From Talking Points Memo (always great on voting issues):
Conservative columnist Matthew Vadum is just going to come right out and say it: registering the poor to vote is un-American and “like handing out burglary tools to criminals.” “It is profoundly antisocial and un-American to empower the nonproductive segments of the population to destroy the country — which is precisely why Barack Obama zealously supports registering welfare recipients to vote,” Vadum, the author of a book published by World Net Daily that attacks the now-defunct community organizing group ACORN, writes in a column for the American Thinker.
I know you’re falling out of your chair right about now with this new and shocking revelation, but it was never about “voter fraud”. This American Thinker is writing about legally registered Americans voting. He’s opposed.
It’s also complete nonsense. Conservatives are also working hard to suppress the votes of college students, who are not people who are ordinarily portrayed as “poor”, but are a group who have always been one of the main targets of voter registration drives. No one will ask this conservative scholar about this inconsistency, however, just like these folks are never asked about the alleged rampant “voter impersonation fraud” they’re always screeching about. The voting process doesn’t interest the horse race pundits, at all. Specific, dull and not at all important.
El Cid
Death has only made ACORN grow even stronger.
The Republic of Stupidity
Let’s face it…
The ONLY True Americans™ are balding, chubby, oddly sexless angry white men… w/ a smattering of women thrown in for good measure… don’t want to seem too… gay… now, do we?
Legalize
This can’t be. I was told by a number of very serious and concerned Patriots that the concern was that too many guys named Mickey Mouse were registering to vote, and then voting like 30 times each.
kay
@El Cid:
Right, and there’s the media exception. ACORN! They loved that story. It had it all: scary minorities, secret plans, covert reality-tv style staged video.
Ordinary poor people filling out forms and voting? Nah. Boring.
trollhattan
Sigh. Since the halcyon days when I enjoyed the dual benefits of eligibility to be drafted and also to vote, unlike my predecessors, I’ve always valued both the opportunity and responsibility. I now conclude it would be antisocial and un-American of me to not shove a garden rake up Matthew Vadum’s arse.
japa21
I have seen some conservatives pine for the old days of only allowing property owners the right to vote. That would take care of the poor and college students both, for the most part.
Violet
Click on over to the TPM article. Does that guy look like a bad guy in a WWII movie or what? I guess that helps with the demographic that votes GOP.
Culture of Truth
Did the Founding Fathers let slaves vote!? Heck no!
Amir Khalid
You might as well come out and say it: Vadum and his ilk want to discourage from voting anyone they reckon might be more likely to vote for a Democrat. That’s why they’re trying to keep the poor, the young, and minority ethnic groups away from the voting booth, right?
Samara Morgan
What do you expect Kay?
the demographic timer is the real issue.
this is just unfair. suppressing the vote is the Rights only option.
i asked Nate Silver how the right can win a presidential election without the cities.
he hasnt replied yet.
300baud
I wish I could be the one to tell him that opinion columnists are also not productive members of society.
TooManyJens
If we’re trying to keep people from voting themselves money in a way that is a drag on the rest of country, I have some suggestions. But they’re not poor people.
Villago Delenda Est
These people (and I use that term loosely) are basically upset that all these minority types will vote in their own interests, not in the interests of vile sacks of reactionary shit like Matthew Vadum.
Well, DUH. That’s the problem with “democracy” in places like Iraq and Libya and Egypt. They’ll vote for their interests, not the interests of parasitical shitstain international corporate executives.
As asshole twits like Vadum ride in the tumbrel to their just deserts, they will, like Louis XVI before them, wonder why this is happening to them. They have no clue that they not only foment revolution, they reap the consequences of being the focus of it.
I have no sympathy for such shortsighted, selfish fools.
Duh rock no balls at all bama
So now “One man one vote” is a ‘liberal’ position?
It’s no wonder they think our 1970s Republican President Obama is a socialist.
JenJen
In a way, I applaud this douchenozzle’s column for just coming right out and saying it. At least they’re on record now!
catclub
“It is profoundly antisocial and un-American to empower the nonproductive segments of the population to destroy the country”
This is why Paris Hilton and the elderly retired should not be allowed to vote. Isn’t that what he says next?
kay
@japa21:
That’s nonsense, too. Conservatives supported motor voter, because rural low income voters (their voters) drive. Hence, laws that depend on a driver’s license as ID.
It’s rural versus urban. They’re not even honest on that small point.
Unenthusiastic Obama voter
Calling ABL, calling ABL! Emergency alert!
Some “liberal” somewhere has had a negative reaction to something President Obama has done! In this case, TPM and HP both report that Obama has caved again and has left in place Bush smog regulations that Obama’s EPA called “legally indefensible.” You know the enemies, right ABL? Attack ’em as they dare to be disappointed in Obama, again.
ABL? Where are you? You need to defend Obama against all those faux liberal that are dissing him. Quick, to the barricades! Get out your enemy list and go to work. Calling ABL!
beltane
Is Matthew Vadum some kind of secret Maoist? Because if poor people are prohibited from voting, they really only have one option in making their wishes known, and this option would likely make Vadum and the rest of them piss themselves with fear.
JGabriel
Goddamn it, I’ve already responded to comments about this Vadum article in two or three other posts, and now I’m outta anymore fuckin’ quips about it.
So I’ll just say the obvious: Vadum is a vote-supressing anal slime, which makes him a typical representative of the GOP anytime in the past 50-odd years. Still, it’s always good when conservatives take off the masks and we can see the ugly classism and oligarchical impulses lurking behind their misdirections, misrepresentations, and lies.
.
Too Many Jimpersons (formerly Jimperson Zibb, Duncan Dönitz, Otto Graf von Pfmidtnöchtler-Pízsmőgy, Mumphrey, et al.)
That guy needs a serious beating.
“Nonproductive”, huh? And just who, I wonder get to say who is and is not “productive”? I bet you anything the “productive” ones aren’t the ones out there building houses for us or working on our roads or picking our tomatoes. No, the “productive” ones are the assholes who inherit their money and fuck people over for fun. Somebody needs to send this guy out into a field of watermelons that need picking for a day, or into one of Tyson’s or Purdue’s chicken plants for a day or so, and then see how “unproductive” those people are.
