We don’t discuss statehouse elections much around here for obvious reasons. Maybe 1 in 100 of my Pendejo Point, Florida* neighbors could identify our state senator and rep. If the people who live here don’t care, why should anyone else? But an interview in Slate with the former head of the Ohio Democratic Party, David Pepper, suggests that as individuals we need to start paying more attention to statehouse elections because “rigged state legislatures are destroying America.”
According to interviewer Paul Rosenberg, the book, “Laboratories of Autocracy: A Wake-Up Call From Behind the Lines,” is important because it “connects democratic erosion to corruption and the decline in America’s quality of life, and provides a wealth of ideas about how to fight back to protect democracy.” I haven’t read the book yet, but the points about corruption and quality of life resonated because I’ve observed that phenomenon in my community for decades.
Pepper’s description of what’s happening in Ohio syncs with what I’ve seen in Florida, another former swing state with a perpetual wingnut supermajority state legislature that is moving the government much further right than voter preferences seem to indicate. And people who want to push back, including me, tend to focus overwhelmingly on gubernatorial races and federal representation. Pepper says that’s a mistake.
As Pepper notes, state legislatures are incredibly powerful since the states run elections, draw districts and count votes. Since most people don’t know who their state representatives are, statehouse pols wield great power in relative anonymity, which Pepper calls a “toxic combination.” When these anonymous, powerful legislators lock in minority rule through gerrymandering, they are unaccountable to voters and corruption inevitably follows.
As an example of the lack of accountability, Pepper talks about how a policy that limited ballot drop boxes to one per county in Ohio created massive traffic jams in cities, which was good for Republicans because fewer Democrats voted. So, instead of removing that obstacle to voting (as a pro-democracy government would be obligated to do), the Ohio legislature codified the policy into state law. Now that same approach has spread to other Republican-run states, like Florida and Texas.
Pepper discusses how corruption at the state level lowers the quality of life for citizens, another thing I bet most of us have witnessed firsthand:
The general theme of these places, outside of extremism and anti-democracy, is a massive transfer of public assets and resources to private insiders. Public school dollars go to the private school donors who are starting scam for-profit schools. In other states, It’s the privatization of the energy grid, so in Texas they couldn’t even keep things going in the wintertime. Small towns not getting any infrastructure, because public dollars have been raided by the state to give out as tax cuts at the very high end.
If you add it all up, there’s a massive movement of public resources and dollars to private insiders. That’s why one thing that comes with broken government is a rapid decline in public outcomes. In Ohio, we’re living it. A great state is finding itself ranked last or close to last in everything from higher education attainment to health care. It’s because their M.O. with the statehouse is keep the private people happy and use public resources to do it, year after year.
Yep. Here in Florida, developers are often the primary beneficiaries in this corrupt transfer of public funds. Fat cat donors get appointed to powerful positions like public university oversight boards, where they have meddled with academic freedom to benefit their party, or hold posts where they can weaken environmental protections. And because state legislators who enable all this fly under the radar, people conclude all politicians are crooks and that government can’t help citizens. It’s a vicious circle.
Pepper says breaking the corrupt, anti-democratic stranglehold on statehouses will require a combination of federal action (like passing voting rights protection plus federal investigations into corruption at the state level) and individual actions (voter registration, fielding opponents in every statehouse race, general voter education on statehouse players and power, etc.). He cites Stacey Abrams as a model for how such a movement can work within the state. As a former state legislator, Abrams knows how this works.
I think Pepper makes a great case that states are where people who want to preserve democracy should focus most of their energy as activists and donors. After all, that’s where the anti-democratic forces started many years ago, and they grew so powerful over time that they’re poised to rip our democracy out from under us if we don’t fight back effectively.
America’s dumb celebrity culture probably contributes to phenomena like the “cult of the presidency.” It makes sense in venues like this to discuss the federal government that we share. But as individuals, it’s worth thinking about how to allocate our time and money for maximum impact, and I plan to pay more attention to the statehouse.
Open thread.
*Not the real name of my town, but arguably it would be more accurate!
Kristine
Downer update of the day, via this morning’s Just Security newsletter. Granted, it’s Politico, which has a vested interest in Bad News For Biden.
Definitely agreeing that as much needs to be done at the state and local level as possible.
Baud
Agree completely.
I also believe a commitment to straight ticket voting would be helpful because people do t have time to research their local dogcatcher candidates. But too many people are averse to making that argument because of the possibility that some imperfect Dem might get elected.
Baud
@Kristine:
Not really news at this point.
Jesse
Making participation at the state level more normal might help. In some (many? Most?) states, you’re in session for like a month a year. And/or you get paid like $5K/year. Practically a recipe for corruption. It’s not a serious job, despite the incredible amount of power.
CCL
Zoning Boards in local areas – Boards of Finance – etc. are important bodies in local politics – and are often populated by contractors, real-estate people etc. who are savvy about purse strings.
Hereabouts, anyways, Dems seem to prefer to run for school and library boards – but where we really their voices are on boards that tend to be magnets for Republicans. Many of these board positions often have Republicans running unopposed. Locally we had a sweep of Dem candidates in every race they ran, but the Zoning board, zoning board of appeals, etc. saw unopposed Republicans win – joining boards already dominated by them.
Kristine
These issues with Manchinema brought back a memory of something I read decades ago. I forget the context and where I read it, but it seems to apply to the current situation. It was something to the effect that the Senate considers itself the true ruling body/calm center of the storm/bulwark against what the hell ever. Representatives come and go, and even a president is around for 8 years max. Senatorial careers can last for decades, and that entrenchment leads to intractability and the sloth-like pace of even the smallest incremental change, which they consider a feature, not a bug.
I don’t recall if the author of the remark was pro or anti or simply stating a fact.
Okay, fine, again, not news.
jeffreyw
@Baud: I remember voting straight ticket here in Illinois but that was discontinued, under a Republican governor, IIRC. When a Dem won the governor’s office I expected it to go back but it never did.
ETA https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-01-18-9701180037-story.html
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Kristine:
They should never have allowed the Infrastructure Bill to pass if Manchin and Sienma wouldn’t agree to a filibuster carve out for voting rights
The Moar You Know
Pepper is correct. Don’t know who originally said “all politics is local” – probably a Sumerian – but it’s true. The GOP is trying – and succeeding – at stuffing our school boards and city councils here in SoCal full of 100% nutjobs who will tell you “Hitler was a socialist” and mean “Hitler didn’t go nearly far enough”.
I have a limited pool of funds to donate and frankly, they are all going to the local elections for the next four years. We have a raging fire at the federal level and I’m cognizant of that, but I ALSO have one in my backyard and frankly I gotta take care of that first.
I would like to know where all the money is coming from. The GOP here locally has spent MILLIONS on our school board elections alone. For a district that comprises less than 200,000 voters. I don’t see how it’s possible.
Baud
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
We’d be in an even bigger hole then.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Baud:
How?
David Collier-Brown
We see similar underlying pattern in Canada too, with two proposed major highway preferentially servicing land bought by major contributors to the Ontario conservative party’s Premier, Doug Ford (see https://thenarwhal.ca/highway-413-bradford-bypass-explainer/)
Baud
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
We wouldn’t have infrastructure or anything else.
Kay
@Baud:
We went back to printing and distributing a sample ballot locally, because local Democrats asked for it.
Voting a straight ticket makes a lot of sense in terms of how things actually work. But that also means there has to be some consistency and reliability among Democrats, so voters can use the Party as a proxy for a set of issues they generally support.
Barbara
Yeah, it’s no joke that some of the first legislation being proposed in the new Virginia legislative session will, by barely concealed stealth, pull money out of public schools and give it to private schools. It won’t pass because, thank heavens, the Democrats maintained control of the Senate, and there are actually Virginia constitutional bars to using public funds for the benefit of private schools. The proposed legislation seems to be trying to get around that by allowing parents to “choose” to have money follow their student. I hope those idiotarians who thought Youngkin was no big deal spend the next four years howling at the moon to protect resources for their own public schools. Northern Virginia — unlike DC — has only the most limited private school subculture.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@Baud:
We got the ARA passed last year. That was Biden’s win. They should’ve immediately focused on voting rights as that is completely foundational to everything else. If Manchinema really wanted the infrastructure bill, they would’ve eventually agreed
Kristine
@The Moar You Know:
They have more billionaires. From what I’ve seen, the ones who aren’t actively supporting the GOP are building hideouts in New Zealand and rockets to anywhere else. They seem to be more interested in isolating or starting from scratch elsewhere than repairing what’s already here.
