Tag Archives: South Carolina

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

South Carolina …do you have a history of exiling the Homeless ? reminder


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

South Carolina City Approves Plan To Exile Its Homeless

 

via @thinkprogress

 

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

We Need Another Democrat



 Tomorrow’s Political Cartoon?

I’m trying my best. But there is a limit to what I can accomplish when there are 232 Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives (a/k/a “the Comatose Caucus”) and only 201 Democrats.

If we’re going to win more votes, and pass more good bills, then we need more Democrats. Democracy is like that.

Tomorrow, there is a special election in South Carolina to replace Tim Scott, who was the last remaining African-American Republican in the House. (There are 42 African-American Democrats in the House.) The Republican nominee is former Governor Sanford. The Democratic nominee is Elizabeth Colbert Busch. Despite the fact that President Obama lost this district last year by 18 points, in the latest poll, the two candidates are only one point apart.

I’m not going to make fun of Governor Sanford. That’s just too easy.

Nor am I going to ask you to support Colbert Busch because her brother is Stephen Colbert of the Comedy Central Channel. By the same token, I will not ask you to support Warren Beatty for Congress just because his sister is Shirley MacLaine. Same thing with Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez. Also Peter Graves and James Arness. And Olivia de Havilland and Joan Fontaine.

I could ask you to support Colbert Busch because, according to one report, she is pro-choice, she backs marriage equality, and she supports immigration reform. So I could ask you to support her without feeling my gorge rise. But I won’t do it for that reason alone.

No, I’m going to ask you to support her campaign because the last thing that we need in the U.S. House of Representatives right now is another Republican. And the thing that we do need is more Democrats. Seventeen more Democrats, to be exact.

We’ve established a contribution page to help her campaign. Click here, etc., etc. Let’s take back the House.

Courage,

Rep. Alan Grayson

P.S. Please help elect another Democrat by sharing this with your friends on Facebook and Twitter.

~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Weak Gun Laws & High Levels of Gun Violence Go Together


 

 McQueen, per 1920 United States CensusHere are the ten states with the highest levels of gun violence:

by Center for American Progress

  1. Louisiana
  2. Alaska
  3. Alabama
  4. Arizona
  5. Mississippi
  6. South Carolina
  7. New Mexico
  8. Missouri
  9. Arkansas
  10. Georgia
~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

Think Voter ID is Bad? Meet the Poll-Watchers

1 Comment

 

by

  • September 13, 2012
  • 8:00 am

Think Voter ID is Bad? Meet the Poll-Watchers

The Republican fight against voter rights has garnered the lions share of press attention, but as The Nation reports, the fight for voting rights extends well beyond the fight over Voter ID and includes the fight over who gets to raise the question over who is eligible to vote.

In at least twenty-four states any random person is authorized, if they feel so inclined, to question individual voters and ask them to “prove” their eligibility to vote. As restrictive and complicated Voter ID laws have passed state-by-state, conservative groups have realized there’s good leveraging in voter registration challenges and poll watcher trainings.

Tea Party loyalists have created True the Vote, an advocacy group which pushes Voter ID laws and training “patriots” to protect the polls. But as a new report from the Brennan Center for Justice, “Voter Challengers” spells out, these groups rely on American’s historical amnesia when it comes to race in order to promote their activities. Poll-watching can’t be divorced from its racially motivated roots, and groups like True the Vote understand that, even if they won’t acknowledge it.

“This history of discriminatory voter challenges casts doubt on the fraud-prevention arguments traditionally used to justify these laws,” writes Nicolas Riley, author of the Brennan Center report.

As it stands, thirty-nine states allow private citizens to challenge voters at the polls. According to the Brennan study, election officials in those states are “under immense time pressure to decide challenges quickly in order to avoid voting delays.” True the Vote is aware of this, but they put it differently, saying at a recent poll watcher training that election officials are “under immense pressure to do the wrong thing”—namely let undocumented immigrants vote, and let people vote multiple times.