And he throws around words like “antisocial” and un-“American”, too. I can’t think of much more antisocial and un-American than keeping people from voting because you don’t think they’re worthy. Asshole.
bkny
voter ids are sooooo 1950s … just wait till you have to show your pay stub in order to vote.. and that pay stub is invalid if it’s issued by the state/federal gubmints…
A Mom Anon
The right wing knows that when large numbers of people turn out to vote,they lose. Paul Weyrich(founder of ALEC among other devious shit)was famous for saying that at many a conservative gathering. It’s honestly not more complicated than that. They know it,they’ve known it in conservative circles for decades. Voting is like a country club membership to conservatives,it’s a privledge,not a right,something for an exclusive group. It pisses them off that we even exist,and especially that we vote,us non-republican types.
Villago Delenda Est
@Culture of Truth:
But they did, in their infinite wisdom, count them as 3/5ths of a person for apportioning seats in the House of Representatives!
kay
@TooManyJens:
Agreed. I think it’s even more important, post-Citizens, that there is some way for those of us without giant piles of cash to weigh in. Voting is one way to practice individual political speech, and we don’t need a Koch-sized fortune to do it. More important now than ever.
beltane
@catclub: I actually agree with Vadum here. Wall Street bankers, Beltway pundits, and glibertarian pretty-boys are unproductive people who are strangers to hard work and so should not be allowed to vote.
Rommie
Well, obviously it’s wrong that a person with a $10,000 annual income has the same voting power as someone with a $10,000,000 annual income. Come on, this is the clearest Because of Why example you can make! The Founding Fathers used percentages for voting power in the past, so it’s perfectly OK to consider it for our modern times.
Excuse me while I go punt kittens to make myself feel less dirty.
scav
OT: Can this still be the 21st century? Somebody resigning because of a flawed review process? Unpossible!
(scientists, always the last to know about how the cool kids step up to the plate.)
virag
like much of the conservative plan, this has been a long war; remember rehnquist was part of a voter intimidation plan when he was a law student. now that they are being so open about it shows that they believe they have won and their plan to prevent minority and poor voting is no longer in danger of being halted.
JGabriel
@trollhattan:
Why give Vadum the pleasure?
.
Zifnab
@Villago Delenda Est:
I’d be curious to see a parallel democracy in which “registered voters” determined Congressional districts and allotment of House seats, rather than simply raw population. Wonder if Republicans would be so gung-ho about voter suppression then?
jibeaux
@catclub:
I am a strong proponent of the right to vote, but now that I’m thinking about the cast of the Jersey Shore, it would be dishonest to say I don’t have more mixed feelings now…
Triassic Sands
@300baud:
My thought exactly.
But running around claiming ACORN is an existential threat to America — now that’s productive!
LanceThruster
@TooManyJens:
Spot on observation.
Elie
@japa21:
I am just starting to think that the policy of “voting by mail” in effect almost does that. Unless you have a permanent address and money for postage, you don’t have a vote in WA state and in many states that have gone over almost competely to vote by mail.
When it was first implemented here, I felt it was convenient and a positive. Now I am not sure not only because of that, but it also complicates “get out the vote”. You could pick up folks at their home and take them to vote. Now, I am not sure how you do that since the votes can come in over a period and if you have group meetings to fill out ballots, you could be acused of illegally “influencing” votes. Its much trickier than I originally thought but could have real impacts over time…
pamelabrown
Great post,Kay.
However I do remember some winger idiot decrying that the college vote is composed of liberal idealists. Hence they’re too naive to vote…except when we accept them as military patriots who can neither vote nor buy a drink. Dying for “freedom” is O.K. but they’re too stupid to vote.
Also, too: the students (people of color,etc.)are not property owners which means that the confederate constitution is being substituted for the real one. Just ask Rick Perry.
bkny
@pamelabrown: not just some winger — it was the new hampshire house speaker:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/06/AR2011030602662.html?hpid=topnews
joeyess
No one can ask. The cowardly fucktwit’s post isn’t open to comments.
kay
@pamelabrown:
I heard that at a book club I once belonged to, right after the 2008 election. I no longer belong. Listening to that from people who voted for Bush because he was a “good man” who they imagined they liked personally is just a bridge too far for me.
Talk about naive. The biggest demographic for the Tea Party are recipients of Medicare and Social Security. I could not imagine just blithely announcing that clearly they do not have the experience to vote correctly. Young people are… young. What’s their excuse?
trollhattan
@JGabriel:
Okay, who’s cleaning dis here coffee from dis here keyboard, huh?
Chris
Yes, because I’m sure the main thing on his mind is “How To Be Un-American So That It Will Piss Off My Opponents.”
Not everybody’s like you, Matt.
les
Has there ever been a more inaccurate name for a site than “American Thinker?”
gnomedad
@scav:
Clearly, some librul hoaxer thug left a polar bear’s head in his bed.
ETA: Snark aside, you will hear about how these noble dissenters have been “silenced” as surely as the sun rises.
Ella in New Mexico
I am not surprised that people have these opinions—they’ve always been here, more or less.
What surprises me is when you read the comments below these posts: these people actually think these are somehow “breakthrough truths!!” no one has ever thought of before–Like in American history we have never had anybody come up with a way to disenfranchise everyone but rich, male, mostly white oligarchs from having a say in their enslavement. Or fought like hell to dismantle that.
Really, there are a whole lot of dumb sheeple out there.
beltane
@les: “Reason Magazine” has similar truth-in-advertising problems.
joeyess
@Violet:
In a word — Yes.
MomSense
Not sure if good news is welcome in the comments section here at BJ but what the heck. It is Friday and I just feel like it.
Here in Maine our Republican Governor and Republican legislature passed a law which ended same day voter registration and actually stops voter registration 3 days before the election. They did this even after the testimony of a number of Town and City Clerks that it is mostly students registering in the last three days.
So a coalition of folks got together and did a petition drive to repeal this voter suppression law using the referendum process. This will appear on the ballot long before the 2012 election.
