Do white-coller criminals generally vote republican?
It’s not because Jeb’s office approved an $80,000 grant for a non-profit ministry the judge had no connection to, either.
The timing is bothersome, even juvenile. I miss the days when politicians would avoid the appearance of ethical impropriety.
If he were honest, he’d just say “nanny nanny boo boo stick your head in poo poo”
Good god, Larry.
Oh, well, if that’s all addicts need, I guess we can just take those silly drug laws off the book!
Yes I’d imagen they generally do. However most felony convictions are not for white coller crimes.
This is why I said generally criminals are in the low income bracket. I understand that some are not.
Just for the record I also understand some poor people vote republican and some rich people democrat.
BTW, the cynic in me says the percentage of convictions of white coller crimes would be higher if other kinds of defendents could afford equally good defence.
Statistics. The prison population is statistically much more black than the general population. Black voters statistically favor Democratic presidential candidates much more than the general population. Therefore, if one wanted to reduce the vote potential of the Democratic candidate, about the first group one would want to eliminate would be released felons.
You got any stats about the voting habits of convicted felons?
This pales in comparison to the realization that they had tried to pull the “felons list” bullshit again… knowing that disproportionately left in African Americans (who vote Democratic) out left out Hispanics (who lean Republican). This is one of the things that tipped the election in Bush’s favor the first time: stripping legal African American voters of their rights by mislabeling them as felons. It defies all reason that they tried the same thing again, only worse. And if they hadn’t lost a court suit to reveal the lists, nobody would have ever known how faulty and how obviously Democrat-skewed the list was.
It’s similar to the way poll taxes and literacy tests were used to disenfranchise black voters after they were first granted voting rights. You find something that is not directly related to race, but has a statistical correllation. Very ingenious, and very evil.
Can somebody please explain to this complete fucking moron (me) how eliminating a 1 page application in favor of a telephone call disenfranchises these people?
I assume it’s just that the Dept of Corrections isn’t shoving “reenfranchisement” down the throats of everyone walking out their doors. I hear all the fucking time on these boards how voting is a “duty” of every american, why do these guys get a free pass on taking responsibility for being registered to vote?
If I were to come on here and say I never bother to vote, or get registered, I’d be slammed from both sides. Apparently if I were a convicted felon in Florida, I would magically transform into a poor, disenfranchised man who was caught up in Jeb Bush’ s evil plan to steal an election for his brother.
There have been a few other neat little tricks going on in Florida.
Exactly.
I have no love for Jeb Bush, but in my opinion this is a huge improvement. He deserves credit for streamlining a government process, nothing more…nothing less.
Jammer
The only rationale I could see is the possible time lapse between release from prison and receipt of the letter telling them that they need to call to have their ability to vote reinstated. While it seems the application is given to them immediately upon release, who knows how long the time is between their release from prison and the mailing of the letter. I’m not implying that the time lapse is significant (I have no information to this regard). It’s just a possibility.
That’s a good possibility. I don’t know what the law is in Florida, but in Illinois you can’t vote if you’ve registered less than 27 days prior to the election.
I know this because we moved last summer, just a couple blocks from our old place, and I have yet to get the address changed on my Illinois ID (I don’t drive so don’t have a license). I fully intend to vote, but figured that the address has to be correct on their list. I looked up on the net what I needed to do, and freaked when I saw that. Sure, I still have lots of time, but what if I’d waited until a week before, not realizing? Super eek!
As much as I would like to pile on in anything anti-Bush, this time I must demur. If slowing the process of reinstatement of voting rights (or in this case, merely refusing to speed it up) could be expected to have an effect on the November election there might be a legitimate beef against the most junior Bush. But, as tomndebb pointed out, it is impossible that anyone recently released from Florida incarceration could get through the bureaucratic backlog in time for the upcoming election whether the state helped with the paperwork or not. Jeb Bush said he was merely saving the state some time and expense, and, at least this time, I’m inclined to take him at his word. He’s a putz all right, but that doesn’t mean everything he does is wrong.
Look at it in steps. Existing law required the Department of Corrections to provide forms to prisoners to apply to the Clemency board to have their voting privileges restored before they left the prison. This wasn’t happening, and last week the Appelate Court said “Naughty, naughty, FL DoC! You’re not following the law. From now on, you’d better provide the forms, and provide assistance with filling them out, before the institutionally rehabilitated schmoe hits the sidewalk.”
Then Jeb said, “Nope, not gonna do that. We’re going to cut through the paperwork. From now on, when an inmate is released, their name will be forwarded to the Office of Executive clemency, which will decide if they qualify to have their voting rights restored automatically or if they have to apply for a hearing. (Something like 90% of folks have to apply for a hearing.) If it turns out that they do have to apply for a hearing, then a letter will be mailed out telling them how to get in touch with them to do that.”
The problem is, a person who’s just getting out of jail often doesn’t go back to their last address. So a lot of those letters are going to end up in the dead letter office.
The ‘streamlining’ doesn’t streamline anything – it adds an extra level of bureaucracy, and is engineered in such a way that it creates an additional delay that means most people coming out of the system now probably won’t be able to vote until 2008. Sure, around 10% of the people, (the ones that the Executive Clemency Board determines qualify for automatic restoration of civil rights) will enjoy a streamlined process – but many more people will be unable to vote in the upcoming election because of this change.
This is all quite apart from the influence that Jeb Bush holds over individual decisions. He is the Clemency Board’s head, and three of his cabinet members sit with him. Any two members together can prevent the restoration of voting privileges – and Jeb can do so unilaterally. Beyond that, the law as it stands says that only the governor has the authority to release documents relating to the hearing.
Appearance of impropriety? Hey, don’t worry about it.
Questions: How many cases are looked at in each session? When is the next session?
Hmmmmm. So what you’re saying is, Jeb Bush is a putz and he’s wrong tbis time, too. I’m choking on my former words. I defended Jeb Bush. WHAT WAS I THINKING? :smack:
PILE ON!!!
::dialing::
Recorded voice: Hello and welcome to the felon voter reinstatement hotline. If you are calling to make an appointment for a hearing, please press one. If you are calling for any other information, please call our toll-free information hotline.
::presses ‘one’::
Welcome to the online reinstatement hotline. Due to heavy volume, all of our operators are presently with customers. Your call will be answered in approximately ::mechanical voice:: “thir-ty-eight min-utes”. Please stay on the line.
::cue music:: dadeedadadadeedee ::voice breaks in:: We’re sorry for the delay. Your call is important to us. Please stay on the line and the next available operator will be with you shortly. Present waiting time for a hearing is ::4.56 months:: ::cue music::
How much patience do YOU have? How much patience do you think an ex-con has: more? or less? How much time do you think he has during a workday to fuck around with a half hour wait on the phone? Do you think his employer, if he has one, is going to look kindly on this activity? Do you think the state is going to staff multiple lines for this effort? Really? Are you an optimist or just hopelessly naive?
Because the state bent over backwards to make it impossible for them to vote in the first place.
This may be a dumb question, but why do they need to apply at all? Why isn’t their voting registration status just automatically reinstated to what it was before they were convicted?