Further details:
The opinion piece writer took the opposite side in 2016 with Cruz. Saying that such outside the norm technicality questions of eligibility from the fringe were bad and should be dismissed. A slightly relevant circumstance is that the opinion piece writer lost a GOP primary for an office that Harris won. Definitely no jealousy or other conflicts of interest at play.
Additionally, though it wasn’t mentioned in the article I first linked… As you point out, the actual question from the reporter was about this (the opinion article) and not about where Harris was born.
However, if you watch the actual exchange you will see that Trump had immediately answered back referring to questions about where she was born. And the reporter immediately followed up saying no, it’s about ___.
It seems likely he could not resist his normal birtherism shtick.
Trump had better be careful. Kamala was born right here in the USA. And she grew up here. She is eligible beyond any doubt to become POTUS . . . or VPOTUS.
Trump only harms himself by questioning stuff like this. Admittedly, Kamala was an anchor baby. But so what. That makes no difference whatsoever to her eligibility under law in place back then . . . . or now.
If Trump does not like the anchor baby scam he should seek to change the law . . . and not use it to skewer Kamala or cast doubt on her eligibility.
Trump down to 47% approval in today’s Rasmussen daily tracking poll. That is not a great number and he will need to do better to be guaranteed of success in November.
I was specifically talking about California. The voter registration form requires it.
With states’ rights and all, I can see why states may allow non-citizens to participate in local and state elections. Federal law prohibits non-citizens from voting in federal elections, but it does not prohibit non-citizens from voting in state or local elections.
What about states’ rights?! Citizenship is a federal institution. I believe residency is decided by the states. If some state wants to give the right to vote in local elections to someone who has been a resident of the state for 5 years (which is what’s required for citizenship), I don’t have a problem with that. I think the only difference is the oath of allegiance to the country, which only makes a difference for honest people (a lock only keeps honest people out). Of course I wouldn’t want non-resident non-citizens to vote, gotta draw the line somewhere. But again, the issue is squarely in the jurisdiction of each individual state. Period. End of discussion.
Here’s another example – a foreigner can legally purchase property in the US. The locality will levy a property tax and use it for all kinds of local expenses. If the owner can’t vote in his locality, it is effectively taxation without representation.
There’s no difference in the process of absentee voting and mail-in voting. There’s nothing special about the “absentee” ballot. In CA, the ballot you receive by mail is exactly the same as the one you’d get at the post office or at the voting booth. The only difference between “absentee” and “mail-in” is that a few states require an excuse to obtain the “absentee” ballot. If the states dropped this requirement, then anyone could vote by mail using that same ballot.
Excuses for an absentee ballot vary, but I’m guessing most would probably allow the impact from a natural disaster (quarantine) or advanced age.
Yes, the unequal voting rights somehow have not been stuck down yet. There’s some lawsuits making their way through the courts now. Won’t be attack down before this cycle.
It’s clear unequal voting rights and disinfranchisement to allow over-65 a route to vote and exclude everyone under 65 from that right.
Well Fauci said it was safe to vote, so we should believe him, right?
“I think if carefully done, according to the guidelines, there’s no reason that I can see why that not be the case… if you go and wear a mask, if you observe the physical distancing, and don’t have a crowded situation, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t be able to do that,” Fauci said.
He qualified that statement.
You quoted the list of conditions he qualified it with following the “if”. Which are not being done (at least uniformly)… No social distancing, crowded, no masks required. Many of the minor votes that have occurred recently have been disasters. In many cases there have been significantly less polling places, understaffed, more overcrowded with longer waits (in the bad situation) than in normal pre-pandemic times.
Also from that article:
"He added that those "compromised physically or otherwise" who do not wish to vote in-person can use mail-in voting. “So there’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to vote in person or otherwise,” he said.
"
This iswas not uniform across the country, even before Trump’s sabotaging of the postal system.
It may be safe to vote in person provided precautions are taken. It was already a slow and tedious process before but I assume that with precautions, it’ll go even slower. And then you need to trust that precautions will be followed and nobody will drag themselves to vote even if they have symptoms.
Not worth it for me. Voting by mail is even safer, requires no special precautions for me. Request your ballot, receive it, fill it, send it back with a 1-2 month buffer to make sure it gets counted. Hey it even helps the post office via your stamp purchase. And that may also indirectly help others who will have a shorter line if they still insist on voting in person. Win-win. No reason to vote in person whatsoever in States that have done voting by mail for years.
“That’s fake news,” Popovich said, insisting with faux indignation that San Antonio’s run of 22 consecutive playoff appearances had not just been halted.
