U.S. Politics - pre-election ballot hijinx

[drawkcabi]

AHA?

Yeah, the epiphany amendment campaigned for by Oprah. :P

Or maybe they meant the recognition of 80's rock bands that had one cool song/video act?

Seriously, seems like they mean ACA.

[Suttree]

Actually you are wrong. The Republicans in the House kept sending bill after bill to fund the government but the Dems in the Senate refused to vote on them because the bills made a change to the AHA.

But was really funny and I'm sure that the voters won't remember this is that six weeks after the government "re-opened" a change the AHA happened anyways.

Yes that is funny. Please continue ignoring all context and tell us more about this alternate reality you've cobbled together after reading various FB posts.

[TerraPrime]

Actually you are wrong. The Republicans in the House kept sending bill after bill to fund the government but the Dems in the Senate refused to vote on them because the bills made a change to the AHA.

But was really funny and I'm sure that the voters won't remember this is that six weeks after the government "re-opened" a change the AHA happened anyways.

You have an odd way of defining holding something hostage. The Democrats not willing to fund poison bills with ride-alongs that kill a bill that the GOP could not kill via other legislative means, like, you know, a vote, is not an example of the Dems holding something hostage. It's actually more analogous to refusing to negotiate with hostage-takers. The party that's holding the regular functioning of the government hostage is the GOP, who's issuing threats of "kill this part of the ACA if you want to receiving funding for the rest of the government."

I can't decide if you're really sincere in your conviction that the GOP is the good guys here, or if you're just criminally missinformed.

[awesome possum]

It's funny that some media outlets are pretending that the latest verbal shot fired in the GOP's War on the Poor is a "gaffe."

The Republican Party’s top leader in Congress is catching flak for a comment that appears to call the jobless lazy – a comment that has rekindled an old challenge for the party: appearing insensitive or uncaring toward Americans who are poor or in financial difficulty.

House Speaker John Boehner was asked after a speech last week to comment on a plan for addressing poverty – promoted by a Republican colleague, Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.

Speaker Boehner gave a response that was favorable toward Representative Ryan's plan, but not so favorable about Americans’ work ethic. He said in part: “I think this idea that’s been born over last ... couple of years that, ‘You know, I really don’t have to work, I don’t really want to do this, I think I’d just rather sit around,’ – this is a very sick idea for our country.”

[DanteGabriel]

It's funny that some media outlets are pretending that the latest verbal shot fired in the GOP's War on the Poor is a "gaffe."

Damn shiftless poor people. If they'd just have the initiative to bootstrap themselves into a seat in Congress, then they would be free (incentivized, even) to be lazy, stupid, dishonest, and enjoy a nice salary and premium health coverage as well.

[lokisnow]

okay, a trio of interesting articles for your reading pleasure:

http://www.mischiefsoffaction.com/2014/09/joebiden-will-mostly-likely-find-his.html

In an age of formal term limits and parties dominated by presidential candidates (instead of the other way around), vice presidents often seem like natural successors. A lot of punditry is based on this assumption. There’s one problem: it’s wrong.

It’s not difficult to look back over presidential history to see that, in the party convention age, only two sitting vice presidents have been elected to the presidency in their own right: Martin Van Buren and George H.W. Bush.

With so few available observations, it’s hard to get a good read on exactly why this is. But we can get some help from the theory of political time. Skowronek’s theory, published in The Politics Presidents Make (first in 1993 and then in 1997), rests on the idea that some presidential politics is a combination of affirming and repudiating the past. Because vice-presidents represent powerful continuity with the outgoing regime, this theoretical framework is useful for us to think about when that continuity might have the best chance for political success. Under what conditions would the electorate welcome more of the same?

