Marshall Sutherland

Wed, 13 Nov 2024 12:30:56 -0500

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

#^The Bitter Taste of Elections - Instant Grace 29 with Jim Babka

Everybody gets hurt. Losing the race leads to grief. If you play the electoral game, if you join a partisan side, your grief has happened, is happening, or it will happen.

Elections are NOT the way to solve social problems! How can we break free from the cult of politics?

#video #politics #voting

video politics voting

Fri, 08 Nov 2024 07:59:39 -0500

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

#^How Vote Counting Impairs Grieving and Crushes Unity - Instant Grace 26 with Jim Babka

Our vote counting process is bad. Unnecessary complications have created unnecessary social consequences. It wasn't always this way! Jim explains how it was better in every voters lifetime. The loser's grief was better soothed; national unity was encouraged.

#video #voting

video voting

Wed, 06 Nov 2024 19:02:00 -0500

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

:-(

#^Ranked choice voting initiatives massively fail

Initiatives related to ranked choice voting in political primaries and general elections were on the ballots in eight states and the District of Columbia.

#voting

voting

Wed, 06 Nov 2024 23:13:14 -0500

Waitman Gobble

hello@rumbly.net

I think it used to the 'runner up' became vice president, but I suppose it caused some issues doing it that way.

Thu, 07 Nov 2024 08:10:23 -0500

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

That is correct, but not particularly relevant. RCV would have a more dramatic effect in more local races where you might have 15 people running for 3 seats. Having a winner who received 12% support seems like a poor way to choose.

Sun, 10 Nov 2024 20:27:52 -0500

Scott M. Stolz

scott@biztechtonics.net

Even with ranked voting, President and Vice President can be lumped together into one ticket, which is what they do now. You could rank which ticket you wanted, and not rank President and Vice President separately.

Sun, 27 Oct 2024 18:12:21 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

It seems that some issues that the media has led me to believe were highly controversial aren't really controversial to the general public.

#^Americans Endorse Both Early Voting and Voter Verification

With less than two weeks to go in the presidential campaign and #voting already underway in many states, 76% of U.S. adults favor the concept of early voting. Two other election law policies are supported by even more Americans -- requiring photo identification to vote (84%) and providing proof of citizenship when registering to vote for the first time (83%).

Smaller majorities of Americans -- 60% each -- favor automatic voter registration, whereby citizens are registered when they do business with state agencies such as the Department of Motor Vehicles, and sending absentee ballot applications to all eligible voters. In contrast, majorities of Americans oppose removing people from voter registration lists if they haven’t voted in any elections in five years (64%) and limiting the number of drop boxes or locations for returning absentee ballots (58%).

voting

show all 4 comments

Sun, 27 Oct 2024 18:39:37 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

I wouldn't say we are irrelevant. Our opinions may be, but the major parties want our votes so they can turn around and tell us that they have a mandate from us to do whatever they want in our name. That is why I have refused to vote for either of them in any race for years.

Sun, 27 Oct 2024 18:45:21 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

I wish every state had the None of These Candidates option like Nevada does. I would have used it at least 4 times in this election.

Sun, 27 Oct 2024 18:52:16 -0400

Scott M. Stolz

scott@biztechtonics.net

I agree. We are not irrelevant. We are the ones who swing elections, after all.

@Tejan Ausland Also, I know which study you are referring to, since we have discussed it before. That same study shows that people have more influence at the state and local levels than they do at the federal level, in most cases. (Exceptions are single-party states, like California.)

It's the lack of influence in Congress that is the problem.

Fri, 05 Jul 2024 19:08:03 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

#^The end of the voting methods debate

People are sick of being forced to vote for the "lesser evil." A new voting method may fix the problem.

