#and there are *many* places to vote in this county

[nodynasty4us]

More from the reblogs:

Also worth noting that asking people who they're voting for or discussing candidate policies is pretty illegal on polling location grounds.#If you're a federal worker there's something called the Hatch Act that makes discussing political affairs SUPER ILLEGAL!#But yes your activism is commendable but it's more important for you to be safe. Lie like hell if you have to in order to stay safe!

how much you wanna bet republicans are going to try to go after private voting after this?

I hate that we hold up honesty as this unassailable virtue#that we don't teach people the difference between wanting to avoid taking responsibility and needing to protect yourself#it's another reason I hate corporal punishment so much#if you teach your children that it's wrong to lie even if they know you're going to hit them for telling the truth#then how are they going to know that they don't owe their spouse a truth that the spouse will hit them for?

my older sibling voted for Obama and never told our mother even tho mom was the one who DROVE them to the polling place

Republicans are really out here saying they’d rather be cucked than have their wives vote for Kamala and not tell them.

I was definitely too spooked to vote too far out of line the first time#Fun fact you don't gotta be spooked just vote whatever

for a group that loves tradition conservatives have really forgotten that so many peoples grandparents would NEVER discuss politics#EVER#my parents would never know who their parents were voting for#it was private. secret.#I never knew my grandfather's politics#either of them

and also don't say you wrote in yourself or him or someone you know because if your county releases a record of who received votes#and you or he don't appear with having received a solitary vote then he could extrapolate that you lied#so just say you voted for who he wanted you to vote for#and make plans to leave him#because if hes this frothing mad at the idea of you voting based on your own conscience then you need to get out

seriously you ain't gotta tell nobody who you vote for#also the volume and intensity of their outrage is meant to intimidate you#they are trying to scare you#'

What's "nauseating" is that these men - Watterson and Kirk - obviously don't believe in women as people, who have rights separate from men - from their fathers, husbands, or sons.

But imagine the gender-flipped scenario: An ad that tells you that you don’t have to vote for who your wife wants to vote for, and you don’t even have to tell her who you voted for — after all, you’re your own man, right? Suddenly, it sounds like common sense.

I hope we see a MASS of divorces after this.#that said I think we need to start getting ready to give additional support to battered women shelters.

If it was 1% more socially acceptable and politically strategically viable to say so, they would just straight up tell you that they want to take away your right to vote as a woman.

i remember seeing some right wingers saying that women shouldnt vote because why would you need to vote differently than your husband#and while i think comments like that are made to get people angry and talking#it's interesting to see the same exact sentiment described in this article#“imagine a man working so hard just for his wife to vote against him” thats crazy#proof they hate women and proof they hate democracy#but we already knew that

And they want to take away no-fault divorce. They don't want partners, they want possessions.

"How'd you vote?" "Same as everyone. Secret ballot."

Also if you have to lie you might seriously want to consider a lesbian affair. At least I think that's what Republicans are saying.

also the fact that the republicans were so mad about that ad proves that the ad is right#there's a reason your wife has to lie to you bud

this is on the heels of one trillion pity party op-eds scolding liberals for not wanting to date conservatives or estranging RW family

12:01 PM

The desperation to control woman is disgusting. Crazy from the party of "freedom"

republican men feeling entitled to control how their wife votes is so fuckin….#i'm grossed out for these women#we need to make it easier for divorce in the usa and i'm not joking

not quite related but u can also lie to the democrats themselves#you can say ''i wont vote for you unless you stop giving weapons to israel''… and then vote for them anyway#this is the having your cake and eating it of using your vote for political activism#except that in this case you actually can have your cake and eat it#as long as you're not discouraging others from voting just telling the democrats themselves this (#(in calls to your representative in emails etc etc)#it has no particular downside

my sisters told me they lied to our mom cause they came home to her angrily watching a trump rally#i dont know HOW she believed them#this is the same person who told me 'im not sure im going to let you leave the house until youre voting for the right person'

Republican men don't believe in female autonomy. You, as their wife, daughter, sister, and even mother are their property and its your job to vote their beliefs. Don't worry you're pretty little head and "try" and think for yourself ladies they'll do the thinkin for you….. Don't know how anyone could stand being married to or dating a man like that, but it sure seems to be quite common.

lie about who you voted for and then cheat on your husband, problem solved

Really makes me think of all the whining they do about how liberal women don't want to date conservative men. They'll say that we can just agree to disagree, but then act like a husband owns his wife's vote.

in 2016 I almost got into a fight with my aunt when I told her I voted for Clinton#it really shook me up and I think I cried afterward#both my mom and my doctor separately comforted me and told me “’you never have to tell anyone who you voted for#if they ask tell them it’s none of their business’#they went on to lament how when they were younger it was common courtesy not to ask how someone voted and they don’t like how people#feel entitled to know how someone voted

lying is easier than a divorce#he'll never know#and then maybe one day this decision can help get you the other tools you need to be free of a controlling man

Absolutely lie if you need to. This thread and the ad reminded me how my conservative parents refused to take me to absentee vote when I was in college because they knew I wasn't going to vote GOP. It was the first time I was old enough to vote, and I didn't have a car. My grandmother took me so I could vote before I went back to school. This was over 30 years ago!

so if believe these people think voting for a different candidate is like having an affair#does that mean theyre fucking trump. or something

Amazing how many republican men see their wives as extensions of themselves and not people with their own minds#to paraphrase Granny Weatherwax “Thinking of people as things is were Evil begins.”

it's a secret ballot for a reason#seriously this is why ballot selfies are banned; to protect the secrecy of your vote

“wife lying about her vote is as bad as an affair.” US is wild! Here, you go vote and press a button. Over there you go out and FUCK THE CANDIDATE! Now I understand why the voting time spread through a lot of days! It never made sense to me, but they do need to recover, get some electrolytes…

Man, conservative men just love announcing how fragile they are.

it is always okay to lie to keep yourself safe. it'd be good to start working on a plan to get tf out of this dangerous situation, mind. but: baby steps.

I don't live at my parents anymore#and I'm in a safe space so I don't give a shit about being as vocal as I am#but once upon a time I wasn't#and I got into a huge fight with my mom about it because she voted for Trump and#and I did not#and it was really touch and go whether or not I'd still have a home after that#republicans are always deep into their own dramatics#this is NOT the same as cheating and they're lying to scare you

Every man who has had an affair deserves a woman who votes for Kamala. (Not really, he deserves to be alone. His significant other certainly deserves better. I just was trying to adulterer-shame)

this ad feels sooooo familiar for anyone who's ever been in an emotionally abusive relationship#i would not put it past my dad to pull this shit if any of us (including my mom) still lived with him#all the troll comments going 'but wHy WouLd YoU LiE tO yOuR hUsBaNd???' are being intentionally dense#so that he doesn't make her life even more of a living hell behind closed doors! that's fucking why!