We have also done some other awesome things here like win a special election after some nasty Republican shenanigans, and successfully beat back some awful Republican redistricting proposals by organizing! We have been on the phones, knocking on doors, and pounding the pavement!
So if these voter suppression laws in your state offend you–as they should–then you can do something about it.
Chyron HR
@Unenthusiastic Obama voter:
Ha ha! It’s funny because ABL is insufficiently pure and devoted to the liberal cause, and therefore she is the true enemy! Go get her, Tim.
MikeBoyScout
As the light of our better nature slowly dims as a polity, the cockroaches become increasingly visible.
Jennifer
Fuck this fucking blog with its broken fucking margins. I guess I’m just not to be allowed to read the comments. Fine. Maybe when I come back in a week or so it will load properly.
Dennis SGMM
@trollhattan:
I, for one, usually detest the idea of offering violence to someone whose opinions differ from my own.
Vadum is an exception. I would not be averse to taking up my trusty claw hammer and driving his American flag lapel pin all the way through his head.
JGabriel
@trollhattan: Danke. We here at Chez JGabriel live only to serve.
.
MattR
@MomSense:
That is good news, but I would have to say the testimony you describe above was probably an additional reason for them to vote to end late registration
joeyess
Found this among the fevered comments section to Vadum’s article:
Wow. This person shouldn’t be allowed to purchase spray paint.
SenyorDave
These people are upset that N’s and S’s get to vote. Vadum is just more honest than most of his fellow wingnuts.
Chris
@Dennis SGMM:
I don’t make exceptions.
Not because I’m a morally superior being, but because if I were to offer violence to the people whose ideas and speeches I find as sickening as Vadum’s, I’d probably have to do it to every conservative in politics.
joeyess
@Jennifer:
We may just have a winner in the revolving quote sweepstakes.
Dave Ruddell
Vadum is Canadian. I was at U of T the same time he was, and sorta kinda knew him (he was the editor of one of the campus newspapers, I was on the student government). He was a dick then. Time doesn’t seem to have improved him.
(Unless, of course, there’s a second Matthew Vadum, but that’s just too terrible to consider).
Dennis SGMM
@Chris:
I admire your spirit. I would observe though that among the many things I learned in combat was that you simply can’t hurt all of “Them.”
TheWorstPersonInTheWorld
What does it tell us that the Dems have had eleven years since the stolen Bush election to make a case for, and enact, meaningful election reform and yet here we are with republican voter suppression strategies ascendant as we move toward another presidential vote?
I lived and voted in Broward County, Florida, in 2,000 and 2,004. TWICE my vote was stolen or invalidated along with thousands of other democratic votes, yet the reaction of the dem party and candidates was…”meh.”
Is the modern dem party the most inept in the history of the world? Or are they, more realistically, doing as they intend to do for the betterment of themselves and their paymasters…? And why hasn’t Obama been beating this drum? Has he ever?
Oh, I don’t know…it’s probably racist to ask those questions…
Tone In DC
@Rommie:
Oh, AYUH.
JGabriel
@Dave Ruddell:
Unfortunately, this country seems to possess not just two, but tens of millions.
.
Elizabelle
I’ve never seen a better combination of issues for organizing college students to vote.
1) coming out of school with lotso debt and uncertain job prospects
AND
2) Republicans don’t want you voting
AND
3) if you or your older friends and siblings did vote for Obama in 2008, the Tea Party and GOP are doing everything possible to thwart a popularly elected president and make your vote worthless.
They’ve disrespected you and the president you voted for.
That the economy sucks is collateral damage for you, and probably your parents who worked hard to help fund and prepare you for college.
Go to it!
Geoduck
@Elie:
As a fellow WA state resident, I’m pretty sure you needed something at least resembling a permanent address before, in order to be registered/assigned at your local polling station. And if there are that many people who are so destitute they can’t even afford a single first-class postage stamp (no snark, ouch..) my city (Olympia/Tumwater/Lacey) at least has several places scattered around where you can drop off your completed ballot without mailing it. I do sorta miss the community-feeling that comes with in-person voting, but I think doing it by mail is the way to go. No intimidation crap, no having to stand in line all day.
scav
well, in the malicious tweaking category, we could suggest rating a person’s contribution to society by their income tax actually paid. Or, how bout allotting representation in the house according to state GDP instead of pop?
Catsy
@Violet:
I know it’s superficial and this guy’s actual views are evil enough for criticism on their own merits, but it’s really striking how he wouldn’t look the least bit out of place in this outfit.
JGabriel
Dennis SGMM:
Sure you can. Just put a black Democrat in charge of the country; “they” will never stop letting you know unfair it is and how butthurt “they” all are.
.
Rabble Arouser
@Elie: IIRC, from my years as a field organizer on various campaigns here in WA, the rules are that you cannot provide postage to any voter, or otherwise make any cash transaction for a vote. I believe you can still get together to talk about how and who you will vote for. My .02 cents.
Dennis SGMM
@Catsy:
Except with a monocle. “You vill beg us for the exquisite mercy of casting a vote!”
FlipYrWhig
@Dave Ruddell: Is he the way he is because of a lifetime of having his last name mocked?
PaulW
And don’t forget “welfare recipients” is merely the dog whistle for “blacks” and “illegals”.
You’d think a nation that historically prides itself as the bastion of democracy would push for universal voting rights to ALL, instead of being so damn selective. But then again, we started out with just white male property/business owners with the right to vote. You’d think our history of expanding the votes to white males in general by 1824 wouldn’t impress the conservative base. And then expanding it to blacks (which then got suppressed again for 80 years), and then women in 1912, and then blacks again in 1964, and then the-over-18 age bracket. But no, now the Far Right wants to reset our voting rights back to landed rich white males.
Why the hell does anyone not rich white and male ever vote for these Far Right wingnut bastards?
If the Far Right even thinks about taking the vote away from unemployed people… grrrrrrrrrr…
danimal
@Jennifer: Simple solution.
Hit F5 17 times, the margins will align perfectly.
Then click on the Next Post and hit F5 4 more times.
Pour a large glass of your favorite beverage.
Start drinking heavily.
Scream or mutter FYWP, repetitively.
