vote for the one most likely to remove a republican.
it’s that simple.
Vote them out.
Vote for the candidate that sees every person as a human being.
not if they can’t win, buddy. i’m serious. LISTEN. VOTE OUT THE REPUBLICANS. EVEN IF THAT MEANS VOTING IN SOME REGULAR ASSHOLES.
if the candidate who sees every person as a human being is green party, then you vote for the democrat who sees every person as a stepping stone, because unless we get rid of the republican who sees every person as a target a lot of us are going to goddamn die. people are dying already. like, not to guilt you, but if we don’t get a democratic majority in the house and senate ASAP we’re screwed.
it doesn’t fucking matter if you voted for Jesus Actual Christ if he was running on a penny ante party ticket. we need you to vote for Joe Slick Bastard Democrat instead, because there is no such thing as a green party majority in the senate, do you understand? there will not be a green party speaker of the house. green party will not get to put up supreme court nominees.
if you vote for the Good People instead of the democrats, we’re gonna end up back in this toilet bowl again, only deeper this time because the republicans will take it as a mandate to do whatever they want.
take a deep breath, put on rubber gloves, and touch the poop. don’t be precious.
In the primary you vote for the best candidate. In the general you vote for the person who can remove the Republican. You have your chance to do both.
In the primary you vote for the best candidate. In the general you vote for the person who can remove the Republican.
I read on another post “this is about setting the difficulty of our boss battle for the next two years” and that is absolutely true. You’re not voting for someone you agree with, you’re not voting for someone who is perfect or great or even good.
You are voting for the person who is a) going to get elected and b) is easiest to fight for what you need. Until we move the needle, the best we can expect is ‘the best of all enemies’ and not ‘an ally’.
Absolutely. You vote your conscience in the primary. Once the candidate is selected, you vote to remove the Republican.
Remember this for 2020. The 2020 primary is where we have the opportunity to fight it out over who we want to lead the country out of this fucking abyss. One of the problems with 2016 is that we did not have a robust primary. Everyone’s handwringing about “divisions in the Democratic party” and there not being a clear front-runner for 2020 and I say, GREAT. That means we will have a real contest and be able to actually do some discerning during primary season. Because whoever we run in 2020, it better be someone who’s offering something new.
[Text of Tweet: George Takei: If you are turned away at the polls because your name is not on the register, don’t walk away. Say this: I REQUEST A PROVISIONAL BALLOT AS REQUIRED BY LAW.
Don’t let them steal your vote]
Additional info:
“Provisional Ballot Laws are laws that require a provisional ballot upon verficiation of the idenity of the voter if a voter fails to present proper identification at the polls or when registering before voter registration deadlines.”
CHECK YOUR REGISTRATION STATUS. You can usually do it at the website of your local secretary of state, or at Vote.org.
Anyone who follows me from Georgia? If not, pass it on.
sigh.. Actually, let me just add, THIS BULLSHIT RIGHT HERE, THIS IS WHY YOUR VOTE MATTERS. You think they’d be so hot to take away your rights if it didn’t?
If you can register to vote by mail DO SO!!! Not only does it give you more time to research your ballot options, it provides a paper trail, so you can PROVE how you voted, no matter how the Russian hackers massage the electronic numbers.
The Supreme Court just issues a ruling allowing Ohio and other states to purge voters from their election registration rolls due to their failure to cast a ballot in previous elections.
This is a major victory for the Trump administration and the GOP, and a direct consequence of the Supreme Court being stacked with more conservative judges (the votes were 5-4). This is also a huge part of what Trump/the GOP were counting on to save them in the 2018 midterm elections, which is where Democrats have been hoping to take back a majority in the House, giving them more power to combat Trump’s abuses of power and Republican legislation.
What this means is YOU CAN NOT ASSUME THAT YOU ARE REGISTERED for the 2018 elections, just because you SHOULD be. Thanks to this decision, red states can purge voters’ registration based on their not having cast a ballot in even just previous federal elections, NOT just the national Presidential elections. Effectively, if you haven’t voted in previous senate races or for congressional representatives in the past few years, that’s all they need now to say you’re no longer registered and need to register again.
They’re deliberately counting on people assuming they’re still registered and so not checking until after registration deadlines have passed, or showing up to vote this November and only then finding out they’re no longer registered, when its too late to do a damn thing about it.
And this is absolutely targeted at marginalized communities, low income voters, disabled voters, and basically anyone who simply can’t always AFFORD to keep on top of every federal election and show up to vote in every senate race, etc. Which not so coincidentally happen to be all the communities and voters who have the most to gain from Democratic victories in the 2018 midterms and are the least likely to cast votes for GOP candidates at this point.
