Tonight's guests:
- Dan Rather, anchor and managing editor of "Dan Rather Reports" on AXS TV
- Rick Hasen, professor of Law and Political Science at UC Irvine, and author of "The Voting Wars: From Florida 2000 to the Next Election Meltdown"
And here's executive producer Bill Wolff with the stories to be covered (with extended soundtrack to accommodate broadband infrastructure trivia):
Leave a Comment:
Looking forward to Rachel's discussion with Hasen. Without knowing what they'll discuss, may I also suggest that it's (past) time to start discuss Diebold and voting booth tampering. And I'm also recalling the year Ohio had locked away voting booths -- and the key had gone "on vacation" with someone.
I would like to know what measures, if any are being or can be taken. Thanks.
I was gonna guess Athens, GA. Didn't they have a city initiative a few years back to do wifi everywhere?
Bill's levels are still coming in really low. Can barely hear him. Also, what happened to the funky reflector? Bring it back! I have one, if you lost it. Has a gold side and a silver side.
In the sound bite you used, with the printed words underneath, Romney said of marriage and marijuana..."I'm not running on marriage and marijuana. Those are state issues, right? Aren't they? Really?"
How different is that from Ryan's comments that lead this segment...leave it to the states.
Sounds like a non-story to me...most rights rest with the individual states, not the federal government.
In the case of marijuana that would mean that this is the first presidential campaign of a major political party advocating for the repeal of a federal law prohibiting the use of marijuana. That would mean Romney/Ryan are effectively calling for the repeal of the bill passed by Nixon.
This would also call into question a lot of problems with previous positions Ryan and Romney have argued before with regards to abortion and marriage. Both have stated that they favor an amendment to the US Constitution banning marriage equality. Now technically speaking an amendment to the US Constitution or an interpretation by the Supreme Court of the US (or another federal US court) would not automatically equate to federalization. In fact states only have the rights granted to them by the US Constitution and it's not considered federalization of an issue to have states adhere to this. However both Romney and Ryan have argued that abortion- in particular the cases of Roe vs. Wade and it's pre-cursor case of Connecticut vs. Griswold- were cases of federalization. Which leaves a great deal of confusion as to how either of the two could consider it a state matter with the issue of gay marriage, but a federal matter with the issue of abortion. This is an especially important question when we consider that at the moment I believe at the 9th Circuit level there is a case regarding marriage in California being argued by the lawyers who argued Bush vs. Gore. That one is waiting to hit the deck of the Supreme Court. If any of the justices retire before that case makes it to SCOTUS then who is president at the time will have a big influence as to the future legality of marriage equality nation wide. Not to mention that Republicans made a huge fuss when the Obama Administration stated that it was no longer going to defend DOMA against legal challenges in the courts. Would Romney/Ryan want to pick back up defense? If that is the case then how does this compare to their supposed argument of wanting it to go to the states?
The biggest problem here is "go to the states" is usually code for "don't ask me this question- it's too controversial and I don't want to answer it." Very, very rarely do people who say "let the states decide" actually mean let the states decide. It's usually a round about way of pouting. Once said person is in power usually they do the opposite IF they intend to move on the issue at all. For instance many elected Republicans right now including Ron Paul have argued to allow the states to manage the issue of abortion. This has not stopped them from voting on laws to restrict access to abortion, restrict funding to abortion, and everything else that would be considered a "federalized" version of that policy.
Or shorter version: it's important because Romney/Ryan a. didn't answer the question directly and b. it's not yet quite hypocritical, but it's also not honest.
I can't believe that Dan Rather thinks Romney can win. I feel he is in a time warp of some kind, because the evidence for a Romney win just is not there. They are not ready for prime time and changing opinions like the wind shows they do not know how to campaign. Barring some unforeseen event the office of the Presidency is Obma's to lose.
Racheal,what,s the matter with Dan rather he talks as if he can not see Barack Obama is a brillant and gifted candidate who has won the last election because people beleive and trust him.He also seems to think Romney still has a chance to win,but what about all the factually baseless things that he and his running mate say..How can Rather give Romney a pass on the fact that he won't submit his tax return,what if we find out that their is something really awful in those financial statements.you know we the people need a uplifting and inspirational leader not a liar and cheater in the white house,you know his policies are the same as bush,What a mess,I think Dan rather has finally lost my respect altogether...
Voter suppress, vote and voting machine tampering, intimidation, $billions in dark money, uninformed voters. THAT's how Romney could still win this. Ask Al Gore about R tactics in 2000.
Rahm Emanuel Replaces Scott Walker as the latest field general in the War on Teachers Unions..... kinda one of those weird newsdays where reality de-rails a heavily-played talking point.
Rachel, in your interview with Rick Hansen you asked why do voter suppression efforts seem to benefit Republicans vs Democrats. My thought is that all the efforts specifically target urban voters. The ID requirement has been shown to disproportionately affect poorer urbanites who rely on public transportation, while more right-leaning rural voters are almost sure to have a drivers license since there is no public transportation out in the countryside. Besides ID, the other thing rural voters have more of is time. The efforts to shorten the voting time, while increasing the complexity of voting also tends to not affect rural voters as much, because they don't face the long lines and crowds of the city, and have a greater number of polling places and poll workers per-capita. Anything that adds a minute to voting won't affect the count in small-town America, but can literally run out the clock in heavily populated, Democratic leaning areas. Limiting voting to business hours only also gives wealthier voters with more flexible schedules a greater chance of getting their vote counted, while poorer voters who either may not be given time off to vote, or have to make a choice of whether to vote or get paid for that day.
If Sun Myung Moon or Jim Jones had run for president, would the big news organizations (print or video) still ignore the elephant in the room? It is NOT a question of religious freedom. The mormon organization is a pyramid scheme, disguised as a cult pretending to be a religion. Feel compassion for the generations who have been duped, but what the mormon leaders believe is that money will buy anything.
You don't have to read the silly thing, just read the outline on wikipedia.