Take a large hammer and beat the crap out of your monitor.
None of it does any good, but you’ll feel like you’ve acted.
PS: I made my sentences short so you can read them.
Joel
Whatever you do, don’t google image search for Matthew Vadum.
jl
Jefferson and Hamilton did not agree on much, but they did agree that the mass of a country’s population should vote in a Democracy.
No time to get the links now, but Hamilton at the Constitutional Convention said that the franchise for voting for the House should be as wide as possible.
And Jefferson remarked that a fool had as much right to vote as anyone else.
I stand with Jefferson and Hamilton. And if anyone suggests that teabaggers be denied their franchise to vote, I will defend their rights vigorously, and cite the wisdom of Jefferson that even a fool has as much right to vote as anyone else.
The reactionaries are resorting to retread arguments that are un American, and out of step with the wisdom of the Holy Founders: Social insurance weakens the moral fiber of the US, degenerate parasites are being allowed to vote. They have no winning arguments on substance on any issue, so they are just spouting nasty vicious nonsense.
The garbage about degenerate parasites not being fit to vote might work in scaring old folks. But they are so desperate that they are firing indiscriminately in all directions. They are also peddling the old pitch that social insurance makes us weak, and they are doing so in an organized coordinated way.
I think any good the degenerates voting issue might do with very scared old people is canceled by nonsense about the moral rot of social insurance.
I’ve noticed in internet clips I’ve seen of Congresscritters peddling the moral rot of Social Security and Medicare line, that oldsters are alert enough to note that they have paid their hard earned money into these programs. When they ask about whether they will get their money back if the programs are cut, another kind of moral rot (along the lines of mendacity and avarice) rears its ugly head, but amazingly enough the smell comes from rich Congresscritters not from the weak moral degenerates in the audience.
Edit: Hamilton was not a friend of the mass of the people. But he realized that if the mass of people did not have a voice in choosing government policies peacefully, they would have a voice in the streets sooner or later. Then, Hamilton thought, regardless of the intentions of the people, force and chance would be the deciding factor, and he feared that approach to political decision making.
Dennis SGMM
@JGabriel:
Lamentably, the reaction of way too many citizens of this proud land seems to be to vote for the craziest white man running for office. It won’t be long until the Republican nominee is the one who advocates the repeal of anti-lynch laws.
IrishGirl
My FSM! They’re not even bothering to hide it anymore….geez. I spent all of yesterday afternoon going back and forth with some conservawankers who started the conversation off by talking about all the non-producers. The one actually thought that the poor and/or liberals (because isn’t that the way it always works) aren’t producers in the way that he is. The arrogance and ignorance of his assumption was just astounding. But I expect that from some unknown poster of a blog. I DON’T expect that from someone who claims to be a scholar. Whatever profession Matthew Vadum belongs to needs to eject him tout suite.
geg6
@Chyron HR:
For reals! Maybe even lynch her!
Peasants: We have found
a witchan Obot! (A witchAn Obot!a witchan Obot!)Burn her burn her!
Peasant 1: We have found
a witchan Obot, may we burn her?(cheers)
Vladimir: How do you known she is
a witchan Obot?P2: She looks like one!
V: Bring her forward
(advance)
Woman: I’m not
a witchan Obot! I’m nota witchan Obot!V: ehh… but you are dressed like one.
W: They dressed me up like this!
All: naah no we didn’t… no.
W: And this isn’t my nose, it’s a false one.
(V lifts up carrot)
V: Well?
P1: Well we did do the nose
V: The nose?
P1: …And the hat, but she is
a witchan Obot!(all: yeah, burn her burn her!)
V: Did you dress her up like this?
P1: No! (no no… no) Yes. (yes yeah) a bit (a bit bit a bit) But she has got a wart!
(P3 points at wart)
V: What makes you think she is
a witchan Obot?P2: Well, she turned me into a newt!
V: A newt?!
(P2 pause & look around)
P2: I got better.
(pause)
P3: Burn her anyway! (burn her burn her burn!)
(king walks in)
V: There are ways of telling whether she is
a witchan Obot.P1: Are there? Well then tell us! (tell us)
V: Tell me… what do you do with
witchesObots?P3: Burn’em! Burn them up! (burn burn burn)
V: What do you burn apart from
witchesObots?P1: More
witchesObots! (P2 nudge P1)(pause)
P3: Wood!
V: So, why do
witchesObots burn?(long pause)
P2: Cuz they’re made of… wood?
V: Gooood.
(crowd congratulates P2)
V: So, how do we tell if she is made of wood?
P1: Build a bridge out of her!
V: Ahh, but can you not also make bridges out of stone?
P1: Oh yeah…
V: Does wood sink in water?
P1: No
P3: No. It floats!
P1: Let’s throw her into the bog! (yeah yeah ya!)
V: What also floats in water?
P1: Bread
P3: Apples
P2: Very small rocks
(V looks annoyed)
P1: Cider
P3: Grape gravy
P1: Cherries
P3: Mud
King: A Duck!
(all look and stare at king)
V: Exactly! So, logically…
P1(thinking): If she weighs the same as a duck… she’s made of wood!
V: And therefore,
(pause & think)
P3:
A witchAn Obot! (P1:a witchan Obot!)(P2:a witchan Obot!)(all:a witchan Obot!)V: We shall use my largest scales.
(V jumps down)
jl
Regarding the related scare campaign, that social insurance makes us weak, Brooks put out a pathetic effort in the NY Times this week. Krugman has a good reply in a post at his NY Times blog today.
The Other Chuck
@Zifnab:
Forget “registered voters”, registration is a state-level thing anyway, and the problem a lot of college students have is having old registration information, not being unregistered. Just go straight to votes cast.
gex
They are just being true to the Founders. Only wealthy white males should get to vote. I don’t know why brown people, female people, or poor people nod along as the party talks about doing things the way the Founders did. I guess it’s like when my Chinese dad complains about all the foreigners in the social security office “taking his tax money”. Somehow he or they are the exception to the rule or something.
JGabriel
@Joel:
Oh, look: Sheperd Fairey has a new project photoshopping a Lucifer mustache & goatee on pictures of the Muppet’s Miss Piggy.