Presidents like Andrew Jackson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan all broke not only with their immediate predecessors, but also with the decades of dominant party rule that preceded them. I think it’s not a coincidence that they also had the most politically successful vice presidents. Jackson and Reagan had the only sitting veeps to win office. Truman is a more complicated case since he inherited FDR’s fourth term three months in. Truman was impressively resilient in the 1948 election despite growing opposition, and it’s an interesting counterfactual exercise to imagine how that election might have gone had FDR lived, and Truman been the heir-apparent rather than the sitting, accidental president.

The point about Jackson, FDR, and Reagan is this, though: the regimes were new and fresh. The break with the old set of dominant ideas and with the administrations of John Quincy Adams, Hoover, and Carter, respectively, were still relatively recent. (Obviously, a bit less so in the FDR-Hoover example.) Sitting vice presidents, while representing continuity with their predecessors, also represented the recent move away from old and problematic commitments.

For someone like Hubert Humphrey in 1968, the situation was much different. The cracks in the New Deal coalition were evident, and Humphrey’s nomination was controversial because he represented the party establishment, as a generation of new liberals sought to try something new and to reject the Vietnam War.

For ambitious veeps like Nixon in 1960 and Gore in 2000, the challenge was to sustain a “third way” approach to presidential leadership while the other party’s dominance remained strong. No presidential aspirant, sitting VP or otherwise, has pulled it off. What would it have meant to carry the Eisenhower or Clinton legacy? The question is harder to answer than for FDR or Reagan.

Gerald Ford’s fate is instructive here too. Like Biden, Ford served as vice president in late-regime preemptive administration. As a result, Ford, the most accidental of our presidents, a talented and once-promising politician, became a national punch line. Ford’s pardon of Nixon probably didn’t help. But Ford also contended with a party that was changing, from the party of Eisenhower, Nixon, and Rockefeller, to the party of Reagan, Phyllis Schlafly, and Richard Viguerie. In 1976, Ford wasn’t just challenged by a more charming politician. Reagan was also a compelling face of the new Republican Party, a clean break from the New Deal era as well as the Nixon administration.

Biden and Obama’s circumstances are different, of course. Impeachment fever seems to have died down. But the Obama presidency has been embattled and polarizing. More importantly, it will end thirty-five years after Reagan took office and reshaped the partisan debates. Biden’s political career predates this era- he took his Senate seat as Nixon began his second term.

Through the lens of late-regime opposition party struggles, the differences between Biden and Clinton are something more than just two candidates – even in primary polls. Clinton, although deeply affiliated with both Obama’s administration and her husband’s, represents something new. Not just for the Reagan era, but for American politics. A former First Lady, a wronged wife, a successful Senator, a popular Secretary of State. Women often have an easier time defining themselves as political outsiders (see Beail and Longworth for more explanation and references), and Clinton combines that with expertise in a very unique way. That said, I am skeptical of the idea that Obama can realistically be succeeded by a Democrat, precisely because of the regime dynamics described here.

http://www.nationaljournal.com/political-connections/the-volatile-senate-20140919

If Democrats lose their majority this year, it will extend a striking pattern: Since 1980, neither party has controlled the Senate for more than eight consecutive years. That persistent volatility marks a distinct change from most of the 20th century. Given the underlying trends in voting behavior, it's likely the Senate will continue to experience fragile and fleeting majorities. And that points toward both more partisan conflict and mounting pressure to rewrite Senate rules—like the filibuster—in ways that strengthen the majority.

Instability is a constant in the modern Senate. After the 1980 election, Republicans controlled the chamber for six years (until 1986); Democrats held it for eight (through 1994); and Republicans regained control for six, until the 2000 election divided the chamber exactly 50-50. The next two years saw the parties trading the gavel (as a GOP defector provided Democrats a temporary majority) before Republicans regained control in the 2002 election. But they held that advantage only until 2006, when Democrats won the majority Republicans are now threatening.

This turbulence contrasts with the 26 years of uninterrupted Democratic Senate control from 1955 through 1980. Earlier in the 20th century, Republicans and Democrats each ran off 14-year streaks of unbroken control. From 1895 through 1912, Republicans posted an 18-year reign.