As detailed in The Nation, even in 2012 voting restrictions are intimately tied to our collective history of racial segregation and discrimination.

In those states, people can make up a reason to challenge a voter’s rights without any evidence backing them up, and do so with impunity. It’s the same as when people drum up charges of voter fraud to pass voter ID bills and go unpunished when it’s revealed that no such fraud exists. You can’t fabricate a police report by saying you were mugged if you weren’t; you can’t file a false claim saying you lost possessions in a disaster. In both cases, you face jail and fines for bearing false witness, but not if you fabricate voter fraud or voter ineligibility in many states.

The Brennan report points out that South Carolina and Virginia allow people to challenge voters even if it’s nothing but a whim. Consider that both South Carolina and Virginia both have passed voter ID laws. In South Carolina, that law is currently being challenged in a federal court, where it was discovered that the law’s author Representative Alan Clemmons made racist comments about black voters in an e-mail while discussing how to pass the legislation.

Both states have strong True the Vote connections. In South Carolina, a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, Cibby Krell, is a True the Vote volunteer with the Spartanburg Tea Party. In Virginia, the Virginia Voters Alliance is a group that trains Tea Party groups in challenging voters while pressuring Virginia election officials to engage in reckless purging processes.

Like other forms of evolved and modern discrimination, poll watching has become more sophisticated. But that doesn’t make it any less toxic to our democracy.

Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/think-voter-id-is-bad-meet-the-poll-watchers.html#ixzz26Rrg1j4G

 

Black History, ~ Recent Post

CONGRESS : the Republican led House – the Senate debates S.3240,Farm bill & 3.5yrs later, Judicial nominees


the Senate Convenes: 3:00pmET June 18, 2012

5:30pm The Senate began a roll call vote on confirmation of Executive Calendar #612, the nomination of Mary Geiger Lewis, of South Carolina, to be United States District Judge for the District of South Carolina; Confirmed: 64-27

WRAP UP

The Senate has locked an agreement to limit amendments and bring the Farm bill to passage. Under the agreement, we will begin voting on amendments at 2:15pm tomorrow. There will be a break in consideration of the amendments to debate and vote in relation to S.J.Res.37, Boiler MACT/EPA, Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning. I will send the agreement on the joint resolution of disapproval in a separate email message once it is locked in. Please note that we will consider amendments in an alternating fashion between Democrats and Republicans.

The agreement is as follows:

Leader: I ask unanimous consent that when the Senate resumes consideration of S.3240, the pending motion to recommit be withdrawn; that amendment #2390 be withdrawn; that the Stabenow-Roberts amendment #2389 be agreed to; the bill, as amended, be considered original text for the purposes of further amendment; that the following amendments and motions be the only first degree amendments and motions in order to the bill:

– Akaka #2440 (highly fractionated tribal lands);

– Akaka #2396 (tribal relations office);

– Baucus #2429 (Livestock);

– Bingaman #2364 (multi-state aquifers);

– Brown (OH) #2445 (rural development);

– Cantwell #2370 (pulse pilot);

– Casey #2238 (technical/study -federal milk marketing)

– Coons #2426 (poultry insurance study);

– Feinstein #2422 (conservation innovation grants);

– Feinstein #2309 (insurance recall);

– Gillibrand #2156 (SNAP);

– Hagan #2366 (crop insurance – plain language);

– Kerry #2187 (commercial fishermen);

– Landrieu #2321 (rural development loans);

– Manchin #2345 (dietary study);

– Merkley #2382 (organic crop insurance);

– Schumer #2427 (acer);
– Stabenow #2453 (NAP);

– Udall(CO) #2295 (bark beetle);

– Warner #2457 (rural broadband);

– Wyden #2442 (microloans);

– Wyden #2388 (farm to school);

– Leahy #2204 (rural development);

– Nelson(NE) #2242 (rural housing);

– Klobuchar #2299 (transportation study);

– Carper #2287 (poultry feed research);

– Sanders #2254 (biomass);