.
jl
Thought I would add that while Jefferson publicly back property ownership as requirement for voting, at least early in his career, he also had proposals to find ways for the gummint to make most people property owners.
Not sure how that proposal would fly today. I guess if a vile debauched parasite poor person got some property or any other kind of income or wealth through a gummint program that the teabaggers deemed unworthy, then said leech would be considered permanently debauched and ruined, so it would not count.
I guess if a person became worthy of voting rights by ripping off the government in some right wing government contracting scheme, that would be different.
Tuttle
If it doesn’t involve heads on pikes then you aren’t talking about raw social justice.
It’s like they view the historical dialectic as some sort of dare.
trollhattan
@JGabriel:
Tell me that puss didn’t get smashed in the playground everyday from first grade through at least tenth. No wonder he totes the giant shoulder chip.
Nicole
The only thing more awful than that article are the comments after it. We’re doomed. Doomed, I say.
AlphaLiberal
Don’t worry! We have our brave warriors from the Democratic Party to save us!
oh wait…
Is it happy hour yet?
gene108
@Nicole:
The comments scare me more than the article. One crack-pot writing crack-pottery has a limited impact.
The fact dozens of people, not only agree with him, but want to one up him in restricting voting rights is spooky.
Tom Hilton
There’s a quote from Jefferson (could be apocryphal, haven’t verified) that wingnuts have been using for years, to the effect that the vote should never be extended to people who don’t own property because they’ll just vote to confiscate the property of people who do. I first heard this one back in 2003.
Point being, the ideological rationalization for this view has been common currency for a long time now. This Vadum guy is just saying what the wingnuts have all been thinking.
geg6
@gene108:
I think I noted some rather familiarly named spoofs toward the end of the comments there. My hat is off to them.
Julie Raffety
I find the tea party profoundly un-American. May we take them off the voting lists?
Dennis SGMM
@AlphaLiberal:
You clearly overlook the impact of a Strongly Worded Letter. Historians know that the Goths were prevented from sacking Rome by a series of Strongly Worded Letters and finally by a Moving Speech delivered from the walls of the city.
Or maybe it was the Visigoths, or the Lombards, or the Ostrogoths. Anyway, it was somebody.
Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen
Can we get this guy a bigger megaphone?
beltane
@Tom Hilton: If non-property owners really wanted to confiscate property, there are better ways of doing it than via the ballot. You’d think the wingnuts with their “2nd Amendment remedies” would be more cognisant of this.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@joeyess: Or scissors with pointy ends.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@TheWorstPersonInTheWorld: I’ll bet your irritable bowel syndrom is Obama’s fault as well.
jl
@Tom Hilton: that sounds more like John Adams than Jefferson. I know Adams argued along those lines, though I don’t know if there is a juicy quote from Adams on it.
Jefferson thought that the mass of the population could only become responsible voters and citizens by actually practicing, and that is the reasoning behind his ‘Republic of Wards’ idea. Jefferson thought a country should be governed at the very local level by local citizens.
(Edit: to be clearer, that national government should start with very local councils run by people from the general population. He saw these as training grounds for people to gain ability to responsibly govern. For governments that had wider scope, at county, state and national level, these would draw from the people who distinguished themselves in the local ward governments. But every who participated would gain the skills to become a responsible voter, and nearly everyone should participate at the ward level.)
You might try an internet search, or look at a few books of selected writing and look for the phrase ‘Republic of Wards’. One of the collectons of Jefferson’s writings has an index entry to the concept, which Jefferson advocated for over several decades.
Madison explicitly came out against a property or wealth qualifications for voting. Madison noted someplace that as long as long as a part of the population is much wealthier than others, or somebody had access to more ready cash, the argument that the poorer would be corrupted by the richer could apply to any one except the very richest, regardless of whether they owned property or not. Sorry, no time to look for links now. But you also have to read through dead tree books for some of their letters and addresses.
WereBear
Louis the 14th had a Something of the Something whose job was to wipe the Royal Behind.
And I imagine it was a coveted job, because of all the perks. Today’s conservatives remind me of that fact a lot; they are spouting the same idiocies the Koch brothers do… somehow, thinking that will help them be part of the crowd that hangs out on yachts.
I mean, it’s really pathetic, though I have no sympathy because they are so mean minded.
Violet
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen:
Yes, exactly. Let’s get him and his friends saying this sort of thing all over the place. Make sure he’s quizzed on exactly who shouldn’t vote? Anyone receiving “government money”? Does that mean Social Security? How about military pensions? How about the unemployed? People who have lost their homes? Let’s make sure he gets to tell everyone who shouldn’t have the right to vote. Nothing like letting everyone know what the Republicans stand for.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@jl: I would also suggest digging through Project Gutenberg (www.gutenberg.org) to find some of Madison and Jefferson’s writings.
A Mom Anon
@Violet: I do believe that those awful “government money” recipients would include Congress and any other paid elected official too. Just sayin’…
jl
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): That a good idea.
I see Gary Hart wrote a book on Jefferson’s idea, which I also see is often called ‘Jefferson’s Ward Republic’
Restoration of the Republic: The Jeffersonian Ideal in 21st-Century America
by Gary Hart
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Restoration-of-the-Republic/Gary-Hart/e/9780195155860?itm=1&usri=gary%2Bhart%2Bjefferson%2Bward%2Brepublic
TheWorstPersonInTheWorld
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
My bowels are in tip top shape, thanks to lots of butt sex, thank you very much.
Now, back to why your president is a wimp…
jl
@A Mom Anon: Disqualificaton because of getting gummint money would get the oil barons off the voter rolls. I think that would take care of the Koch brothers.
Jeffro
@Violet: I agree, bigger megaphone plz.
I just have to run this by my conservative/IGMFU family members – I have no doubt they’re fine with the sentiment, I’m just curious to see if two of them would have willingly surrendered their voting rights a few years back when they were on unemployment.
I’m guessing yes…
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@TheWorstPersonInTheWorld: My president ran for office without changing his skin color. That alone makes him pretty tough.