*snip*

But, ironically, the margins are so small mostly because the territory each party commands is now so large. Each side dominates the Senate seats in the states that also usually support it for president. Some senators always surmount these trends to win, in effect, behind enemy lines. But overall, Democrats control 43 of the 52 Senate seats in the 26 states that twice backed President Obama. Republicans hold 34 of the 44 seats in the 22 states that twice rejected him. (Two states reversed from supporting to opposing Obama from 2008 to 2012, and they split their four Senate seats.) Extending the lens, Republicans control almost three-fourths of the Senate seats in the 25 states that have preferred their candidates in at least four of the past six presidential races; Democrats hold more than four-fifths of the seats in the 23 states that have supported their presidential nominees that often.

November seems certain to widen this divergence. Democrats face some danger in the two-time Obama states (with New Hampshire, Iowa, and possibly Colorado or Michigan at risk). But their vulnerability is concentrated in the states that twice opposed him: After November, Republicans might control 40 of the 44 seats in these reliably red states.

With each party consolidating Senate seats in its presidential strongholds, the prognosis is for narrow Senate majorities tipped by a few swing states and the handful of senators who win on the other side's natural terrain. Looking forward, the Senate's "natural division ... is very close to 50-50," says Emory University political scientist Alan Abramowitz.

Narrow majorities inherently encourage partisan conflict: When control is always within reach, the minority party loses incentive to help mint legislative accomplishments that fortify the brittle majority. "We used to call it a permanent campaign, but [now] it's an unending war that's been created by these narrow majorities," Mann says.

These electoral patterns promote confrontation in another respect. Because more senators are representing states that also usually support their side's presidential nominee, they face heightened pressure to reflexively back a president from their party—and oppose one from the other. As this dynamic constricts the opportunity for compromise, it seems inevitable that the majority party will further retrench the filibuster—which now induces stalemate far more than it does genuine negotiation.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/09/23/upshot/why-senate-control-matters.html?_r=1&referrer=

Democrats eliminated the filibuster last year for judicial nominees, allowing a simple majority of senators to confirm federal judges. The change has helped Mr. Obama put judges on the bench. Yet it has also made the process even more polarized, and a Republican-run Senate may simply refuse to fill judicial openings.

“A total shutdown is not out of the question,” said Mr. Wheeler, perhaps the leading student of the confirmation process. If that happens, Mr. Obama could end up leaving a smaller imprint on the courts than his predecessors, seating dozens fewer judges than either of them.

Federal courts only occasionally burst into the headlines, but they have a large influence. They often have the final say on policies relating to immigration, labor unions, business regulation, climate change, health care and same-sex marriage. The biggest issues go to the Supreme Court, but lower courts decide most questions.

Speaking of the Supreme Court: If a justice were to resign or die unexpectedly in the next two years, the Obama nominee who could win confirmation from a Republican Senate would be quite different from the kind of nominee a Democratic Senate would confirm.

The future. Remember one of the first lessons from civics class: Senators serve for six years.

Even if no major legislation is likely in the next two years, the people elected this November will be in the Senate for another four. The 2014 elections could well mean the difference between a Democratic Senate and a Republican Senate in 2017. (The map is more favorable to Democrats two years from now than this year.)

Imagine a Washington in 2017 in which President Marco Rubio and a Republican House want to cut top tax rates sharply — but Senator Bruce Braley, an Iowa Democrat who squeaked out a win in 2014, is part of a 51-member Democratic Senate caucus that stands in the way. Or imagine that President Hillary Clinton wants to push an immigration overhaul — but can’t get any momentum behind a bill in either a Republican-led Senate or House.

Then, once again, there’s the Supreme Court. In 2018, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg will turn 85, while Justices Anthony Kennedy and Antonin Scalia will turn 82. Anyone elected to the Senate this year is likely to vote on at least one Supreme Court nomination.

