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Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

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Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#11
post #9
post #5

Louisiana politics has been corrupt for the entirety of the lifetime of anyone who is alive. That it has become a bipartisan effort is not shocking.

But what is bipartisan about this particular effort? It's popular to decry corruption and then, in the same breath, say everyone is corrupt so best just lie back and take it.

>It's popular to decry corruption and then, in the same breath, say everyone is corrupt so best just lie back and take it.

Sounds like a succinct description of politics in the Boston-DC corridor to me.

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#12

Imagine you live in a country where about 40% of the population wants to destroy democracy. Even if the other 60% regains control, isn't your society basically fucked anyway? Because you can never trust that 40% with any kind of power ever again. Because the moment they would regain that power, they would try to forever cut you off from any power ever again.

"Destroy democracy" just sounds too abstract to make it scary.

The however many % want their team to be in charge so they can rule the country to their liking, to overuse the f-word, a fascist state where police have impunity to do whatever they want. Or maybe call it a Mafia state, with the police, DHS and ICE being the henchmen, where someone can destroy a nature conservation area for oil, as long as he contributes to the senator's "reelection campaign" funds. Hah it's even okay to give Supreme Court justices weekend getaways, or to have their wife be a lobbyist.

Imagine having an army where, yeah, a high percentage is trying to sabotage the mission, even to their own detriment. Was the US ever a shining beacon of democracy, or was that all just a fairy tale?

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#13
post #2

America has corrupt elections. From Gerrymandering, Voter Database purges, Voter Suppression through closing polling places, making it hard or impossible to vote by mail. All of it is intentional. And it won't change because those who are elected are the ones that set the rules.

It can absolutely change if those who are elected are physically removed from their rule-setting positions by the disenfranchised.

Historically, you can’t cure fascism by voting, even in situations where the elections haven’t been compromised.

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#14
post #8

Imagine you live in a country where about 40% of the population wants to destroy democracy. Even if the other 60% regains control, isn't your society basically fucked anyway? Because you can never trust that 40% with any kind of power ever again. Because the moment they would regain that power, they would try to forever cut you off from any power ever again.

40% wants to destroy democracy, always demonizes the 60% as sub-human violent scum, and has been stockpiling guns and ammo for decades. And the 40% has violent fantasies of a Civil War do-over. And is enthusiastically receiving active support from foreign powers who would love to see the country descend into bloody chaos.

And the other 60% is not doing basically the same?

> 40% always demonizes the 60% as sub-human violent scum

One sentence later...

> 40% has violent fantasies of a Civil War do-over

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#15
post #6

> The explanation given is that the portal needs to undergo "scheduled maintenance” that is “required.” > National Voter Registration Day is a movement to encourage people to register to vote on the fourth Tuesday of September during election years. There's no way this was an honest mistake. Why schedule maintenance on the exact day you expect a lot of voters to want to use the site?

Scheduled maintenance during business hours?

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#16
post #5

Louisiana politics has been corrupt for the entirety of the lifetime of anyone who is alive. That it has become a bipartisan effort is not shocking.

Please put me in my place if I'm wrong here, but isn't it typically the Democrats who have the most to gain with more people voting (e.g. young people more likely to be liberal but less likely to vote)?

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#17

Imagine you live in a country where about 40% of the population wants to destroy democracy. Even if the other 60% regains control, isn't your society basically fucked anyway? Because you can never trust that 40% with any kind of power ever again. Because the moment they would regain that power, they would try to forever cut you off from any power ever again.

I would like to optimistically believe that from that 40%, most of them (80% ?) do not know any better, or in some kind of cognitive dissonance. I imagine, they're thinking something along "we are a country of freedom, we help install democracy in the world, this is the system founding fathers created so it cannot be undemocratic, is it?".

I guess only small amount from those 40% are actively undemocratic and trying to brainwash the rest, by telling them that they're "temporarily embarrassed millionaires/senators/congressman, etc.", thus the system actually will benefit them, when it won't.

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#18
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

40% wants to destroy democracy, always demonizes the 60% as sub-human violent scum, and has been stockpiling guns and ammo for decades. And the 40% has violent fantasies of a Civil War do-over. And is enthusiastically receiving active support from foreign powers who would love to see the country descend into bloody chaos.

And the other 60% is not doing basically the same? > 40% always demonizes the 60% as sub-human violent scum One sentence later... > 40% has violent fantasies of a Civil War do-over

It's probably not true that all Trump supporters want a civil war, but to me it seems true that most/all of Trump's and the enabling Republicans actions are leading their country to either civil war or Putin-style autocracy.

So why anyone would still be a supporter is beyond me.

I'm a European who has been watching the last four years first in disbelief, then in optimism, then in pessimism and now in horror.

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#19
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

40% wants to destroy democracy, always demonizes the 60% as sub-human violent scum, and has been stockpiling guns and ammo for decades. And the 40% has violent fantasies of a Civil War do-over. And is enthusiastically receiving active support from foreign powers who would love to see the country descend into bloody chaos.

And the other 60% is not doing basically the same? > 40% always demonizes the 60% as sub-human violent scum One sentence later... > 40% has violent fantasies of a Civil War do-over

You should compare the antifa vs. fa fatality count sometime. It would put the "both sides are equally violent" hypothesis into some perspective. Or guns and ammo count.

Re: Louisiana voter registration portal mysteriously shuts down on Registration Day

#20
I work in election night reporting. While it’s easy to assume malice, so often it’s just that election officials haven’t entirely thought things through. It’s not an easy job and in the past 4 years, positions no one has cared about are being scrutinized by the whole US and election technical teams now have to worry about election interference from foreign governments. And all of their work comes down to one day where anything that can go wrong does.

Sure it’s possible that this was a voter suppression attempt as I’m seeing in the comments. But much more likely they found a last minute bug that would have screwed them on Election Day, so they took the site down.

There are much more effective ways to stop people from voting. See https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2018/10/20/politics/gwinnett-county-...

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