Baud
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka):
I don’t think they would have. But whatever, alternative histories are as much bunk as predictions.
Baud
@Kristine:
Their billionaires are also more committed.
RaflW
Washington Monthly just put up an article about a WI state senator who won in a purple Eau Claire, WI district, beating Evers’ margin by 3pts in the city and 1pt in the rural parts of the district. I don’t want to slog thru arguments about “defund” but the guy makes some good points about not running the standard three-ring-binder consultant program for state & local races.
Conversely, what works in WWC Wisconsin in a district that is part mid-tier city and part rural isn’t a slam-dunk in suburban-exurban fringe districts in, say, Oregon or North Carolina. I think it does help point to how to better train volunteers to campaign slow not fast.
Another Scott
Yes, state and local elections are important!
But
“as individuals we need to start paying more attention…”
With respect, one could say that about any topic in the public sphere. It’s unrealistic to push these problems and concerns on people who are trying to survive the pandemic, or trying to keep their kids in daycare, or trying to figure out whether one should try to go to night school to get a certificate and move on to a different career.
Kay occasionally reminds us that “we need better elites”.
We elect representatives, pay attention to “thought leaders”, and give our elites lots of money so that they can take care of the nitty-gritty of keeping our government on track. They’re not doing their jobs.
Stacy Abrams and Fair Fight have done a great job. But she’s been in elected politics since around 2007. It’s a category error to expect that the rest of us can be her.
Yes, we all need to be involved citizens and do what we can. But the elites need to do their jobs.
Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kristine: no question the right has a financial advantage, but as Amanda Littman was pointing out last week, the Left can raise over a hundred million for Amy McGrath, leave Sarah Gideon with $14M in cash she literally couldn’t figure out how to spend…
I’m not saying this will be an easy battleship to turn, but we oughta try
(I gave Gideon a fair bit of money and don’t regret it, the polls were off. I don’t regret any of the donations I made to losing candidates. Never wasted a stamp, or a pixel, on McGrath)
Baud
@Kay:
Consistency and reliability are hard, especially because voters have become divided on their pet issues.
weasel
I feel that media consolidation and the decline of local newpapers is a big culprit in this local gov’t level corruption.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: along those lines, and again citing Amanda LIttman:
Joe Biden needs to…..
RaflW
I definitely want to plug Run for Something. They’re mobilizing several hundred candidates for things like school boards. It’s obvious that the right has targeted local control. We can’t just cede that ground. I know we have a thermometer to finish filling (hey, it’s over there! –> ), but if one has a few spare bucks, RfS is doing good work.
Early last cycle I had a bout a 10 minute zoom with their founder (I’d given what was then a fairly big give for her org, like 500 bucks specific to about a dozen of their candidates, and she just wanted to know a bit about my interests. A nice touch that I think she’d not have time for 2.5 years later!).
eta: @Jim, Foolish Literalist Yep that’s RfS’s founder. And she isn’t the type to say what Joe Biden needs to do. She’s all about raising grassroots funds.
Suzanne
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): How is that smart strategy? We’d be exactly where we are but also without an infrastructure bill.
Stop thinking of them as able to be influenced in the typical political ways.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@RaflW: no, I didn’t mean to impute that to her, it just drives me crazy that that’s the default position of so many “activists”, on lots of different issues
Yarrow
Americans vote for so many offices it can be hard to keep up with it all. Last week I was in an area not near my house and saw “Vote here” signs up. It was early/mid-January. What even was that election? I dunno.
Kathleen
@Kay: Our County Dems are great about sending sample ballots including judges. Dems have flipped a lot of County and judicial seats. It’s not a coincidence that Hamilton County was targeted when Rethugs drew their maps. Also City Council is dominated by Dems as opposed to the mix of Dems and Charter members. We have 1 Republican member but she’s not crazy.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
I’d like to know why Biden’s nominees to the USPS Board of Governors recently unanimously elected a Republican to be chairman who supports DeJoy
RaflW
@Kristine: That American heiress who lives in Florence, Italy but funded a big chunk of the Jan 6th insurrection, for example. She already lives in a crumbling, politically volatile country. Why fund more decay here? Jebus.
Betty Cracker
@Another Scott: I agree individuals can’t do it all, but as citizens who care about democracy, each of us gets to decide how we allocate our time and money. I realize I could do a better job of that. After reading the linked interview, I asked my husband if he knew who our state senator and rep are. He had no idea! Obviously, I haven’t talked enough about it! :)
RaflW
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Agree, yes.
RaflW
BTW, I noticed two of the Wisconsin congressional districts don’t yet have Dem candidates. It’s sacrificial lamb/grind territory. But having an even halfway decent Dem run gives blue voters in red districts something to select, hopefully something to turn out for, and means the shitstain R can’t just put out press releases and stay in D.C. all election season. Hmmm.
(Not to move back to national politics, but thinking as I often do about neighboring Wisconsin!)
satby
Still as true and applicable to other states as when she said it:
“All anyone needs to enjoy the state legislature is a strong stomach and a complete insensitivity to the needs of the people. As long as you don’t think about what that peculiar body should be doing and what it actually is doing to the quality of life in Texas, then it’s all marvelous fun.” Molly Ivins
Edmund Dantes
@Jesse: it’s this. Normal people can’t do state legislatures as it’s a part time job that often requires far more specific commitments with little to no pay that people with more normal jobs can’t afford to be involved in. So it tends to be loonies and people that have good incomes from passive sources or things that run outside their control (small business owners that are big enough to have managers to run a lot of it)
Kristine
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
No argument there.
Things are slowly changing here in Lake County IL. Democratic county board for the first time in years? Ever? Dem sheriff and other county level offices. A liberal friend is on our town’s zoning board and is very involved in local school boards, which are areas they never thought they’d get involved in. I signed some nominating petitions over the weekend, and mentioned to the canvasser that they might have a hard time in my neighborhood since it’s fairly conservative, and they said I might be surprised.
Betty Cracker
@weasel: You’re absolutely right — Pepper cites that as a factor in the linked interview.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I think it was in 2018, Charlie Pierce took an early trip to Iowa to get the lay of the land, and he went to a county Republican meeting where they were going to pick their candidate for county agricultural commission. It was a blood-red area so this meeting was pretty much the election. There were five candidates, and they all talked about abortion. County Ag Commissioner. They’ve been doing this for fifty years.
WereBear
I lived in Florida long enough to translate for myself LOL
sab
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): If we wanted the infrastructure bill we had to do it the way it was done, One out of two is better than nothing out of two.
Kay
@Kathleen:
I think it’s great when people feel comfortable saying they have other things to do so want a shortcut and it’s also very practical and aligns with how government actually works, where you need a governing majority. We can accomodate all levels of engagement. Scolding them that they need to make this a part time job is a loser.
Kathleen
I agree with Betty about need to focus on local elections. Gerrymandering took out my Dem Rep and Dem Senator. I didn’t find out until I went to vote in primary several years ago.
sab
@WereBear: I was young when I lived in Florida, so that wasn’t on our vocabulary list, but hilarious. Google does better than my little bowdlerized Spanish-English dictionary.
RaflW
@Betty: “When these anonymous, powerful legislators lock in minority rule through gerrymandering, they are unaccountable to voters and corruption inevitably follows.”
Yet another reason to bemoan the hollowing out of big city and state-level daily papers. The Gannetification of news sources like the once-proud Des Moines Register mean that there’s far less in depth coverage of legislatures.
The pandemic layering on that even the few assigned reporters are more likely to be watching hearings or session on video feed means there’s not even chance encounters for on or off the record scooping. It sucks, but our model for funding news is so damn broken.
satby
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): Not all of Biden’s nominees have been confirmed. There’s two still waiting, and at the time they’re seated there will be votes in place to remove DeJoy. There’s one current vacancy and one official still in place whose term expired in December. Which you could have easily found online; try Google more often.
Kay
David Pepper is really smart and really intense. I’m glad he isn’t disheartened.
