Truth.

The two major political parties have pulled off a masterful long con and the victims are the citizens of the nation.  I am not a conspiracy theorist.  I do not believe this was laid out ahead of time, only that the chips fell as they did and to the victors go the spoils.

On one hand, the parties are as different as night and day.  People who make the claim that it doesn’t matter which party wins control are looking at the situation half blinded.  A GOP win in the 2016 presidential race may very well spell the end of Roe V. Wade, to name just one case that the party naming the next member of the Supreme Court could decide.  Glancing though the legislation passed at the state level by GOP controlled governments shows a terrifying possible future for our nation.  I honestly can not even comprehend the damage the GOP could do with the presidency and a filibuster proof majority.  Forget about any response to climate change.  National voter id, anyone?  Goodbye Affordable Care Act.  See ya later, taxes on rich people and corporations.  Hello, war.

So yes, I vote.  Not only do I vote, but I encourage others to vote.  I work on campaigns.  I volunteer.  I write about issues and fight to get the most progressive candidates as possible elected.

But on the other hand, those people who say it doesn’t matter which side wins?  They have a point.  With the influence of big money in politics, with corporations being people, with lobbyists controlling Washington, we only have as much control over our nation as they decide to give us.

And I don’t mean in a good way, like in a “Bill of Rights protects the minority from the tyranny of the majority” way.  I mean in a “the government will deal with our concerns only after taking the concerns of the monied interests into consideration” way.

I am a strange type of progressive.  I do not find democracy to be the obvious best form of government.  The ignorance of vast amounts of the electorate just causes me to pause and think, sometimes much too much.  Don’t get me wrong, I support democracy, representative democracy to be specific, for lack of a better option.  (Not too many “benevolent dictators” that I would trust laying around.)

That being said, is there anyone who would contest the fact that our representative democracy is currently broken?  That for a large portion of the “issues,” both parties take the exact same stance, giving the electorate zero choice?  That our elected officials think nothing of lying to the voter’s face during the campaign, yet shudder at the idea of crossing special interest groups?  Honestly, what were progressive’s options in 2012, after 4 years of us watching Obama break campaign promises and continue W. Bush’s tactic of gobbling up power for the Executive branch?  Vote for Romney?  Vote for a third party candidate with no chance of winning and in effect, vote for Romney by not voting for Obama?  What kind of a system is it when I have to hold my nose to vote for a candidate that I volunteered for in both elections?

And people wonder why young people don’t show up.

This mid term in Pennsylvania was of great interest to many Pennsylvanians due to the Governor’s race.  Watching “the worst Governor in America not named Brownbeck” go down in flaming defeat and earning his place in history as the only Pennsylvanian Governor to lose reelection in modern history was delicious, but for some of us, myself included, my vote was much less a vote for Wolf and more a vote against Corbett.  To draw inspiration from a quote by Churchill, if Satan would have been running against Corbett, I would have at least researched his views on the issues.  Other than the Governor’s race, let’s look at my other choices Tuesday.

I live in Blair County, which Corbett won 17.2k to 12.5k.  My rep to the US House was up of course, but the only campaign that mattered was the primary.  Bill Shuster defeated the Democratic challenger, Alanna Hartzok by over 10k votes, 19.8k to 9.7k.  My state Senator, a Republican, ran unopposed.  He won.  The race for the state House in the 79th district was similarly one sided, as the Republican was unopposed.  In the 80th district, my district, I had a choice.  A choice between the Republican and an independent candidate running to her right.

Looking at Wolf’s winning margin in the Governor’s race, every single Democrat in Blair county could have decided not to vote and the results of the election would have been exactly the fucking same.  Any wonder young people don’t show up?

I don’t know the answer, although I have some ideas.  (The end to single member districts maybe?  How about representation based on percentage of the vote instead of winner take all?)  But I do know that this system is broken.  The people it benefits are the very people who would have to change it.

Good luck with that.

 

Well Tom, I’d Say It Has Been Fun, But We’d Both Know I Was Lying. (Like You Did. All Campaign Long.)

“Esteemed” Pennsylvanian Governor Tom Corbett became the first Pennsylvanian Governor in modern history to lose his bid for re-election yesterday.

