2008 election hangover and surly aftermath

Probably the greatest crime you can commit against a democracy is fucking with the vote.

It also seems to be one that goes utterly unpunished, even when it's right out in the open.

An exhaustive list of incidents can be found here.

In my own state, drive time radio fuckheads Dennis and Callahan claimed that the election was postponed and that Democrats should cast their ballots on November 5th. Fliers making a similar claim were distributed in Virginia.

Fliers were also distributed on the campus of Drexel University in Philadelphia alleging that police would be staking out the polls to collect outstanding parking tickets. Out of state Virginia Tech students were told that if they registered to vote in Virginia they'd risk loss of student aid and favorable. tax status. Neither institution made a concerted effort to debunk these claims.

So much for our Universities as the last bastions of free thought.

The fact that the party that all of these efforts were intended to aid didn't prevail in the national election doesn't change any of this. At all. Your tax dollars funded a candidate whose campaign tacitly endorsed this behavior. And one who through repeated spurious accusations of electoral fraud directed at ACORN, contributed to a freeze being put on new voter registration operations in more than a dozen states.

In fact, there are thousands of politicians who benefit from this practice and who don't denounce it. And just about every one of them who's gone on the record accusing their opponent of being anti-American is among the number. And I fucking defy you to tell me what's more anti-American than suppressing the vote.

In fact, I defy anyone to give me a good god damned reason why not to revoke the citizenship of anyone who tries to deny someone else their right to vote.


-----

Identity politics has always bothered me. Specifically, the glaring hypocrisy that seems to permeate it. The same night that the first Black man to assume the highest office in our land was voted in, the LGBTQ community was given a gigantic middle finger by 52% of the California electorate, who voted to amend the state's constitution to disallow gay marriage. 70% of Black voters were polled in favor of the measure in exit polls, no doubt at least partially a reflection of nearly every pastor claiming a record as a part of the civil rights movement coming out against it.

This week, the Human Rights Campaign is getting pretty fucking indignant, protesting out in front of the megachurches that promoted Proposition 8 from the pulpit. And don't get me wrong, I'm all for the picketing, but the HRC can have a nice hot cup of shut the fuck up as far as I'm concerned. When you call yourselves the Human Rights Campaign and manage to not figure out whether or not that means you should be supporting the inclusion of language protecting transpersons in equal opportunity employment statutes, you can fuck right the hell off.

So while we're patting ourselves on the back for electing an African-American to the Presidency two hundred thirty two years and five months after our third President wrote that all men are created equal, we ought to remember that we still aren't living up to the basic standards we laid out for ourselves. If we keep trying at it in factions, I doubt we ever will.