Guns For Votes
The 600,000 residents of Washington, D.C., have long been without Congressional representation. They were only allowed to vote for President for the first time in 1964 because of the 23rd Amendment that gave the district 3 electoral votes. But the District still lacks representation in Congress.
Today, the Senate voted 67-31 for a bill that would give the District a single seat in the Congress and would create an additional seat that would go to a state based on population. As it stands, that state would be Utah. Utah typically votes Republican and the District typically votes Democratic. But there are strings attached to the bill.
The bill includes an amendment that would repeal local District gun control laws. Nevada Senator John Ensign (R) sponsored the amendment that would repeal gun control laws in the District. The District currently bans semiautomatic guns. The bill would also restrict the District’s ability to make laws concerning gun control in the future.
Senator Ensign said his goal with the amendment was to “remove the tremendous barriers and burdens on law-abiding citizens” but Senator Dianne Feinstein (D) of California called the amendment “reckless” and “irresponsible.”
It appears that if the citizens of D.C. want representation in Congress, they will have to trade their current laws on gun control to get it. Despite opposition from the residents of D.C. to the stripping of their gun laws, the House is expected to pass the bill next week and President Obama has promised to sign it.
There are more obstacles ahead for the bill. Opponents like Mitch McConnell (R) of Kentucky, insist that the Constitution on Congressional representation is clear: “only states elect members of Congress.” The District of Columbia is not considered a “state.”
The bill will probably wind up in the Supreme Court to test its Constitutionality.
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Among other things, the amendment’s wacky provisions would make it much harder for police to trace crime guns by repealing all registration requirements. The amendment also would bar Washington from enacting laws or regulations that may discourage private gun ownership or use, including by children or felons. It would lift a ban on gun possession by anyone voluntarily committed to a mental institution in the last five years and end a ban on .50 caliber sniper rifles and military-style semiautomatic assault weapons. All of this under the phony guise of complying with last year’s Supreme Court ruling.
US Supreme Court Says Passenger Can Be Frisked

The court unanimously overruled an Arizona appeals court that threw out evidence found during such an encounter.
The case involved a 2002 pat-down search of an Eloy, Ariz., man by an Oro Valley police officer, who found a gun and marijuana.
The justices accepted Arizona’s argument that traffic stops are inherently dangerous for police and that pat-downs are permissible when an officer has a reasonable suspicion that the passenger may be armed and dangerous.
The pat-down is allowed if the police “harbor reasonable suspicion that a person subjected to the frisk is armed, and therefore dangerous to the safety of the police and public,” Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said.
Uphold the Voting Rights Act
Some people claim that Barack Obama’s election has ushered in a “postracial” America, but the truth is that race, and racial discrimination, are still very much with us. The Supreme Court should keep this reality in mind when it considers a challenge to an important part of the Voting Rights Act that it recently agreed to hear. The act is constitutional — and clearly still needed.
Section 5, often called the heart of the Voting Rights Act, requires some states and smaller jurisdictions to “preclear” new voting rules with the Justice Department or a federal court. When they do, they have to show that the proposed change does not have the purpose or effect of discriminating against minority voters.
When Congress enacted Section 5 in 1965, officials in the South were creating all kinds of rules to stop blacks from voting or being elected to office. Discrimination against minority voters may not be as blatant as it was then, but it still exists. District lines are drawn to prevent minorities from winning; polling places are located in places hard for minority voters to get to; voter ID requirements are imposed with the purpose of suppressing the minority vote.
After holding lengthy hearings to document why the Voting Rights Act was still needed, Congress reauthorized it in 2006 with votes of 98 to 0 in the Senate and 390 to 33 in the House. Now, a municipal utility district in Texas that is covered by Section 5 is arguing that it is unconstitutional, and that it imposes too many burdens on jurisdictions covered by it.
If the Supreme Court — which is expected to hear arguments in the case this spring — strikes down Section 5, it would be breaking radically with its own precedents. The court has repeatedly upheld the Voting Rights Act against challenges, and as recently as 2006 it ruled that complying with Section 5 is a compelling state interest. It would also be an extreme case of conservative judicial activism, since the 14th and 15th Amendments expressly authorize Congress to enact laws of this sort to prevent discrimination in voting.
