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| Photo: Roland Scheicher |
22.Qf6+! was the sacrifice move in what is known in chess circles as "the immortal game" between Anderssen and Kieseritzky in 1851.
Yesterday Ducky offered us a "valid Trump support profile", to that I will reply that a valid Trump support profile is anyone who does not want Hillary Rodham Corruption as the President of These United States.
At this point you've probably managed to put 2 and 22.Qf6+! together and come to the realization that yes, I have voted against Clinton, I won't say who I voted for as it ought to be obvious, but let us just say it leaves a bad taste in my mouth and leave it at that. It seriously causes me to question FPTP (First Past The Post) voting.
I am, I would like to think, what you would call a serious voter, for example my wife and I actually read all 17 judicial performance reviews of the judges on our ballot for retention. (In Colorado Judges are appointed, face a retention vote two years later and every four years thereafter). I can honestly say that I did not consider political affiliation in my decision on any of them, I can also honestly say that my wife and I are the exception rather than the rule.
There are some serious problems with voting in America and I'm not talking about the bull that either Trump or Clinton are spreading. The average American voter is apathetic regarding the political decisions given to them, or perhaps I should just simply call them pathetic. If the majority of Americans made their football picks the same way as they vote they'd be making their decisions based on who had the prettier uniform or the coolest emblem. Yes, sadly most Americans spend more intellectual capital on their football pool than the general election.
Most of the people who come here and post are passionate about their beliefs, more so than the common man. They may sometimes get lazy and regurgitate other people's talking points, but most can also put forth a rational argument defending their beliefs, for that they ought to be commended. Make no mistake, most who come here and post are also the exception rather than the rule.
SF likens voting for Trump as throwing a Molotov cocktail, I disagree... voting for Trump is voting against Clinton, sacrificing a piece now for the bigger picture, for the end game. Trump is a Molotov cocktail that's going to go out as soon as you throw it, the flames quenched by all the Republicans and Democrats in the House and Senate that aren't Trump.
I voted and I'm pissed about it.
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| Photo: Martin Olsson |
Yesterday's post raised some interesting questions regarding secret ballots and mandatory voting, here's another:
We all know the circumstances under which conditional voting was imposed in the context of post civil war reconstruction, but it wasn't until the passage of the 24th amendment in 1964 that poll taxes in federal primaries and elections became unconstitutional.
It wasn't until 1966 that the Supreme Court reversed it's previous decision that poll taxes were constitutional in Breedlove v. Suttles (1937) with it's decision in Harper v. Virginia State Board of Elections that they weren't (under the 14th Amendment). Currently other conditions placed upon voting would technically be constitutional, although most would be illegal under the 1965 Voting Rights Act, e.g literacy tests deemed constitutional in Lassiter v. Northampton County Board of Elections (1959).
So the question is, should everyone be allowed to vote?
The Constitutional requirement is that all persons be treated the same under the law yet 15 states and DC bar persons under guardianship or or adjudged mentally incompetent or incapacitated from voting. 20 states have laws that bar people from voting only if they have been adjudged specifically to lack the capacity to vote, three states bar those who have been deemed non compos mentis, nine states bar "idiots" and "the insane" from voting yet the laws are seldom enforced due to the ambiguity of the terminology, 11 states have no requirements at all.
Yes, in Colorado if you have the mental acuity of a house plant you still have the right to vote. If you're incompetent to stand trial in North Carolina... you still have the right to vote.
Legally, only a court can take away your right to vote yet a study of Philadelphia nursing homes determined that staff was deciding who was competent to vote and who was not... in Pennsylvania, which is one of the eleven states that do not have voting competency requirements.
In 2008 it was estimated that 2.5% of potential voters (5.3 million) could not vote due to felony disenfranchisement,
in 2012 that number had climbed to 5.8 million. The Supreme Court held felony disenfranchisement constitutional in Richardson v. Ramirez (1974) under the 14th amendment "shall not be denied... "except for participation in rebellion, or other crime".
It is left up to the individual states to decide. Maine and Vermont have no felony restrictions on voting, 13 states allow voting after release, four states allow voting after parole, 20 states allow voting after probation, eight states have circumstantial rules, and three states require the convict to petition for restoration.
I'll start the conversation with this Robert Heinlein quote:
“Both for practical reasons and for mathematically verifiable moral
reasons, authority and responsibility must be equal - else a balancing
takes place as surely as current flows between points of unequal
potential. To permit irresponsible authority is to sow disaster; to hold
a man responsible for anything he does not control is to behave with
blind idiocy. The unlimited democracies were unstable because their
citizens were not responsible for the fashion in which they exerted
their sovereign authority... other than through the tragic logic of
history... No attempt was made to determine whether a voter was socially
responsible to the extent of his literally unlimited authority. If he
voted the impossible, the disastrous possible happened instead - and
responsibility was then forced on him willy-nilly and destroyed both him
and his foundationless temple.”