From the October 31, 2024 article:

“In the one place in America where women still have a right to choose, you can vote any way you want. And no one will ever know,” Roberts says in the ad as a woman on screen meets up with her husband after casting her ballot for Harris.

The voter winks at a fellow female voter as her husband asks if she made the “right choice.”

Republicans have responded to the video with outrage, with some claiming that a wife lying about her vote is as bad as an affair.

“If I found out Emma was going to the voting booth and pulling the lever for Harris, that’s the same thing as having an affair,” Fox News host Jesse Watters said on air Wednesday in a clip highlighted by Mediaite.

Other GOP members including Charlie Kirk said the thought was “nauseating.”

[sexiestpodcastcharacter]

Hi! If you're registered to vote in the US and you have not done so yet, I urge you to look up your local elections today! Things like City Council, School Board, Water District, etc. are really important. And as fewer voters are involved in these elections (because the population of a city or county is smaller than the population of the country) your vote has more weight!

I personally hope you vote in any elections involving Public Library Boards, Bonds, and Measures! You might be surprised how many people run to be in charge of a service they want to dismantle.

I live in a vote-by-mail state so I can't give any tips about if you need to stand in line to vote, but here's what I do:

Collect my ballot and the Voter's Pamphlet (if it's an election where they send out one) and my computer (or phone if I'm lazy).

Pull up all the local newspapers and the public radio website, especially ones that have done endorsements. I've been doing this long enough that I generally know which editorial boards I align with and which I don't, but if you don't know this and you have strong opinions on who is currently elected, check who a newspaper endorsed previously!

Some years my family goes through the voters pamphlet all together, but often we're busy and just mark it up for the next person.

Sometimes the elections are small enough, or we live in a rural enough place, that there is no voters pamphlet and there is no coverage in what few local news sources that have survived. When this happens, I go to friends and/or social media.

Please vote locally! I wanted to run more polls than just the County Sheriff one, but the truth is anyone can hold nearly any position. Like besides the elections for local judges, I can't think of any that have actual necessary qualifications. And I haven't found enough podcast judges to run one of those polls (which honestly lines up with the reality that most of those elections are the incumbents running unopposed).

[andromeda3116]

oh boy if the first day of early voting here is any indication, the turnout this year is going to be huge

[orcelito]

Reading up on the people on my election ballot and there's some combination of "can ANYONE tell me what their policies actually are???" (Specifically with the smaller offices) VS "Oh, so YOU'RE the reason why Indiana has an abortion ban! Duly noted!"

[gwyoi]

I really don’t want to be catastrophizing but I do feel like history is rhyming. migrants at the boarder are already being treated horribly - Biden asking trump for help is a political play and trump will decline, but it speaks to how similar their approach to the boarder will be. Texas AG asked for the names and health records of people being represented by PFLAG, abortion rights are gone federally and embryos are recognized as “people” . Idaho is already overrun with nazi homesteaders. The war machine doesn’t stop and Biden lied about a ceasefire in Palestine.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The tax sharks are back and they’re coming for your home

I'm touring my new, nationally bestselling novel The Bezzle! Catch me TODAY (Apr 27) in MARIN COUNTY, then Winnipeg (May 2), Calgary (May 3), Vancouver (May 4), and beyond!

One of my weirder and more rewarding hobbies is collecting definitions of "conservativism," and one of the jewels of that collection comes from Corey Robin's must-read book The Reactionary Mind:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Reactionary_Mind

Robin's definition of conservativism has enormous explanatory power and I'm always finding fresh ways in which it clarifies my understand of events in the world: a conservative is someone who believes that a minority of people were born to rule, and that everyone else was born to follow their rules, and that the world is in harmony when the born rulers are in charge.

This definition unifies the otherwise very odd grab-bag of ideologies that we identify with conservativism: a Christian Dominionist believes in the rule of Christians over others; a "men's rights advocate" thinks men should rule over women; a US imperialist thinks America should rule over the world; a white nationalist thinks white people should rule over racialized people; a libertarian believes in bosses dominating workers and a Hindu nationalist believes in Hindu domination over Muslims.

These people all disagree about who should be in charge, but they all agree that some people are ordained to rule, and that any "artificial" attempt to overturn the "natural" order throws society into chaos. This is the entire basis of the panic over DEI, and the brainless reflex to blame the Francis Scott Key bridge disaster on the possibility that someone had been unjustly promoted to ship's captain due to their membership in a disfavored racial group or gender.

This definition is also useful because it cleanly cleaves progressives from conservatives. If conservatives think there's a natural order in which the few dominate the many, progressivism is a belief in pluralism and inclusion, the idea that disparate perspectives and experiences all have something to contribute to society. Progressives see a world in which only a small number of people rise to public life, rarified professions, and cultural prominence and assume that this is terrible waste of the talents and contributions of people whose accidents of birth keep them from participating in the same way.

This is why progressives are committed to class mobility, broad access to education, and active programs to bring traditionally underrepresented groups into arenas that once excluded them. The "some are born to rule, and most to be ruled over" conservative credo rejects this as not just wrong, but dangerous, the kind of thing that leads to bridges being demolished by cargo ships.

The progressive reforms from the New Deal until the Reagan revolution were a series of efforts to broaden participation in every part of society by successively broader groups of people. A movement that started with inclusive housing and education for white men and votes for white women grew to encompass universal suffrage, racial struggles for equality, workplace protections for a widening group of people, rights for people with disabilities, truth and reconciliation with indigenous people and so on.

The conservative project of the past 40 years has been to reverse this: to return the great majority of us to the status of desperate, forelock-tugging plebs who know our places. Hence the return of child labor, the tradwife movement, and of course the attacks on labor unions and voting rights:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/11/06/the-end-of-the-road-to-serfdom/

Arguably the most potent symbol of this struggle is the fight over homes. The New Deal offered (some) working people a twofold path to prosperity: subsidized home-ownership and strong labor protections. This insulated (mostly white) workers from the two most potent threats to working peoples' lives and wellbeing: the cruel boss and the greedy landlord.

But the neoliberal era dispensed with labor rights, leaving the descendants of those lucky workers with just one tool for securing their American dream: home-ownership. As wages stagnated, your home – so essential to your ability to simply live – became your most important asset first, and a home second. So long as property values rose – and property taxes didn't – your home could be the backstop for debt-fueled consumption that filled the gap left by stagnating wages. Liquidating your family home might someday provide for your retirement, your kids' college loans and your emergency medical bills.