MisterForkbeard
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): If there’s anything to take from this, it’s that the Infrastructure Plan would have also never passed.
Manchin/Sinema have no interest in any sort of compromise and aren’t accountable to anyone.
Kathleen
@Kay: Exactly. Anecdotally my Democratic friends said they were just going to vote straight Dem ticket period in our last city election. Our new mayor said first thing on his agenda is affordable housing. Our new city council members promoted each other during the campaign. I’m excited about our new leadership which is balanced with 2 outstanding incumbents.
Kathleen
@Kay: I’m not a fan but I can’t disagree with what he said. He did raise holy hell during our local redistricting meeting with the commission. He pretty much called Republican members liars to their faces.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@satby:
That’s all well and good and I hope the votes will be there once they’re confirmed, but the ones currently seated were Biden’s nominees as I understand it; why would Biden’s nominees vote to support someone who supports DeJoy who is destroying the USPS?
sab
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): It’s still mostly the old Board. Biden’s nominees are still in limbo
ETA I.E. not approved by the Senate (yet.)
debbie
I think states (Ohio especially) have been working under the radar for years, and only now (thanks to TFG) are people beginning to realize what they’ve been up to. Part of that is the issues they’re now on the brink of destroying (women’s rights, public education, public health, etc.) are the issues that really effect and matter to citizens.
They’ve become over-confident which always results in overreaching. This next set of redistricting maps (sometime next week) will force them to either comply with the voters’ will or expose their blatant disregard for the state’s Constitution.
Goku (aka Amerikan Baka)
@sab:
I could’ve sworn I read that two of Biden’s noms were seated already and they voted for the Republican to be board chairman. Maybe I was wrong
Kay
@Kathleen:
I’m maybe too easy on them in Ohio because it’s so hard.
“No one could do this job. Good luck!” :)
frosty
Even I can’t ID my state senator and rep and I’m an active volunteer.
sab
@Betty Cracker: I am finding it very liberating (timewise) to have decided to just vote Democratic for everything, because even the rational local Republicans become toxic if they aspire to higher office, so why even let them in on the ground floor.
lowtechcyclist
One problem is that state legislatures are typically only in session for two or three months a year. You might think of contacting your state legislator about something, but then you think, what’s the point? Especially if it’s summer or fall, and they won’t be back in the Capitol until the following spring.
This IMHO is a big contributor to the disconnect between the state legislature and the public.
The time that the legislature is in session, and the compensation that legislators get, is another problem in terms of corruption. The session is long enough that most people can’t take that much time away from their real job to be a state legislator, but the remuneration is generally too low to not have another job, or some other source of outside support.
So if you’re a legislator, either you’re rich, or you’re a lawyer or in real estate or some other profession with an extremely flexible schedule, or some private interest is providing some sort of sinecure for you. That’s not a good way to get a very representative legislature.
satby
OT: thanks to everyone who donated to SNAP of Michigan yesterday in honor of Betty White’s 100 birthday. We raised $470, approx. the copays for 14 cat spays or 8 dog spays. (Yes, they’re that expensive even with our discount). You folks saved potentially hundreds of unwanted puppies and kittens from being born. THANK YOU!
debbie
@Baud:
I always vote straight ticket and have for more than 25 years. Kind of a nuisance to find out which judge is which party, but I’ve taken that time. Now, the state GOP is considering putting each judicial nominee’s party affiliation on the ballot. I think they think they’re intimidating the Dems with this “threat,” but really, they’ll just make my life that much easier.
RaflW
@Another Scott: It’s not a great book, and Chris Hayes has certainly disappointed me various times since, but reading “Twilight of the Elites” did help me see how, as you say, we need better elites. And I don’t think we’ll get them. Not in the short term.
One of the things I’ve been repeatedly aghast at (though it’s probably at least in some ways not anything at all new): How someone like Ronny Jackson could have made it to the level of Rear Admiral in the USN, and yet be such a characterless, hollow vessel of ambition + sleaze that he now lies on the daily as a congressman.
I get that ambition is needed to rise to that height of command. But the slimy reliance on lies, pandering to idiots, and generally corrupt intent of his aims after leaving the USN! Speaks volumes to how badly a major institution is in promoting leaders (Flynn is another obvious indicator of elite decay).
Kathleen
@debbie: I loved that Republican Maureen O’Connor was the swing vote on the maps.
Kay
@debbie:
Just the SLIDE in public education in terms of national rankings. You can quibble with the measure but when you slip 10 slots you better start paying attention. “Maybe the other states got better”. Yeah, maybe but you recognize that’s not a defense, right?
Banning CRT and mandating hanging posters about God in each classroom fills a lot of legislative session hours, making it possible for them to not do any actual work.
satby
@Goku (aka Amerikan Baka): why do you waste time thinking about it? Until they have the votes to change things it’s not like it matters. And they have to work with those people, so waiting until the time is ripe for a winnable battle is a legitimate tactic.
debbie
@satby:
So depressingly true.
RaflW
@lowtechcyclist: My former sate rep here in MN was an educator. I don’t know where he taught, but he managed to have a deal where he only worked the fall semester each year, since the lege was in session starting in Jan and running 3-5 months. But that’s a rarity.
He was an important policy expert on education at the capitol. I wish it were possible for more citizen-leaders like him.
Anonymous At Work
Unrelated to politics but is there any industry for which customer service is worse than cable/broadband?
schrodingers_cat
I know both my state legislative rep and senator by name and they know me. They are both doing an excellent job representing this district in Boston. We have town meetings too, where we discuss our local issues like money for new playground equipment for the elementary school or a new fire truck. I feel Iike I live in a different country than what BC is describing up top. Anyone can speak up in the town meeting as long as they are registered to vote. And then we vote on stuff that impacts our taxes
I was elected to the town Democratic committee in 2018 and I have participated in stuff like voter registration drives etc.
Geminid
@Edmund Dantes: Virginia’s part time state legislators tend to be lawyers, with some doctors and real state professionals in the mix. My State Senator is a commercial real estate broker, while the Delegate representing Charlottesville is a university professor.
I actually don’t think Virginia would do better with a full time, “professional” legislature. There don’t seem to be any more corruption problems than in states with full time legislators, maybe even less. I would like to see state campaign contributions limited, though.
Betty Cracker
@sab: Agree, and for a person whose only participation in the political process is voting, that’s enough, IMO. That’s what my husband does. He’s not interested in politics. He doesn’t volunteer, doesn’t go to meetings, lets me decide how much money to donate and who gets it. But for people who are more involved, which I suspect includes a lot of us here, maybe it’s worth allocating more time and attention to statehouse candidates.
debbie
@Kathleen:
Oh, me too. I’ve never (until now) agreed with her, but her intelligence was undeniable. Can’t say the same for DeWine Jr.
debbie
@Kay:
They won’t care about rankings. They’ll wear their failures like trophies.
Kay
Are there any bigger frauds than the anti-cancel culture people? Hey asshole- you’re backing state speech codes and banning books in K-12 public schools- 55 million students. Maybe the Oberlin student council was never the threat you imagined it to be.
I denounce the exclusionary Yale Law school dinner parties. God, the BRAVERY. I could weep for them.
debbie
@schrodingers_cat:
That sounds like an old-timey movie. It’s good to hear that that is still possible.
schrodingers_cat
@debbie: Its the norm in small town MA. My town celebrated 300 years and the town next to us 350 years not that long ago. These traditions predate the American revolution.
trollhattan
@Kristine:
“democratic centrists” If those two are “centrist” I’ll consume my chapeau. If they were Republicans they wouldn’t even be RINOs, they’d be “one of us.” Also note Politico’s use of the lower-case d. Passive-aggressive much?
Kay
@debbie:
They do care about rankings though. They want to keep college educated young people in the state. They’ve decided to do that by awarding cash prizes, because they’re morons.
Kathleen
@schrodingers_cat: I know mine as well due to town halls I’ve attended. Alas they’re both Rethugs but my State Senator made an interesting comment. He said if he gets 20 calls/letters on an issue he pays attention because normally he doesn’t get feedback from constituents. If that’s typical for Ohio reps that says we’ve got a great opportunity to wield some influence. 20 contacts should not be hard to drum up
sab
@debbie: I am hoping the redistricting issue makes people more aware of what they have been up to. We passed the law twice by 75% and they still just ignored the law, as did three Republican members of the Supreme Court (” that partisanship section was just optional.”)