Chris
@gene108:
Perusing PajamasMedia for long enough, I found the same thing. Really, the articles and what’s in them are irrelevant. They’re just the trigger designed to unleash the daily dose of white-hot Two Minutes Hate induced fury that keeps their readers’ status as motivated voters and activists.
Ruckus
@trollhattan:
Something along the lines of a semi moving 80 mph would be more effective in getting the message across.
And not be in any way pleasurable.
To the recipient.
joes527
@jl: Yeah I love the idea that all government should bubble up from neighbourhood associations.
What could _possibly_ go wrong?
ppcli
@Dave Ruddell: Tabarnak, I think you’re right. This cementhead studied at U of T. I wouldn’t have thought it possible for someone to graduate my alma mater and remain that stupid. (And I was in the same class as Tony Clement!)
Violet
@Jeffro:
If not-eligible-to-vote includes unemployed people, that would mean stay at home moms wouldn’t be able to vote either. Wonder how well that would go over.
Chris
@Tom Hilton:
I think it’s Tocqueville: “The American Republic will endure, until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money.”
I seriously doubt if the people who quote him would be willing to see all those nice military bases with all the jobs attached to them go away (to take just one example), but military bases, much like highway and farm subsidies, are not bribes, because shut up that’s why.
artem1s
@Violet:
don’t forget school vouchers and Pell grants and any type of government contract money. Or anyone that used a federal highway or bridge, the post office and/or ever rode on a train or mass transit.
Ruckus
@Ruckus:
OK let’s get this out of the way FYWP. Not letting me edit my own post?
I see JGabriel bet me to the pleasure part.
Marc McKenzie
“I know you’re falling out of your chair right about now with this new and shocking revelation, but it was never about “voter fraud”. This American Thinker is writing about legally registered Americans voting. He’s opposed.”
Nope. Not falling out of my chair at all. Just shaking my head and saying, “What, why are you surprised by this? They’ve only been pretty upfront about this since the 2000 election.”
No surprise at all…except at the bald-faced gall of this guy to actually say it out loud.
So, when is the MSM going after him?
jl
@joes527:
OK, fine, whatever. Thanks for chiming in.
The argument here is about whether the vast majority of the adult citizens should vote, or whether only those deemed worthy should vote. And I am arguing that most of the Founders, including Hamilton, Jefferson and Madison, said the vast majority should vote, whether they owned property, were wealthy, or fools, or not.
It should be clear that I am not arguing for Jefferson’s Ward Republic here, since I also gave Hamilton’s argument for having a very wide voting franchise, and that is a very different argument.
A Mom Anon
@jl: Now this I like,lol.
It just freaks me out that these elected doofuses bitch about people getting gov’t money and big gov’t while happily taking a paycheck and benefits from the very same gov’t they claim to hate. It makes me nuts that they’re never confronted with that bit of reality.
FlipYrWhig
@jl: The Republic of Wards sounds like English club football. Maybe when a big city wants to hire an ace young administrator, they could pay transfer fees, or an underperforming state capital could be relegated into the second division.
singfoom
Ah yes, the landed gentry vote. You go Vadum, et al, reach for that America of the 1860s for which you pine.
No surprise that a winger thinks the poor shouldn’t vote. I guess that comes from the “Only job creators may vote” part of election law, right?
It makes perfect sense given our current system, you get to vote as many times as jobs you have created. Lines up perfectly with the vote$ of corporations.
Of course, the obvious answer to our problems is to disenfranchise further those without power. I’m sure that’ll totally help us out.
Someday, I might get my wish to see their heads pop at the cognitive dissonance.
FlipYrWhig
@Violet:
The entirety of contemporary conservatism relies on a shared nightmare that somewhere in the country, probably closer than you’d think, there’s a bunch of people getting a free ride, and pretty soon they’ll outnumber decent folks like you, and the Democrats are helping them do it, so you’d better stop them.
Ruckus
@Geoduck:
In CA you can vote by mail and you can make it permanent. Of course you have to register and there is a cutoff time before each election to do that. You need an address to send the ballots to but it does not need to be a residential address but it has to be in the county you vote in. Otherwise you have to pick up a ballot at the clerks office. So even the homeless can vote, it just can be a bit of a challenge.
Elie
@TheWorstPersonInTheWorld:
What have YOU done to fix any of this?
Why is it always someone else’s job? Specially with all that contempt and indignant attitude that “those folks” over there should have fixed this by now.
Who? Oh yeah. Obama. Of course.
You some sort of shut-in or something?
metricpenny
@MomSense:
Kudos to you all! And your handle is so appropriate.
Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen
@Violet: WIC, AFDC, Medicaid? Families with children who receive health care through SCHIP? Did ya get help with that heating oil last winter? Step away from the voting booth, moocher!
I like your approach because a lot of people who would have died of starvation or simple medical conditions long since have fooled themselves into thinking that only lazy darkies get “Welfare,” while they get “Assistance.” In their minds it is completely different.
Elie
@Ruckus:
It makes it a little harder to organize getting folks to vote. In some ways it was easier when there were polling places that you could arrange rides . Now, if you try to have a meeting where people could bring their ballots and vote, there might be accusations of “coaching” or interfering with votes, etc. Its a little more complicated.
Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen
Fxd.
TheWorstPersonInTheWorld
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
What the hell does that mean? In your mind, at least…
singfoom
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen: No no no, it would be much more satisfying to have their heads pop from the inside. Someone else removing it is much less satisfying, just sayin.
Dino
I humbly propose the following:
USA Inc.
Reorganize our blessed union as a corporation.
Each citizen is given one vote per one thousand paid in income taxes, not payroll taxes because lucky duckies don’t count. Joint filers without enough paid in get half a vote each.
Or better yet, sell “shares.” Then we can finally complete corporate person hood and allow business entities to purchase shares (tax deductible of course).
Adam Smith would approve. It is really what our Founding Fathers wanted.
How long til Cato or Reason picks up this meme?
FlipYrWhig
@Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen:
Yup. They earned it through a lifetime of hard work and/or deserve it because of bad breaks they couldn’t control. The lazy darkies, on the other hand, didn’t earn it and don’t deserve it, because you know what _they’re_ like. Differentiating the “deserving poor” from the “undeserving poor” goes way, way back.
