Quo Vadis GOP?

[alfred russel]

So looking at Syt's point she now has an approval rating of 8% among Democrats and apparently it's only in the low 30s among Republicans.

The polling is all over the place -- I was trying to ignore Syt's point because polling is not going to be that relevant for a legislator several years from an election and at this point a lot of the polling is being done with a partisan intent. That poll was conducted by an online polling group owned by Daily Kos. I could point to polls showing her ahead of Mark Kelly but there is a dearth of polling and super reputable polling outfits aren't doing pubic polls of senators not up for reelection for a couple cycles.

[The Minsky Moment]

The filibuster is what's preventing voting rights safeguard.

It's not the filibuster, it's the lack of 50 votes in the Senate.  See above.

My opinion is and always has been that the filibuster as it currently exists in Senate - effectively requiring 60 votes to pass legislation - is unconstitutional, or at least in great tension with the Constitution.  The Constitution always specifies whenever a supermajority is required; ordinary legislation requires only a simple majority.  The traditional "talking filibuster" is consistent with the Senate's role as a deliberative body, but the 60 vote "rules filibuster" is not consistent with the constitutional plan.  I've always been against it regardless of the party of power.

[ulmont]

My opinion is and always has been that the filibuster as it currently exists in Senate - effectively requiring 60 votes to pass legislation - is unconstitutional, or at least in great tension with the Constitution.

I'll give you "in great tension", but it's functionally the simple majority implementing it, and they get to decide what they'll pass and what they won't...

[Syt]

So looking at Syt's point she now has an approval rating of 8% among Democrats and apparently it's only in the low 30s among Republicans.

The polling is all over the place -- I was trying to ignore Syt's point because polling is not going to be that relevant for a legislator several years from an election and at this point a lot of the polling is being done with a partisan intent. That poll was conducted by an online polling group owned by Daily Kos. I could point to polls showing her ahead of Mark Kelly but there is a dearth of polling and super reputable polling outfits aren't doing pubic polls of senators not up for reelection for a couple cycles.

I didn't mention any polls. That was Tim. s

[Valmy]

I think people vote against a particular ideology rather than for something.

Well if the Republicans do something there will be more reasons to vote against them.

[Sheilbh]

I didn't mention any polls. That was Tim. s

Soz

Randomly dragging innocent posters into my chat 

[grumbler]

So, after arguing that only the state legislature has the power to pass health regulations, Virginia's newly-elected GOPtard governor has directed that schools ignore state law and allow parents to decide whether or not their students mask in school.

The 2023 legislative elections are going to be critical for the chances of retaining sane government in the state.

[Syt]

https://www.npr.org/2022/01/23/1075219215/jan-6-panel-is-investigating-a-trump-administration-plan-to-seize-voting-machine?t=1643112452327

Jan. 6 panel is investigating a Trump administration plan to seize voting machines

The House panel looking into last January's attack on the Capitol is investigating a plan that would have directed the secretary of defense to seize voting machines in battleground states, the chairperson of the Jan. 6 committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., told Face the Nation on Sunday.

"If you are using the military to potentially seize voting machines ... the public needs to know," Thompson said.

Politico reported Friday that an executive order was drafted in December 2020 citing conspiracy theories about election fraud and foreign ownership of Dominion voting machines.

The order, complete with a dotted line ready for Trump's signature, would have directed the secretary of defense to "seize, collect, retain and analyze all machines, equipment, electronically stored information, and material records required for retention" under a law that relates to preserving election records.

The draft order provided seven days for the secretary of defense to issue an initial assessment, and 60 days for a final assessment, to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. It then ordered that the assessment and supporting information be disseminated throughout the executive branch.

In his comments Sunday, Thompson backed up that reporting.

"We have information that between the Department of Justice, a plan was put forward to potentially seize voting machines in the country and utilize Department of Defense assets to make that happen," he said.

The committee has already had conversations about the draft order with former Attorney General Bill Barr and various Defense Department officials, Thompson said.