This was absolutely a calculated effort aimed specifically at keeping the GOP in power with a majority control of the government come November, and unfortunately, it has a DAMN good chance of accomplishing just that if it goes by unacknowledged. I’m not looking to alarm or panic anyone, simply to say:
If you are a registered voter in a red state at this point, please please please do not take your registered status as assumed. Check on your registration status, look up all relevant voter registration deadlines for your state and district, CIRCLE THAT SHIT ON YOUR CALENDAR, and check your registration status AGAIN right before those deadlines pass, so you can be sure of it before its too late to do anything about it til the next voting cycle.
use vote.org to check your registration status. use the form, or scroll down to find the resources for the state you live in.
please do check! even if you think you are OK. even if you are not in Ohio. and please be aware of your state’s voter ID laws.
I am a poll worker in Pennsylvania, and if you haven’t voted in a certain period of time you do get asked for ID. I don’t like it but that’s the rule.
I feel like this would be a slippery slope towards making it illegal for people to choose to not vote.
that’s already how it is in australia
That’s just so fucked up. 😦 Do certain medical conditions exempt you?
?????? why is it be fucked up to have compulsory voting? that’s the way it is in most democratic countries? it’s a part of being a citizen, like paying taxes and obeying speed limits? the fine for not voting is only like $50 and because of the compulsory voting law, our country bends over backwards to make it accessible: it’s always on a weekend, lasts most of the day, and is set up at schools and community centers so there’s one within easy reach of almost everybody. you can also mail your ballot or vote early if you’ll be out of the country on the day. like, IT’S EASY TO VOTE, and the penalty isn’t even that ridiculous. i don’t understand why the usa doesn’t have this, except obviously it would make it harder to literally stop minorities from voting.
I think we Americans tend to forget that a lot of other countries don’t actively work to make it harder to vote.
Adding to this here, in Australia you don’t have to vote. Or, more precisely, there’s no way they can tell if you ruined your ballot. You have to turn up, get your name marked off, but you can put a line through the ballot if you don’t think any of the candidates are worth voting for. Or do this:
Or this:
Or this:
You have get your name crossed off (if you don’t want to wear the fine), but you don’t have to make your vote counted if you’re opposed to it.
And it is so, so easy to vote. Stuck at work or on holidays? That’s fine. Do a postal vote. Stuck in hospital? That’s fine. They’ll go to you. Stuck in an old people’s home and can’t get around? Again, they’ll go to you. It’s amazing to me that it’s so hard for so many Americans to actually vote. If you make it compulsory, than at least the government is obligated to provide you with the means to vote.
And look, I get it. Sometimes I don’t want to vote either. But I suck it up, I walk three minutes down the street, and I hope that this year they’re selling lamingtons again. Oh, and I buy a democracy sausage, which, even if all the candidates suck, makes the effort of turning up pretty worthwhile.
ALSO, you can see even on the fucked up ballots that you NUMBER CANDIDATES IN ORDER OF PREFERENCE. There’s no need to calculate whether I would be throwing away my vote on the candidate that I most agree with if they’re not from a major party. I can say, I want that independent person to get in, but if not them, give me Big Party A, and if not them, that minor party person is still better that Big Party B, and I’m not giving any preference to the Lunatic Fringe Party.
Our system certainly has some issues still, but I can show up to somewhere nearby, line up for a few minutes (if at all), vote exactly in line with my values (on paper, leaving a paper trail that can be recounted), and then buy a sausage and some home made cupcakes on my way out.
A country’s voting system matters a hell of a lot and every citizen deserves one that makes it easy to vote and results in a government that is representational and accountable.
And by the way, one time I had a bad asthma flare-up on Election Day and didn’t make it to my polling station. I got my fine in the mail, I filled out the form explaining why I couldn’t vote, no more fine. I would rather have, you know, expressed my preference for who should run my country, but they were cool with the fact that I couldn’t do it that day.
“oh no, what if people actually have to participate in picking the government officials who will impact their lives” jesus christ
I want this in the US
Mandatory Voting has a spooky sound that genuinely freaks a lot of Americans out, but I can assure my fellow Americans that I have now witnessed how Other Countries Vote and it is usually a pretty efficient and painless process. You should see what voting is like in the UK – there are literally polling stations EVERYWHERE, with no lines, and no pre-registration bullshit, and they’re open all the time, you can just wander up to any one you like at most hours of the day, there’s basically no organization required. People will just vaguely wander out of work in random directions and come back five minutes later with a Costa and a voting sticker. Although I think everyone recognizes that the Australians are on the next level with their hot dogs.
This last election in New Zealand we had two weeks of advance voting at most polling places where you could enrol and vote on the same day, for any reason or no reason at all. We had voting booths in the departure areas of international airports. We had voting booths in malls. We had voting booths at universities. 50% of votes were cast before election day. We had 80% turnout overall and nearly 70% turnout for 18-24 year olds – and voting isn’t compulsory here, just enrolment.
If somebody wants to make voting difficult, what they mean is that they are afraid people who will vote if it’s made more accessible won’t vote for them.
Smile It Won't Suck Forever 