I heard Paduchik (Chief of Ohio Republican Party) at last Friday’s Cleveland City Club Forum and he said the redistricting was a mess, especially because one of the Justice’s “didn’t do her job”. Arrgh!! This is who they are.
Kathleen
@debbie: Really. They’re just flaunting their contempt.
Yarrow
@Baud:
Texas eliminated straight ticket voting as an option on ballots. Went into effect in 2020. I expect it will be a contributing factor to why downticket races won’t stay as Dem as people think/hope this year, even in traditionally Democratic places. It’s a pain to go through 16-18 pages of candidates and vote for each on individually. Texas also made it much harder to vote by mail so it’s not like most people will have the option of voting at home.
laura
I’m crazy about my state assembly member who was previously my city council member. His focus on early childhood education has never wavered and he’s done excellent work on justice and policing and now budget and higher education/student housing needs. He lives just up the street, he’s a visible presence in the community and I admire and respect his commitment to public service.
sab
@Betty Cracker: I pay a lot of attention at the primary level. I just will never trust a Republican
inwith office again.Betty Cracker
@Geminid: I’d like to see some data on the corruption question (F/T vs. P/T), but I don’t know where to start to look. It is kind of troubling that the structure mostly limits participation to the people who have the means and flexibility to take on a PT gig. My PT state rep and senator are a doctor who owns a big practice and a farmer who owns a ton of land. Both are self-dealing Republican crooks.
@schrodingers_cat: It could be that your community is more civic-minded overall, but I wonder if your neighbors are as familiar with their reps as you are. You served as a delegate, etc., in the past, correct?
The two Republican crooks who represent my area are occasionally featured in articles in the local paper (very flattering ones — the local rag is conservative), hold local meetings sometimes, etc., but most people don’t pay attention.
Baud
@Yarrow:
People can still look for the D candidate on the ballot.
Suzanne
@Kay: They want college-educated young people to stay because they want their money (college grads still make more), but then they don’t want those people to vote for Dems or to be queer. They want the prestige of the big hospital but don’t want to listen to the doctors who work there. They want the big skilled employers but don’t want employees who move in from out of state and raise the property values. It’s fucking exhausting.
debbie
@sab:
@Kathleen:
I really want this to be an issue in the next election. Both redistricting and recreational marijuana — the Legislature has purposely disregarded the will of the voters. “They’ll come for you too eventually!”
Mike in Pasadena
I enjoy reading Betty Cracker’s posts from the other side of the country. I’d like to read posts of local news from other states, too. I’m always interested in the antics of RWNJs across the country.
WereBear
@Anonymous At Work: health insurance
Geminid
@trollhattan: Sinema and Manchin both voted to convict Trump, twice each. That alone would qualify them as “RINOs” in the eyes of most Republicans.
debbie
@Yarrow:
Are you saying Texas can stop someone from voting for every Dem candidate?
Suzanne
@Baud: In AZ, there were a lot of nonpartisan races for things like City Council and judgeships and various commissioners and the like. Also there were plenty of referenda. When I voted in person, I found the sample ballot very helpful because I could figure it all out ahead of time and bring it with me. I asked the local LD to do an easy voter’s guide for all of these races and put it on social media. You’d be surprised how people thought that was a mindblowing innovative idea.
Kathleen
@Kay: When I called my state rep about one of their draconian bills (There have been so many I forgot) I made the point that Ohio will not retain or encourage talented young professionals with regressive legislation which in turn may discourage new businesses coming to Ohio. I played the Capitalism Card but I don’t think even that penetrates Republicans’ tribal cortexes.
Gin & Tonic
@schrodingers_cat: The old New England governing method of “town meeting” hasn’t traveled well outside of New England, AFAIK. Even still, where I live we will get maybe 1% of the population attending the annual financial meeting (where the town budget and tax rate is approved.)
opiejeanne
@schrodingers_cat: I know our state Senator, and the two State reps for our district (WA is strange). I’ve met them, talked with them, and campaigned for them. I doubt many of my neighbors can say the same. I’ve also met and talked to one of our US Senators, and our Congressperson.
I startled my son when he was visiting and we had had lunch across the street from Suzan delBene’s office in Mt Vernon. He noticed the sign on the building and I asked if he’d like to meet her. He was astonished that we could just walk in and talk to a US Congressperson. “Small state”, I told him. We didn’t go in, didn’t want to pester her, but we did talk to her assistant when TFFG was in office, to ask where the girls were. The girls being the kids separated from their parents at the border. At the time, we knew where most of the boys were but the girls seemed to have vanished.
Yarrow
@Baud: Oh, sure. But depending on the race the party is not always listed. And it’s a pain and generally easier to make a mistake since there are pages and pages to go through. People don’t know about all those candidates so they just quit. It’s one more obstacle to getting people to vote all the way down ballot. The Republicans in Texas did it on purpose to limit votes for Democrats down ballot.
cmorenc
@Baud:
Yarrow
@debbie: No, but it’s harder. It has to be done one by one instead of a straight ticket party vote option. Republicans took away the straight ticket voting option to make it less likely that people (Democrats) will vote all the way down the ballot.
Kathleen
@debbie: 20 contacts. All On The Line also suggested letters to the editor. That’s one avenue they seem to pay attention to
Also Ohio LWV has a booklet with tips on how to work with the legislature. It’s an excellent document ( I just skimmed it) but I think I’ll check it out again.
satby
@Baud: nearly impossible in races considered “non-partisan” even though those candidates are usually D or R.
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: The convention was online though. I am pretty active in town Dem Committee and the rep is from our town and the senator was a write-in candidate who I canvased for. So I am probably an outlier and not a normie.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: How many people do your state legislator and state Senator represent?
debbie
@Kathleen:
Public shaming it is then!
schrodingers_cat
@Gin & Tonic: Town meeting is attended by about 100 people. But the voter participation even in local elections is over 50% and close to 75% when we have federal level elections.
You know who doesn’t vote ? Young people. Many college students are registered to vote at their parents’ address and many are not registered at all.
Kathleen
@debbie: Love it!
Betty Cracker
@Mike in Pasadena: In that case, here’s a tale of wingnut corruption I highlight to everyone around here (where I live) who will listen. I discovered it by accident on Google Maps when I first moved here while looking for a shortcut.
There’s a road that’s identified as a county road on the map, and it would work as a shortcut for me when going to and from a nearby town — if I was allowed to use it. But while there’s a signpost identifying the road as County Road XYZ, it’s actually a county-maintained private driveway that leads to a local bigwig’s house on his family’s massive ranch. You can turn onto the road at either end of it where it meets other small highways, but you’ll soon encounter big gates.
I think it’s outrageous that our tax dollars are maintaining that prick’s miles-long private driveway. But no one seems to give much of a shit. “Oh well, that’s just the way it is…” I think that sumbitch should either pay for his own driveway or let the rest of us have the use of it.
Baud
@Suzanne:
I wouldn’t be surprised. It’s thankless work done by mostly ordinary people. Most of the are thinking about how to hold things together rather than thinking creatively about how to innovate.
lowtechcyclist
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Two thoughts:
First, the GOP probably didn’t raise much of that money from grassroots donations, because even on their side, there can’t be that many people contributing to races for what most people would consider a fairly esoteric office. I guess we don’t have big-money angels on our side who are focusing on Secretary of State races.
Second, if the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State is the primary fundraiser for these races, we’ve got a problem. Funding for races like these needs to be wrapped in with some better-funded group, such as the Democratic Governors Association, or the DLCC which funds state legislative races.
Because there’s the DNC, the DCCC, the DSCC, the DGA, the DLCC, and who knows what else, and the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State gets lost in the shuffle. Hell, I only found out in this thread that it existed, and like most of us jackals, I probably pay more attention to this shit than 90% of the electorate.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: Legislator about 40,000 people and senator about 160,000.
SiubhanDuinne
@satby:
I sent them a small contribution via PayPal, but there was no place (that I saw) to indicate it was for the Betty White Challenge. Did they basically count every unexpected donation yesterday as part of the BWC?