……

……

Ya know, typing that sentence felt so damn good that I refuse to ruin my mood by talking about the rest of the expected, yet still insane, results of this mid-term election.  (Brownbeck?  Again?  Really Kansas?)  So instead, I will just wish I lived in Oregon or Alaska, where I would be well on my way to legally being able to smoke a celebratory joint.  (I’d add Washington, D.C. in as well, but we all know citizens of D.C. don’t have actual rights like the rest of us and are only counting the days until the federal government tells them that it doesn’t matter what they voted for, Congress knows best.)  (Which may be the most frightening possible statement with the make up of the incoming Congress.)

So get off of my cloud.  I’ll be back tomorrow to deal with the hangover.

(Hangover preview?  The head of the committee on the Environment is going to be possibly the most strident climate change denialist in Congress.  Happy days.)

Gov. Tom Corbett Risks 4th Degree Burns by Refusing to Remove His Pants, Which Happen to be on Fire.

Any other cycle, the current race for Governor in my home state of Pennsylvania would be, for all intents and purposes, over.  The esteemed Governor of Pennsylvania, Tom Corbett, has been laughably bad during his term in office.  He has drastically cut education.  He imitated several other GOP governors by refusing to allowing PA to take part in the Medicaid expansion, but made the issue his own by essentially calling children, pregnant women, and breast cancer patients who receive Medicaid moochers.  He’s a Republican, so of course he attacked abortion access.  He resisted the crowd on a different issue, resisting charging natural gas companies any extraction taxes, instead going with an “impact fee” that makes PA the most industry friendly state when it comes to fracking.  (Corbett’s stated reasoning, that a fee means that all wells have to pay something, while an extraction tax only collects from wells that are actually producing, may make sense at times.  When it doesn’t make sense is when the region is experiencing a fracking driven boom, with companies extracting huge amounts of natural gas while making huge profits and doing unknown amounts of harm to the environment.)  While standing strong against raising taxes on the rich and corporations, he signed a transportation bill that is sending the gas tax skyward, which of course affects the middle and lower classes far more than the rich.  (Note: I know the Democratic candidate for Lt. Gov also supported this transportation bill.  I am not saying that gas taxes are an unacceptable way of generating tax revenue.  My issue and point is Corbett’s support of the bill in context with his other actions. It makes a difference.)  Now while the preceding points can all be argued as partisan critiques, the rest of what makes Tom Corbett possibly the worst Governor in America not names Brownbeck are not.  They are matters of fact.  Of failure filled fact.  Of horrible, horrible failure.  He failed at privatizing the state run liquor stores.  (For those of you not from PA who are now thinking “WTF?,” Pennsylvania owns and operates all liquor stores in the state.  Yep, a state run monopoly for drug dealing.)  He failed at fixing the state pension crisis.  And perhaps most embarrassingly, his signature policy, an attempt to privatize the state lottery by outsourcing it to a foreign company, went down in a flaming ball of failure.  Actually, the only good thing I can say about Tom Corbett is that he is not Sam Brownbeck.

So why isn’t it over?  Why do I have a nagging worry about this one?

Because it is a midterm election with a sitting Democratic President.  Midterms are always a bit iffy for the left, as Democratic turn out is notoriously horrible in non-Presidential election years.  Historically, midterms also favor the opposition party, which is another plus in the GOP’s column.  While nothing is certain til the votes are counted, especially with voter suppression tactics in full force, it is increasingly appearing that the GOP will take control of the Senate by a small margin.  (The House is a lost cause for Dems until the next census and redistricting.  Yeah, the GOP gerrymandered itself one chamber of Congress for a decade.)  While there are quite a few races that are nail-bitingly close this close to E-day, the political climate and fear-mongering over ISIS and Ebola could keep some GOP incumbents is offices they no longer deserve.  Hell, look at Kansas.  The Governor’s race there is effectively tied, and chances are decent that Sam Brownbeck will be rewarded for turning his state into a science fair project examining the damage unrestricted “Voodoo economics” can do to all sections of a state with another term in office for him to insist you just need to give it more time.

So yeah, even though Democratic challenger Tom Wolf is maintaining a significant lead in the polls, breaking the 50% barrier in several, you must forgive me if I worry until the final nail is driven in the coffin of Corbett’s term as Governor.

