In the last debate, Sen. John McCain's answer appears to have been yes. Republicans are up in arms over what they say is the potential for widespread "voter fraud," most evidenced by the activities of ACORN. The ACORN acronym has been thrown around in this election nearly as much as the name of Bill Ayers, but I doubt most Americans have taken the time to really find out what's going on. In truth, voter fraud is extremely rare in this country these days. What ACORN committed was voter registration fraud, which sounds the same but is extremely different in degree.
When Republicans say "voter fraud," they seem to be referring to some of the old-style techniques commonly thought to have been employed by the old political machines. Tammany Hall, the rulers of 1800s New York, used to take drunks off the street, dress them up nicely, and take them around from polling place to polling place, gradually changing their appearance as they went. This was before photo ID. You'll also often hear that President Kennedy beat Richard Nixon in 1960 because the Daley machine in Chicago counted votes from dead people. This is probably false, though it seems to have permanently entered American political lore (when Republicans accuse Obama of being a "Chicago politician," people are supposed to remember this). The key in both of these scenarios is that they involve people actually voting when they aren't supposed to.
ACORN stands for the American Community Organizations for Reform Now (Yes, Rudy, community organizers). It was founded in 1970 and since then has been an advocate and lobbying group for poor Americans. One of its many objectives is to register as many of the poor as possible to vote. In this particular election, what has come to light is that ACORN tried to accomplish two things at once by paying low-income individuals to register other low-income individuals. Unfortunately, in order to meet their quotas, some of these workers seem to have simply made up names and filled out the forms for those imaginary people. Some of these were extremely obvious frauds, such as "Batman" or "Tony Romo".
Now, this is of course illegal. ACORN immediately admitted that they had no good way of filtering out all of the fakes, since they're not the government, but also refused to simply throw out all the applications. So some fakes probably slipped through the cracks and actually ended up registered. But here's the thing: for this fraud to even start having an effect on the election, the fake people have to actually show up and vote. They have to show ID. Now, you can certainly fake an ID (just ask any 19-year-old college student), but for such a fraud to be widespread and organized, as the Republicans seem to suggest, there would have to be legions of people with valid fake IDs in the same identities that were registered. Since the fake names were blatantly made up by independent workers, this is not going to happen. A conspiracy in this manner would just not be practical.
In other words, in order for Batman being registered to really be a problem, Batman would have to actually show up and try to vote. One incident that happened in Illinois has gotten a lot of play in the media, where registration info was mailed to a dead pet goldfish. Illinois Republicans immediately claimed fraud. Not only would the fish have to actually appear and vote for this to be an issue, it wasn't registered in the first place... it was only sent information on how to register.
So really, Republican claims of fraud in this instance are just that... a fraud. They are an attempt to a) link Barack Obama to something that sounds like corruption, in the absence of actual corruption to link him to, and b) lay the groundwork for a possible challenge to the electoral results if necessary. Now, at the moment Obama seems to have a big lead in the polls, but if that tightens by election day, and I have little doubt that it will, we may see a long, drawn-out fight that Republicans have been preparing for some time now.
Showing posts with label Republicans. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Republicans. Show all posts
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Saturday, October 11, 2008
Movie Reviews for People Who Go to the Dollar Movies After Work: Swing Vote
I went to the discount theatre today with the vague intention of seeing Brendan Fraser's Journey to the Center of the Earth, but when I got there I decided to go with my gut and saw Swing Vote. This isn't a bad movie, necessarily. It's an okay movie stuck with Kevin Costner as its star, and that just brings down the whole proceeding. Costner has had good movies before, but even in them he was the stoic rock around which the action moved. Here he's just a dumbass, and the movie seems to think we like dumbasses because we're dumbasses, too.
Costner plays Ernest "Bud" Johnson, a drunk and a nobody. He's a single dad to a fifth-grade-or-so daughter who's much smarter than he deserves ("What do you want to be when you grow up?" "I go back and forth between veterinarian and chairman of the Fed."), making me seriously wonder how his sperm produced this bright little girl, especially when we later see her mother is even worse. Bud is the sort of guy who responds to his daughter telling him she registered him to vote through the mail with "That's just great. I could get jury duty now!" He seems to love her, but then forgets about her repeatedly. I hate Bud. Even when Bud is theoretically redeemed at the end, mostly by admitting that he's a dumbass, I still hated him.