For conservatives who want to restore Gilded Age class rule, this was a very canny move. It pitted lucky workers with homes against their unlucky brethren – the more housing supply there was, the less your house was worth. The more protections tenants had, the less your house was worth. The more equitably municipal services (like schools) were distributed, the less your house was worth:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/06/the-rents-too-damned-high/

And now that the long game is over, they're coming for your house. It started with the foreclosure epidemic after the 2008 financial crisis, first under GW Bush, but then in earnest under Obama, who accepted the advice of his Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who insisted that homeowners should be liquidated to "foam the runways" for the crashing banks:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/03/06/personnel-are-policy/#janice-eberly

Then there are scams like "We Buy Ugly Houses," a nationwide mass-fraud outfit that steals houses out from under elderly, vulnerable and desperate people:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/11/ugly-houses-ugly-truth/#homevestor

The more we lose our houses, the more single-family homes Wall Street gets to snap up and convert into slum properties, aslosh with a toxic stew of black mold, junk fees and eviction threats:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/02/08/wall-street-landlords/#the-new-slumlords

Now there's a new way for finance barons the steal our houses out from under us – or rather, a very old way that had lain dormant since the last time child labor was legal – "tax lien investing."

Across the country, counties and cities have programs that allow investment funds to buy up overdue tax-bills from homeowners in financial hardship. These "investors" are entitled to be paid the missing property taxes, and if the homeowner can't afford to make that payment, the "investor" gets to kick them out of their homes and take possession of them, for a tiny fraction of their value.

As Andrew Kahrl writes for The American Prospect, tax lien investing was common in the 19th century, until the fundamental ugliness of the business made it unattractive even to the robber barons of the day:

https://prospect.org/economy/2024-04-26-investing-in-distress-tax-liens/

The "tax sharks" of Chicago and New York were deemed "too merciless" by their peers. One exec who got out of the business compared it to "picking pennies off a dead man’s eyes." The very idea of outsourcing municipal tax collection to merciless debt-hounds fell aroused public ire.

Today – as the conservative project to restore the "natural" order of the ruled and the ruled-over builds momentum – tax lien investing is attracting some of America's most rapacious investors – and they're making a killing. In Chicago, Alden Capital just spent a measly $1.75m to acquire the tax liens on 600 family homes in Cook County. They now get to charge escalating fees and penalties and usurious interest to those unlucky homeowners. Any homeowner that can't pay loses their home.

The first targets for tax-lien investing are the people who were the last people to benefit from the New Deal and its successors: Black and Latino families, elderly and disabled people and others who got the smallest share of America's experiment in shared prosperity are the first to lose the small slice of the American dream that they were grudgingly given.

This is the very definition of "structural racism." Redlining meant that families of color were shut out of the federal loan guarantees that benefited white workers. Rather than building intergenerational wealth, these families were forced to rent (building some other family's intergenerational wealth), and had a harder time saving for downpayments. That meant that they went into homeownership with "nontraditional" or "nonconforming" mortgages with higher interest rates and penalties, which made them more vulnerable to economic volatility, and thus more likely to fall behind on their taxes. Now that they're delinquent on their property taxes, they're in hock to a private equity fund that's charging them even more to live in their family home, and the second they fail to pay, they'll be evicted, rendered homeless and dispossessed of all the equity they built in their (former) home.

It's very on-brand for Alden Capital to be destroying the lives of Chicagoans. Alden is most notorious for buying up and destroying America's most beloved newspapers. It was Alden who bought up the Chicago Tribune, gutted its workforce, sold off its iconic downtown tower, and moved its few remaining reporters to an outer suburban, windowless brick building "the size of a Chipotle":

https://pluralistic.net/2021/10/16/sociopathic-monsters/#all-the-news-thats-fit-to-print

Before the ghastly hotel baroness Leona Helmsley went to prison for tax evasion, she famously said, "We don't pay taxes; only the little people pay taxes." Helmsley wasn't wrong – she was just a little ahead of schedule. As Propublica's IRS Files taught us, America's 400 richest people pay less tax than you do:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/04/13/for-the-little-people/#leona-helmsley-2022

When billionaires don't pay their taxes, they get to buy sports franchises. When poor people don't pay their taxes, billionaires get to steal their houses after paying the local government an insultingly small amount of money.

It's all going according to plan. We weren't meant to have houses, or job security, or retirement funds. We weren't meant to go to university, or even high school, and our kids were always supposed to be in harness at a local meat-packer or fast food kitchen, not wasting time with their high school chess club or sports team. They don't need high school: that's for the people who were born to rule. They – we – were meant to be ruled over.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/04/26/taxes-are-for-the-little-people/#alden-capital

[txttletale]

how do ml's reconcile with lenin going for a bigbrainhaver hierarchy which just so happened to place him at the tippy top? most of the things he's quoted for writing make a kind of sense in that longwinded academic philosopher way, but, like, russia went from having a revolution against monarchy to having a monarchy, essentially, and what folks do tends to align with their desires, yeah? wouldn't that make everything he said, idk, suspicious?

we reconcile with this because none of this is even remotely true. lenin did not 'happen to be placed at the tippy top' but was in fact elected by the soviets, who worked in a very simple electoral system by which workers and peasants would elect representatives to their local soviet, who as well as administering local services would also elect members to higher bodies. the quote unquote bigbrainhaver hierarchy system in question was as follows:

The sovereign body is in every case the Congress of Soviets. Each county sends its delegates. These are elected indirectly by the town and county Soviets which vote in proportion to population, following the ratio observed throughout, by which the voters in the town have five times the voting strength of the inhabitants of the villages, an advantage which may, as we saw, be in reality three to one. The Congress meets, as a rule, once a year, for about ten days. It is not, in the real sense of the word, the legislative body. It debates policy broadly, and passes resolutions which lay down the general principles to be followed in legislation. The atmosphere of its sittings is that of a great public demonstration. The Union Congress, for example, which has some fifteen hundred members, meets in the Moscow Opera House. The stage is occupied by the leaders and the heads of the administration, and speeches are apt to be big oratorical efforts. The real legislative body is the so-called Central Executive Committee (known as the C. I. K. and pronounced "tseek") . It meets more frequently than the Congress to which it is responsible-in the case of the Union, at least three times in the year-passes the Budget, receives the reports of the Commissars (ministers), and discusses international policy. It, in its turn, elects two standing bodies: (1) The Presidium of twenty-one members, which has the right to legislate in the intervals between the sittings of the superior assemblies, and also transacts some administrative work. (2) The Council of Peoples' Commissars. These correspond roughly to the Ministers or Secretaries of State in democratic countries and are the chiefs of the administration. Meeting as a Council, they have larger powers than any Cabinet, for they may pass emergency legislation and issue decrees which have all the force of legislation. Save in cases of urgency, however, their decrees and drafts of legislation must be ratified by the Executive Committee (C.I.K.). In another respect they differ from the European conception of a Minister. Each Commissar is in reality the chairman of a small board of colleagues, who are his advisers. These advisory boards, or collegia, meet very frequently (it may even be daily) to discuss current business, and any member of a board has the right to appeal to the whole Council of Commissars against a decision of the Commissar.

