The Republican Party Today

#152
#152
norrislakevol said:
I was assuming. Is he? I thought he had significant health issues, but may be thinking of someone else.
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Why would you assume that?

Edit: he stated he runs a construction business, took the money, felt guilty for taking the money and didn’t need it; but rather than donate the money to charity, spent it on his land.
 
#155
#155
clarksvol00 said:
See my edit.
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Gonna take a stab at this...think I see what you are trying to ask, but please feel free to correct me if I am wrong. If a person pays his/her debt to society, and then becomes a contributing member of society again for a certain period of time, then yes, they should be able to vote. Most people deserve a second chance. Repeat offenders, no.
 
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#156
#156
norrislakevol said:
Right. I also think that in person voting is the way to go, but some could register to vote remotely via a paper mail in ballot if they register their thumbprints before hand. There is no way to cheat that way. The thumbprints can be scanned and verified before the vote is counted.
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If you are going to insist on in person voting, then there must be some consistency in the ratio of voters to machines among precincts. To have some precincts with little to no wait while others of hours long waits is not acceptable and is certainly not fair.
 
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#158
#158
luthervol said:
If you are going to insist on in person voting, then there must be some consistency in the ratio of voters to machines among precincts. To have some precincts with little to no wait while others of hours long waits is not acceptable and is certainly not fair.
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That's not an unfair statement. Paper ballots too. It's the most secure way. You cast your vote, then you can clearly see who you voted for.
 
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#159
#159
So many of our problems would work themselves out naturally if we’d do just four things:

Repeal the 17th - Senators are working for the wrong people

Like many states, require a balanced budget

Simplify the tax system - 90% of people should be able to do their taxes on the back of a napkin

Regress the tax code along with item #2 - too many people pay no income tax - want more govt bennies? Better cut something else or pony up more tax dollars.

This would go a long way in resolving the government dysfunction.
 
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#160
#160
clarksvol00 said:
It's kind of a catch-22. If somebody doesn't agree with you, you prefer totalitarianism or anarchy
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Dictatorial would have been my choice of words, but this is basically my takeaway. Most people on this forum who claim to value individual liberty really just mean their personal liberty. This is basically just another example of that.
 
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#161
#161
clarksvol00 said:
I think most people pushing poll tests are hoping to measure mental capacity by agreement with their views. Wait til all these gerrymandered l partisan state legislatures (both sides) get the opportunity to start formulating qualifications for voting tests.
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Agreed. The question would always be how to decide impartially. Someone confined to a facility because they cannot function due to mental incapacity could be one criteria. Perhaps there are other limiting criteria; for instance, can a mentally unfit person qualify for a drivers license. The great example would be the form required to buy a firearm as a qualifier ... that would cause liberal heads to explode.
 
#162
#162
clarksvol00 said:
Maybe I'm reading this wrong; but you want to restrict voting rights based on whether somebody is "vested," but you can't define "vested."
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"Vested" would certainly imply citizenship and residency in the location where the vote is applicable at the very least.
 
#163
#163
RockyTop85 said:
It’s nonsensical, but also objectively far more extreme than even some kind of aptitude test and would result in less freedom.

Elections are a substitute for violent revolution. The threshold commitment for voting being far lower than “willing to risk death or commit murder” makes governments more accountable because the citizens’ risk side of the risk/reward matrix is lower so change is more appealing.

Inversely, raising the threshold for change by putting more restrictions on voting makes governments less responsive to demands of the populace, and/or completely unresponsive to the preferences of the disenfranchised.

For example, look at the very people mentioned, earlier: the “dreamers.” They have no path to vote and the only incentive the government has to respond to their issues is the extent to which voters care about them. Despite the fact that it’s a fairly popular issue, the support is insufficient because it isn’t an important enough issue to motivate voters who aren’t directly affected. Look at the history of black people in America, citizens of Russia, Iran, Syria, etc. etc. The disenfranchised have less liberty in almost every context until they rise up and force the government to give them the vote.
So if the very idea of Democratic systems is to not have to risk death to change government policy, requiring military service and some risk of death just to achieve the tool of nonviolent revolution is nonsensical.
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Too bad. They didn't come here by legal means. Why should they derive a positive from an illegal act? Isn't fruit of the poison tree a thing the law likes to parade around? How is being an illegal "resident" with intent to live like a full blown citizen different than illegally obtaining information with intent to use it in court?

Every person has citizenship somewhere - just not always here. Citizenship is similar in concept to membership. If you aren't a member of an organization, you don't have rights within the organization; that's pretty much been an established practice worldwide since forever. Would you propose that someone not trained as a lawyer and part of the bar should be able to hang out a shingle and practice law because he/she believes himself/herself to be qualified and should have the right to practice law? Would you feel confident if medical associations allowed anyone identifying as a doctor to go into practice?
 
#164
#164
AM64 said:
Too bad. They didn't come here by legal means. Why should they derive a positive from an illegal act? Isn't fruit of the poison tree a thing the law likes to parade around? How is being an illegal "resident" with intent to live like a full blown citizen different than illegally obtaining information with intent to use it in court?

Every person has citizenship somewhere - just not always here. Citizenship is similar in concept to membership. If you aren't a member of an organization, you don't have rights within the organization; that's pretty much been an established practice worldwide since forever. Would you propose that someone not trained as a lawyer and part of the bar should be able to hang out a shingle and practice law because he/she believes himself/herself to be qualified and should have the right to practice law? Would you feel confident if medical associations allowed anyone identifying as a doctor to go into practice?
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What are you talking about didn’t come here by legal means? He was talking about a “test,” (military service, apparently) for everybody. Not just immigrants.

