The Press, Politics and Police
The Democratic and Republican National Conventions are the perfect place for protesters to voice their opinions to the people that can affect policy. They are also the perfect place to see a concentration of what is going on in politics and on the street. The first amendment grants the freedom to assemble and the freedom of the press but if anything, these conventions have proved that both major parties don't seem to care much about the Bill of Rights when it is inconvenient for them. ...
First up is an excerpt from Democracy Now!. Though biased, because its reporters were arrested, I feel that they did a good job of presenting the fact and minimizing the amount of story they added. However, some of that experience does come through fairly loud in their telling of it.
Second up is for those thinking this has everything to do with the Republicans and that the Democrats will be our salvation. If there is anything WTO protests in Seattle taught us is that the Democratic leaders hate protesters as much as the Republicans. I seem to remember a Clinton leading that charge. It's so inconvenient when people are so upset they uproot their lives to organize and be part of a protest. It also seems the Democrats don't like reporters nosing in on public streets outside their lobbyist dinners.
Anyone who loves freedom needs to be aware that our freedoms are corroding quickly and neither of the major parties are doing much about it. We need to force them to stand up and listen, we want our freedom. However, if the word freedom makes you say,"meh, it's not for me." Then by all means keep quiet.
UPDATE: Just looking around and I found out this. Sheriff Lott in Richland County, South Carolina is ready for the next convention.
Reducing voter rights
Beware, voter right are getting reduced. Of course, in many states, voters rights are limited because laws work to keep minor parties off the ballots thus taking away voter choice. And while that is a valid issue, that is not what I will be writing about today. It seems that Missouri is looking to make a (state) constitutional amendment to require proof of citizenship when someone registers to vote. On the surface this makes sense, but look deeper and it has further reaching problems without much cause. ...
The article from the New York Times is a pretty good news story. It shows both sides of the story. On one side it talks about the numbers of non-citizens who may have registered to vote. That number is 624. It also gives the numbers from October 2002 to September 2005 of people indicted by the justice department for registration fraud or illegal voting. Those numbers 40, with only 21 being non-citizens. Those seem like pretty small numbers to me. What will be the financial cost to the taxpayer to ensure this level of registration checking. Most likely it is small, but you will be paying for it with your tax dollars.
How else will you be paying for it? What if you are poor, elderly or for any other reason you have difficulty providing adequate proof of citizenship. In that case you will pay for it with your right to vote. That's correct, your rights as an American get revoked so that Missouri can keep a possible 624 non-citizens from voting. How many people will that actually affect though? More numbers from the article are 38,000 and 70. 38,000 is the number of voter registration applications that have thrown out since Arizona adopted its proof of citizenship requirement in 2004. 70 is the percent of people who stated under oath that they were born in the United States. I'm understand people lie, even under oath, so let's say only half told the truth. By my calculations that is 13,300 people whose voices aren't heard so that we can stop what could be 624 people who are not citizens from voting. Of course, that is just an assumption that half of the 26,600 people were telling the truth. Maybe only a quarter told the truth( 6650 ), at least then only about 10 times as many Americans as illegal aliens are having their voices silenced through a new loophole around the 15th Amendment. Perhaps we can possibly find ways around the 19th amendment as well. Moving backwards is fun.[END Sarcasm]
If you live in Missouri, please take a stand against this amendment. Write to your state senators and congressman. If you are in another state that is thinking about this law ( Florida, Kansas, Oklahoma and South Carolina ) then please do the same. You will be fighting the propaganda machine against these bills but please keep in mind what these bills actually accomplish. Sure, they keep illegal immigrants off the ballots however a much greater number of honest Americans who have difficulty proving their citizenship will be affected. Those affected will be the poor, the elderly and I'm guessing a majority of those people will of groups we label as minorities.
It's our turn to fight for our rights.