specific voters in terms of who had to take them)
There is something to be said for those of a certain aptitude being the ones making the decisions in the country (the founding fathers certainly agreed with this sentiment).
The thing that is scary regarding this is that there might be occasions when what’s best for the country is detrimental to those who aren’t voting (due to their lack of ability in retaining the necessary knowledge rather than their ability to obtain that knowledge) I suppose I would support some kind of emergency override of this group in cases where they felt that their well being was at risk (I wouldn’t want them being abused in some way like being forced into some kind of undesired labor or danger)
Kind of like a “veto of the plebs” where they have the occasion to halt a decision by the normal voters based on danger to safety or servitude. They could vote amongst themselves to veto an act requiring them to be drafted into a military conflict for example.
Essentially they would have avote but it would be disparate in nature based upon their mental capacity and they wouldn’t have the ability to create overarching legislation for the country
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Lankford has no credibility anymore. This will follow his career wherever he goes. He’s shameful.
Honestly, we already have these tests for voting... they’re called citizenship tests... just not everyone is made to take them.
I just want to prevent another case where we might have a buffoon elected largely with the assistance of other buffoons potentially leading us to slaughter and we can’t do anything about it for 4+ years due to the nature of our system.
I just want to prevent another case where we might have a buffoon elected largely with the assistance of other buffoons potentially leading us to slaughter and we can’t do anything about it for 4+ years due to the nature of our system.
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A worse case is someone not a buffoon being elected with a similar lack of respect for US institutions whose goal is to amass presidential power. We’ve seen how the Republican party will fall in line behind an authoritarian populist regardless of institutional barriers and decades (even centuries) of tradition and precedent. Had Trump had even a modest level of management skill (and interest in his job) he would have been reelected easily.
Hawley and Cruz seem to have made this assessment and saw it as an opportunity. The Georgia outcome may have surprised them?
So, considering today’s events, I would like to remind you about the last 5+ years when I was telling you that Trump and the people blindly supporting him were bad for the country.... I the Enablers here are happy.
Agree with you, but let’s not forget the events of the summer. Lawlessness begets lawlessness. Rioting cannot be seen as a legitimate form of protest. It should be put down hard, everytime
The events of last summer were escalated by the same folks that are in the capital. They’re “blue lives matter” until the blue lives are tasked with protecting the other side.
I agree. Voting is an absolutely guaranteed right, as much as the "right" to own a gun and exercise free speech. I hate the constant manipulation of the system to disenfranchise voters who would likely vote for the other side. Voter ID laws discriminate since government issued IDs are expensive. I would argue requiring such to vote would also constitute a "poll tax" in a way. If state governments want to make driver's licenses/state IDs free, then great but you also need to make obtaining them accessible, and in many poor rural areas, they are not.
My son is actually taking 9th grade government right now (having just completed his semester of Oklahoma history). His teacher really challenges their thought process. Almost all of his assignments are writing assignments based on readings the teacher has assigned. I like the fact that it's not just simple regurgitation of dates and facts. Of course, those who favor homeschool and parochial schools do so because they can control curriculum and thought processes because heaven forbid we teach kids to be free thinkers.
My IQ test requirement was a joke mostly. And watching the current situation at the Capitol, the party of law and order and Back the Blue are now attacking the blue and breaking in and destroying the US Capitol Building. They carry flags that say "Don't Tread on Me" but they're OK treading and trampling on the rights of others. They don't want to be disenfranchised...they want their vote to count....but they don't feel the votes of 81 million people should count. The hypocrisy that drips out of one side of their mouth while they try to argue their point from the other side is both palpable and insane.
Most of the folks in that rally couldn’t pass a citizenship test if they were given all the questions and answers the night before.