A new voting method, AADV (Approve/Approve/Disapprove Voting), was proposed in 2020. Each voter has the option to approve of either one or two of the candidates, and also has the option to disapprove of one candidate. Each candidate's approvals and disapprovals are separately summed. Disapprovals are then subtracted from approvals to obtain the net approvals for each candidate. The candidate with the most (positive) net approvals is declared the winner. If no candidate achieves positive net approvals, NOTA (None Of The Above) has won. If NOTA should win, all candidates are disqualified and a new election must be held with new candidates.

Can I trade one of my approve votes for a 2nd disapprove vote? Trying to decide which is the greater of 2 evils is tough. I'd rather disapprove of both.

#voting

voting

Wed, 26 Jun 2024 18:32:32 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

#^How to Watch the Rigged CNN Debate - EP102 Gracearchy with Jim Babka

Since at least 1988, televised presidential debates have been manipulated to discriminate against certain candidates. In this episode, we reveal the way Chase Oliver and Bobby Kennedy legally qualify, and the way that Donald Trump and Joe Biden do not qualify for CNN's June 27 match-up.

We also open and expose the playbook used by the members of the Conflict Machine (political industrial complex) to influence voters and perpetuate a feeling of powerlessness. You'll see right through the rigging. Plus, we debunk the myth of wasted votes and show why Libertarians and Greens don’t "steal" votes from major parties (it's the other way around). Equip yourself with history and political science insights that will amaze and convince your friends. And if you share this episode with friends, it'll change the way they view debates forever. They'll see the rigging too!

#podcast #video #politics #voting

podcast video politics voting

Wed, 26 Jun 2024 18:46:44 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

Plus, we debunk the myth of wasted votes and show why Libertarians and Greens don’t "steal" votes from major parties (it's the other way around).

No one has ever said "I just felt like I had to vote for the minor party candidate even though I REALLY wanted to vote got the major party candidate."

When was the last time a minor party prevented a voter from voting for a major party candidate?

After an election, anyone claiming votes were "stolen" from major party candidates by minor party candidates is a liar. Show me those voters who has their votes stolen! I'll (supposedly) be one of them. My vote won't have been stolen because it was MINE to give to whom I choose (or to no one, if I choose). If it does get stolen, it will be after I cast it and I'm pretty sure it won't be the minor parties stealing it.

Wed, 08 May 2024 22:03:18 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

I'm not generally a fan of Top N voting, but ranked-choice voting voting with 17 candidates is rather unwieldy, so I guess setting a limit is a practical reality. Top 4 + RCV is WAY better than Top 2. Once people get the hang of it, maybe we could expand to more than 4.

#^Why US Politics Is Broken — and How To Fix It | Andrew Yang | TED

The electoral system in the United States needs a redesign, says political reformer Andrew Yang. Exposing the flaws of a system built on poor incentives, he proposes a cost-effective overhaul inspired by primary elections already working in places like Alaska and advocates for ranked-choice voting, where voters can choose candidates in order of preference regardless of party, stemming the influence of extreme ideologies.

#video #voting

video voting

Tue, 05 Mar 2024 18:00:24 -0500

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

All sorts of great topics in this episode

Are Americans Brainwashed Into Submission?

Americans are captives, conditioned to love their captors.

Most Americans even get their own bodies confused on this matter, operating under the myth that they are the rulers of this country.

That’s an old fairy tale. That’s why this episode of Gracearchy is titled “Are Americans Brainwashed Into Submission?” The concepts we covered match some of our Zero Aggression Project “Mental Levers” especially the one on…

Stockholm Syndrome.

This installment also features plain, blunt talk about…

…borders.
…the U.S. civic religion.
…how little your vote matters.
…how you don’t even have choices about who governs you.

#voting #politics #podcast #video

voting politics podcast video

Mon, 04 Mar 2024 13:23:53 -0500

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

U.S. Supreme Court Rules that Only Congress Can Enforce Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment

On March 4, the U.S. Supreme Court released its opinion in Trump v Anderson, 23-719. This is the Colorado ballot access case involving former President Donald Trump. Read it here. It is only 13 pages long and is probbly written by the Chief Justice, although it is unsigned. Justice Amy Comey Barrett wrote a one-page concurrence, and there is a six-page concurrence by Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson.