A perennial criticism of Section 5 is that it covers jurisdictions it should not, or fails to cover ones it should. There is no way to construct a perfect list, but Congress has done a reasonable job of drawing up the criteria, and it has built flexibility into the act. Jurisdictions are allowed to “bail out” if they can show that they no longer need to be covered, and courts can add new jurisdictions if they need to be covered.
In last fall’s election, despite his strong national margin of victory — and hefty campaign chest — Mr. Obama got only about one in five white votes in the Southern states wholly or partly covered by Section 5. And there is every reason to believe that minority voters will continue to face obstacles at the polls.
If Section 5 is struck down, states and localities would have far more freedom to erect barriers for minority voters — and there is little doubt that some would do just that. We have not arrived at the day when special protections like the Voting Rights Act are not needed.
Real Short: 7 Problems with Real ID
The Real ID Act creates a federal identity document that every American will need in order to fly on commercial airlines, enter government buildings, open a bank account, and more.
It creates huge administrative burdens for state governments, while providing no federal funds for implementing its onerous requirements. At the same time, it does nothing to combat terrorism, and puts us at greater risk for invasions of privacy and identity theft.
On this page you can learn more about Real ID: the costs, the burdens, and the real bureaucratic nightmare coming to a DMV near you.
What’s Wrong With Real ID
- It’s a national identity system. The standardized national driver’s licenses created by Real ID would become a key part of a system of identity papers, databases, status and identity checks and access control points – an “internal passport” that will increasingly be used to track and control individuals’ movements and activities.
- Will not be effective against terrorism. The fact is, identity-based security is not an effective way to stop terrorism. ID documents do not reveal anything about evil intent – and even if they did, determined terrorists will always be able to obtain fraudulent documents (either counterfeit or real documents bought from corrupt officials).
- Will be a nightmare for state governments. Real ID requires state governments to remake their driver’s licenses, restructure many of their computer databases and other systems, create an extensive new document-storage system, and – perhaps most difficult of all – verify the “issuance, validity and completeness” of every document presented at DMVs. See Real Burdens.
- Will mean higher fees, long lines, and bureaucratic nightmares for individuals. Because Congress ordered but did not pay for these mandates, which will cost states billions of dollars, fees on individuals applying for driver’s licenses will inevitably rise, perhaps steeply. Individuals are also likely to confront slower service, longer lines, and frequent bureaucratic snafus in obtaining these ID cards. Many unlucky individuals will find themselves caught in a bureaucratic nightmare as they run up against the complexities of this law.
- Increased security and ID-theft risks. The creation of a single interlinked database as well as the requirement that each DMV store copies of every birth certificate and other documents presented to it will create a one-stop shop for identity thieves.
- Will be exploited by the private sector to invade privacy. Real ID would make it easy for anybody in private industry to snap up the data on these IDs. Already, bars often swipe licenses to collect personal data on customers – but that will prove to be just the tip of the iceberg as every convenience store learns to grab that data and sell it to data companies for a dime.
- Will expand over time. The Real ID database will inevitably, over time, become the repository for more and more data on individuals, and will be drawn on for an ever-wider set of purposes. Its standardized machine-readable interface will drive its integration into an ever-growing network of identity checks and access control points – each of which will create new data trails that will in turn be linked to that central database or its private-sector shadow equivalent.
For more information on these problems, see the Real Answers FAQ.
Drunken Politics: Gay is the New Black
Allison and Jamie talk about race, gay rights, Ann Coulter’s jaw and how apparently “Gay is the new Black”.
Enjoy it, it’s Drunken Politics on BreakThru Radio. Check back at Breakthru Radio every Wednesday to hear new episodes of Drunken Politics.
Drunken Politics: myspace.com/drunkenpoliticsradio.
Velvet Revolution Calls on CA Secretary of State to Investigate Prop 8 Vote
And so it is with Proposition 8, the California initiative revoking marriage equality that was announced to have passed in the November 4 election. We support the lawsuits challenging Prop 8 on legal grounds. We simultaneously call for Secretary of State Debra Bowen to initiate an investigation into the results of the Proposition 8 election, based on concerns raised by voters, election monitors and election integrity advocates.