—H.N. Brailsford, How The Soviets Work (1927)

you might notice that the congresses of soviets were not directly elected -- this is because they were elected by local soviets, who were directly elected, in a process that many people have given first hand accounts of:

I have, while working in the Soviet Union, participated in an election. I, too, had a right to vote, as I was a working member of the community, and nationality and citizenship are no bar to electoral rights. The procedure was extremely simple. A general meeting of all the workers in our organisation was called by the trade union committee, candidates were discussed, and a vote was taken by show of hands. Anybody present had the right to propose a candidate, and the one who was elected was not personally a member of the Party. In considering the claims of the candidates their past activities were discussed, they themselves had to answer questions as to their qualifications, anybody could express an opinion, for or against them, and the basis of all the discussion was: What justification had the candidates to represent their comrades on the local Soviet. As far as the elections in the villages were concerned, these took place at open village meetings, all peasants of voting age, other than those who employed labour, having the right to vote and to stand for election. As in the towns, any organisation or individual could put forward candidates, anyone could ask the candidate questions, and anybody could support or oppose the candidature. It is usual for the Communist Party to put forward a candidate, trade unions and other organisations can also do so, and there is nothing to prevent the Party’s candidate from not being elected, if he has not sufficient prestige among the voters. In the towns the “ electoral district ” has hitherto consisted of a factory, or a group of small factories sufficient to form a constituency. But there was one section of the town population which has always had to vote geographically, since they did not work together in one organisation. This was the housewives. As a result, the housewives met separately in each district, had their own constituencies, and elected their own representatives to the Soviet. Here, too, vital interest has always been shown in the personality of every candidate. Why should this woman be elected ? What right had she to represent her fellow housewives on the local Soviet ? In the district next to my own at the last election the housewife who was elected was well known as an organiser of a communal dining-room in the district. This was the kind of person that the housewives wanted to represent them on the Soviet. Another candidate, a Communist, proposed by the local organisation of the Party, was turned down in her favour.

[...]

The election of delegates to the local Soviet is not the only function of voters in the Soviet Union. It is not a question here of various parties presenting candidates to the electorate, each with his own policy to offer. The Soviet electorate has to select a personality from its midst to represent it, and instruct this person in the policy which is to be followed when elected. At a Soviet election meeting, therefore, as much or more time may be spent on discussion of the instructions to the delegate as is spent on discussing the personality of the candidates. At the last election to the Soviets, in which I personally participated, we must have spent three or four times as much time on the working out of instructions as we did on the selection of our candidate. About three weeks before the election was to take place the trade union secretary in every department of our organisation was told by the committee that it was time to start to prepare our instructions to the delegate. Every worker was asked to make suggestions concerning policy which he felt should be brought to the notice of the new personnel of the Moscow Soviet. As a result, about forty proposals concerning the general government of Moscow were handed in from a group of about twenty people. We then held a meeting in our department at which we discussed the proposals, and adopted some and rejected others. We then handed our list of pro¬ posals to a commission, appointed by the trade union committee, and representing all the workers in our organisation. This Commission co-ordinated the pro¬ posals received, placed them in order according to the various departments of the Soviet, and this co-ordinated list was read at the election meeting itself, again discussed, and adopted in its final form.

—Pat Sloan, Soviet Democracy (1937)

Between the elections of 1931 and 1934, no less than 18 per cent of the city deputies and 37 per cent of village deputies were recalled, of whom only a relatively small number — 4 per cent of the total — were charged with serious abuse of power. The chief reasons for recall were inactivity — 37 per cent — and inefficiency — 21 per cent. If these figures indicate certain lacks in the quality of elected officials, they show considerable activity of the people in improving government. The electorate of the Peasants' Gazette, for example, consisted of some 1,500 employees, entitled to elect one deputy to the Moscow city soviet and two to the ward soviet. For more than a month before the election every department of the newspaper held meetings discussing both candidates and instructions. Forty-three suggested candidates and some 1,400 proposals for the work of the incoming government resulted from these meetings, which also elected committees to boil down and classify the instructions. These committees issued a special four-page newspaper for the 1,500 voters; it contained brief biographies of the forty-three candidates, an analysis of their capacities by the Communist Party organization of the Peasants' Gazette, and the "nakaz," or list of "people's instructions," classified by subject and the branch of government which they concerned. At the final election meeting of the Peasants* Gazette there was literally more than 100 per cent attendance, since some of the staff who for reasons of absence or illness had not been listed as prospective voters returned from sanatoria or from distant assignments to vote. The instructions issued by the electorate in this manner — 1,400 from the Peasants' Gazette and tens of thousands from Moscow citizens — became the first business of the incoming government.

—Anna Louise Strong, The New Soviet Constitution (1937)

does this mean that the soviet project was some utopian perfect system? no. there were flaws in the system like any other. it disenfranchised the rural peasantry (although not, i would like to add, to any extent greater or even equivalent to the extent to which the US electoral system disenfranchises the urban working class) -- the various tiers of indirect selection created a divide between the average worker and the highest tier of the executive -- and various elements of this fledgling system would calcify and bureaucratise over time in ways that obstructed worker's democracy. but saying that it was 'a monarchy' is founded in absolutely nothing except the most hysterical anticommunist propaganda and tedious orwellian liberal truisms.

even brailsford, in an account overall critical of the soviet system, had to admit:

Speaking broadly, the various organs of the system, from the Council of Commissars of the Union down to the sub-committees of a town Soviet, are handling the same problems. Whether one sits in the Kremlin at a meeting of the most august body of the whole Union, the "C.I.K.," or round a table in Vladimir with the working men who constitute its County Executive Committee, one hears exactly the same problems discussed. How, be-fore June arrives, shall we manage to reduce prices by ten percent? What growth can we show in the number of our spindles, or factories, and in the number of workers employed? When and how shall we make our final assault on the last relics of illiteracy? Or when shall we have room in our schools, even in the remotest village, for every child? Was it by good luck or good guidance that the number of typhus cases has dropped in a year by half? And, finally, how can we hasten the raising of clover seed, so that the peasants who, at last, thanks to our propaganda, are clamoring for it, may not be disappointed?