All nine justices agree that states cannot enforce Section Three of the Fourteenth Amendment. The majority opinion says that only Congress can enforce it. The four concurrences agree that states cannot enforce Section Three, but they say there was no need for the majority to also hold that courts can’t enforce it either.

Nothing in the opinions discusses state power to enforce other qualifications to hold the presidency or to run for president. Nothing in the opinions mentions the authority of political parties over their own nomination process. Nothing is said about whether Trump engaged in insurrection. There is a general philosophy expressed that it is undesirable for states to adjudicate section three because then there would be a patchwork effect. “State-by-state resolution of the question whether Section 3 bars a particular candidate for President from serving would be quite unlikely to yield a uniform answer consistent with the basic principle that ‘the President…represents all the voters of the Nation.'”

Page twelve says, “The ‘patchwork’ would likely result from state enforcement would ‘sever the link that the Framers found so cricical between the National Government and the people of the United States’ as a whole.'” The opinion goes on to criticize a situation in which a presidential candidate is on the ballot in some states but not all of them. This part of the opinion will help to invalidate severe ballot access restrictions that apply to presidential candidates, aside from Section Three matters. Page two of the three-justice concurrence also expresses this point.

As a result of the decision, which relies partly on Anderson v Celebrezze and partly on U.S. Term Limits v Thornton, the influence of both of those decisions is enhanced. It is likely that this opinion dooms any effort by supporters of term limits for Congress to get that 1995 ruling overturned, even though it was 5-4 back in 1995.

#voting #law #politics

voting law politics

Thu, 15 Feb 2024 12:53:32 -0500

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

Conservative group tells judge it has no evidence to back its claims of Georgia ballot stuffing

A conservative group has told a Georgia judge that it doesn’t have evidence to support its claims of illegal ballot stuffing during the the 2020 general election and a runoff two months later.

Texas-based True the Vote filed complaints with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger in 2021, including one in which it said it had obtained “a detailed account of coordinated efforts to collect and deposit ballots in drop boxes across metro Atlanta” during the November 2020 election and a January 2021 runoff.

A Fulton County Superior Court judge in Atlanta signed an order last year requiring True the Vote to provide evidence it had collected, including the names of people who were sources of information, to state elections officials who were frustrated by the group’s refusal to share evidence with investigators.

In their written response, attorneys for True the Vote said the group had no names or other documentary evidence to share.

#voting #politics

voting politics

Thu, 15 Feb 2024 13:17:58 -0500 last edited: Thu, 15 Feb 2024 13:29:40 -0500

Jason Cook

jason@hub.inktada.com

Yeah... There may be much more to that story, when I saw how short and sweet the article was, without interviews, I had to go to the true the vote website..

This is from True the Vote, I'm sure with their own bias too, but at least you can somewhat hear their voice:
"On Thursday, October 26th, our trial began in a lawsuit filed against us by Fair Fight, Stacey Abrams, and Marc Elias, with the Biden Justice Department having intervened. This case has been ongoing since December 2020.

A short background … in 2020, True the Vote helped Georgia citizens lawfully provide information about ineligible voter records to their counties. Over 364,000 records were identified. For our efforts, Stacey Abrams, Marc Elias, and the Biden Justice Department sued me, True the Vote, and five Georgia citizens who I’d thanked by name in a press statement.

Mainstream media has been all over this. New York Times, AP, and Atlanta Journal Constitution, to list just a few. And, as you would guess, the coverage has been largely negative.

Despite the inaccurate details and biased framing, they are right about one thing, this is a landmark case. We are fighting to protect citizens’ rights, your rights, to engage in electoral processes.

If we were not standing this ground, groups like Fair Fight would continue to bully citizens into silence. We must retain the right to engage, assemble, and lawfully petition our government - and in elections, we must strive to true the vote! "