There have been hundreds of federal law suits on voter ID. Not one of them has uncovered a person who could not obtain the necessary identification at no cost to cast a vote. In several there were fees, but due to dubious poll tax allegations that requirement has been eliminated. You can find plenty of people claiming they can’t get ID, or it’s hard, or I’m rural. But under depo, their factual and legal arguments quickly fold. It’s one of the reason the professional class of left wing lawyers thar files these suits started calling for national vote by mail. They were losing political points on voter id, which a vast majority of Americans support, then started losing in court. So they pivoted to mail in that doesn’t require id.
Yeah this is just false. If you’ve ever lost your birth certificate / social security card you know that there are fees associated with having to prove your identity, and you’re really out of luck if you live nowhere near the town that you were born in or have some circumstance that makes proving your heritage difficult. Or maybe you just aren’t sure about where you were born.... (city of Tulsa vs a suburb for example)
I know I had fees associated with getting a new copy of my birth certificate. I also know my driver’s license renewal just cost me $35. I’m not sure about the availability of a basic identification not asssociated with a drivers license or how much it costs, but I would be astounded if there is no associated fee.
Upon reflection, this wasn’t a great post. Yeah all rioting should be condemned and there was some really bad stuff this summer, but it’s not anything that needs to be talked about right now. Lunatics are rioting in the Capitol, there are reports of possible IEDs, etc, and these people need to be put down fast. Politicians that indulged this crap for two months should feel rightly humiliated right now, including(perhaps especially), Ted Cruz
None of which is a poll tax and you are admitting you could get the ID which was my point. There must be minimum common sense measures that assure the participants in the process that the process has sufficient integrity to trust the result. You have a right to observe Article III courts in session. It requires Photo ID. There are countless other government functions that also require ID that are constitutionally protected. Or are you saying I should be able to buy a handgun with no ID and no waiting period? If so, you are more MAGA today than I thought.
I don’t think you should be able to buy a handgun because you aren’t in a well regulated militia charged by your state with the defense of your community. ID doesn’t come into play.
I appreciate you taking a further moment to ponder the severity of the situation (despite relatively few being physically injured, what was irreparably been harmed are our Republic’s democratic principles and its constitution)
Im sorry if I snapped back, but one thing everyone on here should know about me already is that I’m an idealist and today’s events fall so far from the ideals of what our nation is supposed to stand for that I get upset. There are other timelines from today that honestly do result in much more tragic, much more malevolent outcomes. Imagine if one person had decided to set Pelosi’s chair on fire... they could have burnt down the nation’s capitol (on purpose or by accident).
I feel like we are very lucky that no members were hurt or taken hostage. Imagine if this crowd had found Pelosi hiding out in her office? Yeah, it would not have ended as well as it did.
They spent 2 years as a minority party in both houses of Congress. 2 more of the years were spent trying the case against the president which was legitimate, but the same spineless senators from this afternoon saved his bacon.
I am hopeful, though never optimistic, that something like this happening is finally something humiliating enough to provide a shock to the system for Rs and result in a bit of a course correction. I don’t expect the party to suddenly have my preferred brand of conservatism (it just doesn’t sell), but maybe let’s move a little ways back toward “character matters” and not pick the biggest amoral dumbass next time. We’ll see I guess
I almost thought some of the moderates like Romney might be ready to split off and form a third party if they’re going to have to continue to share a party with the likes of Gaetz and Cruz. If there ever was a time for a moderate third party to emerge, now might be it.
Yes. Add John Kasich. He is the one that saw the reality of Trump early and never got compromised.
Him Sasse, etc... don’t let Collins or Graham in the club... they’re spineless bootlickers.
Would anyone like to tell me about how Hillary would have been worse than what we’re seeing today? I told ya so....
I have a different view of Kasich. He refused to throw punches at Trump in the 2016 primaries and actively criticized candidates that did - trying to act as if he was above it all during his vanity project presidential run - and he ultimately stayed in long enough to fracture the anti-trump vote enough for Trump to secure the nomination. Seeing him going on TV as the the GOP’s conscience makes me want drop kick my TV. YMMV though
I mean, you would certainly have W’s administration and Jeb on board considering how Trump treated them. Guys like Mattis as well. Maybe Paul Ryan or Boehner. Maybe even swing a guy like Manchin. Possibly some of the Georgia / Arizona politicians that saw the writing on the wall in their states.
