You shouldn’t have to overcome any obstacles to vote.
There is zero reason to make voting harder, and it is indefensible to only do so in specific areas to affect your political “enemies”.
Those are typically in the same place.
It’s hard to compete when:
a) You generally try to play by the rules, and:
b) You’re using “Factoring in estimated hysteresis, the planet’s average temperature is poised to rise by 3*C over the next ten years” against their:
- They’re turning this country socialist, like Venezuela
- They’re giving this country over to illegals and brown people
- They’re going to ban your guns and your religion
- They’re teaching your children to be ashamed of their race, their heterosexuality, and their ethnicity
- They’re forcing The Ghay Agenda on your kids
- They’re turning your cities into war-torn cesspools
- Your children are utterly not safe in Librul 'Murica
- You won’t be able to buy a 17 ounce fountain drink
- We’ll all be forced to eat nothing but kale. An In-n-Out Double Double will be a Felony
- They’re using Agenda 21 to force us all to live in cramped barracks and drive Smart cars
- Bill Gates is going to inject a chip into your @$$. Big Brother will own you
- You’ll pay 105% of your income in taxes
- You’ll have to marry interracial, have LGBTQ kids, and get an abortion. You’ll just have to
- They want us to bend over for Putin and Xi
- We’ll all be buying Teslas for non-English speaking Welfare recipients
- FOR THE LOVE OF GRID … BENGHAZI !!!
And I really could go on and on.
They’re evil, but they’re generally not stupid.
If Democrats need to reach people who are vulnerable to this kind of marketing effort, I really don’t know how they could. Whatever other qualities that cohort has, it will be hard to bypass these lizard-brain, existential issues to talk intelligently to them about the reality of “their economic interests.”
I guess Texas has different locations for drop off and early voting. This doc lists almost 50 early voting locations for Tarrant county (Arlington/Fort Worth): https://www.tarrantcounty.com/content/dam/main/elections/2021/1121/locations/1121_EV_Sched.pdf
The first week they’re open from 8-5, but from then on they’re generally open 7-7, including Sat. Sunday has some shorter hours. With that many locations and those hours, it seems like anyone who wants to vote can vote. It’s just a matter of carving out the time. I’m sure there are people who are working 18 hour days 7 days a week and can’t make time to vote, but it seems like they would just make up just a tiny percentage of voters.
So what, would you say, is the reason that Republicans have consistently been passing these restrictive laws in state after state aimed at blue and minority urban areas. If these laws do not have any effect on voter turnout in these areas, then why are they doing it?
I’m not saying they don’t have an effect. They do have an effect, but that’s because the D voters aren’t as motivated to vote. Simple impediments are enough to discourage D supporters from going to the polls. R voters seem to vote no matter what. They seem more motivated to make the time to vote, so these impediments don’t affect their votes as much.
That’s baloney. If a district’s voters are 65 Dem/35 GOP, the impediments discourage them all equally, but the impact is disproportionate. It has nothing to do with who’s more motivated.
It’s a just-so story. The inconvenient stuff that contradicts the narrative doesn’t change that narrative.
The simple fact that the number of House members even with a state - say Texas - aren’t in proportion to the relative votes for D vs R should be enough. The overall voting in Texas was ~56/44 R/D but somehow House representation is 23/13. That’s no accident. It also says the Dems are getting out the vote in the state (would you have guessed the vote proportion was actually that close in Texas?) but aren’t being represented in proportion to their votes.
So, I guess that just means they need to try harder because they’re not voting hard enough?
Damn straight. Everything Republicans stand for fits on a bumper sticker. God, Guns, No Taxes. In the meantime, Democrats fight with themselves and can do no more than what the most conservative Democrat in the Senate wants. Elizabeth Warren may have had great plans and I’d probably agree with nearly all of them, but nobody is ever going to take the time to digest every detail.
The system is gamed for Republicans, from gerrymandering to the distribution of voting machines to the built in inequities of the Senate and electoral college to having a Supreme Court majority thanks to a stolen seat to having cable networks dedicated to spreading their propaganda. The GQP is taking a jackhammer to the foundations of democracy. All other issues are window dressing. Sure, the BBB will be good when it passes, but voting rights are far far more important.
So it’s our fault they are infringing on our rights?
Sounds like the kind of thing an abusive spouse would say, which more and more appears how the Right behaves toward the rest of the country. If they don’t get their way then they will force it on us and then blame us for making them do it.