Through some arbitrary plot mechanics that the movie knows better than to dwell on, an entire presidential election comes down to Bud's vote. The state of New Mexico is tied, and due to a voting machine malfunction that caused Bud's "vote" to not count (I'm gonna skip over a whole part here made more complicated than it needs to be, involving how Bud didn't really try to vote), he gets to re-vote ten days later. The global news media (Aaron Brown, Chris Matthews, Arianna Huffington, etc. all have extended cameos) descends upon Bud's tiny hometown of Texico, New Mexico, as do both candidates.
This is where the movie finds itself as much as it does. The candidates include the republican President Boone (Kelsey Grammer), and a democrat from Vermont named Donald Greenleaf (Dennis Hopper). Neither of these men is given much of personality, though Greenleaf, probably unintentionally, reminds viewers of John McCain. A lot. Maybe it was just me, I dunno. Anyway, both of them sycophantically try to please Bud in whatever way that they can, which Bud buys hook, line, and sinker but his daughter Molly immediately sees through. We also spend time with the candidate's advisors, with Stanley Tucci as the President's ruthless Rovian operative and Nathan Lane (perhaps the most restrained I've ever seen him) as an idealist democrat who is just so sick of losing it hurts.
The best parts of the movie come when the candidates fall all over each other in an attempt to conform to Bud's every whim, with the Republican coming out in favor of gay marriage and the Democrat denouncing abortion rights based on off-hand remarks. The campaign commercials in which they do so are absolutely hysterical. We also see each of the candidates questioning, in his own way, whether any of this is right, and how far he's willing to go. Though a bit earnest, all of that works. There's also a fairly worthless side plot involving a pretty hispanic reporter and her boss (George Lopez, who is totally pointless but at least doesn't have time to ruin the movie), but it's also fairly inoffensive.
Where the movie runs into trouble is in the relationship between Bud and his daughter, and the fact that it's front and center more than we really want it to be. Normally, I appreciate character development, but it just doesn't work. There's also a truly bizarre shaky-cam drama detour at the top of the third act that definitely didn't need to be there... it's as if the film-makers think it's the key incident in the film, but the audience just wants it to go away. In the end, Bud gives a long, vaguely poetic speech on national television that is Costner's best moment in the movie by far, but it doesn't feel earned and I was left wondering if we were supposed to think his daughter wrote it for him.
This is a movie with some thought behind it, that manages to comment on our system without seeming like a polemic for one side or the other. However, it runs into trouble trying to make those ideas into a movie. We're left with a comedy with many funny moments, but also moments like that when the Secretary of State and Attorney General of New Mexico show up at Bud's trailer to tell him about the situation. He assumes they're social services and pleads with them not to take his daughter away. I was left not sure whether this scene was supposed to be funny or not. And that's why this is definitely a dollar movie.
Costner plays Ernest "Bud" Johnson, a drunk and a nobody. He's a single dad to a fifth-grade-or-so daughter who's much smarter than he deserves ("What do you want to be when you grow up?" "I go back and forth between veterinarian and chairman of the Fed."), making me seriously wonder how his sperm produced this bright little girl, especially when we later see her mother is even worse. Bud is the sort of guy who responds to his daughter telling him she registered him to vote through the mail with "That's just great. I could get jury duty now!" He seems to love her, but then forgets about her repeatedly. I hate Bud. Even when Bud is theoretically redeemed at the end, mostly by admitting that he's a dumbass, I still hated him.
Through some arbitrary plot mechanics that the movie knows better than to dwell on, an entire presidential election comes down to Bud's vote. The state of New Mexico is tied, and due to a voting machine malfunction that caused Bud's "vote" to not count (I'm gonna skip over a whole part here made more complicated than it needs to be, involving how Bud didn't really try to vote), he gets to re-vote ten days later. The global news media (Aaron Brown, Chris Matthews, Arianna Huffington, etc. all have extended cameos) descends upon Bud's tiny hometown of Texico, New Mexico, as do both candidates.
This is where the movie finds itself as much as it does. The candidates include the republican President Boone (Kelsey Grammer), and a democrat from Vermont named Donald Greenleaf (Dennis Hopper). Neither of these men is given much of personality, though Greenleaf, probably unintentionally, reminds viewers of John McCain. A lot. Maybe it was just me, I dunno. Anyway, both of them sycophantically try to please Bud in whatever way that they can, which Bud buys hook, line, and sinker but his daughter Molly immediately sees through. We also spend time with the candidate's advisors, with Stanley Tucci as the President's ruthless Rovian operative and Nathan Lane (perhaps the most restrained I've ever seen him) as an idealist democrat who is just so sick of losing it hurts.