—H.N. Brailsford, How The Soviets Work (1927)

genuinely, i think you should take a moment and think about where you learned about the soviet union. have you read any serious historical work on the topic, even from non-communist or anti-communist sources? because even imperialist propagandists have to make a pretence at engaging with actual facts on the ground, something which you haven't done at all -- and yet you speak with astounding confidence. i recommend you read some serious books instead of animal farm and reflect on why you believe the things you believe and how you know the things you think you know.

[aashiqeddiediaz]

you know, after watching day 3 of the democratic national convention, i need to say something, especially to other muslims like me.

most of the muslim communities that i'm a part of have chosen to vote uncommitted, or independent, or sometimes, even trump. they refuse to give their vote to kamala harris and tim walz, because of the way the us has handled the war in gaza, and how they have been careless with acknowledging palestinian lives lost, how it was american bombs and american tax money that went towards funding this genocide. it's fucked up, and it's wrong, and there shouldn't be any debate on that.

and i am 100% in support of that anger. i am 100% in support of forcing america to stop funding this genocide. no one wants to keep seeing palestinian lives suffer. no one is free until we're all free, and i believe that to my very core.

my only concern is that where this anger is being placed, from 1 year to 11 weeks before the presidential election, is so scary. because the reality of the situation is that america has a bipartisan outlook. whoever gets the presidency is either democrat or republican. and every vote that doesn't go towards democracy (i.e. voting for kamala harris) inadvertently goes towards trump's big plan of project 2025, which is basically dictatorship. Even voting uncommitted, even voting independent. we cannot afford to elect trump for a second term, and voting anything other than democrat draws that line way too close, especially in swing states like michigan, pennsylvania, wisconsin, georgia.

yes, there are many issues that we wish joe biden would handle better. there are many ways that the democratic party has fucked up beyond repair. there are many ways the democratic party has refused to acknowledge the pain of people affected by their military people throughout the years, and we've been seeing it for years. this is not a new thing. this did not start on october 7th. we see it during pretty much every administration.

however, voting for your candidate should never be based on a singular issue. no political candidate is ever going to check every single box. and its so unfortunate that we have to always take the "lesser of two evils" approach when nominating our president, but that's the reality of the situation at this very moment. there are many other rights to be considered that are at stake this election, all of which trump is trying to remove. abortion bans, women's rights, healthcare, social security, climate change, to name a few.

(and, somehow, there's a belief that trump will lead to a ceasefire deal where biden-harris didn't? let me tell you that is never going to happen.)

does this mean we just stop protesting or pressuring? absolutely not. you NEVER stop, because if our votes are the ones that put the candidate in their position of power, then we expect results. we expect them to work towards what they promised. and we can't let up on reaching out to our local county offices and our state governors and escalating these issues further until someone takes notice and does something about them. we don't elect them and just leave them to do what they want. we keep them accountable. use that anger i was talking about.

but it also means not having tunnel vision. the election in november could very well mean the end of democracy if kamala harris doesn't win. this post is not me all giggly-happy over the democratic party, because trust me, i have my fair share of issues with them as well. this post isn't to tell you what to do, because i can't force you to vote blue. i can't force the community i'm in to change their minds about toss-up votes. but what i can do is put down plainly what's at stake this election. and that is, very simply, our right to choose everything.

so if you are eligible to vote and haven't registered, please do. if you haven't voted before because "what's the point", please see above what the point is. a handful of votes is enough to flip the outcome of an election, especially with the electoral college.

and if you're still on the fence on whether to vote for kamala or trump, hopefully this post gives a little bit more perspective in the most streamlined way i could manage without bogging you down with statistics and numbers.

the choice is yours.

[vote-democrat-president-congress]

In Plain Sight, Republicans Are Still Trying to Undermine the Election

Some of the most important and alarming reporting during the 2024 election cycle has centered on what used to be one of the sleepiest and least divisive corners of election administration — the vote certification process. Specifically, the nationwide effort by Republicans to install state election officials who are prepared, if not motivated, to undermine and possibly block the certification of vote totals. If that were to happen in the right counties in the right states, it could tip the outcome of the entire election.

Republicans are not being secretive about this. According to an investigation by Rolling Stone, nearly 70 battleground-state election officials have openly “questioned the validity of elections or delayed or refused to certify results.”

Certification has long been a routine ministerial task, unencumbered by partisanship, as the investigation points out. Increasingly, though, that’s not the case in the Trump era, now that Republicans have reprogrammed themselves to believe that it is impossible for them to lose any election except by fraud.

The danger comes not only from isolated kooks who get their news from Rudy Giuliani news conferences. Last week in Georgia, the Republican-controlled state election board approved a measure that could unleash local election officials to do their own research and delay certifying vote counts (those that Trump doesn’t win outright, anyway).

Put aside for the moment that this new rule appears to be in conflict with longstanding Georgia law that requires certification in absence of a court challenge. The bigger problem here is in how we choose our president — via the Electoral College — and how much power that winner-take-all system gives a single state to influence the outcome of the entire election.

Americans experienced this firsthand in 2000, when the quirks of Florida’s ballot design allowed George W. Bush to win the whole state — and with it the White House — by a mere 537 votes. In 2016 and 2020, battleground states like Arizona and Georgia were decided by extraordinarily tight margins; as Trump’s threatening phone call to the Georgia secretary of state demonstrated, a swing of just a few thousand votes would have shifted all 16 of the state’s electoral votes from Joe Biden to him.

Thankfully, key election officials that year put their civic obligations above their partisan preferences, ensuring that the vote count in 2020 was reliable. Today, most local election officials and poll workers are still honest, hardworking citizens doing a thankless job. But as political rhetoric becomes more toxic and infused with partisanship, many of those workers are leaving or being driven out, replaced by single-minded people with a partisan agenda instead of a patriotic spirit.

None of this would be an issue under a national popular vote. Biden eked out his 2020 win in the Electoral College, but all together he won seven million more votes than Trump. A few dozen or hundred or even a few thousand well-placed votes would not have made any difference. In 2000, 2016 and 2020, of course, they made all the difference.

Jesse Wegman, NYTimes Editorial Board Member

[white-weasel]

Update on this, I ended up having to wait just over three and a half hours to cast a vote. A woman literally passed out in the line. I love the election process and potential voter suppression tactics

I forgot to bring my book and my headphones to the polling line, this sucks

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

A federal lawsuit filed Tuesday seeks the removal of a Confederate monument marked as “in appreciation of our faithful slaves” from outside of a North Carolina county courthouse.

