I suspect the upcoming elections will hinge on:
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voter suppression
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Nazi terror attacks-- another major attack before the election would hurt them, one during the election seems more likely.
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voting machines, hacking, and bugs.
I worry about groups of white thugs hanging around polling places, though I guess thatâs included in voter suppression.
Random white thugs hanging about are bad, but itâs the thugs with badges who are more problematic. White cops running warrant/ticket checks on Black voters is an old standard.
Also expect ICE to be in heavy attendance around voting booths in Latinx neighbourhoods.
The debate over voter suppression in the midterm elections extends to multiple states. In North Dakota the Republican-controlled government has implemented a controversial new law requiring residents to show identification with a current street address. But as Ruben Kimmelman reported for NPR, âMany residents of Native American reservations â who tend to vote for Democrats â do not have street addresses. They have Post Office box numbers, and those donât qualify.â
In Iowa, the Republican Secretary of State is phasing in a new voter ID law, and in Dodge City, Kansas, a federal judge has denied a request to open a new polling site far from the city center that advocates say would put Latino voter turnout at risk. The location of the new polling site would have been more than a mile away from the nearest bus stop, making travel there difficult for some potential voters.
I can absolutely see this scaring someone with less-than-great critical thinking skills. What gets me (and tells me that thatâs exactly who theyâre aiming at) is the way âscientistsâ is highlighted on the cover. Somehow implying that scientists are the last people you should trust with your data.
No, that would be corporations and political entities.
We got something very similar this week⌠Hm. Not going to stop us from going to the polls, of course⌠the one we got, I donât think, highlighted scientists in the same wayâŚ
This is what we got:
To me, that highlighting seems part and parcel of the discredited of anyone educated and thus overly liberal.
Especially with it going out in Texas.
I assume theyâre trying to intimidate non-Republican voters. And I imagine general fear of retaliation is higher among non-Republican voters, for obvious reasons. But I imagine fear of scientists is higher among Republican votersâŚ?
The weird thing is, this is only scary if the government were going to go after people who hadnât voted for them.
Say, like what happened to dissenting Germans when Hitler got elected.
Hitler didnât get elected. Hindenburg got elected, as the man who could stop Hitler, compromised by appointing Hitler chancellor, supported the Enabling Act, and then died leaving Hitler with absolute power.
Fuck Hindenburg.
In retrospect, a vote for Thälmann the Stalinist would have been the least worst option.
Sorry, but Iâm sick of the idea that these people-- Hitler, Trump, etc-- are âdemocratically electedâ and in a lot of cases itâs provable that they werenât/arenât.
Hitler was made chancellor in January 1933. The last federal election was after that, in March.
There are eyewitness accounts talking about how irregular and undemocratic that vote was, how many people voted under fear of reprisal. People gathered in the town square and raised their hand when their preferred candidateâs name was called, how stormtroopers bullied people.
So no, not democratic, but there was a fucking vote. I never said anything about âdemocratically electedâ â you did.
And hundreds of other people keep saying that Hitler and/or Trump were âdemocratically electedâ so I feel I need to address that.
Okay.
Would you mind not making the person youâre replying to an unwitting member of this other group youâre actually replying to?
This is from 2016 and I donât know how much of it still applies, but jeez Texas was making it hard to register people. All kinds of scary ways to mess up and get in legal trouble during a registration drive.
So that includes rigged polls, of course, which are equally illegal. Of course. /s