Nothing they are doing is preventing people from voting. If D voters want to vote, they can vote. If the lines are too busy on voting day, then find time in the 2 weeks prior of early voting. I fail to see how anything that the R’s are doing should really block anyone from voting. But what I do feel is that D’s are less motivated to vote. Any impediment is seen as too hard to overcome. The R voters don’t seem to have that same attitude. They’ll vote no matter what. And if they’re not happy about how the voting is run, they’ll come out to the minor elections to vote in people that will run the election as they like. D’s don’t really have that same motivation.
If the lines are too busy on election day then they should go back in time and vote early?
If you really believe that this is the case, then isn’t it a pretty dismal view of the party? I mean, imagine you didn’t know anything about America or politics, and you heard someone lamenting that “factoring in estimated hysteresis” wasn’t a good campaign strategy. Wouldn’t it strike you as a blindingly obvious self-own? It’s like a line a nerd says in an 80s sex romp.
Stop using that, then! Make a better pitch! That’s not to say that there aren’t real challenges with some of the things you bring up, but it doesn’t seem to me like “the voter is a loathsome and worthless animal, it can’t be reasoned with” is a good starting point for winning elections. Is there some law of nature that says you can’t have a good campaign aimed at people who are concerned about existential issues and can only think with their lizard brains, even granting that you’re correct in this very bleak and contemptuous point of view?
(bolding mine)
Your feelings against the documented (and admitted) voter suppression tactics widely implemented in the last few years? Gee, which should I believe?
These “voter suppression” tactics don’t seem like they would really prevent anyone from voting who wanted to vote. They might make it more inconvenient, but someone would just need to put in a bit more effort to overcome them. No snacks given out in line? Bring your own snacks. Lines too long on voting day? Vote at one of the 50 early-voting locations in the prior 2 weeks. No ID card? Find some time in the years between elections to get an ID card. I just don’t see how these tactics would really stop masses of D voters clamoring to cast their vote. I see it as stopping the people who are casual about voting and the political process. If someone will only vote if it’s quick and easy, then those people are easy to cut out of the political process. If they don’t step up to be counted, I can’t really have a lot of sympathy for them not getting their needs addressed.
Philosophically, I am far more aligned with the basic platform and core values of the Ds (while – intellectually – I’m pretty moderate because … well … partisan politics comprises virtually nothing but snakes) than I am with anything the current crop of Rs has to offer.
But the D’s platform doesn’t lend itself to the kind of fear mongering coming from the Right. Greta Thunberg’s voice is quickly drowned out midst the hordes of RW demagogues with relatively large audiences shrieking all my bullet points, above.
Tax policy and health care policy are dry, particularly compared to “class warfare,” “socialism,” and “death panels”.
Others upthread are saying the same thing: simple messages, fit on a bumper sticker, evoke strong feelings.
The other night, my wife was nearly hit by an inattentive driver. She was just minutes from home. When she got home, she was visibly shaken. The mere fact that this near collision caused a visceral and evolutionary response in my wife didn’t make her a bad person.
Similarly, the demagogues and strategists in the current Republican party machinery are aiming for the primal. They have long used fear and faith to win elections but they seem to me to be letting up on faith a tad and putting fear all the way to its stops.
I’m not even making a particularly adverse judgment about their audience. They’re being manipulated. It’s the demagogue’s playbook and they’re all in.
Going back to the story about my wife, when she was visibly shaken from the near collision, I would have had a very hard time getting her to discuss what we should do for dinner.
I’m defining what I see as a strategic obstacle for the Democrats, and using a bit of satire to portray it.
But I don’t have the answer.
Fear is a powerful motivator. It’s very hard to break through that fear with policy proposals and wonky oratory. It’s hard to compare the endless litany of existential threats constantly trumpeted by the right with Global Climate Change (ETA: and appealing to the better angels of our nature).
But I don’t know the alternative, short of trying to beat them at their own (fear) game – which I find unimaginable, and a step toward Mutually Assured Destruction. I don’t have a better strategy to offer them, and – ISTM – they don’t either.
Add in all the current efforts to truly rig the entire voting process, and … I’m not overly optimistic.
It depends on the composition of the electorate. Logic is only a portion of oratory and it may not be the most effective one.
Awww, shit.
You and I aren’t in agreement, here, are we ???
By use of a time machine?