ETA: That’s good to know what an impact even a modest sum can have on the problem of unwanted puppies and kittens.
opiejeanne
@schrodingers_cat: That’s wonderful.
We live just outside the city limits so our local elections are for county and school district business, and we can only watch the nonsense in the town from a distance even though what they decide affects us. Most of the voters inside the city limits seem to not be very engaged.
We feel lucky to have some great activists for county issues (like zoning changes), and we get recommendations from the Democratic Party for most of the candidates in the elections, but there are always a few seats that are a complete mystery as to who we should vote for. Last election there were a lot of candidates who were unchallenged, which seemed odd.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat:
My new tactic in talking with young people about voting is to tell them their vote has way more potential impact than mine because no one expects them to vote. They don’t show up in polling. If they can get five or ten of their similarly aged friends to vote and those people do the same (and so on) they can shake up races like no one could see coming.
My most recent use of this tactic resulted in lots of wide-eyes and “Really?!” responses. I then had to walk them through how it works and they got kind of excited about it. Young people may not understand their power.
schrodingers_cat
@opiejeanne:These Town meetings can be soporific but hey no one said that a well functioning democracy is exciting.
Baud
@Yarrow:
From what I can tell, young people are told nothing they do matters because they don’t see instantaneous results.
ETA: I like your approach.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: That’s relatively manageable.
Brantl
@Another Scott: If we don’t elect ’em, they can’t do those jobs. The last time a non-elected official showed up to do a job he had not been elected FOR, he was thrown out (TFG).
WaterGirl
@Kathleen: I appreciate hearing the encouraging news.
satby
@SiubhanDuinne: Thanks so much! Yes, we just counted everything that came in yesterday as the tribute to Betty White. As I’m sure most other rescues did. I’m going to be looking for a place that aggregates totals to add ours to.
WaterGirl
@sab: The problem here is the “non-partisan” races where they don’t tell you who is a Dem and who is a Republican. Those races are absolutely partisan – everything is now. But you have to do a ton of research now on those judges and other “non-partisan” offices.
Yarrow
@Baud: The times I’ve employed it it has been quite successful. I think something about telling them “No one thinks you’re going to vote. They underestimate you.” and variations on that theme gets their attention. Makes voting seem subversive or something. Along with “Your vote therefore can have a much higher impact” makes them seem like they matter. Which they do. All of what I’ve said to them is true. No one will see them coming if they turn out in numbers.
lowtechcyclist
Seconded. It’s a particular problem at the local level. How the fuck do I know who would make a good Register of Wills or Recorder of Deeds or Judge of the Orphans’ Court? Town council, county council, school board, sheriff, district attorney, judges…the list goes on.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: Yeah in the number of people but the geographic area they represent is huge. (they = my rep and state senator).
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT: Our Supreme Court is pretty much a small town board meeting with a large Tea Party contingent and nobody can do anything about it
Sotomayor is diabetic and thus at a higher risk. I’d bet a large amount of money that there are other co-morbidities, besides age, on that bench.
Kathleen
@WaterGirl: I ‘m very optimistic about Cincinnati. Just looking for some communications wedges with state officials.
Yarrow
@lowtechcyclist: Yep. And the elections are always happening. Every time I turn around there’s another election. It’s little wonder people tune out and/or feel overwhelmed by it.
trollhattan
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: What a dick. Looks like he wants to be just like good ol’ mom.
opiejeanne
@Mike in Pasadena: There was an election a few years ago that included a couple of spots on the wastewater commission for Brightwater, our sewage plant. Two of the R candidates ran on a platform accusing the board of a commie plot to do something nefarious with the treated water. I wish I remembered exactly what it was now because it was hilarious. There are people here who still rail against fluoride in the water, because it’s a commie plot, not because of suspected health problems caused by its presence.
Another Scott
@Brantl: Sure.
People need to turn out for every election. And vote for every Democrat for every race as long as the GQP is insane.
But only a tiny percentage of voters will be watching what their elected representatives do with any regularity. It’s unreasonable to expect that percentage to be high.
It’s the job of local parties to make sure that people on the ticket are vetted and sensible. It’s the job of the elected people to respect their oaths and follow the rules and norms. It’s the job of the news reporters to watch what those representatives are doing and report on it. It’s the job of prosecutors and law enforcement to make sure that charges of malfeasance are investigated and prosecuted. Etc.
Voters have a vital part to play, but not the only one.
Cheers,
Scott.
Geminid
@Betty Cracker: The part time and full time models for state legislatures each have their advantages and disdavantages. The occupational profile of Congress seems similar to that of part time legislatures. But that may be because many Representatives advance from state legislative office.
If one is looking at the prevalence of nuts, the full time nature of a U.S. Representative’s job doesn’t seem to screen them out. They used to be more scarce.The bumper crop of nuts we have in Congress now is a result of them taking over the Republican party.
Like you say, it would be good to have some data on corruption in part time vs. full time legislatures. The lack of data enables me to spin my theory of the case: that a full time legislator with a fixed salary has more incentive to sell favors than a part time legislator does, and maybe more time to think about it. But I only observe Virginia politics from close up, and Florida seems to be a very different beast.
danielx
From WaPo:
Florida governor proposes special police agency to monitor elections
It Never Stops.
Kathleen
@danielx: What could possibly go wrong?
Brantl
The Rethugs have adopted the termite tactic, they’re infesting everything that they can get their hands on, and turning it their way. They have organized around fear and hate, and we need to organize around cooperation. They have organized around spite (good as a motivator, bad for morale).
This reminds me of the difference between the Boy Scouts and the Girl Scouts. The Girl Scouts publish this massive book about all the activities that are available for their kids, or any kids, really, to do in their state. The Boy Scouts don’t have squat. We need to do a better job of “prepping” our constituents, and the PARTY AS A WHOLE needs to get involved in that. We should have our equivalent to Frank Luntz, we should have people working to keep Democrats and Independents informed of who the good judges running for judgeships, are. We don’t do this stuff well enough, and we need husbandmen in every state to make sure we have somebody running for every damn office in the state.
We can’t let them keep mailing in taking control of our states. We’re focusing only on the top, and they’re cutting us off at the knees.
Anonymous At Work
@WereBear: Ouch. Health insurance makes its money by confusing people into signing up for policies that over-protect the areas that aren’t used and under-protect the areas that are used. Cable companies make money by signing up people up and providing services.
Miss Bianca
@satby: You’re welcome! Good to hear!
The Moar You Know
@RaflW: I know you’ve heard this one before: better to rule in hell than serve in heaven.
pat
@Baud:
I never vote for repubs, even if one is running unopposed, not going to get my vote.
Wisconsin is also such a place, dem voters 50%, seats in the assembly 30%. Dem governor elected, lame duck repubs take away most of his authority before he is installed, now are quoted as saying that Evers is a failure.
Like how Biden is a failure….
Scary stuff altogether.
The Moar You Know
@debbie: I go to “judgevoterguide.com” and vote for whoever they hate the most. Works like a charm.
Gin & Tonic
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I don’t get why Sotomayor was forced to be remote and not Gorsuch.
opiejeanne
@schrodingers_cat: Haha. I used to go to city council meetings a lot when we lived in Riverside, CA. It had about 200,000 population back then, a third larger now. There were almost always open seats in the meeting room except when something kind of big was in the offing.
What got me started attending was we had a corrupt pod of 4 council members out of the 7, known as the PALM quartet, and one of the first actions of the last one elected was to propose to eliminate my husband’s job in the city government . Pinter, the P in PALM, owned a surveying company, and he proposed that they lay off the civil engineer in planning because he thought he’d get more business. Talk about not knowing how things work. I was 27, started out by saying, “We voted for you, etc.” and then chewed on him in that meeting about what civil engineers do for the city.
He made the mistake of asking how I was such an expert on the subject, and I said, “My husband’s is the job you want to eliminate.” The room roared, some with laughter because who was this young woman, anyway? It was voted down. (Part of my husband’s job was to supervise the surveyors who worked for the city.)