The best parts of the movie come when the candidates fall all over each other in an attempt to conform to Bud's every whim, with the Republican coming out in favor of gay marriage and the Democrat denouncing abortion rights based on off-hand remarks. The campaign commercials in which they do so are absolutely hysterical. We also see each of the candidates questioning, in his own way, whether any of this is right, and how far he's willing to go. Though a bit earnest, all of that works. There's also a fairly worthless side plot involving a pretty hispanic reporter and her boss (George Lopez, who is totally pointless but at least doesn't have time to ruin the movie), but it's also fairly inoffensive.
Where the movie runs into trouble is in the relationship between Bud and his daughter, and the fact that it's front and center more than we really want it to be. Normally, I appreciate character development, but it just doesn't work. There's also a truly bizarre shaky-cam drama detour at the top of the third act that definitely didn't need to be there... it's as if the film-makers think it's the key incident in the film, but the audience just wants it to go away. In the end, Bud gives a long, vaguely poetic speech on national television that is Costner's best moment in the movie by far, but it doesn't feel earned and I was left wondering if we were supposed to think his daughter wrote it for him.
This is a movie with some thought behind it, that manages to comment on our system without seeming like a polemic for one side or the other. However, it runs into trouble trying to make those ideas into a movie. We're left with a comedy with many funny moments, but also moments like that when the Secretary of State and Attorney General of New Mexico show up at Bud's trailer to tell him about the situation. He assumes they're social services and pleads with them not to take his daughter away. I was left not sure whether this scene was supposed to be funny or not. And that's why this is definitely a dollar movie.
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Updates: As the Bailout Turns
-The Senate voted for a version of the bailout today, 74 to 25. Both Barack Obama and John McCain voted in favor of the bill. The current version is very similar to the one the House rejected earlier this week, except for "sweeteners" (and yes, that's apparently the official term) that were added, especially tax cuts. Said cuts are apparently intended to lure Republicans. If I was a Republican, I would feel insulted by that. "They'll vote for anything with tax cuts, it doesn't matter how much they hate the rest of it." And of course, that makes it even less likely that we actually have the $700 Billion dollars to use for this.
-Scientists now say the AIDS virus jumped to people as early as 1884, much earlier than previously thought. I'm not sure what the implications of that are, but it's interesting stuff.
-Sarah Silverman, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Jonah Hill are among an all-star cast that doesn't want you to vote. That reverse psychology won't work on me! http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1832128
-The Baseball playoffs are underway here in the States. Early victories for the Phillies, Dodgers, and Red Sox.
-Comic books too... booky for you? Ever thought "this is great, but I wish it was more computerized?" Comic book stories animated through machinima, now on the intertubes. http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=DF54DE54A3BAA597
-Real life blind people have apparently decided that the upcoming film "Blindness" is offensive in its depiction of blind people. Shocking!
-Scientists now say the AIDS virus jumped to people as early as 1884, much earlier than previously thought. I'm not sure what the implications of that are, but it's interesting stuff.
-Sarah Silverman, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Jonah Hill are among an all-star cast that doesn't want you to vote. That reverse psychology won't work on me! http://www.collegehumor.com/video:1832128
-The Baseball playoffs are underway here in the States. Early victories for the Phillies, Dodgers, and Red Sox.
-Comic books too... booky for you? Ever thought "this is great, but I wish it was more computerized?" Comic book stories animated through machinima, now on the intertubes. http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=DF54DE54A3BAA597
-Real life blind people have apparently decided that the upcoming film "Blindness" is offensive in its depiction of blind people. Shocking!
Monday, September 29, 2008
Breaking News: Bailout Voted Down
In one of the most dramatic floor votes in a long time, the US House of Representatives today rejected the proposed emergency bailout of financial institutions, and not by only one or two votes, either. The final tally was 205 for, 228 against, with Democrats supporting the measure 140-95 and Republicans rejecting it 65-133. This despite the urging of leadership of both parties, as well as the President and most national financial leaders, for passage. On news of the vote, the Dow Jones average fell over 700 points, a one-day record.