Still, even as a constantly concerned pessimist, I have to admit the ads coming out of Corbett’s campaign are starting to smell of desperation.  Shall we pay a visit to factcheck.org?

We’ve noticed that the most deceitful attack ads often come from candidates who are most desperate. For example, consider the claim by Pennsylvania’s unpopular Republican Gov. Tom Corbett that his opponent “is promising to raise middle-class taxes,” when in fact Democratic nominee Tom Wolf promises to cut them.

FactCheck then airs the amusingly (if not intended to deceive Pennsylvanian voters) factually challenged ads.  I’ll pass, but feel free to visit them and watch away.  I’ll wait.

….

it is Corbett who’s being dishonest here. He knows exactly what Wolf is proposing, because he was standing only a few feet away from him during an Oct. 8 debate in which Wolf sketched out his plan.

Wolf said (starting at about 23 minutes into the recording): “If you are in the seventy to ninety thousand dollar range as an individual — and you can double that if you are married — you should not pay any more in taxes. And people making below that will get a break. That’s my goal.”

And that is consistent with what Wolf has been saying as far back as February, when he released a “Fresh Start” campaign white paper that included a promise of a “progressive income tax” that “will result in every middle-class family receiving a tax cut.” But the initial plan didn’t define “middle class” or give an income level.

In later interviews, including a July 25 session with Associated Press reporters and editors, Wolf specified that the “middle-class” cutoff would come somewhere between $70,000 and $90,000 in annual income. Later, his campaign said that would be just for single taxpayers, and the income level would be double that for married couples filing jointly. In the Oct. 8 debate, Wolf confirmed the $140,000-$180,000 range as the likely cutoff for couples.

By way of background, Pennsylvania currently imposes a flat 3.07 percent income tax on all taxable income, allowing for a hodgepodge of deductions but with no standard exemption or exclusion. Wolf says he would institute a universal exclusion, exempting all income below a certain level from any income tax. And he would increase the percentage tax rate on income above that level.

So sure, Wolf is going to raise taxes on the middle class.  As long as those members of the middle class are earning more than 90k or so as an individual, or 180k or so as a couple.  Now I understand that you can never have enough money, and I get it that those income figures don’t make someone wealthy, but you know, I know, and my dog knows what Corbett is implying when he says “middle class tax increase.”

Even if Wolf provides a tax break only to those at the lower end of the income ranges he has mentioned, many more people would see an income tax cut than would see an increase. We know this because the most recent figures from the U.S. Census Bureau show that two-thirds of all households in Pennsylvania reported income of less than $75,000 last year, and all of those would see income taxes reduced or eliminated if Wolf sets his cut-off at that level, which is on the low side of the $70,000-$90,000 range for individuals.

Even fewer taxpayers would see an increase if Wolf eventually were to set the cut-off at closer to $90,000.

Looking only at married-couple families in Pennsylvania, Census reports that 16.5 percent had income of $150,000 or more, which is also at the lower end of Wolf’s $140,000 to $180,000 range for couples filing jointly. And yet, Corbett’s ads keep calling the Wolf proposal a tax increase on middle-class taxpayers, rather than the tax cut he promises for most.

We freely concede that some Pennsylvanians who think of themselves as “middle class” have incomes higher than the levels described by Wolf, and they would see their taxes go up. A USA Today/Gallup Poll found in 2012 that only 2 percent of Americans considered themselves to be “upper class” and only 10 percent identified themselves as “lower class.” The rest described themselves as “middle class” (42 percent), “upper middle class” (13 percent) or “working class” (31 percent).

Both candidates are exploiting the tendency of egalitarian Americans to think of themselves as in the “middle” no matter how high or low their actual incomes. So Wolf’s promise of an income tax cut for “every” middle-class family is true only for those who accept his particular income definition of “middle class.” But Corbett’s ads strive to give the impression that Wolf is proposing an income tax increase for everybody who considers himself “middle class.” And that’s not the case.

Keep fucking that chicken, Tom.  I’ll be calling ya on every thrust til E-Day.

Let’s Play a Round of “Offensive Analogies” with Special Guest, PA Gov. Tom Corbett!