All of which is to say that while the 2014 election is certainly is not the most important of our lifetimes, it is important in some stealth ways.

With six weeks to go, the Republicans have taken leads over Democratic incumbents in Arkansas and Louisiana, while Senator Kay Hagan of North Carolina, another Democratic incumbent, is in better shape. The four tossups are in Alaska, Colorado, Iowa and — surprisingly enough — Kansas. The Democrats would need positive results in three of those four, along with North Carolina, to keep control.

The Upshot’s Senate forecasting model currently gives the Republicans a 57 percent chance of victory. That’s a real advantage, but it’s not a large one. To put it in terms of baseball, another subject that will occupy much of the next six weeks: The Democrats, for all their troubles, still have a better chance of keeping the Senate than even today’s best hitters have of reaching base.

[TerraPrime]

In keeping with the therad title, a recap of the clown show that is Kansas senate election:

1. Democratic Candidate (Taylor) decided to withdraw from the race so that the independent candidate Orman can have a better chance of unseating the incumbent Republican, Roberts.

2. Taylor went to the office of the State Secretary to ask about the proper way to withdraw from the race and get his name off the ballot. He completed the process as instructed by the staff at the office and filed the request before the formal deadline.

3. The next day, State Secretary Kobach declared that the written request was invalid because it didn't state specific reasons on why the candidate couldn't fulfill the duty if elected, and in the absence of such declaration, it's his discretionary power to decide.

4. Taylor and company filed suit.

5. During hearing in front of the Kansas State Supreme Court, Kobach asserted that he must certify the ballot by the deadline of the Sep 19 so that the overseas absentee ballot can be sent out in time, per mandated by federal laws.

6. The Kansas Supreme Court ruled on the 19th that Kobach must remove Taylor's name, because based on the past pattern, Kobach had reasonably granted other candidates the withdrawal under comparable circumstances.

7. Later in the evening of the 19th, Kobach declared that he would extend the ballot sending by a week so that the Democrats can replace Taylor on the ballot slot. This is in contrast to his testimony that the ballot must be sent out by Monday. This is also probably perjury since he gave a sworn testimony on the time line.

8. By Monday, he had changed his tune, probably because he got some legal advice from others who are qualified to tell him that he's fucking nuts to defy a federal election deadline to mess with the overseas ballots. So he sent out ballots without Taylor's name on the Senate race.

9. However. He also sent out a disclaimer letter with the overseas ballot, basically lying to say that the court has yet to make a decision (the court has), and that there might be other ballots coming to the voters in the future. If the voters use the current ballot, and then later, vote again using the alternate version hypothetical ballot, then the hypothetical ballot will be counted. If a hypothetical alternate ballot does not appear, then the current ballot will be counted.

10. Kobach is said to be trying to move the entire election back by a week. The. Entire. Election.

If you want, you can read all about it. Here's a google search link: https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=kansas+state+ballot&tbm=nws

This level of nuttiness takes a good amount of chutzpah to pull off, I must say.

[lokisnow]

Sounds like kobach is trying to engage in voter fraud on a massive perhaps unprecedented scale.

Hmm it's actually election fraud, but voter fraud sounds scarier and is a loaded term that comes with baggage, so it's a lot more fun to call it voter fraud.

[awesome possum]

But we've all been told only Democrats commit voter fraud. How do you think Obama was elected?

The Republicans, what they do is just stretch the rules for Freedom.

[Larry of the Lawn]

Wasn't this the plot of Black Sheep? Just have Gary Busey show up last minute and save the day.

[Mudguard]

I wouldn't call the latest shenanigans by Kobach election fraud or voter fraud, but it appears to me it's pretty pointless. There are 500 to 600 overseas ballots being mailed out in Kansas. Many of these will go to people in the military who are serving overseas. I think it's reasonable to assume, that out of this small group from a conservative state, a large percentage tend to vote Republican. Playing games that may result in the disqualification of some overseas ballots in a random manner (i.e. people who don't send in the second ballot if a second ballot is mailed out), isn't going to affect the results of the election. From a practical standpoint, it's a useless gesture, at least with respect to an effect on the election.

