The Alna Erratic: February 2018

Saturday, February 17, 2018

Framing: gun control vs. gun safety

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

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