Republican Presidential primaries are typical defined by “lanes”. The gubernatorial lane was crowded with six viable and three more unviable candidates. The Kasich plan was to survive that lane while waiting for Trump to implode. They didn’t have the money or free press to go directly at Trump. They knew if they swung at him. He would hit harder and they would be unable to respond.
Meanwhile Trump had a well financed research operation that had the proveable numbers to show to undecided big money donors that Kasich couldn’t win the primaries or the general, despite mass appeal in the moderate suburbs. That strangled Kasich’s money. He came in a distant second in NH and was the first candidate in modern history to get no money boost out of it, nor did any of the Bush people move into his camp over past grudges.
In hindsight, he never should have run. But Schmidt and Weaver made a fortune off him. And he got his CNN gig back. So it ended well I guess and that may have been the point of running all along.
Bogus investigation. The impeachment would have been thrown out of a real court.
Untrue. In fact the tangentially related court cases resulted in jail time for multiple Trump cronies until he abused his powers of office by pardoning them.
This is all tactical stuff. He was in the right. He did not attend the Republican convention in Ohio. He stayed far away from Trump - never coddled him. Never curried favor for a cabinet job.
As a matter of fact, he aligns so well with my views that he is the only political candidate I have ever sent money. And I am 55. I would vote for him today on principle regardless of tactical concerns.
But sadly he has the reputation amongst mainstream Republican elected officials and senior influencers as being difficult to work with and socially awkward. As President, you have the army and the ability to persuade. I have tremendous respect for the Governor. People who know me irl know why. But he would have been a very impotent president with his party not liking him and his opposition sensing weakness because of that. Neither side would have worked with him. He had tremendous success in Ohio by triangulating that dynamic by focusing a several key issues that resonated with both rural whites and urban blacks (drug addiction, though root causes in each setting are very very different, is a good example). He went straight to the people on certain issues and committed discretionary resources to leverage short term political wins. At the national level, you don’t have that type of flexibility and the level of complexity of the federal responsibility prevents you from single issue triangulation on most issues (for instance, the issues for urban blacks and drug addiction are very similar but still different in cities with a heroin problem versus cities with a crack and violence problems). He would have been a poor President.
Reagan had many failed policies and some continue to dog us today. But he understood the game and how to play it. Congressional leadership hated his policies but loved him personally and never missed his cocktail parties. Reagan got a lot done on that simple Mainstreet USA goodwill. Kasich doesn’t have the ability or interest in playing on that field. And his signature policy is reducing spending. Something nobody wants to do. It’s professional and political suicide as long as we can print our own money and the world has to say it’s valuable because we have the best weapons.
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I am not a political person nor really interested in being involved in "how" one gets into power. I am a trained and practicing behavioral scientist. Instead I have always looked first at honesty and character. From that lense, I look at the Republicans in 4 groups now.
1. Principled Resisters - Kasich is #1 in this group because he was morally consistent from the beginning. I changed my registration to Independent when it became clear that Trump would be the nominee mostly because so few people acted as Kasich did. Although he had a dalliance with Trump for the cabinet job, Romney is a close second here. Jeff Flake is another. These are the kinds of people that would motivate me to join a political party again if they were part of a center-right effort.
2. Moderate Distancers - This would be people like Ben Sasse who played along but never embraced Trump too warmly. Not delighted with them, but would be OK with them in the team.
3. Late Comers - This is the bulk of the Senate such as McConnell. Glad they turned yesterday, but hard to see them being invited.
4. Trumpists - People who due to power or principle held up the electoral counting. They can go to hell.
Amen. I at least could respect the pre-Palin brand of Conservatism...the one where they were adamant about states' rights, fiscal conservancy, strict adherence to the written constitution. Today's GOP is nothing more than a push for a wild west gun-toting theocracy.