While Pennsylvania reliably turns blue during Presidential elections, the vast swaths of Pennsyltucky that make up the center of the state transform us in off year elections, making us anything from a swing state to a clone of Alabama, depending on how much of the electorate decided voting in an election without a Presidential choice isn’t sexy or worth their time.  Since conservatives relish every opportunity to vote, a trait I so wish more people left of center would develop, a minority of registered voters becomes a majority of people who bothered showing up, leading to results such as the infamous Senator Rick Santorum, and our current political embarrassment, Governor Tom Corbett.

For those of you who are unaware, Pennsylvania’s ban on same sex marriage is currently being challenged in the courts.  Good ole Corbett is defending the law since it is such a pressing state interest to discriminate against those evil homosexuals, and in court filings Corbett’s lawyers compared gay marriage to marrying children, as you do, since both actions are against the law in the state.

Just a quick time out…  What is it with bigots and their absolute refusal to understand the concept of consent?  Practically every argument against marriage equality includes some form of slippery slop or reduction to the absurd where allowing gay marriage results in people marrying their hamster, pedophiles marrying their neighbors 6 year old daughter, and the creepy guy who you never see during the day marrying 7 corpses he dug up from the local graveyard last night.  At least he stays busy, am I right?

Marriage equality simply allows consenting adults the right to enter into the legally binding contract that is named “marriage,” and benefit from the legal privileges such as hospital visitation, inheritance, spousal inclusion on health insurance, and many others.  See that?  Two consenting adults.  I can’t hit Steve over the head with a brick, drag him to the justice of the peace and force him to gay marry me just because it is legal.  CONSENT!  Children can not consent.  Non-human animals can not consent.  Fresh corpses can not consent.

No matter what form this argument takes, it is always a logical fallacy of some sort.  Makes you realize how little the opponents of marriage equality have when they keep returning to the same debunked talking points, doesn’t it?  Okay, back to the main story….

People saw this comparison and when presented with the opportunity, decided to ask our noble Governor about it.  From the HuffPo:

Corbett was on WHP-TV in Harrisburg when an anchor asked about a statement his lawyers made in a recent court filing, comparing the marriage of gay couples to the marriage of children because neither can legally wed in the state.

“It was an inappropriate analogy, you know,” Corbett said. “I think a much better analogy would have been brother and sister, don’t you?”

I will pause a moment for you to realize what a fine example of humanity us Pennsylvanians are blessed to have as our Governor.

…..

…..

The bigot just compared homosexual relationships to sibling incest.

The bigot just corrected one offensive analogy with a equally offensive analogy.  And he probably thought he was scoring political points when he said it, and the sad thing is, if the moderates and the left stays home next year like usual, this bigotry could actually help him get reelected.

Anyway, in honor of Gov. Tom Corbett, Pennsylvania’s embarrassment and a perfect example of a politician squeezing all the political points he can out of bigotry and hate before the demographic shift forces the GOP to find a new strategy or cease being relevant, I give you a few other “inappropriate analogies.”

Having Tom Corbett as your Governor is a lot like having Jerry Sandusky as your child’s football coach.

Voting for Tom Corbett for Governor is like fucking your sibling.  You have to be black out drunk to do it, the whole time it is happening you keep asking yourself “Why am I doing this?” the very idea makes you want to throw up, and when it is over you hate yourself for doing it, make a deal never to admit that it happened, and try to blot the memory out of your mind.

Attending a fund raiser for Tom Corbett is a lot like attending a Klan rally.  At least the Klan lets you stay anonymous.

Voting for Tom Corbett for Governor and expecting him to be an elected official who puts the good of the State and its people ahead of partisan squabbles, his own career ambitions, and his rich white man bigotry is kind of like going to a sleazy adult bookstore, heading back to the viewing booths, sticking your penis in a glory hole and expecting a woman to be on the other side.

Gov. Tom Corbett is like Rick Santorum and Todd Akin.  Bigots who will hopefully be irrelevant soon.

Tom Corbett is like George Wallace.  ‘Nuff said.

I know.  Those are all inappropriate.  I am very sorry.

No Health Insurance, But At Least I Still Have My Dignity

I am not a happy Foster this morning.  I am, however, apparently still a Foster with his dignity.

