Tag: Electoral College

Corporate interests & front organizations behind ranked-choice voting

Ms. Cat
Scott Walter Testimony at Wisconsin State Senate

Related:

Ranked-Choice Voting: Biggest Advocates

Hewlett Foundation, Chamberlain Project, Peter Ackerman, Action Now Initiative, George Soros, Open Society Foundations, Jennifer and Jonathan Allan Soros Foundation, Soros Fund Charitable Foundation, Laura and John Arnold Foundation, Tides Foundation, Joyce Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Pierre Omidyar, Omidyar Network, Democracy Fund, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Public Welfare Foundation, Katherine Gehl

Capital Research Center – InfluenceWatch

Capital Research Center – SourceWatch

Heritage Foundation, Hoover Institution, Bradley Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, State Policy Network (Atlas Network)

Front Organizations

YouTube restricts video of Dems, critics saying 2016 election was hacked — then backtracks

Ms. Cat

YouTube cracked down on a video compilation of Democrats and media pundits questioning the legitimacy of former President Donald Trump’s 2016 election victory – then overturned the move amid backlash on Thursday.

YouTube restricts video of Dems, critics saying 2016 election was hacked — then backtracks

Don’t they understand that The Capitol is a “temple of democracy”?! /s

Could this SCOTUS case push America toward one-party rule?

Ms. Cat

The court considers ‘Moore v. Harper’ to be a legitimate constitutional question. Critics say it’s a ‘power grab.’

Could this SCOTUS case push America toward one-party rule?

Related:

Beware the “Independent State Legislatures doctrine” — it could checkmate democracy

The Independent State Legislatures doctrine used to be a fringe theory, but not anymore. Multiple Supreme Court justices are on the record in support of it. Right-wing legal activists from the Federalist Society and its “Honest Elections Project” are pushing for it in legal briefs authored by white-shoe law firms (BakerHostetler, counsel for the Honest Elections Project, has defended Republican gerrymandering in Pennsylvania and North Carolina.) And some GOP-controlled state legislatures, including Arizona, are considering bills that would allow them to intervene in presidential elections to choose electors themselves if election results are “unclear.” If a state were to pass this type of law, it would set the stage for a court to agree that the Independent State Legislature doctrine requires that in some circumstances, state legislatures rather than voters should determine election outcomes.

As Jane Mayer reported recently, right-wing funders like the Bradley Foundation and the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) have been working with Republican state legislators to advance ways to re-engineer how states allocate Electoral College votes. Last year, a GOP state representative from Arizona, Shawna Bulick, sat on an ALEC-convened working group that discussed the Electoral College, and this year, she introduced a bill that would have given the state legislature power to undo the certification of presidential electors by a simple majority vote up until the inauguration.

Socialism and Democracy in the DPRK

Ms. Cat

Socialism and Democracy in the DPRK

Bourgeois media continues to portray the DPRK as a totalitarian nightmare, populated exclusively by a pacified and frightened citizenry. As I have shown, this is far from the case. The north Korean people have a far greater say in how their lives are structured than do citizens of even the most “democratic” capitalist countries. They are not forced to adhere to a Party Line handed down from on high, but rather are encouraged to participate in the running of society. The DPRK is an excellent example of socialism, which is focused on developing the working class-and humanity-to its full potential. It is only through socialism that we can realize our collective dream of a free and prosperous society. The DPRK is marching towards this dream, even in the face of unparalleled imperialist aggression. It is partly on this basis that we should pledge solidarity with the country. To reiterate the point I made in my last post, however, the DPRK should be supported regardless of whether it is itself socialist. It is standing against imperialism, which is the greatest enemy of socialism. Indirectly or directly, the DPRK works in the interests of socialism.

Trump’s coup attempt: dangerous for the US and the rest of the world

Ms. Cat

Trump’s coup attempt: dangerous for the US and the rest of the world

All kinds of Chickens come home to Roost

Ironically, there are big problems with US elections, but they favor Republicans and have been tolerated by Democrats in order to ensure that the only real electoral threat to Democrats comes from the right. In 2000 and again in 2016, the Republican candidate won the presidency despite losing the popular vote. From 2008- 2010, despite controlling the White House and both houses of Congress, Democrats did nothing to reform an electoral system skewed in favor of Republicans. While Democrats did resort to the Russiagate conspiracy theory to try to discredit and even overturn Trump’s 2016 victory, there was no visible interest in abolishing the “winner take all” voting system that led directly to that victory. Getting rid of that system would not only make it harder for Republicans to win elections, it would increase electoral pressure on Democrats from the left. Without such pressure – with “nowhere else to go” [as US historian Thomas Frank stresses] to punish Democrats electorally for failing to deliver for anyone but the rich – voters either stay home or get taken in by people like Trump. In short, a voting system rigged to ensure that Democrats can ignore pressure from the left has saddled the country with menacing right wing insurrectionists.

Additionally, US politicians constantly get involved supporting coup attempts abroad (often successful ones). In 2019, to take a very recent example of one Trump supported, bogus claims of electoral fraud incited right wing riots (aided and abetted by the police) which finally led the military to “suggest” that the democratically elected president, Evo Morales, resign. The coup led to the installation of a dictatorship which was in power for almost a year before overwhelming popular revulsion led to the restoration of democracy in October. The coup could never have succeeded without Bolivian and international media cynically spreading the fraud claims. Should we be surprised that Trump and his handlers thought a coup like that might be worth a shot at home?