Obama floats mandatory voting

[Merc14]

I still lean towards citizenship tests to earn citizen rights such as voting. Show that you actually understand the structure and purpose of the government. None of this natural birthright garbage. Leave that for the people who still have monarchies.

There should be some kind of proof that you are in the game enough to vote but we can't even require ID without the race police going wild.

Edited March 23, 2015 by Merc14

[F3SS]

Though having to take a test to vote will never happen. Was done to get blacks down in the civil rights era so it has a really bad association

I remember reading that they didn't even try to mask the fact that blacks were getting screwed. They were impossible trick questions or super confusing.

[F3SS]

Here is what I was thinking of. They're mostly phrased to be as right or wrong. They aren't all impossible but pass and fail was at a whim I'm sure. Questions one and four are definitely tricks.

Edited March 24, 2015 by F3SS

[Merc14]

Here is what I was thinking of. They're mostly phrased to be as right or wrong. They aren't all impossible but pass and fail was at a whim I'm sure. Questions one and four are definitely tricks.

LOL I guarantee 33% of the adult public couldn't pass that test, maybe more since one wrong answer denotes failure. What year was that used? Sad to say but :

From Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functional_illiteracy

According to begintoread.com:

• Two-thirds of students who cannot read proficiently by the fourth grade will end up in jail or on welfare.
  
• Three out of four individuals who receive food stamps read on the two lowest levels of literacy.
  
• 16-to-19-year-old girls at the poverty line and below with below-average reading skills are 6 times more likely to have out-of-wedlock children than their more literate counterparts.
  

Kozol, Jonathan (1985). Illiterate America (Plume ed.). New York: New American Library. p. 229. ISBN 0-452-25807-3.

Second bullet of the above may have changed since the Obamaeconomy has put record numbers of people on Foodstamps but I'd bet the other two bullets are correct.

[Indiogene]

In America, most of the people seem uninterested, unaware of, or uncomfortable around politics nowadays. In the last mid-term election, about 36% of the registered voters shown up in the polls. Why is that? Was there a huge winter storm on election day on Nov.? Not a huge national issue on the agenda? or we're sick and tired of politics as we know it? There has to be reason the American people are turned off by the idea of voting, either they're too busy in their lives on a workday like Tuesday or they learned voting doesn't bring forth "hope and change" in our lives in this country (anymore).

I find more Americans claim to hate politics...hate work...and feel very iffy about sex, but they are VERY comfortable or happy about religion or attending church/place of worship. Personally, I hold more confidence in government than in organized religion, while we have to remember we can chose where we work and IMO, I don't find sexuality the biggest "taboo" while I'm aware of social rules regarding the subject matter. Why we're so bothered by casting a vote to change government and replace elected leaders? This is what I'm worried about in our country.

Americans believe voting is a personal choice not to be forced on other people...we believe you have the right to attend any church you want (or not at all), we choose to work (but we have to in order to survive), choose a mate to marry (then there's the issue of legality of Gay/same-sex marraige) and finally we want government not to make choices for us. I don't see mandatory voting ever happening in the US, because our culture doesn't allow that or tolerate being told how to vote. Thank goodness many states have early voting and like me, you can take 5 minutes of free time to decide to vote in the privacy of your home and mail it in about a week or two before election day. That's what it takes.

[KariW]

If this comes to pass, my husband and I have discussed about moving to another country. Because if they can mandate this, it really opens the door for other things.

[+and-then]

If this comes to pass, my husband and I have discussed about moving to another country. Because if they can mandate this, it really opens the door for other things.

I'd move to Kiwiland in a HEARTBEAT if I had the resources.

[KariW]

I'd move to Kiwiland in a HEARTBEAT if I had the resources.

Ditto that! Kiwiland or Austrailia would be just fine!!

[Degen]

Ditto that! Kiwiland or Austrailia would be just fine!!

So you would leave a country for putting into place mandatory voting to come live in a country that already has it?

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

I'd move to Kiwiland in a HEARTBEAT if I had the resources.

Where, incidentally, voting is mandatory.

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

So you would leave a country for putting into place mandatory voting to come live in a country that already has it?

Better not tell them that we have "Socialised Medicine" as well.

And a minimum wage people can actually live on.

[F3SS]

Better not tell them that we have "Socialised Medicine" as well.

And a minimum wage people can actually live on.

Maybe if our nation had the population of New York city like yours does I could go for that. That social stuff works best for small and homogenized populations. 310 million people of every kind and government that spends money 3:1 and asks US for more when they run out doesn't quite sell me on the idea of centralized health care.

[KariW]

So you would leave a country for putting into place mandatory voting to come live in a country that already has it?

No not just for that..... NSA Spying, IRS targeting, and a host of other issues, that Australia is not plagued by....

[KariW]

Where, incidentally, voting is mandatory.

Better not tell them that we have "Socialised Medicine" as well.

And a minimum wage people can actually live on.

I bet its a lot better than what we have here....been waiting for 2 years to get a mammogram.

[Merc14]

I bet its a lot better than what we have here....been waiting for 2 years to get a mammogram.

2 years for a mamogram? Why?

[KariW]

When I finally qualified for a mammogram, they ran out of funding, and didn't know if they would get any more funding for the program.....it totally sucks!