The Concerned Citizens of Tyrrell County, a civic group focused on issues facing local Black residents, and several of its members filed the lawsuit against the county’s commissioners. The legal complaint argues that the monument constitutes racially discriminatory government speech in violation of the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.

Tyrrell County includes a few thousand residents in eastern North Carolina. The monument, which was erected on the courthouse grounds in 1902, features a Confederate soldier standing atop a pedestal, with one of the markings below mentioning “faithful slaves.” The lawsuit argues that the monument conveys a racist and offensive message that Black people who were enslaved in the county preferred slavery to freedom.

“The point of putting such a monument near the door of the Tyrrell County Courthouse was to remind Black people that the county’s institutions saw their rightful place as one of subservience and obedience, and to suggest to them that they could not and would not get justice in the courts,” the lawsuit argues.

The Associated Press contacted the Tyrrell County manager via email requesting a comment on the lawsuit.

North Carolina legislators enacted a law in 2015 that limits when an “object of remembrance” such as a military monument can be relocated. Still, the lawsuit says more than a dozen Confederate monuments have been taken down in North Carolina in the past five years, many due to votes by local officials.

Others were removed by force. In 2018, protesters tore down a Confederate statue known as “Silent Sam” at the University of North Carolina campus at Chapel Hill. Statues of soldiers from the North Carolina Confederate Monument on the old Capitol grounds in Raleigh came down in June 2020. Gov. Roy Cooper, citing public safety, directed that the remainder of the monument and two others on Capitol grounds be removed.

Confederate monuments in North Carolina, as elsewhere nationwide, were a frequent focal point for racial inequality protests in the late 2010s, and particularly in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.

The Concerned Citizens of Tyrrell County wrote that they have fought for the courthouse monument’s removal for years, from testifying at county commission meetings to advertising on billboards.

[virovac]

Sharing a message from a discord

in most states, Monday is the deadline to register to vote and to update your registration if you've moved or changed names. Please check your registration, because many were removed this year. You can do this within seconds on sites like http://vote.org/ (or a .gov one; it just takes a couple extra steps)

Every state has different rules about voting, and red states keep introducing all sorts of legislation that makes it difficult to keep track of, so please check in advance in case your state now requires a voter ID, your polling place has relocated, mail-in ballots have new requirements, etc. I recommend doing this ASAP, since some states require the registration to at least be mailed by Monday.

Most states will let you register and update your registration online in less than five minutes- if yours requires the registration to be mailed but you don't have a printer, it could be done at a library, school, or county office. Sites like http://vote.org/ will help you navigate all of this.

Early voting is a great option if you want to avoid lines, intimidation, and last-minute hurdles. I prefer it over voting by mail because it's faster and more reliable. If you mail a ballot, I recommend tracking it to make sure it was accepted, because you won't always be notified if there's an issue.

VoteRiders provides free transportation to everywhere involved in voting, and they'll pay any fees, including getting you a state ID. (They rely on volunteers and donations.)

Lastly, you can find virtual and in-person volunteer opportunities for blue campaigns across the country at http://mobilize.us/

[covid-safer-hotties]

Also preserved on our archive

By Julie Luchetta and Troy Oppie

Residents in the Southwest Idaho Health District will no longer be able to get vaccinated against COVID-19 at District Health offices.

The District’s Board of Health voted 4-3 Tuesday to remove the COVID-19 vaccines from its facilities after receiving around 300 public comments urging them to do so. The board vote followed anti-vaccine presentations from multiple doctors widely accused of spreading conspiracy theories and misinformation, including Idaho pathologist Dr. Ryan Cole.

Other presenters joined by teleconference, including Dr. Peter McCullough, a Texas-based cardiologist who had his medical certifications threatened by the American Board of Internal Medicine in 2022, pediatrician Dr. Renata Moon, who has sued Washington State University over free speech when the school did not renew her contract after an appearance before a 2022 U.S. Senate panel questioning vaccines, and Dr. James Thorp, an OB/GYN who was featured in the conspiracy-laden and widely debunked documentary 'Died Suddenly.'

They were invited to participate by the only physician on the Southwest District board of health, Dr. John Tribble. The board initially heard a presentation from a district staff physician, Dr. Perry Jansen, who recommended keeping the vaccine available through the health district offices.

"We really serve as a safety net provider for people who can't get health care in any other way, largely because of finances," Jansen told the board. "We're able to offer free and discounted services for people who don't have access through private care."

COVID-19 vaccines are no longer free, but public health departments can purchase them at a discount. Health insurance often covers the cost of the shots, but anyone paying out-of-pocket would pay less at their local health district clinic.

Many public comments received by the board expressed outrage at local tax dollars supporting COVID-19 vaccine distribution, but Jansen reminded the board that people who want the shots pay for them, either through insurance coverage or in cash, and the health district is not subsidizing the costs in any way.

Board chair Kelly Aberasturi questioned the authority of the board to remove vaccines for everyone, saying many going to the District for COVID vaccines are referred by their doctor.

“So now, you're telling me that I have the right to override that doctor? Because I know more than he does?” Aberasturi said.

"It has to do with the right of the individual to make that decision on their own. Not for me to dictate to them what they will do. Sorry, but this pisses me off," he added.

Tribble disagreed, saying the COVID vaccines had not been proven to be safe.

“They show up at the door, trusting us, and we continue to break that trust by saying, tacitly or otherwise, that these things, there's no risk from these.”

The CDC recommends everyone above the age of six months receive a COVID vaccine and acknowledges the potential risks.

Board member Jennifer Riebe said she didn’t agree with a lot of the CDC’s recommendations but didn't think it was the board’s role to make this kind of decision.

“My concern with this is the process because if this board and six county commissioners and one physician is going to make determinations on every single vaccine and pharmaceutical that we administer, I'm not comfortable with that," she said. "It may be COVID now, maybe we'll go down the same road with the measles vaccine or the shingles vaccine coverage.”

“I don't know why we as a health agency, as a public health agency, would want to give that or make it available when they can go other places,” said board member Viki Purdy.

Dr. David Pate, the former CEO of St. Luke's Health System who also served on the Governor's Coronavirus Task Force told Idaho Matters the decision would only serve as a financial barrier to those who wanted to get the vaccine.

"We've got tons of data now, and the fact that there is this group of physicians who is still able to promote scientific nonsense and scare people, and have a public health board of all people, fall for it, and vote in favor of vaccine disinformation is disheartening," he said.

The District serves Adams, Canyon, Gem, Owyhee, Payette and Washington counties. The organization had already received 50 doses of the vaccine at the time of the vote; they are still scheduled to go towards residents of a skilled nursing facility in Canyon County.