Thompson said the committee was also aware of a plan to appoint a new attorney general, who would then tell certain states that the election had been fraudulent and direct them not to produce certified documents.

The committee's job, Thompson said, "is to get to the facts and circumstances of how far did they go" in implementing that plan. The committee plans to have a series of public hearings "showing the use of federal assets, Department of Justice, Department of Defense and other agencies to actually stop the duly election of a president," he said.

Last week, the committee moved its investigation to Trump's inner circle by asking Ivanka Trump, the former president's daughter, to voluntarily cooperate and by requesting phone records for Trump's son Eric Trump and Kimberly Guilfoyle, who is engaged to Donald Trump Jr.

[Syt]

https://www.newsweek.com/students-slam-school-board-over-book-review-order-say-its-hurting-honor-students-1672973

Students Slam School Board Over Book Review Order, Say It's Hurting 'Honor Students'

BY DANIEL VILLARREAL ON 1/25/22 AT 11:11 PM EST

Students have slammed a Texas school board's "book review" order that would allow board members to ban books from district schools without public comment. At least one of the students pointed out that the Granbury Independent School District's (GISD) plan would most hurt "honor students" looking to advance their studies with advanced texts.

The students commented against the policy at a Tuesday meeting of the school board in Granbury, Texas, a town of roughly 11,000 people just southwest of Fort Worth.

"I simply want to emphasize who it is that is upset about this book ban, and it's not just delinquents who want to read smut. It's honor students who want access to the full extent of their education," said a junior who mentioned that she is at the top 3 percent of her class.

"I'm simply going to say that no government—and public school is an extension of government—has ever banned books and banned information from its public and been remembered in history as the good guys," she added.

School library books in Texas have fallen under greater scrutiny during the past several months. Both the Texas House General Investigating Committee led by Republican State Representative Matt Krause and the Texas Education Agency have been directed by Governor Greg Abbott to review all books in the district's schools to prevent children from viewing "pornography or other inappropriate content."

GISD and other state school districts have begun evaluating texts in their libraries to determine their educational value and age appropriateness. However, critics worry that the investigations will go well past "pornography and inappropriate content" and start banning any books that cause discomfort.

Krause published his own list of 850 titles of objectionable books. Krause told school board officials to confirm whether the schools carry any books on his list. If so, he demanded a detailed accounting of where the books reside and how much money was spent on them, NPR reported.

Most of the books on Krause's list were written by women, people of color and LGBTQ writers, The Dallas Morning News reported. Nearly two-thirds of the titles mention LGBTQ people, and about 15 percent provide sexual education information, according to the book news website Book Riot.

Krause's list includes the Amnesty International book We Are All Born Free: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Pictures. At least 11 of the books focus on the landmark Roe v. Wade Supreme Court abortion ruling. Other titles on his list include An African American and Latinx History of the United States, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness and Avoiding Bullies?: Skills to Outsmart and Stop Them.

"Removal of these books can lead to miseducation of teens due to lack of consistent information which could add to mistrust of parents, teachers and other adults in their life," a GISD sophomore said at the meeting.

"This constant need to control youth and their development shows a systematic problem within the school system. So many histories such as those as LGBTQ plus people, Indigenous people, and that of the true history of our country will be erased if this book ban falls through," she added.

The Texas State Teachers Association (TSTA) has also denounced the effort to remove the books.

"What does [Krause] need this list for. Is it to burn the books later? Is it to block the books? It's just one step into censorship," said Ovidia Molina, president of the TSTA.

Molina said that Krause's campaign to become Texas' attorney general is likely the motivation behind his investigation.

"It is just something that a representative is using for political gain," Molina said. "They're not thinking about what our students need, they're not thinking about the professionalism of our educators, they're not supporting our public schools. They're just using this to make a name for themselves."

Newsweek contacted Krause's office for comment.