In order for Bowen to investigate problems that may have affected the outcome of Proposition 8 or other election results, her office must receive Election Complaint Forms from California registered voters as soon as possible. Final election returns are to be submitted by December 9th and the results will be certified on December 13th. Similar complaints may be combined in a joint investigation. The more personally-witnessed and well-documented complaints we can get to her, the better.
We ask that anyone who has bona fide information relevant to such an investigation submit it to Debra Bowen’s office by Monday, November 24, 2008 if at all possible, so that an investigation can be launched immediately. Complaints about individuals’ experiences while voting or monitoring the election are encouraged. Please use the official complaint form, which is available for download in several languages, and follow the outlined procedure. See below for more information about submitting complaints. If you cannot submit your complaint by Monday, November 24, please submit it as soon after that date as possible.
Please email a copy of the complaint to us as well at info(at)StandingForVoters.org. (StandingForVoters.org is a project of Velvet Revolution.)
Of course, we also encourage people to submit complaints to their local and state elections officials about any election irregularities they can document, regardless of where they occur or which campaign or issue they may favor. We the People demand accountability in our elections systems and a true basis for confidence in the election results.
In addition to the new reward being offered in the Proposition 8 race, Velvet Revolution is also offering rewards related to Mike Connell’s election manipulations, the break-ins at ACORN’s offices in Massachusetts and Washington state, and the 2002 Georgia Senate race in which Saxby Chambliss prevailed. Chambliss is currently fighting to retain that Senate seat in a runoff election to be held December 2. Velvet Revolution’s tipline for election fraud whistleblowers can be reached at 1-888-VOTE-TIP.
HOW TO SUBMIT AN ELECTION COMPLAINT FORM:
- Download the form from: www.sos.ca.gov/elections/elections_fraud.htm
ELECTION FRAUD INVESTIGATION UNIT
1500-11th STREET, 5th Floor
Sacramento, CA 95814
- You can scan the completed form and supporting documents and email them to:
- You can call in a complaint at one of the following:
Spanish: 1-800-232-VOTA (8682)
The SoS legal staff recommends casting the widest net possible in the section “PERSONS OR ORGANIZATIONS AGAINST WHOM THE COMPLAINT IS BROUGHT,” i.e., anyone and everyone who could be liable, responsible or accountable for or otherwise involved in elections results.
EXAMPLE: All companies whose election systems are used in the State of California including but not limited to ES&S, Sequoia, Hart Intercivic, and Premier Election Solutions (aka Diebold); all elections officials and elections personnel of the State of California, including the Secretary of State’s Office, all County Registrars’ Offices and their staffs including temporary poll-workers; National Exit Polls (aka Edison/Mitofsky); CNN.
If you want your complaint to also be reviewed under HAVA regulations such as “HAVA Title III-Subtitle A-Requirements. SEC. 301.VOTING SYSTEM STANDARDS (a) (5) “The error rate of the voting system in counting ballots…” you must also include the second page of the form notarizing your signature.
Blogged by Emily Levy 11/22/08
Huckabee Explains Why Gay Rights Are Not Civil Rights
Mike Huckabee appeared on The View and explained why the gay rights movement is not at all like the civil rights movement, and separate but equal gay rights is not at ALL like separate but equal for civil rights.
Spoiler alert: it makes no sense.
Huckabee reasons that the two are different because gays don’t “get their skulls cracked” in their struggle for equality. Joy, correctly, points out that gay-bashing does occur. Huckabee counters that he means the institutionalized sort of police skull-busting that occurred in the south.I would argue that the only reason that doesn’t happen is because our media would cover it and there would be a public outcry precisely because civil rights advocates went through that forty years ago. Therefore, the institutionalized form of discrimination is still there, but it’s a sneakier, softer kind of discrimination. They don’t blast gays with fire hoses, but they refuse them equal legal rights. It would be difficult to weigh which hurts more: getting blasted with a hose or being denied the privilege of sitting beside your loved one while he or she dies in a hospital bed.
This is a shameful chapter of our country, and people like Mike Huckabee are on the wrong side of history.
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