Thoughtful Black Co-Citizen
Meanwhile Edroso shares this lovely skreeed he found in the Washington Times*:
A co-ordinated bout of African-American bashing by the fReichtards, or is the stress of a black PotUS causing them to crack simultaneously? You be the judge.
*Which is published and distributed in D.C. Where we just got the MLK memorial and we’re not exactly an all Caucasian crew, if you know what I mean.
GregB
Blessed are the poor for they will be proudly disenfranchised by the lunatic Christianists on the eve of our American apocalypse.
gocart mozart
Prepare to be shocked.
http://www.americanthinker.com/cartoons/2011/09/image_by_dale_of_out_2.html
FormerSwingVoter
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Republicans are openly at war with the American people.
Chris
@GregB:
Blessed are the poor, cause if there really is a God, they’re a hell of a lot more likely to go to heaven than the wide-eyed lunatics who’ve spent the last thirty years trying to patent Christianity.
Elizabelle
I gotta tell you —
American Thinker’s logo looks to me like a Tea Partier relieving his bowels.
Judas Escargot
@gocart mozart:
Saw that, WTF?
kc
God almighty, I hate wingnuts.
AlphaLiberal
This message would have gotten more legs today if not for this message:
Did the White House double-cross its supporters on the smog rule?
Memo to Democrats: You’re making Romney look good. Cravenness and capitulation are actually not traits admired in politicians.
bemused
Vadum is creepy looking. I wouldn’t let him walk my dog.
Elizabelle
Recent comment on Vadum’s “American Thinker” column:
by “todayslies”
quannlace
‘Because, dammit, I reserve that right to desimate the remaining Middle and working class, to myself and my fellow wingnuts.’
Vadum, why don’t you just make it simple and say ” Worthless scum. Just shut the hell up and do what we tell you to do.”
God, what a frigid fuckwit. Maybe he should add that the poor should die and decrease the surplus population.
lou
@Duh rock no balls at all bama:
Well, they do want to get rid of the public’s right to vote for Senators, so there you go.
suzanne
@The Republic of Stupidity:
FTFY.
Davis X. Machina
@AlphaLiberal: Who said this?
“At a time when so many people are hurting, we need to put the decisions about our energy future in to the hands of the people and their elected representatives…. EPA actions in this area would have enormous implications, and these issues need to be handled carefully and appropriately dealt with by the Congress, not in isolation, by a federal environmental agency”
Answer: Sherrod Brown, Carl Levin, and six other Democratic senators.
It’s from Sen. Rockefeller’s home page. He’s proud of his position — but he’s from West Virginia. Senator Brown, though, is often suggested as exemplary true progressive, and a potential Obama primary challenger. And Levin is widely reputed a liberal lion.
Yeah, it’s from February of 2010. On clean coal, to be sure, but what do you expect their position to be when the EPA has to make the call on CO2?
This is not just an Obama problem. This is a ‘Democratic rust-belt-state’ problem. A ‘states-where-the-2008-election was won and lost’ problem. A ‘party-who-polls-horribly-among the-white-working-class’ problem.
Gravenstone
@JGabriel: Okay, that’s classic. In one row, there is a pic of Valdum right next to a pic of Mussolini. Someone’s been busy tweaking the search results.
harlana
o.O
harlana
@Dino: By jove, I like the cut of your jib!
Keith G
@Davis X. Machina:
So…what will they give up next?
harlana
@FlipYrWhig:
THIS, drives me crazy, because they think they’re never gonna end up like “those people”, depending on the government to survive, when it’s one job loss, one foreclosure, one sick child or parent away for these people before they would apply for gubmint assistance to keep their kids from going hungry in a heartbeat. This miserable, hating mass of the brainwashed, they just don’t get what’s happening here.
suzanne
I have this liberal fantasy that goes like this: if you vote against any part of the social safety net, you lose the ability in the future to ever draw on it. Vote against school funding? Your kids get kicked out. Vote against Social Security? You can never draw on it, even though you’ll still be required to pay into it.
I love thinking about how the world would be different if these asses were ever held accountable.
harlana
@bemused: i was immediately struck by his creepiness!
but, you know, you’d expect somebody sick and twisted to look like that
Davis X. Machina
@Keith G: You thought maybe the Obama EPA was going to regulate CO2 as a pollutant? It’s irrelevant what the EPA wants.
Ask Senator Stabenow, and Senator Levin, and Senator Casey, and Senator Manchin, and Senator Rockefeller, and Senator McCaskill, and Senator Baucus, and Senator Begich, and Senator Brown of Ohio, what they want.
The “they” in your question is a little bigger than it looks… and to whom they’re surrendering isn’t always the GOP.
Corner Stone
@suzanne:
I’ll take two!
Corner Stone
@Davis X. Machina: Then why bother having an EPA at all? Or an SEC? Or a DoJ? Or an…
RalfW
If we’re going to disenfranchise “unproductive” people, then we should bar anyone who is 62+ and lives on Social Security.
Come to think of it, I think anyone who dares to retire and who actually needs SSI (IE: no IRA’s, no golden parachute, or gold in a vault for that matter), should be put one the few remaining ice flows and pushed out to sea.
These retirees are unproductive and have the temerity to want to pull money out of what Rick Perry lambastes as a Pnozi scheme. It’s only Ponzi if the olds keep living thereby screwing up the actuarial tables!
Omnes Omnibus
@Keith G:
What does that even mean? Rust belt liberals have always been less than perfect on environmental issues. Northeastern liberals have always been less than perfect on financial issues. New York City liberals tend to be down the line supporters of Israel. Everyone has parochial concerns. This is not new.
General Stuck
@Keith G:
My hope is Texas
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: Because there are a lot of things that are regulated. In this particular case, because of whose ox is getting gored, CO2 isn’t getting added to the the lsit of thing that are being regulated. But you knew what he was saying, didn’t you?
TenguPhule
@Chris:
I fail to see a problem here.
TenguPhule
@Dino:
So Wars would then be relabeled as Hostile Takeovers and when the stockholders get cut out, they literally get their heads chopped off?
