The Alna Erratic: 2018

Monday, October 01, 2018

Tuesday, August 28, 2018

GOP ↔️ Racism

Over at SplinterNews, Hamilton Nolan argues that the GOP is "existentially racist."

The Republican Party exists primarily to enable rich people to get richer. Its most powerful tool for drawing public support to this niche cause is racism. Indeed, research shows it.

In the American system, money can directly purchase political power. Wealthy people and business interests have used money to purchase an entire political party. (And much of the other party, too, but at least that’s a mixed bag.) The entities who fund the Republican Party do so as an investment. And that investment pays off in the form of tax cuts and deregulation. You’ll notice that tax cuts are the only thing this inept Republican Congress actually managed to achieve so far.

Because “cut taxes on multimillionaires” is not a strong “populist” message, the Republican Party uses religion and patriotic flag-waving and culture wars to attract votes, out of necessity. But what works better than anything for this purpose? Racism. It is well understood and widely accepted that the shift among Southern voters from the Democratic to Republican Party occurred largely as a result of direct racist appeals by the Republicans, spurred by the civil rights movement. For the Republicans, civil rights were simply an opportunity to capture racist voters. And it worked. [...]

Anyone who rejects racism cannot in good conscience be a member of the Republican Party. It’s that simple. If you are a Republican who believes racism is evil, either vote Democratic, vote for a third party, or don’t vote.

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Conservative "freedom" means power, that is all

Commenter ifanyinterest nails it:

Conservatives don't want freedom. They want power. Freedom for those at the top is power over everyone else. Freedom for those at the bottom is a threat to power at the top.

"Freedom" for the GOP means taking out the government's ability to balance out the needs of the many against the needs of the few. Who cares if clean air regulations save literally thousands of lives? They cost shareholders money. Privatize the gains from polluting, but shove the cost onto the public.

In this case, regulation means putting the thumb on the scale to ensure that Facebook and Google become vehicles for conservative propaganda. It's never been about freedom. It's always been about power and control.

"States rights" = the freedom to oppress black people. It was about protecting slavery and then Jim Crow. "States rights" advocate Scalia still argued for the government's right to regulate marijuana. "States rights" has always been about protecting the power of old white conservatives. It was never a real ideology. It was always about power over others.

"The right to bear arms" = the right for white people to bear arms. Ronald Reagan and the Republican-controlled legislature in California repealed open-carry? Why? Because the Black Panthers carried openly. "Stand your ground" often doesn't apply to black people.

The TEA Party was created by Big Tobacco. The entire "get government off our backs" movement was funded by major corporations fighting deregulation. The TEA Party, which supposedly cared about the federal deficit, has gone entirely silent as Donald Trump blows up the deficit. It existed entirely to hamstring The Democratic Party's ability to control federal spending. They didn't want "freedom" from government healthcare. They wanted "freedom" for one of "their" guys to decide the budget, to work it so they get enormous subsidies in the form of unpaid tax cuts.

"Tough on crime" = "tough on poverty". Crimes associated with having none, such as property crimes, are responded to with the full force of the police state. SWAT teams are called out 50,000 times a year, often to serve warrants. Property crime account for $14 billion in losses each year. Wage theft accounts for $50 billion. Meanwhile, the agencies in charge of enforcing wage theft, protecting consumers, and policing corporations are gutted.

It's never been about freedom. It's always been about power. Power to tell women what to do with their bodies. Power for Christians to tell others how to worship. Power for wealthy businesses to pollute, cheat, and steal with impunity. Power to do whatever you want to black people--structural racism allows for poor whites to still have absolute power over others, so that they can buy into a system that has no constraints on power for those with money. The modern GOP is a fucking sham. It's about giving the powerful more power, and it spends literally billions of dollars a year to try and convince people otherwise, because it's a fundamentally untenable moral position. It's cancer.

Wednesday, April 18, 2018

ANOTHER another updated history of RCV in Maine

Courtesy again of the energetic Diane Russell:

First, I introduced bill after bill in the Legislature to create a Ranked Choice Voting election system. They told me it couldn't be done.
Then, we launched a citizen's initiative. I was stripped of my committee position for doing so.
Next, the people of Maine voted YES at the ballot box to get ourselves some better politicians.
Then, the Legislature voted to REPEAL the people's law because they liked the politicians we had.
So, we launched a People's Veto to stop the repeal. They laughed at us because, "it's impossible."
We collected 80,000+ signatures in 88 days in subfreezing winter weather to get on the ballot (AGAIN, but who's counting?) and force implementation for the June 12th primary.
The State would STILL not implement the law. So we sued. And won.
Then the Senate GOP (and some Democrats) voted to sue to STOP implementation of Ranked Choice Voting.
Last night, the Maine State Supreme Court ruled in FAVOR of implementing RCV in June, meaning the People won!