According to the Altoona Mirror, Gov. Tom Corbett (R- Pennsyltucky) has decided that Pennsylvania will not be taking part in the upcoming expansion of Medicaid.

…Gov. Tom Corbett has misgivings about the Medicaid program. In his budget address Tuesday, he said he wouldn’t expand it here, as the federal government has invited states to do, until there are program reforms and clarifications.

Am I shocked?  Of course not.  As a single male member of the working poor, I’ve been following this issue pretty closely, since it directly affects me.  My income puts me over the medicaid limit currently, yet under the expanded medicaid program I would be eligible.  While I was hopeful that Gov. Corbett would approve the expansion, since he has been pretty indecisive about it up until now, he is a member of the GOP and is as conservative as he can get away with in PA.  (For example, Voter ID.)

So Corbett’s decision did not come as a great surprise.  In fact, it actually left me kind of hopeful, since he didn’t come right out and say that PA would not be taking part in the expansion, period.  He left the door open at least.  As little as I can stand Corbett, he is not actually the cause of Foster’s bad morning.

Who is, you may ask?  Let’s take a closer look at the above linked article (Bolding is mine as always):

To illustrate his opposition to an expansion of Medicaid in Pennsylvania, Dr. Zane Gates – founder of two free clinics in the region that help the working poor – told a story from his childhood.

He was shopping at the A&P in Eldorado, near Evergreen Manors housing project where he grew up, when he saw a classmate.

Instead of checking out, Gates walked around the store until the classmate left, before handing over his food stamps for groceries.

Modern Medicaid is like food stamps because it generates embarrassment – “it takes a lot of people’s dignity away” – largely because the program’s low reimbursements cause providers to refuse service to cardholders, Gates said this week.

Thank you, Dr. Gates.  Thank you for caring so much about my dignity.

And fuck off.

Yes, Dr. Gates.  Some places do not accept medicaid because of the low reimbursements.  But some places do.

Do you know what hurts my dignity, Dr. Gates?  Having 8 teeth, and not being able to get them out so I can get dentures because I don’t have 2000$.  If I had medicaid, perhaps I couldn’t go to my preferred provider.  But I could go somewhere, and I wouldn’t have had to learn to hold my jaw just right so no one can tell how bad my teeth are.  Hell, perhaps I could even smile.  Now that I think of it, smiling is a bit undignified.  Looking out for me again, Dr. Gates.

What else hurts my dignity?  How about not having an annual check-up for the last 15 years?  Or are physicals undignified?

Not going to the doctor when I am sick.  Sure helps my dignity.  Or spending a large fraction of my paycheck, which I don’t have to spare, on the doctor when I have no choice.

Of course, maybe I am lucky enough to have access to a free clinic, like the ones you operate.  Lucky me!  Free clinics are oh so dignified.  Of course, I still have to pay for my prescription.   Almost forgot about that!  If covered by medicaid, my script would cost a 1 to 3 dollar co-pay.  Much more dignified for me to stand at the pharmacy counter asking what each prescription costs, counting my money, trying to figure out which ones I can do without.

Some people live in the real world:

Program advocates said it’s crazy to refuse the invitation, which includes a federal promise to pay – temporarily – almost all the costs of expanding enrollment from 100 percent of federal poverty to 133 percent.

“It’s a tragedy if the state doesn’t,” said Dr. Deborah Baceski, who runs a free medical clinic in Somerset.

“It would truly be an act of fiscal malpractice for the governor to reject Medicaid expansion,” said Ron Pollack, executive director of Families USA, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group.

….

“It’s a no-brainer,” he said.

….

Medicaid is imperfect, but it isn’t the dignity-robbing program Gates imagines, according to Pollack.

Surveys of Medicaid recipients in recent years – including a Harvard researcher’s study of Oregon residents – show the program “makes a huge difference in giving people true access to care,” Pollack said.

It also has a high satisfaction rating, he said.

“Things have changed,” Pollack said, referring to Gates’ experience with the food stamp program decades ago.

But FREE CLINICS!!!!!

Gates believes that a reasonable alternative to Medicaid expansion is expansion of the free clinic model he pioneered with Buffalo insurance broker Patrick Reilly.

Corbett’s budget includes $5 million for clinics – including some for hospitals to reproduce the Gates-Reilly model.

But REALITY!!!!