I later brought them down, by talking to a reporter for the local newspaper. She was introduced to me by her married name so I didn’t realize that she was someone whose column I always read and admired. I mentioned that the paper was pillorying the planning department for shoving through so many approvals for new houses ahead of the moratorium on new builds, and I told her that the truth was that they were being forced to work 60-70 hour weeks (overtime not paid) in order to do so, under extreme pressure from the PALM group and the city manager. Two days later the newspaper had several articles focused on them and what they were doing, and the outrage was such that they and the city manager had all resigned within a couple of months.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Nina’s report was infuriating. As much as I hated him, Scalia would have knocked Gorsuch’s teeth out for being so insensitive
ETA: Meanwhile, the RWNJ radio world persists in calling her idiotic and not at all knowledgeable.
RaflW
@Gin & Tonic: Roberts is chickenshit.
Betty Cracker
@danielx: Perfect experiment for a laboratory of autocracy. If this thing is allowed to happen and helps DeSantis intimidate opponents and suppress votes, other wingnut-run states will adopt it.
This news was widely covered by the Florida dailies last week and seemed to get a fair amount of pushback. People were pointing out that DeSantis originally claimed the 2020 vote was flawless, so why direct millions to this, especially since local law enforcement agencies have fewer dollars and bigger problems. We’ll see.
debbie
@The Moar You Know:
Thanks. I see with rankings like this, you’re right.
Judith French was censured after she told her audience to vote for conservatives like her. Nonparitsan, my ass.
lowtechcyclist
@Betty Cracker:
But even if they were the most honest of people, they’d still see the world from the perspective of their privileged vantage points. The deck would be stacked anyway, but they’d be taking unconscious rather than deliberate advantage of that.
The notion that someone could not afford to be a legislator is inherently undemocratic.
debbie
@debbie:
Funny, their “about” page says nothing about who they are or what their slant might be. I hit almost every page, but then came across this:
They just gave themselves away. Not very bright.
debbie
@RaflW:
She’s got seniority. ??♀️
Miss Bianca
@Gin & Tonic: particularly since such a provision would likely have instantly compelled compliance.
The Moar You Know
@debbie: Oh, they don’t care. They know who their audience is. Thing is, that cuts both ways and I see no reason not to use all their hard work and research for my own agenda.
AND WHY DON’T DEMS HAVE ANYTHING SIMILAR? Good God. Every seat in the goddamn country, we ought to have something just like this. At least one. They have two that I know of off the top of my head – biblicalvoter.com is another. I’m sure there are dozens more.
dc
The state legislature is where I put my door knocking (pre-Covid) and phone banking time. That’s where it’s at. Pay attention to your state government, get involved in some way and give money.
gene108
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’ve been getting emails from the Democratic Association of Secretaries of State (DASS) recently. Might be worth donating to. Link to DASS Act Blue fundraising page
Adam
What hurts Ohio as well is that the state D party is criminally incompetent. And I think David did a good job, he’s a smart guy. But the party needs to be completely razed and rebuilt. Too many old timey people that would rather retain their power than win elections.
Betty Cracker
@lowtechcyclist: Exactly right. I’m also not a fan of uber-wealthy politicians saying they won’t take a salary if elected. We’re supposed to be grateful for that? I’d rather they take the damned salary, which implies an obligation to the taxpayers who are paying it that a volunteer gig does not.
Betty Cracker
@Adam: I don’t know the first thing about Ohio politics, but you’ve described the problem here in Florida to a tee…
Matt McIrvin
@Kristine:
The important thing Mitch McConnell managed to do was to create a mechanism for obstructing nearly 100% of any Democratic President’s agenda and couch it in terms that made it seem like it was the “cooling saucer” function, when it was really “Democrats don’t get to do anything at all.”
But it should be obvious to anyone who’s on the inside, especially if they’ve been around for a long time. So either they want “Democrats don’t get to do anything at all” and are being disingenuous, or they’re extraordinarily dense.
BlueGuitarist
@Betty Cracker:
I think it makes sense to put additional effort/resources into
winnable state legislative elections that overlap
competitive US House elections
in states with important statewide elections, especially competitive US Senate elections.
BlueGuitarist
Late getting to this excellent thread.
Love y’all
Soprano2
@jeffreyw: The Republicans here did away with straight ticket voting under the theory that it helped Democrats, but I don’t think it did much of anything other than make it harder for Republicans. Shoot, down here several years ago we got an unqualified person voted in as public administrator because people could still vote straight ticket. Their candidate was unable to get bonded due to some shady financial stuff in her past. They had to put the Democrat who had previously held the post back in it!
Suzanne
@Baud: A lot of young people struggle with the mechanics of voting. Like, just take registration, for example. Motor voter doesn’t help if they don’t have any reason to go to the DMV. Or if they get a license at 16 but then have to register at 18. Even for me, who is really into this stuff, registering in PA was a PITA. Had to have a bill with my name and address on it, which I didn’t really start getting until we’d been here for a few weeks, and my mom doesn’t get bills, so I had to state that she lived in my house so she could register. When I was in college, I legally couldn’t register to vote with the local address when I lived in the dorms, and getting an absentee ballot was a terrible pain. Like, in every way we make this more difficult than it should be.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
speaking of De Santis vs trump … the O’Bros were talking about this, I was multi-tasking and didn’t hear that it was Roger Stone
Omnes Omnibus
Everyone who is worried about local elections needs to go to the next thread and donate if you can. If you can’t, maybe publicize it somewhere. Or just cheer on the good work. We have raised money to support get out the vote efforts in GA, AZ, WI, and now MI. Let’s keep up the effort.
Another Scott
@lowtechcyclist: +1
Similarly with the US Senate – their pay hasn’t increased since 2009.
I’m a strong advocate of full-time legislators. The “Virginia Way” is bunk. Commercial interests who are willing to dump millions into races for these “part time” positions shows how important they are. People who aren’t independently wealthy need to be able to run for those positions and be able to pay their bills.
Cheers,
Scott.
schrodingers_cat
@opiejeanne: You are my hero! Well done 27 year old you.
Fair Economist
Terribly late to the thread, but my opinion on this is “Oh God, Yes!”. We have a federal system and conceding the state level to the Regermagains is very bad even if we hold the federal level, and possibly catastrophic because it becomes harder to hold the federal level.
schrodingers_cat
In Massachusetts, registering to vote is pretty easy and can be done online. If you are registering for the first time after filling and online form, you get a letter from the town clerk confirming your registration and other details you have provided.
I had to complete my naturalization application which is a four step process and can take several months to complete. It took me 6 months from start to finish. For most people the process of registering to vote is easier than that because they are already citizens in the first place. That’s the zeroth step.
Voting is the least a citizen can do.
(Steps in the naturalization process:
Application
Biometric scan
Interview
Oath)
Soprano2
@Kay: Of course some Republicans here are trying to pass two awful bills re: CRT and education. Even some Republicans are aghast at what they are trying to do. One of them brought up that we don’t want a law that would make teachers feel they have to teach both sides of the Holocaust, like what happened in Texas. I’m hoping that the worst of it won’t make it into law, but I’m sure they’ll pass something because they have to keep propping up the panic – it helps them raise money.
O. Felix Culpa
Just popping in to say that the White House has started a soft launch today of the website to order free COVID tests. The official start is tomorrow, but I just ordered mine at covidtests.gov.
CaseyL
@Yarrow:
??!! It’s too much trouble to work through 18 pages, in order to vote for the candidate they prefer?
Maybe they can pretend they’re reading statistics to pick a Fantasy Sports team.
Old School
https://www.covidtests.gov/ has gone live for those wanting to order tests
Edit: And O. Felix Culpa has gotten there first.
japa21
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: It would seem to me that the Chief Justice could actually mandate mask wearing while the Court is in session. Oh wait, mandates are a Dem thing. Foolish me.
Ruckus
@Kristine:
The house and senate were set up like this for a reason. Land was considered more important than people. Land owners were the political leaders. Many of those land owners believed that the “people” could not govern at all, it took someone who had managed to own land to handle the business of the state and also to insure that land owners ruled of course. So the direct reps had to run for office every 2 yrs, while the reps of the land – and land owners only had to run every 6 yrs. And remember that as the number of states and population grew the house used to grow. Until it started to get too big and those landowners (richer) started to see their power erode and the size of the house was fixed. The land, in the form of the senate, has effectively, more power than the people, in the form of the house. CA district 27 has almost 200,000 more people in it than the entire state of Montana. MT has 2 senators and 1representative and CA has 2 senators and 52 representatives. CA has just under 40 million population and MT has just over 1 million. Here’s a good listing of the population and differences List_of_U.S._states_and_territories_by_population
Soprano2
@opiejeanne: OMG that is so hilarious! Treated water is discharged into a stream or other body of water, or as we do with one of our plants here it’s sent to the electric generation plant right next door for cooling, since it’s actually purer water than they can get from the water system! I can’t imagine what nefarious purposes they thought water from the sewage treatment plant was going to be put to, but I’d love to know.