COVID vaccines are still available at other locations, like commercial pharmacies and healthcare clinics not affiliated with Southwest District Health.

[reasonsforhope]

"Two years ago, the biggest battles in state legislatures were over voting rights. Democrats loudly — and sometimes literally — protested as Republicans passed new voting restrictions in states like Georgia, Florida and Texas. This year, attention has shifted to other hot-button issues, but the fight over the franchise has continued. Republicans have enacted dozens of laws this year that will make it harder for some people to vote in future elections. 

But this year, voting-rights advocates got some significant wins too: States — controlled by Democrats and Republicans — have enacted more than twice as many laws expanding voting rights as restricting them, although the most comprehensive voter-protection laws passed in blue states. In all, 39 states and Washington, D.C., have changed their election laws in some way this year...

Where voting rights were expanded in 2023 (so far)

Unlike two years ago, though, we’d argue that the bigger story of this year’s legislative sessions was all the ways states made it easier to vote. As of July 21, according to the Voting Rights Lab, [which runs an excellent and completely comprehensive tracker of election-related bills], 834 bills had been introduced so far this year expanding voting rights, and 64 had been enacted. What’s more, these laws are passing in states of all hues.

Democratic-controlled jurisdictions (Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Maryland, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, Rhode Island and Washington) enacted 33 of these new laws containing voting-rights expansions, but Republican-controlled states (Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wyoming) were responsible for 23 of them. The remaining eight became law in states where the two parties share power (Nevada, Pennsylvania and Virginia).

That said, not all election laws are created equal, and the most comprehensive expansive laws passed in blue states. For example: 

New Mexico adopted a major voting-rights package that will automatically register New Mexicans to vote when they interact with the state’s Motor Vehicle Division, allow voters to request absentee ballots for all future elections without the need to reapply each time and restore the right to vote to felons who are on probation or parole. The law also allows Native Americans to register to vote and receive ballots at official tribal buildings and makes it easier for Native American officials to get polling places set up in pueblos and on tribal land.

Minnesota followed suit with a law also establishing automatic voter registration and a permanent absentee-voting list. The act allows 16- and 17-year-olds to preregister to vote too. Meanwhile, a separate new law also reenfranchises felons on probation or parole.

Michigan enacted eight laws implementing a constitutional amendment expanding voting rights that voters approved last year. Most notably, the laws guarantee at least nine days of in-person early voting and allow counties to offer as many as 29. The bills also allow voters to fix mistakes on their absentee-ballot envelopes so that their ballot can still count, track the status of their ballot online, and use student, military and tribal IDs as proof of identification. 

Connecticut became the sixth state to enact a state-level voting-rights act, which bars municipalities from discriminating against minority groups in voting, requires them to provide language assistance to certain language minority groups and requires municipalities with a record of voter discrimination to get preclearance before changing their election laws. The Nutmeg State also approved 14 days of early voting and put a constitutional amendment on the 2024 ballot that would legalize no-excuse absentee voting.

No matter its specific provisions, each of these election-law changes could impact how voters cast their ballots in future elections, including next year’s closely watched presidential race. There’s a good chance your state amended its election laws in some way this year, so make sure you double-check the latest rules in your state before the next time you vote."

-via FiveThirtyEight (via FutureCrunch), July 24, 2023

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

August 20, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Aug 21, 2024

At Chicago’s United Center today, the delegates at the Democratic National Convention reaffirmed last week’s online nomination of Kamala Harris for president. The ceremonial roll-call vote featured all the usual good natured boasting from the delegates about their own state’s virtues, a process that reinforces the incredible diversity and history of both this land and its people. The managers reserved the final slots for Minnesota and California—the home states of Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz and presidential candidate Kamala Harris, respectively—to put the ticket over the top. 

When the votes had been counted, Harris joined the crowd virtually from a rally she and Walz were holding at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Last month the Republicans held their own national convention in that venue, and for Harris to accept her nomination in the same place was an acknowledgement of how important Wisconsin will be in this election. But it also meant that Trump, who is obsessed with crowd sizes, would have to see not one but two packed sports arenas of supporters cheer wildly for her nomination. 

He also had to contend with former loyalists and supporters joining the Democratic convention. His former press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, told the Democratic convention tonight that when the cameras are off, “Trump mocks his supporters. He calls them basement dwellers.” Grisham endorsed Harris, saying: “I love my country more than my party. Kamala Harris tells the truth. She respects the American people and she has my vote.”

Trump spoke glumly to a small crowd today at the Livingston County Sheriff’s Office in Howell, Michigan. 

It was almost exactly twenty years ago, on July 27, 2004, that 43-year-old Illinois state senator Barack Obama, who was, at the time, running for a seat in the U.S. Senate, gave the keynote address to that year’s Democratic National Convention. It was the speech that began his rise to the presidency.

Like the Democrats who spoke last night, Obama talked in 2004 of his childhood and recalled how his parents had “faith in the possibilities of this nation.” And like Biden last night, Obama said that “in no other country on earth, is my story even possible.” The nation’s promise, he said, came from the human equality promised in the Declaration of Independence.

“That is the true genius of America,” Obama said, “a faith in the simple dreams of its people, the insistence on small miracles.” He called for an America “where hard work is rewarded.” “[I]t's not enough for just some of us to prosper,” he said, “[f]or alongside our famous individualism, there's another ingredient in the American saga.”

He described that ingredient as “[a]belief that we are connected as one people. If there's a child on the south side of Chicago who can't read, that matters to me, even if it's not my child. If there's a senior citizen somewhere who can't pay for her prescription and has to choose between medicine and the rent, that makes my life poorer, even if it's not my grandmother. If there's an Arab American family being rounded up without benefit of an attorney or due process, that threatens my civil liberties. It's that fundamental belief—I am my brother's keeper, I am my sister's keeper—that makes this country work. It's what allows us to pursue our individual dreams, yet still come together as a single American family. ‘E pluribus unum.’ Out of many, one.”

Obama emphasized Americans’ shared values and pushed back against “those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters and negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes.” He reached back into history to prove that “the bedrock of this nation” is “the belief that there are better days ahead.” He called that belief “[t]he audacity of hope.”

Almost exactly twenty years after his 2004 speech, the same man, now a former president who served for eight years, spoke at tonight’s Democratic National Convention. But the past two decades have challenged his vision.

When voters put Obama into the White House in 2008, Republicans set out to make sure they couldn’t govern. Mitch McConnell (R–KY) became Senate minority leader in 2007 and, using the filibuster, stopped most Democratic measures by requiring 60 votes to move anything to a vote. 