He's getting a lot of press from this though, and is developing a reputation as an extremely zealous/crazy Republican. I didn't know who he was until very recently, but now many people who follow politics know who he is. Maybe he's angling for a Fox news political contributor type job like Palin, or maybe he's going to leverage his new name recognition into a run at a higher political office.

[Paladin of Ice]

Google decides to cut ties with ALEC, largely over climate change denialism.

Google Inc. (GOOG) Chairman Eric Schmidt said the world’s biggest Internet search company made a mistake in funding a political group that opposes U.S. action on climate change.

Schmidt said Google paid the American Legislative Exchange Council as part of a lobbying campaign on an unrelated issue. Without elaborating on Google’s relationship with the group, Schmidt said facts about global warming aren’t in dispute.

“The people who oppose it are really hurting our children and grandchildren and making the world a much worse place,” Schmidt said on NPR’s “Diane Rehm Show” yesterday. “We should not be aligned with such people. They are just literally lying.”

Google confirmed in a statement yesterday that it won’t renew its ALEC membership at the end of the year.

...

ALEC develops model legislation for state legislatures. It was behind Florida’s so-called Stand-Your-Ground law that drew scrutiny after Trayvon Martin was shot and killed by a neighborhood watch volunteer who later was acquitted of murder. It has also pushed to repeal state mandates for renewable energy use.

The group has written model legislation calling for an interstate research council to study possible beneficial effects of climate change and to examine how regulations capping carbon may hurt the economy.

Quote from interview with Google CEO Eric Schmidt:

ERIC SCHMIDT: Um, we funded them as part of a political [campaign---somewhat unintelligible] of something unrelated. I think the consensus within the company was that that was some sort of mistake and so we’re trying to not do that in the future.

REHM: And how did you get involved with them in the first place and were you, then, disappointed in what you saw?

SCHMIDT: Well, the company has a very strong view that we should make decisions in politics based on facts — what a shock. And the facts of climate change are not in question anymore. Everyone understands climate change is occurring and the people who oppose it are really hurting our children and our grandchildren and making the world a much worse place. And so we should not be aligned with such people — they’re just, they’re just literally lying.

Google joins a wave of major companies parting ways with ALEC, including Microsoft, Kraft Foods, Coke, Pepsi, Intuit, and many others.

[ThinkerX]

Its faster for me to take public transit sometimes, depending on traffic and the availability of express lanes.

According to the 'Top Gear' fragment I saw yesterday, the fastest way to cross London is by bicycle, then boat, then public transit, and dead last, automobile.

That said, taking their cue from Kansas, the republican party here in the about-to-be-freezing north filed suit against the combined ticket (former republican Walker plus independent) for Governor. (Dem's bowed out of the race in favor of Walker). Naturally, those filing said suit are very loudly insisting this has nothing to do with partisan politics, and deny being directly associated with any specific campaign and appear genuinely baffled when people don't believe them on this. An expedited judgment on this suit is expected.

When one model creates a disaster, why not repeat?

[Shryke]

Yeah, NOW they are cutting ties?

Goddamn Silicon Valley fucks.

[TrackerNeil]

This level of nuttiness takes a good amount of chutzpah to pull off, I must say.

What makes it even nuttier is that Kobach serves on Pat Roberts' reelection team. If this kind of thing were going on in Somalia, the United Nations would send Jimmy Carter to intervene in an eminently corrupt situation. It's crazy, but that's Kansas.

[Commodore]

True, but a fully automated traffic management system guiding fully automated cars is still going to be pretty efficient. Efficient enough that I think people will opt for auto-car travel to such extent that passenger rail transit suffers (bus travel will likely survive longer because of poor people who can't afford auto-driven cars, assuming the "used" cars of 30 years from now aren't all automatic as well).