Pollack thinks that’s wishful thinking.

Clinics do good work, but they can only be “a drop in the bucket” compared to the comprehensive reach of Medicaid, said.

Free clinics like the ones Dr. Gates has opened are great.  They do good things.  But they are not medicaid.  They are not health insurance.

So fuck Dr. Gates.  And fuck my dignity while we’re at it.

I rather have Medicaid.

 

Who Cares If the Law Got Put on Hold? The GOP Got What They Wanted

If you’ve been following the issue or reading this blog, you know that Pennsylvania’s new Voter ID law, the strictest such law in the nation, will not be in effect for this years election cycle.  The Republican run state government rammed the law through the legislature, and made no effort to hide the political intent behind Voter ID.  As independent analysts examined the amount of citizens the law could potentially disenfranchise, they urged the government to slow down, to roll the law out over time so that all eligible voters who wanted one could get the required ID.  Gov. Corbett ignored them and instead rolled out a multimillion dollar ad blitz telling PA residents they would need an ID to vote this year, even though the law was being challenged in the court system.  Disenfranchising voters wasn’t a bug; it was a feature.

When the law was eventually put on hold for this years election, many saw this as a victory for voter’s rights advocates and a defeat for the state GOP.

The courts ruling was neither.

Sure, the law won’t be in effect for this years election.  People who do not have the required ID will still be permitted to vote.  Yay.

But the law is still on the books.  It was not struck down, only placed on pause.  But the larger problem is the damage that has already been done.  As I said, the state ran a multimillion dollar ad blitz earlier in the year telling people they needed to show ID to vote this year.  And that information was also on the state voter information hotline as well as every government website dealing with elections.  When the court ruled the law couldn’t be enforced for this years election cycle, there was no multimillion dollar ad blitz informing PA residents of that fact.  The “Show It” television commercials are still running, with a minor change in wording that states “you will be asked for but not required to provide” ID to vote.  After the court ruling, the voter information hotline continued telling callers they needed ID to vote until a staffer at The Rachael Maddow Show called and complained.  As far as I know all the local election board webpages are now updated with the correct information, but they took their own sweet time making the changes.  As I reported recently, at least one newspaper run by Trib Total Media has published articles claiming you still need to show ID to vote.

Sure, people without ID will not be legally prevented from voting this election cycle.  But with the information out there, how many will stay home on election day believing they need an ID to vote?

Add this one to that list of conflicting information.  From ThinkProgress:

The latest misleading claim comes from CBS Pittburgh radio station KDKA, which is running an ad claiming that voters will need photo identification to go to the polls on November 6th, despite the fact that while voters may be asked to show ID, it is not required to vote. The ad aired on October 26, around 7:30 am immediately after a weather report for the Pittsburgh area. “The Voter ID law was just recently signed by the governor,” an unidentified woman in the ad says:

NARRATOR: When you need to vote–

WOMAN: The voter ID law was just recently signed by the governor.

NARRATOR: You need to know –

WOMAN: You’re not going to be allowed to vote unless you present an acceptable photo identification. Get to a PennDOT licensing center and get a photo ID at the drivers’ license center.

NARRATOR: It’s your right, it’s your duty, it’s your choice –

WOMAN: And you will need an acceptable ID in order for you to vote.

Click on through to ThinkProgress if you want to listen to the ad yourself.  Continuing:

The ad is particularly confounding because KDKA itself has reported on the recentdecisions regarding the voter ID law.

But it also follows a trend of misleading information in the state — like billboards and television ads, as well as reports from local governments — that has become so rampant voting rights’ groups have asked a court to step in to stop the wrong information from spreading.

So proud to be a Pennsylvanian right now.

 

 

Speaking of Voter Suppression

Remember a couple of weeks ago when a Pennsylvania Judge ruled that the new Voter ID law in PA wouldn’t be in effect for the 2012 election cycle?  Me neither!*  And neither does Trib Total Media or their one newspaper, the Mount Pleasant Journal.  First a little background information on the movers and shakers of this story, courtesy of ThinkProgress:

The Mount Pleasant Journal is one of several newspapers run by Trib Total Media, a media conglomerate owned by billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife. Scaife’s foundation donated hundreds of millions of dollars to conservative organizations ranging from the American Enterprise Institution to the Federalist Society, and he currently serves as vice-chairman of the right-wing Heritage Foundation’s board of trustees.