My use of the dreamers example was just that: an example of how government treats the disenfranchised.
 
#165
#165
RockyTop85 said:
What are you talking about didn’t come here by legal means? He was talking about a “test,” (military service, apparently) for everybody. Not just immigrants.

My use of the dreamers example was just that: an example of how government treats the disenfranchised.
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I was referring specifically to the "dreamer" part. How are they disenfranchised? They are here, they are allowed to live and work here. They didn't come here legally, and they could return to the country of origin and go through the proper process to come here and gain citizenship. I'm not about to apologize for having rights of US citizenship that they don't have because my citizenship came both from that of my parents (and many generations before) and by having been born here.
 
#166
#166
AM64 said:
I was referring specifically to the "dreamer" part. How are they disenfranchised? They are here, they are allowed to live and work here. They didn't come here legally, and they could return to the country of origin and go through the proper process to come here and gain citizenship. I'm not about to apologize for having rights of US citizenship that they don't have because my citizenship came both from that of my parents (and many generations before) and by having been born here.
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I suggest going back and reading the conversation from the beginning and applying relevant context.
 
#167
#167
Orangeburst said:
I was talking about voter ID.Something just about every EU nation requires.
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Dems negated the ID issue with mail in voting. They fought against voter ID for years; and just when they lost the battle, they used a "pandemic" to win the war.
 
#169
#169
AM64 said:
Maybe next time, but my issue with non-citizens as voters still stands.
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The conversation isn’t about non-citizens, it’s about citizens, which is why I’m blowing this off. It’s a tangential argument that clouds the current discussion. Right now the United States doesn’t deny suffrage to large groups of citizens so non-citizens provide the best recent analog to the situation created by the proposal of voting qualifications. I also included a historical US example and several foreign examples.

That’s all they are: just examples of the reality that would face people denied suffrage to show why the idea of requiring citizens to qualify to vote is extreme and authoritarian.
 
#170
#170
RockyTop85 said:
The conversation isn’t about non-citizens, it’s about citizens, which is why I’m blowing this off. It’s a tangential argument that clouds the current discussion. Right now the United States doesn’t deny suffrage to large groups of citizens so non-citizens provide the best recent analog to the situation created by the proposal of voting qualifications. I also included a historical US example and several foreign examples.

That’s all they are: just examples of the reality that would face people denied suffrage to show why the idea of requiring citizens to qualify to vote is extreme and authoritarian.
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OK. Let's take it from there. Why is it extreme to require a citizen to prove citizenship and residency in the voting location?

There are two similar terms that were being thrown around "vested" and "qualified". "Vested should apply to the issue of citizenship and residency - that someone is a US citizen and a resident of the place where the vote is taken. I live in a county and less than a mile outside a city limit. Although I'm often directly affected by what the city does; I don't have city residency, and I rightfully cannot vote on city issues. I also own another home in TN but don't spend the majority of my time there, so I don't vote there ... or in two places even though what happens there directly affects me. Citizenship and residency seem to be a pretty sound basis for being vested, and it is not extreme in the least to have to prove such.

Mental incapacitation, criminal conviction, minimum age would seem to be "qualifiers" if they are allowed by law. There could be more things that go into that category - the welfare vs income issue, for example.

In the end being vested by virtue of citizenship and residence should be considered absolutes. Qualifiers would be attributes not solely based on "being" or being here vs there - minimum age as covered by the 26th Amendment, for example.
 
#171
#171
TNVOLNAVY said:
Well you did get one thing right, Trump is destroying the GOPe. The days of spineless RINOs and Republicucks are dead and over.
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Case in point, the result of long term frequent exposure to extreme MAGA rhetoric.
 
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#172
#172
clarksvol00 said:
A follow-up: today @VolinWayne stated that he took government covid money (which was approved under trump) for his business, wound up not needing it, and felt guilty because of it. I asked him if would donate the funds to a charitable cause and he responded that he spent it on his acreage in GA. Should he be prohibited from voting because of his utilization of government largesse?
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Hang on now, that was a joke...you mentioned that you liked habitat, I do to. We purchased this acreage last year and my business received PPP loan in the winter of 2020. It was only used for the business I promise....You are going to have the IRS knocking on my door
 
#174
#174
DC_Vol said:
So many of our problems would work themselves out naturally if we’d do just four things:

Repeal the 17th - Senators are working for the wrong people

Like many states, require a balanced budget

Simplify the tax system - 90% of people should be able to do their taxes on the back of a napkin

Regress the tax code along with item #2 - too many people pay no income tax - want more govt bennies? Better cut something else or pony up more tax dollars.

This would go a long way in resolving the government dysfunction.
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5 things, all that you said plus eliminate 1/2 to 3/4 of all federal departments and agencies and strip the rule making power of unelected bureaucrats.
 
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#175
#175
OrangeBoro said:
LOL Trump has been in politics for like 7 years and all this is his fault. Not joe biden who has been around for 50 years not all Trump
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It ain't Trump's fault, it's not Biden's fault --- its the voters that are buying in, donating, branding and voting for these idiots.

Two completely different brands of politics with the clowns as in Congress for support.
Corruption on both sides, power and money quests and none of them are serving in anybody's interest....

We are being Conned by both parties... So you can vote for the lesser of the two Evils but in reality one is just as bad as the other.
 
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