Omnes Omnibus
@TenguPhule: He would get tired and his dry cleaning bills would go through the roof.
bemused
@harlana:
My creepdar goes off right away for guys like Vadum. Gaffney, Krauthammer, Savage, Rove, Cheney, the list goes on & on. There is something very, very wrong with these people
Thom Hartmann often has Peter Ferrara, American Civil Rights Union, on his show as a guest. It’s kind of fascinating in disturbing way to listen to this guy get hysterical when Thom pushes back on his goofy views. Seriously hysterical. His voice gets so high pitched, he sounds as if he is having a psychiatric meltdown…every time he is on Thom’s show.
Julie
@gocart mozart: I just… wow. What the fucking fuck? I didn’t think I could be surprised anymore, but I guess I was wrong. Holy Baby Jesus.
Villago Delenda Est
@Dino:
The interesting thing here is that the notion that stockholders can shape corporate policy is one that corporate management wishes to go the fuck away. Buying a few shares and then “disrupting” a shareholders meeting by opposing management’s position on any number of corporate policies based on the long term future of the corporation is about as heretical as you can get.
Keith G
@Davis X. Machina:
The Clinton Admin did in 98. What does the Obama EPA want? Hell, what does any part of the Obama Admin want?
“Let standards slide. Let industrial processes pollute. Maybe they will like us enough to vote for us”
You can use that same corrupt argument for helping the poor or regulating abortion.
“Let’s give in a bit and become more like them. It won’t hurt that many people.”
Keith G
@General Stuck:
You know what happened to hope.
FlipYrWhig
@Keith G:
Rust-belt Democrats like regulating abortion, too. Remember Bob Casey Sr.? Remember Bart Stupak? It’s not that Democrats are “becoming more like them.” They were like that when they got there.
Keith G
@Omnes Omnibus:
Yet in the past, leadership has stood up and taken on those fights – and on occasion made some progress and by doing so, made this place a bit better.
Look, I get it. This particular hill may not be the one to die on, but my question is earnest.
What is the next hill to be given up?????????
Odie Hugh Manatee
@Gravenstone:
And I’ve been doing my part to help make it happen. After all, people are known for the company they keep.
On teh google. :)
Omnes Omnibus
@Keith G: I don’t know. With the jobs speech coming up, do you think that Obama has gotten a commitment from these guys to support something that they would have otherwise had problems with? I am speculating here, but it would be irresponsible not to do so.
Rabble Arouser
@Keith G: It got left in Arkansas?
B W Smith
@Keith G: I’m not defending Obama’s decision but by invoking Clinton, you’re missing two key points. The economy was in much better shape at the time and Clinton was not facing re-election. Now I would like to think that the decision is more about the current economy, but I’m not naive.
harlana
@General Stuck:
But how would we survive without all those awesome Texas jobs?
FlipYrWhig
@Keith G:
This is kind of abstract, honestly. What leadership and what fights? Because I remember rather well how Democrats used to stand for gun control, and then they started losing a lot of elections on that issue, and eventually they gave up on it entirely, and nowadays even the biggest and loudest liberal voices there are never even mention it. I can’t think of a halcyon period where Democrats were known for sticking to a coherent set of beliefs.
FlipYrWhig
@Omnes Omnibus: I was kicking around some ideas along those lines with Jay B. and Corner Stone near the end of the Battle lines are being drawn thread.
Davis X. Machina
I’m not privy to any special information, but I will bet blind that certain key members of the Senate Democratic Caucus are the driving force behind this.
Running in 2012, from rust-belt and/or coal-mining states:
Stabenow of Michigan, Tester of Montana, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, Casey of Pennsylvania, Joe Manchin of West Virginia. Add Webb’s open Virginia seat, and there’s the control of the Senate right there.
Corner Stone
@Omnes Omnibus:
My vote is “No”.
Tester, McCaskill and Manchin are all going to be in fights for their very lives. They aren’t swallowing ANY hard votes.
Ergo hoc propter sum, any deal they could sign onto is going to suuuuccckkk.
Davis X. Machina
@Corner Stone: Joe “Nighthorse” Manchin in particular worries me. He will be back in the Senate, and I don’t think he cares much on which side of the aisle.
Omnes Omnibus
@Corner Stone: Giving them a little something that they can take home and say they got out of the White House? Trying to keep control of the Senate? Again, just speculating.
Keith G
@FlipYrWhig: I guess I could Googs all the workplace, enviro, health/food/drug, political and education reforms that have been added during my adult life, but I’d rather cook supper.
West of the Rockies (formerly Frank W.)
My unfiltered gut reaction: I. Hate. Republicans.
Omnes Omnibus
@West of the Rockies (formerly Frank W.): Dude, are you sure you aren’t toning down a little? Might it not work better with an f-bomb in there?
Little Boots
but how will this keep george soros from voting? that’s the real problem here.
Little Boots
I’m starting to wonder if we need to look at this another way. maybe they working poor need their own house of government. as so often, the Romans actually had an answer: the Tribunes. You could only vote for them if you were the working poor, and they had a veto over legislation. that would not work in our system, but imagine if there were a block in congress that simply, and only, answered to the working poor. what would that do?
Little Boots
threadkiller rides again!
Emma Anne
@Elie:
Mail in ballots are terrific for get out the vote. The reason is that we GOTVers get reports from the secretary of state that list whose ballot has come in. Hence we can call the people who haven’t voted yet and leave the voters alone. In Colorado at least you are allowed to bring up to five ballots to the polling place for people, so you can even do the same-day thing.
PurpleGirl
@Zifnab: But then you would be counting poor children and poor adults. You know there are so many more poor children than rich children and we can’t have that now, can we?
FlipYrWhig
@Keith G: I think you’ll find that a lot of those won Republican support, back in the days when Republicans cared about appearing reasonable. I don’t think you’ll find that they were rammed through a reluctant Congress by a ballsy bunch of devil-may-care Democrats.
Peggy
@gocart mozart:
Shocked?
Notice Obama’s eyes and Holder’s tongue hanging out. This is the old black man rapes white woman prelude to a lynching.
It’s just revive classic American tropes, like antiquing in Vermont.