This is really good news. I've already noticed an unusual amount of civility among our 8 Dems vying for governor, because if you want to be someone's 2nd or 3rd choice you can't run the risk of trashing their 1st. Also: this a huge boost for the campaign of Zak Ringelstein, the awesome Democrat running for the seat now held by Angus King. If the People come through again for RCV on June 12, we can vote for the best candidate without fear of the spoiler effect.

Saturday, February 17, 2018

Framing: gun control vs. gun safety

Newreign talks back to an NRA shill:

I told her that if the NRA required competency training to own a gun, safety training to carry concealed, and advocated actually treating guns like we do cars, including requiring insurance, I would gladly support it and become a member.

This is, in my opinion, an opportunity to emphatically change the left position from the intrusive sounding "gun control” to the much more palatable “gun safety,” which is more conducive to getting legislation we want passed if liberals retake any part of the government in 2018 and 2020. We should take that divers license analogy and run with it. Literally.

Friday, February 16, 2018

RCV explained

Courtesy of Diane Russell:

A Brief History...

On November 8, 2016, we passed Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) at the ballot box.

On October 23, 2017, the Legislature passed a law to delay and repeal RCV.

On February 2, 2018, we submitted 80,000 signatures (72,000+ valid) to stop the repeal. According to the Maine Constitution, upon "filing," we blocked that law from taking effect, paving the way for an RCV election during the June primaries. At the same time, Maine people will be voting on the question of whether to restore RCV. (Hint: vote YES)

The final certification on the validity of the People's Veto signatures will not come back from the Secretary of State until late this month. However, I designed and personally oversaw every step of the compliance process and am fully confident we will be on the ballot in June.
We did not file this lawsuit lightly. However, since filing our signatures, there have been many statements by leaders that have genuinely confused Maine voters and brought uncertainty to the coming election. This lawsuit asks the courts to clarify the plan for the June primaries. Politicians and the Secretary of State have had since November 2016 to implement this and have not done so.What happens in the Primary if we win the court case?
If we win - and I believe the constitution is on our side - Maine voters will be voting in a Ranked Choice Voting primary where they can vote for multiple candidates in order of preference. At the same time, they will be asked whether they wish to vote for RCV itself.
People's Veto is FULLY ConstitutionalThe Supreme Court gave an advisory opinion at the request of the Legislature. It does not have the weight of a formal ruling, but we have decided to have that debate another day. The People's Veto restores ONLY the parts of law that are fully constitutional, including gubernatorial and state house primaries, federal (US House + US Senate) primaries, and federal general elections (US House + US Senate). We left intact the delay and repeal of the general election for governor and state house, which we will fight for in the future.

Tuesday, February 13, 2018

In case you were wondering

If you were wondering how Trump plans to pay for his tax cuts for billionaires and corporations, now you know: with $1.8 trillion in cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.
- Sen. Bernie Sanders

Sunday, February 11, 2018

The "Two Santa Clauses" long con

Thom Hartmann explains how the GOP has been punishing Democrats for 40 years:

When in power, spend like a drunken sailor. Also cut taxes. Give people stuff you can't afford to pay for, and slip them money while you're at it.
When out of power, howl about deficits. Make the Democrats cut spending and raise taxes. Deficits are the worst thing ever!!!
Get re-elected. Rinse and repeat.

It all started with Jude Wanniski, who proposed his evil Two Santa Clauses strategy in 1974:

Democrats, he said, had been able to be "Santa Clauses" by giving people things from the largesse of the federal government. From food stamps to new schools to sending a man to the moon, the people loved the “toys” the Democrats brought every year.
Republicans could do that, too, the theory went – spending could actually increase without negative repurcussions. Plus, Republicans could be double Santa Clauses by cutting people's taxes!
For working people it would only be a small token – a few hundred dollars a year on average – but would be heavily marketed. And for the rich, which wasn’t to be discussed in public, it would amount to hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts.
The rich, Reagan, Bush, and Trump told us, would then use that money to import or build more stuff to market, thus stimulating the economy and making average working people richer. (And, of course, they’d pass some of that money back to the GOP, like the Kochs giving Paul Ryan $500,000.00 right after he passed the last tax cut that gave them billions.)
There was no way, Wanniski said, that the Democrats could ever win again. They'd be forced into the role of Santa-killers by raising taxes, or anti-Santas by cutting spending. Either one would lose them elections.

Why am we just learning about this?

Thursday, February 08, 2018

Disgusted? Share.

from the good people at Ultra Violet.

Tuesday, February 06, 2018

What to do and where to go

Courtesy of the Good News Roundup over at Daily Kos, these are great links for connecting with other local activists, finding useful actions, and organizing events:

Indivisible	Indivisible435	Hope (an info app)
Swing Left	The Action Network	#Resist at Meetup
Flippable	Sister District Project	Postcards To Voters
The Resistance Calendar	5 Calls (easy impact)	Open Progress (texting)

and here are two more...

Social Justice Organizations at StartGuide.com

Environmental and Social Justice Organizations at Global Stewards.org

The Alna Erratic