Krause's Index Librorum Prohibitorum: https://static.texastribune.org/media/files/94fee7ff93eff9609f141433e41f8ae1/krausebooklist.pdf

[crazy canuck]

Have they started burning books in public bonfires yet?

[HVC]

Have they started burning books in public bonfires yet?

He would, but paper is a renewable resource so their against using it as fuel.

[Josquius]

How the hell do they even begin to square this with their wailing about cancel culture.

[Syt]

Well, it's not just Texas schoolboards who review what's "appropriate" and not.

https://www.npr.org/2022/01/27/1076180329/tennessee-school-district-ban-holocaust-graphic-novel-maus

A Tennessee school district has voted to ban the Holocaust graphic novel 'Maus'

A Pulitzer-Prize winning graphic novel about the Holocaust has been banned by a Tennessee school district, prompting blowback from critics who say it's essential to teach children about the genocide.

The 10-member McMinn County School Board voted unanimously earlier this month to remove Maus from its curriculum and replace it with an alternative, which hadn't been decided at the time of the vote.

"We are here because some people objected to the words and the graphics used in the book," board member Rob Shamblin said during the meeting, according to the minutes posted on the school board's website.

News of the Jan. 10 meeting trickled out this week as the world was preparing to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is the anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp in 1945.

"Maus has played a vital role in educating about the Holocaust through sharing detailed and personal experiences of victims and survivors," the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum said in a series of tweets. "Teaching about the Holocaust using books like Maus can inspire students to think critically about the past and their own roles and responsibilities today."

Maus tells the story of author Art Spiegelman's relationship with his father, a Holocaust survivor, and it depicts Jews as mice and Nazis as cats. Spiegelman said this week that the school board seemed to have a "myopic" focus on potentially offensive words and limited nudity in the book and that the decision smacked of something more sinister.

"It has the breath of autocracy and fascism about it," Spiegelman said on CNN. "I think of it as a harbinger of things to come."

At issue are "eight curse words" and an image of a nude woman, according to McMinn County Schools director Lee Parkison. The board discussed censoring the language and imagery it deemed inappropriate but ultimately decided to discard the novel outright.

Jonathan Pierce, the board member who initiated the vote to remove Maus from the eighth-grade curriculum, said during the meeting that the Holocaust should be taught in schools, but this is not the book to do it.

"Our children need to know about the Holocaust, they need to understand that there are several pieces of history ... that shows depression or suppression of certain ethnicities. It's not acceptable today," Pierce said, according to the meeting minutes. "[But] the wording in this book is in direct conflict of some of our policies."

There's been growing momentum recently among some Republican leaders to ban certain books in schools, particularly those dealing with issues of race and LGBTQ identity. According to the American Library Association, the number of attempts to ban school library books was 67% higher last September than in the same month the year before.

This isn't the first time Maus has faced a ban. Russia pulled the graphic novel from bookstores in 2015 over the swastika depicted prominently on its cover, because the country was trying eliminate depictions of the symbol as it commemorated the Soviet Union's victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.

Going over the meeting minutes it seems "bitch" was one of the objectionable words?


Favorite quote:

So, my problem is, it looks like the entire curriculum is developed to normalize sexuality, normalize nudity and normalize vulgar language. If I was trying to indoctrinate somebody's kids, this is how I would do it. You put this stuff just enough on the edges, so the parents don't catch it but the kids, they soak it in.

Yeah, can't treat sexuality as something normal, no siree. 

[grumbler]

Sales of Maus have skyrocketed.

Some of the intolerable swear words are "bitch" and "damn."  None of them will be words the students will be encountering for the first time.

[Valmy]

This is one of the stupidest culture incidents. A bunch of bonds didn't get passed because the culture warriors were heroically out to defend teenagers from "porn". Gregg Abbott was talking about throwing people in prison and all kinds of idiocy. Because we cannot have an honest conversation about anything. Bullshit must dominate.

It isn't about that though, the disingenuousness is hilarious. They are trying to go after left wing books under the guise of "Think of the poor innocent 16 year olds."