To really blow your mind, take it a step further. Instead of automated cars, what if there were autonomous cars?

They would be programmed to take your money (bitcoin), transport you somewhere, and use that money for refueling/maintenance as needed. With no person controlling it, only its software.

Basically, autonomous agents that transact with humans, collecting their money and using it in whatever way their code tells them to.

Then imagine autonomous agents engaging in transactions with each other, with no humans involved.

[Maltaran]

To really blow your mind, take it a step further. Instead of automated cars, what if there were autonomous cars?

They would be programmed to take your money (bitcoin), transport you somewhere, and use that money for refueling/maintenance as needed. With no person controlling it, only its software.

Basically, autonomous agents that transact with humans, collecting their money and using it in whatever way their code tells them to.

Then imagine autonomous agents engaging in transactions with each other, with no humans involved.

Isn't that called Skynet?

[lokisnow]

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/09/paul-ryan-declares-war-against-math.html

So, let us review. Obama enacted policies to increase revenue and slow health-care inflation, over the staunch and often hysterical opposition of Ryan, who insisted that budget forecasts showing that Obamas proposals would reduce the deficit were wrong. The deficit has in fact fallen very fast. Ryans response is to deny that any of this has happened, to castigate Obama for failing to reduce the deficit, and to propose new measures that would increase it. And he wants everybody to ignore the budget forecasters because their numbers wont bear out his claims.

Chait outlines Paul Ryan's war on Math (which seems like a comfy bedfellow for Republicans general war on Science) and rather delightfully eviscerates the weasel.

[TrueMetis]

Isn't that called Skynet?

Nah Skynet's smart enough to avoid bitcoin.

[Shryke]

I am the blood-pressure fairy, come to relieve you of your lack of appalled anger:

http://www.salon.com/2014/09/24/challenging_mississippis_depraved_justice_system_months_in_jail_with_no_indictment_and_no_lawyer/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=socialflow

The law—based on a 1963 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Gideon v. Wainwright—says they are entitled to a lawyer to represent them. But without a lawyer, they have no way of forcing the local courts to take notice. The law also says that people who are arrested must be formally indicted and that they have a right to a speedy trial—but the Mississippi judges in Scott County and the 8th Circuit Court District won’t give the prisoners attorneys to represent them until they are indicted.

And this is where it gets truly strange. In this, and other parts of rural Mississippi, judges only convene grand juries—the group that hands down indictments—three times a year. That means someone can sit in jail for four months before learning whether or not he has been indicted for a crime. If the district attorney isn’t ready to present a case to the grand jury because say, he needs more time to investigate, that person can sit in jail even longer—as Burks and Bassett have.

Why the lag in appointing a public defender? “I can only imagine it’s a fiscal reason,” says Mississippi state public defender Leslie Lee, explaining that the county likely saves money by not paying a public defender during that long lag period between arrest and indictment.

She worries about the scope of the problem: “The scary thing is, we don’t know how many people are out there sitting in jail like that. We have no statewide public defender system, no accountability or way to check if these defendants have attorneys.”

While the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in a 2008 case, Rothgery v Gillespie, that the accused are entitled to an attorney at every “critical stage” of the process, it did not clearly define what constituted a “critical stage.”

Most places have interpreted this to mean at the initial bail hearing. But not Mississippi.

“In a state like Mississippi where not having any representation at the initial hearing means you could be in jail without talking to an attorney for months, a bail hearing is a ‘critical stage,’” Buskey insists.

For the TLDR among you, basically they will arrest you and leave you in jail for up to 4 months with no charges against you, waiting for a grand jury to convene. Because you haven't been charged with anything, you can't get a public defender and thus there is no one to contest your 4 months or more of imprisonment.

And, of course, it disproportionately effects the poor and minorities because what in the US doesn't.

Mississippi: still there to make your state look better