“That’s total fake news,” Popovich continued. “Lots of guys have been telling me the streak hasn’t ended. I talk to people all the time. They call me. They tell me: ‘Pop, the streak didn’t end. It didn’t.’ I don’t know where you guys are getting this stuff.”
Anticipating an avalanche of absentee ballots, the U.S. Postal Service recently sent detailed letters to 46 states and D.C. warning that it cannot guarantee all ballots cast by mail for the November election will arrive in time to be counted
Some states anticipate 10 times the normal volume of election mail. Six states and D.C. received warnings that ballots could be delayed for a narrow set of voters. But the Postal Service gave 40 others — including the key battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Florida — more-serious warnings that their long-standing deadlines for requesting, returning or counting ballots were “incongruous” with mail service and that voters who send ballots in close to those deadlines may become disenfranchised.
”The Postal Service is asking election officials and voters to realistically consider how the mail works,” Martha Johnson, a spokeswoman for the USPS,
In short, vote early (and often!) if you plan to vote by mail.
Phil Murphy has opened my eyes. Phil, a Democrat, is Governor of New Jersey.
Over the many months of this thread I have posted, from time to time, Rasmussen’s daily approval rating for President Trump. This has annoyed scripta, but I always insisted Rasmussen’s number was important because it reflects the feelings of LIKELY voters. To me, likely voters’ opinions mean a lot more than those of registered voters. And while I stand by that, things have changed . . . big time.
Democrats are VERY smart politicians. What they appear now to be doing is transforming registered voters into likely voters! That is political genius. I think it could be a winning strategy for them.
Phil is sending every NJ registered voter a ballot and a postpaid return envelope. All the voter has to do is vote, seal the envelope, and put it out for the postman. Easy peasy. No effort and no inconvenience.
Now polls other than Rasmussen often reflect the views of registered voters. And those numbers are favorable for Biden/Harris. It is Democrat strategy to turn out the votes of those registered voters . . . who might not have voted in the past. This is smart strategy in my view, one quite harmful to Trump’s prospects. And I think he is well aware.
NJ, of course, does not matter. Trump never had a chance there. But if this same strategy is adopted in the several swing states, I think Trump might be finished.
Also, merely as a subordinate point, the strategy also destroys the Rasmussen poll’s numbers which are hopeful for Trump. This is because the Democrats are redefining who will be a likely voter and Rasmussen does not account for that change. It’s too new.
I view this pandemic as the quintessential force majeure, by definition for goodness sake. The response of the Trump administration has been uneven, but probably as good as any other would have been given the extraordinary circumstances. Trump’s pandemic messaging, on the other hand, needed a lot of work and still does.
Point is, the pandemic is a legitimate election issue for Democrats to exploit to their heart’s content. That’s politics and Trump has to deal with it. Am speaking here from a public health standpoint.
But there is a second aspect to the pandemic which impacts the election specifically. I got into this in my earlier post. Trump cannot campaign as he would like. His massive rallies are dead. And the pandemic is having the effect, potentially, of increasing turnout of voters who prefer Biden/Harris . . . . by making it easier for them to cast ballots.
These things are a massive “one-two” punch opposing Trump’s reelection effort, with both blows in effect being delivered by the pandemic.
Oh, and the pandemic has destroyed his “Trump card”, a great economy wherein even persons of color were finding jobs and became able to support their families. Trump did that and the pandemic came along and carpet bombed all our progress.
So maybe instead of a “one-two” punch, the pandemic has brought about a “one-two-three” salvo directed against Trump’s prospects. In any event, I doubt there is sufficient time remaining between now and early November for Trump to recover from the pandemic’s onslaught.
Yes, this pandemic, is like a volcano eruption. It has almost killed Trump election prospects.
I was just reading my Kiplinger’s magazine. For a hint about who will win this election, keep a close eye on market indexes. If they’re up in the three months preceding the election, the incumbent wins 87% of the time.
Some will claim this is a good thing, and the whole point to mail in voting - more participation.
I disagree. “Access” has never been an issue - every state has absentee options for when someone does not have access. But if someone is unwilling to put any effort into casting their vote, it’s highly unlikely they’ll be casting an informed vote.
You might enjoy this speech on capitalism vs collectivism by Milton Friedman. It’s from 1980 referencing events of the 70s and history over the last several centuries, but seems to have a great deal of relevance to our times currently.
For example, he discusses the changing trends in civil discourse, personal responsibility, crime/riots, corruption in government and various other social ills and how they are in a sense encouraged directly or indirectly by the social structures and personal philosophies associated with a collectivist approach as opposed to a capitalist one.