Many representatives seem to have felt that the measure, which would use approximately $700 billion to buy "bad debts" from financial firms, was so unpopular in their districts that a "yes" vote would amount to political suicide. Others felt that it represented too large of a government intervention in the free market. Even those who supported the bill were often see as "holding their nose" while voting for it, with House Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner calling it a "mud sandwich" while explaining why it was necessary. (what does that even mean?) Democrats immediately blamed the Republican leadership for failing to get their rank and file in line, while Republicans blamed Speaker Nancy Pelosi for turning off some of their members with a "partisan speech" just prior to the vote.
It's unclear where we go from here. Wall Street will probably continue its toilet spiral. The measure will probably come back up for a vote at some point this week, but it's unclear what sort of changes they'll have to make to get this past the House.
As I have said here before, I'm not an economist. But I take it as a good sign when individual members of Congress at least attempt to think for themselves and represent their districts rather than just doing what they're told. Were they right in this case? I guess we'll see.
More details here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/business/30bailout.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp
Many representatives seem to have felt that the measure, which would use approximately $700 billion to buy "bad debts" from financial firms, was so unpopular in their districts that a "yes" vote would amount to political suicide. Others felt that it represented too large of a government intervention in the free market. Even those who supported the bill were often see as "holding their nose" while voting for it, with House Minority Leader Rep. John Boehner calling it a "mud sandwich" while explaining why it was necessary. (what does that even mean?) Democrats immediately blamed the Republican leadership for failing to get their rank and file in line, while Republicans blamed Speaker Nancy Pelosi for turning off some of their members with a "partisan speech" just prior to the vote.
It's unclear where we go from here. Wall Street will probably continue its toilet spiral. The measure will probably come back up for a vote at some point this week, but it's unclear what sort of changes they'll have to make to get this past the House.
As I have said here before, I'm not an economist. But I take it as a good sign when individual members of Congress at least attempt to think for themselves and represent their districts rather than just doing what they're told. Were they right in this case? I guess we'll see.
More details here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/business/30bailout.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1&hp
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Breaking News: We Have a Deal
In an update on some of our previous discussions here, the US Congress seems to have negotiated a deal for a Wall St. bailout that at least a majority can live with.
CNNMoney discusses the provisions of the deal here: http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/28/news/economy/Sunday_talks_bailout/index.htm?cnn=yes
Basically, the deal is based on the original $700 billion package proposed by Treasury Secretary Paulson. The Democratic add-ons (the most discussed of which have been additional Congressional oversight of the money and caps on CEO pay for those companies receiving the money) seem to be included, as well. The Republican "revolt" in the House was placated at least somewhat with a provision involving mortgage insurance (which was pretty much that group's alternate plan), but Paulson has (not in so many words, but these people never say anything in so many words) that he doesn't think that will help and doesn't want to use that option.
In the end, we have a somewhat more sensible version of the plan we started with a week or so ago. This is the plan sparking public public protests around the country, roundly accused of favoring "Wall St. over Main St." Polls this week have showed that Americans are pretty much split... one third favor the plan, one third are opposed, and one third are undecided. No one will ever accuse me of being an economist, but I personally do not yet understand how this will actually solve the root problem. I hope it will, though, since otherwise this is an awful waste.
CNNMoney discusses the provisions of the deal here: http://money.cnn.com/2008/09/28/news/economy/Sunday_talks_bailout/index.htm?cnn=yes
Basically, the deal is based on the original $700 billion package proposed by Treasury Secretary Paulson. The Democratic add-ons (the most discussed of which have been additional Congressional oversight of the money and caps on CEO pay for those companies receiving the money) seem to be included, as well. The Republican "revolt" in the House was placated at least somewhat with a provision involving mortgage insurance (which was pretty much that group's alternate plan), but Paulson has (not in so many words, but these people never say anything in so many words) that he doesn't think that will help and doesn't want to use that option.
In the end, we have a somewhat more sensible version of the plan we started with a week or so ago. This is the plan sparking public public protests around the country, roundly accused of favoring "Wall St. over Main St." Polls this week have showed that Americans are pretty much split... one third favor the plan, one third are opposed, and one third are undecided. No one will ever accuse me of being an economist, but I personally do not yet understand how this will actually solve the root problem. I hope it will, though, since otherwise this is an awful waste.
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