[Sir Wearer of Hats]

Maybe if our nation had the population of New York city like yours does I could go for that. That social stuff works best for small and homogenized populations. 310 million people of every kind and government that spends money 3:1 and asks US for more when they run out doesn't quite sell me on the idea of centralized health care.

Exactly F3SS I've always said that Socilism works at het he village level.

[Harte]

I'm with George Will on this one.

In 1960, 62.8 percent of age-eligible citizens voted. In the 13 subsequent presidential elections, lower turnouts than this have coincided with the removal of impediments to voting (poll taxes, literacy tests, burdensome registration and residency requirements). Turnout has not increased as the electorate has become more educated and affluent and as government has become more involved in Americans’ lives.

There are obvious reasons for nonvoting.

One is contentment. Americans are complainers but are mostly comfortable. Second, the stakes of politics are low because constitutional rights and other essential elements of happiness are not menaced by elections.

Third, the winner-take-all allocation of electoral votes in 48 states — an excellent idea, for many reasons — means many state races without suspense. (After their conventions, Barack Obama and Mitt Romney campaigned in just eight and 10 battleground states, respectively.) Fourth, gerrymandered federal and state legislative districts reduce competitive races.

Because the likelihood of any individual’s vote mattering is infinitesimal, and because the effort required to be an informed voter can be substantial, ignorance and abstention are rational, unless voting is cathartic or otherwise satisfying. A small voting requirement such as registration, which calls for the individual voter’s initiative, acts to filter potential voters with the weakest motivations. As indifferent or reluctant voters are nagged to the polls — or someday prodded there by a monetary penalty for nonvoting — the caliber of the electorate must decline.

It has been said that for every complex problem there is a solution that is clear, simple and wrong. Washington soon may seek a complex “solution” ... to the non-problem of people choosing not to vote.

But I'm pretty much with George Will all the time - minus the baseball obsession.

Harte

Edited March 25, 2015 by Harte

[+joc]

America is all about Freedom. Don't tell me I have to buy insurance. I don't. Don't tell me I have to vote. I don't. I'm sick and tired of little dictator wannanbes like Obama Bin Biden telling me what kind of light bulbs I have to own...telling me I have to limit this or that because a snail might be affected.

Wow....and then out of the quagmire of the pit of stench that Hussein has left on this country...out of the mist...rides a man on a White Stallion...blazing with the sword of Conservative Principles which America was founded on. A man that has no problem calling Islamic Terrorism...Islamic Terrorism.

Enter the DragonSlayer....Ted Cruz.

[Degen]

America is all about Freedom. Don't tell me I have to buy insurance. I don't. Don't tell me I have to vote. I don't. I'm sick and tired of little dictator wannanbes like Obama Bin Biden telling me what kind of light bulbs I have to own...telling me I have to limit this or that because a snail might be affected.

Wow....and then out of the quagmire of the pit of stench that Hussein has left on this country...out of the mist...rides a man on a White Stallion...blazing with the sword of Conservative Principles which America was founded on. A man that has no problem calling Islamic Terrorism...Islamic Terrorism.

Enter the DragonSlayer....Ted Cruz.

Go live in a cave away from civilized people then if thats what you really want.

Ted Cruz - For a more fanatical america tomorrow.

[2-B]

America is all about Freedom. Don't tell me I have to buy insurance. I don't. Don't tell me I have to vote. I don't. I'm sick and tired of little dictator wannanbes like Obama Bin Biden telling me what kind of light bulbs I have to own...telling me I have to limit this or that because a snail might be affected.

Wow....and then out of the quagmire of the pit of stench that Hussein has left on this country...out of the mist...rides a man on a White Stallion...blazing with the sword of Conservative Principles which America was founded on. A man that has no problem calling Islamic Terrorism...Islamic Terrorism.

Enter the DragonSlayer....Ted Cruz.

I am so with you on the light bulbs. I know this thread is not about light bulbs, but I want to buy light bulbs that that don't come with warnings that if they break, they're health hazards. Had one shatter in my hands right over the couch and carpet where my dogs like to lie, and have been angry ever since I can't find a safe, old-fashioned incandescent bulb. Frustrated I need a doctorate to buy a lightbulb. Bane of my existence. /end rant

So impressed with Cruz' speech the other day, especially the "imagine a president who..." section. Vultures have already descended.

[F3SS]

I have broken and been around no less than a dozen of those squiggly shaped bulbs. Sweep em and toss em just like the old ones. What are you supposed to do?

[2-B]

I have broken and been around no less than a dozen of those squiggly shaped bulbs. Sweep em and toss em just like the old ones. What are you supposed to do?

You're actually supposed to CUT OUT AND DISCARD any section of carpet they shatter on because of the mercury content.

I am not making this up.

But they are allegedly "green" and save oh so much energy.

Next up: the EPA wants to monitor and restrict how long we can spend in the shower. For those keeping score, it's SEVEN minutes folks.

Edited March 25, 2015 by 2-B

[F3SS]

I know. It's ridiculous. Not only did the government find a way to mandate something so inane they figured out a way to also enlarge government by involving the EPA. Probably created an entire new $700 million dollar lightbulb division too that'll cost US $2.1 billion and turn those of US who sweep and toss them into environmental criminals.