Now ones political views do not remove your ability to publish an unbiased newspaper.  Not every piece of media put out by conservative run companies is destined to lean to the right, but I have first hand experience with Trib Total Media since I read Pittsburgh area newspapers, and it isn’t a secret that the Pittsburgh Tribune Review is basically a print version of Fox News.  You know, “fair” and “balanced”.  *winkwink*  In fact, it is such a known fact that the Tribune Review paid for a television ad campaign  to try and convince people that while their editorials and opinion pages heavily leaned to the right, their actual news department was unbiased.  (Objective News/ Conservative Views or something similar was their tagline.  If anyone can find the ad online, please link it for me.  It used to air during every damn Pirates game.)

And the common knowledge understanding of the Trib’s political leaning causes me to have a really hard time believing this is an honest mistake:

That was from the Mount Pleasant Journal.  Once again from ThinkProgress:

Last Thursday, at least one of Scaife’s newspapers printed an inaccurate story headlined “Photo ID required for November election,” when, in reality, a court order suspended the requirement that Pennsylvania voters show an ID or lose their right to vote.

…

the claim that voters will need to show ID in order to vote, as well as the claim that voters who do not show ID will be forced to cast a provisional ballot and then show ID later, are entirely false. The state of Pennsylvania is currently bound by a court order which permits voters without ID to cast normal ballots, not provisional ballots, and to have those ballots counted just like any other. Voters will still be asked to show ID at the polls, but may not be turned away or given a provisional ballot because they do not show it.

The Republicans in Pennsylvania pushed through the strictest voter ID law in the nation, admitted that it was a political move that would help Mitt Romney, and put out a multi-million dollar ad campaign to inform voters that they needed an ID to vote.  Once the law was put on hold for this year, the state suddenly seemed to lose interest in informing the public, as several government run websites claimed until last week that you needed ID to vote, and the PA voter information hotline stated that you needed ID to vote until a stafffer at The Rachael Maddow Show called the state and complained.  Even though the law was put on hold because it would have disenfranchised voters, the damage was done with the ad campaign.  And now right leaning newspapers are continuing the disinformation process.

Gov. Corbett and the state government needs to end this confusion and get the word out to all PA voters that they do not need an ID to vote this year.  They were more than willing to spend the money when their pet law was passed, now they need to undo the confusion they caused by trying to force a law like this onto the books in time for this years election.

But I won’t be holding my breath….

 

*Apologies to Mock, Paper, Scissors.

Partial Victory in Pennsylvania

Via the Washington Post, although I am sure you can find it wherever you prefer to get your news:

A Pennsylvania judge on Tuesday ordered state officials not to enforce the commonwealth’s tough new voter-ID law in the November election, a political victory for Democrats who say the measure is an attempt to discourage support for President Obama in a battleground state.

…..

Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson, who upheld Pennsylvania’s law when he first considered it this summer, ruled Tuesday that state officials had not made enough progress in supplying photo IDs for those who lack them. He said it seemed likely that some otherwise qualified voters would be disenfranchised.

So the law has been postponed until after this years election, meaning that you will not have to show ID to vote in Pennsylvania this year.  That’s what we wanted, right?  So why is it only a partial victory?

Well, two things.  First, Judge Simpson ruled that poll workers can still ask voters for ID.  The poll workers have to allow you to cast a normal ballot (no provisional ballot mess) whether you have ID or not.  This could cause all sorts of problems.  People in line without ID could hear the poll workers asking those in front of them for ID and then assume that since they don’t have it that they won’t be allowed to vote, causing them to get out of line and leave.  Some could get to the front of the line and then leave after saying no to the question, mistakenly assuming that the poll workers asked them the question for an actual reason.  And perhaps more concerning, poll workers may end up turning away people without ID because of poor training and/or confusion over the law.

All of those possibilities become significantly more likely due to the second issue:  Pennsylvania’s ad campaign for the new law.  From MSNBC:

But the ruling did not address the state’s $5 million advertising campaign telling voters that they’ll need an ID to vote. One TV ad that last month was running across the state says: “To vote in Pennsylvania on Election Day, you need an acceptable photo ID with a valid expiration date,” and tells voters to “show it.”