In 2010 the Supreme Court handed down the Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission decision, declaring that corporations and other outside groups could spend as much money as they wanted on elections. Citizens United increased Republican seats in legislative bodies, and in the 2010 midterm elections, Republicans packed state legislatures with their own candidates in time to be in charge of redistricting their states after the 2010 census.  Republicans controlled the key states of Florida, Wisconsin, North Carolina, Ohio, and Michigan, as well as other, smaller states, and after the election, they used precise computer models to win previously Democratic House seats.

In the 2012 election, Democrats won the White House decisively, the Senate easily, and a majority of 1.4 million votes for House candidates. Yet Republicans came away with a thirty-three-seat majority in the House of Representatives. And then, with the 2013 Shelby County v. Holder decision, the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act, making it harder to protect Democratic voters.

As the Republicans skewed the mechanics of government to favor themselves, their candidates no longer had to worry they would lose general elections but did have to worry about losing primaries to more extreme challengers. So they swung farther and farther to the right, demonizing the Democrats until finally those who remain Republicans have given up on democracy altogether. 

Tonight’s speech echoed that of 2004 by saying that America’s “central story” is that “we are all created equal,” and describing Harris and Walz as hardworking people who would use the government to create a fair system. He sounded more concerned today than in 2004 about political divisions, and reminded the crowd: “The vast majority of us do not want to live in a country that’s bitter and divided,” he said. “We want something better. We want to be better. And the joy and the excitement that we’re seeing around this campaign tells us we’re not alone,” he said. 

And then, in his praise for his grandmother, “a little old white lady born in a tiny town called Peru, Kansas,” and his mother-in-law, Marion Robinson, a Black woman from the South Side of Chicago, he brought a new emphasis on ordinary Americans, especially women, who work hard, sacrifice for their children, and value honesty, integrity, kindness, helping others, and hard work. 

They wanted their children to “do things and go places that they would’ve never imagined for themselves.” “Whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican or somewhere in between,” he said, “we have all had people like that in our lives:... good hardworking people who weren’t famous or powerful but who managed in countless ways to leave this country just a little bit better than they found it.” 

If President Obama emphasized tonight that the nation depends on the good will of ordinary people, it was his wife, former first lady Michelle Obama, who spoke with the voice of those people and made it clear that only the American people can preserve democracy.  

In a truly extraordinary speech, perfectly delivered, Mrs. Obama described her mother as someone who lived out the idea of hope for a better future, working for children and the community. “She was glad to do the thankless, unglamorous work that for generations has strengthened the fabric of this nation,” Mrs. Obama said, “the belief that if you do unto others, if you love thy neighbor, if you work and scrape and sacrifice, it will pay off. If not for you, then maybe for your children or your grandchildren.”

Unlike her husband, though, Mrs. Obama called out Trump and his allies, who are trying to destroy that worldview. “No one has a monopoly on what it means to be an American,” she said. “No one.” “[M]ost of us will never be afforded the grace of failing forward,” she said. “We will never benefit from the affirmative action of generational wealth. If we bankrupt a business…or choke in a crisis, we don't get a second, third, or fourth chance. If things don't go our way, we don't have the luxury of whining or cheating others to get further ahead…we don't get to change the rules so we always win. If we see a mountain in front of us, we don’t expect there to be an escalator waiting to take us to the top. No, we put our heads down. We get to work. In America, we do something."

And then Mrs. Obama took up the mantle of her mother, warning that demonizing others and taking away their rights, “only makes us small.” It “demeans and cheapens our politics. It only serves to further discourage good, big-hearted people from wanting to get involved at all. America, our parents taught us better than that.” 

It is “up to us to be the solution that we seek.” she said. She urged people to “be the antidote to the darkness and division.” “[W]hether you’re Democrat, Republican, Independent, or none of the above,” she said, “this is our time to stand up for what we know. In our hearts is right. Not just for our basic freedoms, but for decency and humanity, for basic respect. Dignity and empathy. For the values at the very foundation of this democracy.”

“Don’t just sit around and complain. Do something.”

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[ineedhjalp]

intro!!

hi!!!!!!!!!

I’m INeedHjalp, but you can call me Adele or Hjalp.

I’m a 22 year old currently finishing up my Master’s in Elizabethan literature. I graduated from Middlebury College in Vermont on a partial scholarship and am working through a TON of student debt. I’m from Colorado, in El Paso County. I’m trying to become a screen actor but right now I’m working at a local ice cream place.

My favorite things are Shakespeare (particularly M*cbeth), Hozier, Columbo, and my current hyperfixation, Dead Boy Detectives. (FUCK YOU NETFLIX!!!!!!)

Depending on when it crosses my dash, I also reboot stuff from NBC Hannibal, Good Omens, Doctor Who, or some of my old fandoms like Magnus Chase or Night At the Museum.

I’m queer! I’m some flavor of bisexual and biromantic, but I’m also on the aroace spectrum. (I might be demi, I think?) I’m also on the nonbinary spectrum (I’m a guy. But I’m also a girl. It’s complicated).

My preferred pronouns are she/her, though I’m fine with anything, really.

Some of my LOVELY mutuals are @flowers-of-anise, @a-chaotic-business, @gayoticbeing, @homoquartz, @judeisunsure, @ineffablefood, @understand-some-thing-some-time, @that-one-greml1n, @lunarsolar1, and, of course, @andiv3r. (I’m forgetting SO MANY PEOPLE. If you are a moot and see this post and you aren’t included, PLEASE reach out. I’m quite forgetful.

I have undiagnosed ADHD. I would go to the doctor, but Money.

My tags:

#ineedhjalp — my tag for posts I make myself.

#hjalp lives — personal posts

#hjalp writes — my fics (check out my new dbda multichap!

#hjalp draws — nothing on here yet!!!!! I do do art though.

#hjalp answers — my asks! PLEASE ask me things!!

I do a LOT or reblogging. A LOT. You have been warned. It’s 99% reblogs on this blog, folks.

As of this moment, I have 2,823 Dead Boy Detectives photos saved to my camera roll.

I support queer people and their rights. I support intersex people and their rights. I support disabled & chronically ill people and their rights. I support women’s rights.

I DO NOT condone Neil Gaiman’s disgusting behavior. He’s dead to me.

I do not condone racism or sexism of any kind.

I don’t get the hate towards furries and therians. While I’m not one myself, bullying is never ok and people should just live their lives.

Trans women are women and trans men are men. Fuck the TERFs!

I will be voting for Kamala Harris in November. KEEP TRUMP AND THE CONSERVATIVES OUT OF OFFICE!!!!!!

FREE PALESTINE!!!! 🇵🇸