The True Vote

For John, BLUF:  In an age of identity theft there are thousands of politicians and bureaucrats, and media types, who think it is everywhere, except in voting.  This kind of thinking seems strange to me.  Perhaps it is form of mass hysteria.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

---

On Page A4 of The [Lowell] Sun we have an Associated Press article, Dominion Voting sues Fox for $1.6B over 2020 election claims, which seems to wander into propoganda:

The lawsuit is part of a growing body of legal action filed by the voting company and other targets of misleading, false and bizarre claims spread by President Donald Trump and his allies in the aftermath of Trump’s election loss to Joe Biden.  Those claims helped spur on rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 in a violent siege that left five people dead, including a police officer.  The siege led to Trump’s historic second impeachment.

That second paragraph deserves a fisking.  I will leave that for another day.

Then, on page A8, we have "Democrats assail Georgia law, make case for voting overhaul".

I am not sure the Democrats are making a case, except in their own minds and the minds of Associted Press Reporters.

Democrats have seized on new voting restrictions in Georgia to focus attention on the fight to overhaul federal election laws, setting up a slow-building standoff that carries echoes of the civil rights battles of a half-century ago.

In fiery speeches, pointed statements and tweets, party leaders on Friday decried the law signed the day before by the state’s Republican governor as specifically aimed at suppressing Black and Latino votes and a threat to democracy.  President Joe Biden released an extended statement, calling the law an attack on “good conscience” that denies the right to vote for “countless” Americans.

And our Senator, Senator Elizabeth Warren, tries to make it about racism, with this quote on Thursday♠:

"The Republican who is sitting in Stacey Abrams’ chair just signed a despicable voter suppression bill into law to take Georgia back to Jim Crow," Warren tweeted.

Yes, another move by Democrats to alienate my vote.  I wish for elections that are both free and fair.  Poisoning the well by suggesting I am a throw-back to the Jim Crow era is not just insulting, it is unjust.  The good news for Democrat operatives is that I am old and will soon be ineligible to vote.♥

To make matters worse, here is a Tweet about a quote from CNN, which shows the nonsense being thrown about regarding the "voting rights" act before Congress:

"The bill does far more than expand voting access . . . It also would amend the Constitution to overrule Citizens United, a controversial Supreme Court decision that determined corporations could spend unlimited amounts of money in elections."

The big takeaway is that the US Congress may not amend the US Constitution.  It make kick off an effort to pass an Amendment to the US Constitution, but the States are involved.

Yet here in Lowell we are cracking down on voter rolls and residency requirements, as today's Editorial, "Lay case shows need for election residency review", shows.  The Editorial ends:

In any case, we’d also encourage Secretary of the Commonwealth William Galvin to undertake a review of what constitutes a candidate’s legal residency, so we don’t have to rely on a judge’s interpretation of competing facts to make that determination.

I think the Commonwealth Secretary of State should take the extra step and check on what constitutes a voter's legal residency.  The scandal of the dead voting has tainted our elections for far too many decades.♦

Regarding the Editorial, the penultimate paragraph reads:

Should Lay eventually prevail in court, we hope he takes advantage of this opportunity to engage in constructive debate on the issues facing this diverse school district of more than 14,000 students.

Exactly.  The education of our youth here in Lowell is much too important to take a laissez faire approach.  Once out in the "real world" our students will have to compete against fellow adults who have had many advantages in life.  We need to be equipping our students for the struggles of adulthood.

In the mean time, we, as the Citizens of this Great Nation, should examine electoral facts with care, demanding the Fourth Estate go down every rabbit hole, and tell our elected representatives that we want fair elections, with everyone having a chance to vote, but no one having a chance to abuse that privilege.

The other thing is we should look into is how the rest of the world votes, from Voter ID to fingers dipped in ink, †o show one has voted.

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  To make matters worse, Senator Warren is confronting the solid Democratic Party and Media meme that there is no fraud in elections.  I don't think it is hypocrisy, which would be a harsh judgement.  However, it could be short term memory loss.
♥  Except as a Democrat.
♦  Except in Lowell.