In a statement released Tuesday afternoon, Secretary of State Carol Aichele said the ad campaign would go on. “We will continue our education and outreach efforts, as directed by the judge in his order, to let Pennsylvanians know the voter ID law is still on track to be fully implemented for future elections, and we urge all registered voters to make sure they have acceptable ID,” said Aichele.

Asked for clarification, Aichele spokesman Matthew Keeler told Lean Forward, via email: “We are looking into the media campaign to transition and update information and ads to continue to educate voters and prepare for election day.”

……

Still, supporters of the law are claiming that changing the campaign would be impractical. “It’s already in the works,” said Steve Miskin, a spokesman for Rep. Mike Turzai, a Republican, told Lean Forward. “How do you just pull it back?”

But voting-rights advocates say if the state doesn’t do so, the result could be widespread confusion, leading some voters to stay away from then polls because they wrongly believe they need ID.

“There is a concern on our side about the possibility of misinformation going out,” David Gersch, a lawyer for civil-rights groups challenging the law, told reporters on a conference call. If there’s confusion about whether an ID is needed, he added, “folks may just stay home.”

Gersch and other voting-rights lawyers on the case said they might pursue further legal action if the state won’t assure them it’ll change the ad campaign, though they’re hopeful that won’t be necessary.

Of course, none of this chaos would be happening if it wasn’t for the GOP’s brave contingent of anti-voter fraud warriors* insisting that this law needed to be rammed through and in place for the 2012 election cycle, even though in person voter fraud, which is the only type ID laws could have any effect on, doesn’t really exist**.

But ram they did, and then they took out an ad campaign that insured that no matter what the court ruling on the law would be, part of the damage from the law would already be done.  From Philly.com on July 8th: (Bolding, for once, is in the original article)

Republican Gov. Tom Corbett‘s administration has signed a $249,660 contract with a company run by Mitt Romneyfundraiser, former state GOP party executive director, pharmaceutical lobbyist, and school voucher advocate Chris Bravacos to direct a media campaign promoting the state’s Voter ID law.

Yes, that very same law, requiring that voters present identification at the polls, which critics contend will suppress Democratic-leaning non-white, poor, elderly and youth voters and which House Majority Leader Mike Turzai recently boasted (video) is “gonna allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania.”

One sample PSA on the Bravo Group‘s Vimeo page portrays voter ID as just the latest installment in a bright history of American voting rights, and features anodyne black and white photos―including one of suffragettes. Another spot portrays a lot of shiny-toothed middle class models holding ID cards. [note: Bravo removed the two videos this morning but Occupy Harrisburg has reposted them here and here.]

The tagline? “Your right to vote: it’s one thing you never want to miss out on.”

So the law is halted for this election, but how much damage has already been done is unknown.  I hope Gov. Corbett proves me wrong, but I have a strong suspicion that the state is not going to spend the same amount of time and money telling voters they don’t need ID than they did telling them they did need ID.  You know, since the law itself was a naked partisan attempt at voter suppression.

The job ahead of us in PA is simple.  Get this information out there.  Make sure every PA voter knows that they don’t need an ID to vote this election, no matter what they hear and no matter what any poll workers tell them.  I’d bet my last dollar that shady right wing groups will unleash robo-calls in the weeks prior to the election claiming that ID is required.  We need to make sure PA residents know the facts.

 

*Strange how the GOP’s brave contingent of anti-voter fraud warriors doesn’t have much to say about the voter registration scandal caused by the GOP hiring a group known to engage in practices that range from questionable to outright illegal, is it not?

**Don’t believe me?  Here is the state admitting there is no problem with in-person voter fraud from TPM.

The state signed a stipulation agreement with lawyers for the plaintiffs which acknowledges there “have been no investigations or prosecutions of in-person voter fraud in Pennsylvania; and the parties do not have direct personal knowledge of any such investigations or prosecutions in other states.”

Additionally, the agreement states Pennsylvania “will not offer any evidence in this action that in-person voter fraud has in fact occurred in Pennsylvania and elsewhere” or even argue “that in person voter fraud is likely to occur in November 2012 in the absense of the Photo ID law.”