Another Scott
@O. Felix Culpa: @Old School:
Thanks. Easy-peasy. Name, address, email address. Shipment starts by the end of January.
Cheers,
Scott.
(“Who had some unusual sinus drainage late last night and is developing a headache now…” :-(
UncleEbeneezer
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Kimberly Atkins Stohr reported that once they were inside and seated to hear arguments, Alito and Thomas also took their masks off. So while Gorsuch is getting the most attention for walking in without one, there were THREE Republican assholes going maskless on the SCOTUS bench.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@O. Felix Culpa: Ordered mine. Thanks.
Cameron
Our Liberal Media are part of the problem, too. As is probably true everywhere in Florida, the Manatee County Commission is owned by the developers, but you won’t learn much about that from the paper of record (Bradenton Herald). No, the only source that I’ve found for dishing the dirt is a small, online vanity project, the Bradenton Times.
One idea I’ve been exploring is to try to get some of the groups that focus on local issues involved in Manatee and Sarasota Counties. I think it might be helpful if people could find out more of how their interests can be served through local politics. Institute for Local Self-Reliance, Strong Towns, Rural Assembly, etc.
Cameron
@O. Felix Culpa: My friend who’s in the hospital with covid just texted me about this.
japa21
@Old School: Ordered mine a while ago. Super easy.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Roger sounds kind of jealous. Emerald seems to be both their type.
Gin & Tonic
@O. Felix Culpa: Thanks, just placed an order and sent the info out on the family chat.
Ramalama
@RaflW: My young cousin ran for a super local spot in his Chicagoland town and used Run for Something as his advisor. And he won! Totally recommend the book.
debbie
@O. Felix Culpa:
Thanks! Yikes, through the post office! It will be interesting to see how long it takes people to get them.
BlueGuitarist
@Ruckus:
You’re right that this is a profound problem, but worth noting that at the Constitutional Convention James Madison (and others) argued that the Senate should be proportional to population.
Madison: “the proper foundation of Government was destroyed by substituting an equality in place of a proportional Representation”
this could result in “the majority of States… injur[ing] the majority of people”
this “evil instead of being cured by time would increase”
Long overdue for DC to be admitted as a state.
TheTruffle
@Kristine: I’ve read that the Dems are coming up with a plan B. They should go ahead with the vote anyway, get people on record, and use the campaign ads against GOP incumbents.
Kay
An absolutely insane position for a political party to take. Go look for an example of Republicans telling their voters they aren’t good enough voters. You won’t find one.
I get the frustration but this has to stop. It’s bad on every level.
Baud
@Kay:
Is he talking about voters or Congress critters outside of leadership?
ETA: he’s still wrong. It’s really only two people at this point.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Gin & Tonic: I sent a text to Madame, she ordered hers as well.
The Moar You Know
@Suzanne: To REGISTER TO VOTE? That’s fucking lunacy. I think I had to provide a driver’s license. That’s it.
The only thing you need a bill with your name and address on it for in CA is to buy a gun. Seriously.
Kay
@Baud:
No, sadly it’s us. We suck:
It’s not even true. Lots and lots and lots of people tried to move Manchin and Sinema. Stacey Abrams wrote a voting rights bill with Manchin, so HUGE sacrifice on her part.
You can’t talk to them like you’re their supervisor and they haven’t met production goals.
Matt McIrvin
@Suzanne: When I was in college, I missed the 1986 midterm election entirely (the first one where I was eligible to vote!) because, even though I was registered in my home district, the mechanics of figuring out how to request an absentee ballot were more than I could be bothered to do at the time, while navigating my first semester of college.
But… that was before the Web. Though I eventually figured it out, I don’t even remember what the mechanism was–probably you needed to pick up some kind of mail-in form at the post office. These days, it shouldn’t be too hard to at least figure out what the procedure is. But it does take some effort unless the ballots get mailed to everyone.
Old School
@Baud:
Seems like Congress. I can only find Mediaite’s 18 second clip, but the question was why Biden didn’t put his full force behind voting rights.
So Green Lantern-ism from CNN, but unlikely to be focused on voters in response
Edit: I see Kay had more context.
Matt McIrvin
@The Moar You Know: A lot of this stuff is trivial if you have a driver’s license with your current address on it, but gets much harder if you have no driver’s license. It’s a significant divide since we have no universal ID cards.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay:
But they are in fact better voters than we are. It’s because they’re complete hacks and cult-followers who do what they’re told. But that’s how things get done.
Jinchi
I just saw another headline telling me that
“Sinema and Manchin support voter legislation, but….”
It would be really nice if some reporter would ask them, ‘If you support it, what have you done to get it passed?’.
It’s pretty astounding that the statement can be headlined without any justification at all.
debbie
@Kay:
Yep, just like those boycotters from last week. We want it all NOW!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Matt McIrvin: I’m going to have to find a time in my schedule which still seems to be flexible to go to the DMV and get my RealID California Driver’s License since I’ll need it to take the test for my Remote Pilot License.
Scout211
You can order your free COVID tests kits now. The order site is up and running.
ETA: Others have already posted this. Late again, I guess.
Soprano2
@Kay: Yes, just a crazy message to your voters. I have no idea what Begala is thinking to say this.
trollhattan
Am I to take it on face value that these mooks are 100% in favor of muzzling the California court system and letting voters and the legislature have their way? I don’t think that means what they think it means.
What’s their take on Bush v. Gore, 2000? Pretty activist judges on display.
lowtechcyclist
And we can’t have those because Number of the Beast and all.
But doesn’t pretty much every state allow people to get an ID that is just like a driver’s license, except it doesn’t authorize you to drive?
Seems like Dems could channel some money towards making sure people who needed an ID to vote, got one of those.
debbie
@trollhattan:
No, what they want is legislating from the bench their way. ??♀️
Ksmiami
@Jinchi: I just left a message for Sinema
sab
@WaterGirl: In Ohio judges are partisan in the primary and non-partisan in the general election. I kid you not. So I keep a list of the Dems on my ballot for the general election.
Geminid
@Kay: The context of Begala’s facile answer was the question, Why is it that Biden can push an Infrastructure bill through, but can’t push a Voting Rights bill through? It was a fairly silly question, but Begala gave an even sillier answer. He dressed his snappy sound bite up with a historical example that isn’t really applicable, but thumbs today’s voting rights activists in the eye.
This is the kind of “support” Joe Biden does not need. Begala hasn’t made much of a showing in practical politics since 1992, and I can why.
Jinchi
The correct answer was
“Because Manchin and Sinema wanted an Infrastructure bill, but they don’t care about Voting Rights.”
And this is the correct answer from a political view as well as a literal one. Manchin and Sinema care about their reputations. Begala scolding the little people undermines the Democratic party and elides the responsible parties. Begala scolding the Senators would at least spark a reaction.
Jinchi
@Ksmiami: Great. Hope you get an answer from her.
Soprano2
Well, I just saw on FB that my 7-year-old grand-niece has Covid. I don’t know if she’s vaxxed, but her parents are. The most worry is for their 3-year-old. I hope none of the other family members get it, but with Omicron I won’t be surprised if they all have it in a few days. Thanks, idiot governor who declared the Covid emergency “over”, and idiot state attorney general who is suing schools to make them discontinue their mask mandates because seeing masks on kids’ faces makes them feel butthurt. Our local public school put theirs back in place for teachers and staff members because of staffing problems. From what I can see on the local Covid dashboard it looks like Omicron started here in earnest about the 3rd week of December, so we’ve got a couple more weeks of this to go before it starts to subside.
Matt McIrvin
@lowtechcyclist: Yes, but they don’t necessarily make it easy.
I think it’s actually federally required now for a REAL ID-compliant ID to exist. But they’re not free.
