US elections compare poorly with Brazil’s

Glenn Greenwald and Victor Pougy compare yesterday’s election in the US with last month’s election in Brazil to show how awful it is here.

That a country poorer than the U.S., with a much shorter history of democracy, can hold such seamless, fair, participatory, and efficient elections proves that the opposite outcome in the U.S. — massive voter disenfranchisement, multi-hour voting lines, pervasive machine malfunctions, and elections that are not decided until weeks after the fact — are very easily avoided and thus likely intentional.
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Results of ballot initiatives

Rachel M. Cohen provides a run down of some of the ballot initiatives that passed yesterday, including one important one in Michigan that reader Mark Dowd has pointed to.

FROM STATE LEGISLATIVE races to the House of Representatives, progressive candidates made a dent in the 2018 election season, and will be relatively well-represented in federal and state-level governments next year. But it’s not just elected office: Left-wing activists also made their voices heard through ballot initiatives across the country. On Tuesday night, progressives walked away with some wins and some losses on that front.

They made gains for Medicaid expansion, public education, and voting rights. But they lost other battles, like on criminal justice reform, nurse-to-patient ratios, and universal home care.

Cohen’s article is worth reading.

Election results review

As I feared, the Trump cult remains strong in the US, strong enough to increase its majority in the US Senate, even as it lost control of the House of Representatives. In Ohio, Republicans won all the statewide elected offices except for incumbent Democratic senator Sherrod Brown who won quite easily. No congressional seats switched parties either, so the status quo in Ohio was retained.
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Homophobe Kim Davis loses her re-election bid

Kim Davis is the rancid homophobic clerk of a county in Kentucky who shot to fame because of her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, even after the US Supreme Court ruled that all bans on such marriages were unconstitutional. She has been defeated in her effort to retain the office that she seems to regard as a family sinecure, having taken it over from her mother who hired her to work in the office. She has lost to a Democrat. Her replacement is by no means a great friend of the LGBT community but he has promised to enforce the law equally.

This is not a major election, just a small one in a backwater. But the defeat of the awful Davis pleases me a great deal.

Triumph the Insult Comic Dog goes to Texas

While there he talks to Beto O’Rourke and Ted Cruz and their respective supporters. O’Rourke had the good sense to play it straight but Cruz does not seem to realize that when you try to trade sharp barbs with a comedian, you will always lose because comedians deal with hecklers all the time. This is especially the case when your interviewer has the name ‘Insult’ but Cruz tries anyway and gets drubbed. That happens at the 9:00 mark.

Samantha Bee urges people to vote

I voted at about 10:00am today. While there were no lines, the polling place was busy and most of the booths were occupied. I met a friend there as she was leaving and she said that there was a line when she arrived. We both felt that the turnout was high for an off-presidential year election but what the means is anybody’s guess, though since where we live is a pretty progressive area, a high turnout should be good for statewide offices and issues.

Inside the minds of Trump cult members

Election day today will be a good, though not perfect, test of the size of the Trump cult. Since Trump is not on the ballot, it will not be a direct test but since the Republican party has almost unanimously capitulated to him and even shown a pretty disgusting level of obsequiousness towards him (Ted Cruz being the perfect example), any Republican candidate for any office is seen as a surrogate for Trump. The old adage that all politics is local does not apply in this election.
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Pakistan blasphemy ruling

The laws in Pakistan against blasphemy are an absolute disgrace. They are so expansive and ambiguous that people can use them against their enemies by alleging blasphemy and making their lives intolerable. It seems like charges can be brought easily and religious mobs easily incited who then in turn intimidate authorities into take action against the accused. Hence the decision last week by the Pakistani Supreme Court to overturn the blasphemy conviction of the woman known as Asia Bibi is a welcome development.
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