– Thune #2437 (crop insurance);

– Durbin-Coburn #2439 (crop insurance);

– Snowe #2190 (milk marketing order reform);

– Ayotte #2192 (value added grants);

– Collins #2444 (dairy);

– Grassley #2167 (pay cap marketing loans);

– Sessions #2174 (SNAP);

– Nelson(NE) #2243 (SNAP);

– Sessions #2172 (SNAP);

– Paul #2181 ($250,000 income limit);

– Alexander #2191 (wind loans);

– McCain #2199 (catfish);

– Toomey #2217 (organic/AMA);

– DeMint #2263 (broadband funding);

– DeMint #2262 (SoS Free MKT);

– DeMint #2268 (Loan guarantees);

– DeMint #2276 (checkoffs);

– DeMint #2273 (broadband);

– Coburn #2289 (MAP);

– Coburn #2293 (Limit Millionaires);

– Kerry #2454 (North Korea);

– Kyl #2354 (North Korea);

– Lee #2313 (Forest Legacy);

– Lee #2314 (CSP/CRP cut);

– Boozman #2355 (Ag research, law info);

– Boozman #2360 (TEFAP);

– Toomey #2226 (energy title);

– Toomey #2433 (sugar);

– Lee Motion to Recommit (FY 2008 levels);

– Johnson(WI) Motion to Recommit;

– Chambliss #2438 (conservation crop insurance);

– Chambliss #2340 (sugar);

– Chambliss #2432 (FMPP);

– Ayotte #2195 (GAO crop insurance fraud report);

– Blunt #2246 (veterans);

– Moran #2403 (food aid);

– Moran #2443 (beginning farmers)

– Vitter #2363 (pets);

– Toomey #2247 (paperwork);

– Sanders #2310 (genetically engineered food);

– Coburn #2214 (convention funding);

– Boxer #2456 (aerial inspections);

– Johanns #2372 (aerial inspections);

– Murray # 2455(sequestration);

– McCain #2162 (Sequestration report – DoD); and

– Rubio #2166 (RAISE Act).

That at 2:15pm, Tuesday, June 19th, the Senate proceed to votes in relation to the amendments in the order listed alternating between Republican and Democratic sponsored amendments; that there be no amendments or motions in order to the amendments prior to the votes other than motions to waive points of order and motions to table; that there be two minutes of debate equally divided in the usual form in between the votes and all after the first vote be ten minute votes; that the Toomey #2247; Sanders #2256; Coburn #2214; Boxer #2456; Johanns #2372; Murray #2455; McCain #2162 and the Rubio amendment #2166 be subject to a 60 affirmative vote threshold; that the clerks be authorized to modify the instruction lines on amendments so the page and line numbers match up correctly; that upon disposition of the amendments, the bill, as amended, be read a third time; that there be up to ten minutes equally divided in the usual form prior to a vote on passage of the bill, as amended, if amended; finally, the vote on passage of the bill be subject to a 60 affirmative vote threshold.

ROLL CALL VOTE

1) Confirmation of Executive Calendar #612, the nomination of Mary Geiger Lewis, of SC, to be United States District Judge for the District of South Carolina; Confirmed: 64-27

LEGISLATIVE ITEMS

Agreed to a Snowe amendment to the preamble of S.Res.488, a resolution commending the efforts of the firefighters and emergency response personnel of Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Connecticut, who came together to extinguish the May 23, 2012, fire at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Kittery, Maine., notwithstanding adoption of the resolution.

Discharged Judiciary and adopted S.Res.470, a resolution designating July 28, 2012, as “National Day of the American Cowboy”.

Adopted S.Res.495, designating the period beginning on June 17, 2012, and ending on June 23, 2012, as “Polycystic Kidney Disease Awareness Week”, and raising awareness and understanding of polycystic kidney disease and the impact such disease has on patients.

No EXECUTIVE ITEMS

—————————————————————————————————————————————–

House Floor Activities
Legislative Day of June 18, 2012