(I don’t currently have a REAL ID because I’d heard passport+driver’s license would suffice if you don’t have one, and I have an active passport. But my driver’s license needs to be renewed this year so it probably makes sense to go that route with the renewal.)
TheTruffle
@Geminid: Is Begala even much of a player anymore?
Dorothy A. Winsor
Over at LGM, Campos just posted a rumor about Breyer’s retirement:
trollhattan
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
If Biden gets to nominate, will Manchin and Sinema play nice?
The LGM folks have been tearing out their collective hair over Breyer and yet I don’t know whether his retiring is more dangerous than staying on.
StringOnAStick
I’m hoping that I’m seeing a case of Mango Moron follower over reach here that is going to bite them in the butt in this rapidly blue-ing area. Today the county sheriff is having a closed door meeting with some local militia loonies, and that is hitting the local media, hard. Next a story came out that the 2 R county commissioners told the ReStore America loons that they can hold their big Flynn-headlining event in the county fairgrounds building without masks (coming in April). The D we voted onto the commission has stated he will go to OSHA about it and now the two R’s are backtracking. Both those R’s are up for re-election this year and I am willing to bet there will be good D candidates running against them. They’ll get lots of press because you just know the event in April will be a shit show.
J R in WV
@Betty Cracker:
Here in WV that would be criminal. They do mow along the county roads, and last summer the guy mowing tore up the holly tree beside our driveway. But we can’t even get a small load of gravel pushed into the driveway where it meets the county road. I would hope no one can!
We’re hoping the holly tree pulls through, it’s a wild volunteer that lit too close to the county road for its own good…
One thing they do here now, when someone gets busted for election fraud, which it much more rare than it once was, on their plea agreement they make them swear to never run for elected office ever again, ever!
You would think that being convicted of election fraud would make it hard to get elected, but not so much…
Kay
@Geminid:
I disagree it’s a silly question. You know why and I know why and Poppy knows, but to a normal voter it’s a real question. Tell them and then tell them again. It really isn’t incumbent on them to memorize senate rules.
I think there’s a reluctance among people like Begala to say “Sinema and Manchin are holding it up”, but I think Democrats should say that to their base because it’s the truth. It’s just time to level with them. They don’t have to give them a solution! Just bring them in on the problem. They’ll get the rest themselves.
Omnes Omnibus
@trollhattan: They have played nice with regular judges. That is one of the main planks in the case against excommunicating them.
Baud
@Kay:
Just catching up to this. Agree that PB f’ed up in his response to the Green Lantern question.
Yarrow
@CaseyL:
It’s hard work to read up on the races to pick your preferred candidate and information you might want isn’t readily available. People feel intimidated and that they might vote for the wrong candidate. So they don’t vote. Figure those who know more will vote in those races.
The way people are talking it seems like this drop off in down ticket voting is some new discovery. It’s not. It happens every election. People vote for the marquee candidates and maybe one or two under that and voting drops off after that. It’s a known phenomenon! Beat up on the voters all you want but Not Voting Down Ticket is a Thing. Figuring out how to change that, how to make local races, election of judges and so forth relevant and important to people so they’ll vote is our challenge.
Geminid
@TheTruffle: I don’t know. Maybe Begala was trying to be relevant. He did it in a really bad way, though. The voting rights impasse is bad enough in itself. The recriminations over it are a whole other source of damage, and Begala just added fuel to the fire.
H.E.Wolf
@Omnes Omnibus: Everyone who is worried about local elections needs to go to the next thread and donate if you can. If you can’t, maybe publicize it somewhere. Or just cheer on the good work. We have raised money to support get out the vote efforts in GA, AZ, WI, and now MI. Let’s keep up the effort.
What Omnes said. Let’s support the GOTV-ers at Four Directions, who are making a difference wherever they get involved.
Kay
@Geminid:
There’s trust and respect in bringing people into a problem and NOT telling them what to do to solve it.
Tell them the problem and then stop talking. It’s their turn.
NotMax
OT.
Holy crap. Opened up the quarterly Medicare bill. Price jumped close to one hundred dollars from the last quarterly bill in October.
Baud
@Geminid:
Do people care about what Begala says?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Baud: Not really, we all say stupid stuff sometimes, except Baud.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: No. We can’t freak out every time anyone who was ever associated with the Democratic Party says anything.
Baud
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
I do have a good track record.
@Omnes Omnibus:
Sometimes we freak out when someone who has been associated with the Democratic Party doesn’t says anything.
trollhattan
Another asshole speaks.
Oh, Mitch, I’m sure they’re super scared that you really, really mean it.
Jamey
*Not the real name of my town, but arguably it would be more accurate!
It’s really more of an isthmus…
Geminid
@Kay: Democratic voters have a big stake in voting rights legislation. I’m not sure how many are paying enough attention to even know that Manchin and Sinema are stymieing it, much less ask themselves why Biden can push infrastructure through but not voting rights. That question is being put forward by critics and activists, some of whom are sincere and some of whom are not and are trying to build clout. Begala could have just pointed out the difference between a bill that promised over a trillion dollars in spending, and for which the U.S. Chamber of Commerce aggressively whipped Republican votes, and one that a united Republican caucus has stonewalled.
Begala certainly could have blamed Manchin and Sinema too; it’s not like that’s going to hurt their feelings. I’ve noticed, though, that the rest of the Democratic Senate Caucus has been pretty quiet about Sinema’s and Manchin’s obstruction. It could be they are inhibited by the social norms of the institution. But it could also be that they still think it’s possible to pass some meaningful voting rights protections.
lowtechcyclist
It’s really hard to kill a holly tree. Both my next-door neighbor and I have had holly bushes that we’ve sawed off at ground level, and a few years later, we had holly bushes again.
Knowing you, I’m sure you called the county to point out the barriers blocking County Road XYZ. What excuse did they come up with?
Kay
@Geminid:
The infrastructure bill passed because it didn’t raise taxes but spent a trillion dollars. It preserved the Trump tax cuts. They don’t have to pay for it. That’s why they supported it.
It’s cake and ice cream. 1950’s level infrastructure investments with 2017 tax rates.
MikefromArlington
Until the left gets their own Americans for Prosperity type operation to organize state lvl turnout, we’ll never keep up.
Geminid
@Kay: But Democrats did manage to put a lot of 21st century initiatives into the infrastructure bill. Any way you slice it, though, it’s easy to pass an infrastructure bill; voting rights legislation is a different ball game, and I don’t think it’s a reflection on Joe Biden that he has gotten one through and not the other.
Speaking of the infrastructure bill, Trump is now trying to take out the thirteen Republican Representatives who voted for it. He may succeed, but Democrats could take some of those seats. Nebraska Congressman Don Bacon is one of the Republicans, and he holds a district that Trump lost last year.
Stephanie Malliatokis (R-Staten Island) is another. Once Albany Democrats draw a new map, the billions Malliatokis helped bring to her city-$10 billion for the MTA alone- will be the only thing that could get her reelected.
Kay
@Geminid:
I know Democrats support voting rights – it’s not a question of “belief” – but it is a hard thing to tell people that they will not get the civil rights protections they had from 1965 until 2013 without 60 Democratic Senators and a Democratic President. But you have to tell them.
Geminid
@Kay: Do we? This is certainly a raging debate right now among politically engaged Democrats. But as a practical matter, how should this affect messaging for Senate candidates like Val Demings and Tim Ryan? They ‘ll be running against Marco Rubio and Josh Mandel, not Joe Manchin and Kysten Sinema.
Politically engaged Democrats are going to vote for Demings and Ryan regardless of Manchin and Sinema. There will certainly be people telling voters that Democrats have not earned their votes because they were weak on voting rights. But if voting rights legislation passed tomorrow morning, these same people will have moved the goal posts by evening.
debbie
@sab:
I’ll have to watch for this next time around. I don’t remember noticing any affiliations.
Geminid
@Baud: Overall, Begala is fairly inconsequential. To extent that the recriminations over voting rights are hurting the party, though, he aggravated the situation. But in one report I noticed that a couple of the people professing outrage were Nina Turner and Krystal Ball, who are hostile anyway to the Democratic party as presently constituted.
Kristine
@Scout211: But yours is the message I saw first, so thanks! I just placed my order.
TheTruffle
@MikefromArlington: Does Run for Something count?