Republican Power Grab In Alabama Is Unconstitutional
July 27th, 2006The Alabama Democratic Party filed an intervention in United States District Court today to prevent Gov. Bob Riley from assuming voter registration duties over the democratically elected Secretary of State, Nancy Worley.
“Republican Attorney General Troy King has once again placed politics over principle and partisanship over professionalism and is using his constitutionally empowered office to launch a Republican power grab,” the party said in a press release. “King, along with the Bush Justice Department, has singled out Alabama because our Secretary of State is an elected Democrat.”
In addition to Alabama, 19 states have faced similar obstacles in fully implementing the Help America Vote Act including Illinois, New York and California, which have publicly indicated that they will not be compliant.
Yet it appears the Justice Department has only targeted states where Democrats administer elections, according to the statement.
“What Republicans can’t do at the ballot box, they are trying to do through the courts,” Alabama Democratic Party Chair Joe Turnham said. “As an Alabama Democrat elected statewide, Republicans have targeted her for defeat.”
Worley received more votes than any other candidate, Democrat or Republican, including Bob Riley, in the June 6 primary.
“Republicans realize they must further attack and besmirch Worley in order for their preferred candidate Beth Chapman to have a chance in November,” Turnham says. “Chapman’s own record in regard to election administration is highly suspect, as she has publicly spoken out against reauthorization of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. This extreme position puts her in direct conflict with Alabama’s two Republican senators and President George W. Bush.”
At a July 15th meeting, the Alabama Republican Executive Committee unanimously urged the U.S. Congress to refuse to authorize the original version of the 1965 Voting Rights Act, although it was approved by both Houses of Congress recently and signed into law by President Bush.
Turnham objected to the appointment of Bob Riley as a “special master” due to his obvious political self-interest in the 2006 elections and his total lack of experience in administering elections.
“The full resources of the Governor’s office and the Secretary of State’s Office should be available to any special master the judge approves,” Turnham said. “But it is entirely inappropriate for Bob Riley to assume that responsibility in middle of a nip-and-tuck race against Lieutenant Governor Lucy Baxley. The integrity of our election administration is at stake and Alabama voters need to have full confidence that elections are run by individuals with expertise and without a personal, partisan agenda.”
In addition, the Rev. Jack Zylman of Birmingham says this is the same administration which has been trying desperately to force U.S. voters to use insecure voting machines from Diebold that have no paper trail, from a company known for corruption and owned by a Republicans.
“After all the harassment of Democratic elected officials and candidates that the Bush Justice Department has dragged into court, we now see that this cynical, corrupt department is attempting to take the supervision of voting in Alabama and give it to Bob Riley,” Zylman said. “This is the same Justice Department in the same Bush administration that has given us (at least) one stolen election and possibly another.”
As usual, the local press and media coverage of this issue has been less than comprehensable.
AP: State Election Job May Switch from Worley to Riley
Where are the editorials and columns calling this power grab what it is? Does the Alabama press care about fair and accurate election results?
Tags: Alabama Governor's Race
July 28th, 2006 at 12:31 pm
The integrity of our election administration is certainly NOT at stake, here. Integrity has long been dead with regard to Alabama election administration.
The DemoCrans and RepubliCrats have forever been co-conspiritors, in Alabama and nation-wide, to limit ballot access and manipulate elections to their mutual advantage; All to the detriment of democracy.
Even our tax forms encourage us to contribute money to one party or the other. This only to ensure that both survive to kill any third-party attempt to become part of our political process. Indeed, the recent attempt by Alabama Congressmen (among others) to kill the Voting Rights Act is just another example of party politicians’ efforts to limit the ability of the People to join in the political process. (Not to mention that the Voting Rights Act would never have been implemented if it wasn’t for partisan Alabama politicians!)
Nancy Worley is as guilty as any other elected official, as it is her disingenuous foot dragging which has caused this issue to come to this point, anyway. If she would fulfill the duties of her office, without playing party politics, then the requirements of the Help America Vote Act would already be met and the partisans could waste our Courts’ time with some other political stunt.
George Wallace said it best when he said there wasn’t a dimes’ worth of difference between the two parties.
Democracy does not exist in a two-party system. A better word for that is collusion.
July 29th, 2006 at 10:59 am
I understand the frustration of those who wish we had a third party movement in the U.S.
But you are wrong that this does not further jeopardize our already compromised electoral system. You are also wrong that Democrats and Republicans are exactly alike when it comes to what policies they pursue.
The problem today is not just that both parties have been corrupted by the corporate dominance of financing elections. It is that the Republicans now hold ALL the power in every branch of government nationally and are in the process of gerrymandering that control down to the state and local levels.
Unless you favor a Bush Royal Family taking away all our freedoms in the name of “liberty” to fight this religious war for oil in the Middle East, at the very least you should hope that some progressive Democrats get elected to some offices. If the Democrats can take back a majority in Congress in the November mid-term elections, it might be possible to impeach Bush.
There would also overnight be a sea change in a host of policies from the way we deal with rogue states in the Middle East to the minimum wage to the environment.
Anyone who favors a third party movement in America better hope the Democrats get back in power. If the Bush takeover is allowed to continue, there will only be one party left - not two, not three.
With the Democrats back in power and a more balanced system in place, you can work to pressure them at the margins on all kinds of policies and maybe even get third party candidates elected at the local and maybe even the state level.
I urge you to watch the Bill Moyers interview on PBS. Margaret Atwood talked a lot about the dangers of one party using “the one true religion” to take total control of this country and the world.
That is the real danger now - if you want to fight against something.
While I gave George Wallace all kinds of grief as a reporter back when Alabama was a one-party state and even editorialized for the rise of a two-party system, it is obvious now that the Republicans are no better than Wallace. They are borrowing from Wallace to try and turn this into a one-party state on the other side. The only way to counter that is with competitive Democrats and transparent elections.
As for the two-party system, that is the essence of American democracy. If you would rather have a theocratic monarchy, continue to support a third party on the left. That just splinters the bright votes and makes them totally ineffective against a monolithic, Christian Republican majority.
And after they fuck up this country for good, you will share the responsibility, just as Ralph Nader and the Green Party share the responsibility for helping to elect George Bush in 2000.
July 30th, 2006 at 1:53 pm
Glynn,
I have great regard for your perspective and your experience. But your apparent belief that there are significant differences between the two major parties is naive, or worse. I’m even a little surprised that an obviously accomplished journalist would abdicate his position in the “Fourth Branch of Government” for a cheerleader role in a political party! Maybe I haven’t been following you long enough - I only started during the “Great (American) Backyard Bird Count.”
I acknowledge that there are differences in degree regarding policy pursuits of the two major parties. But I disagree that the answer to our current and temporary six-year discomfort is to make yet another wild political swing - it seems like that’s how we got here in the first place!
Even when you factor in inflation there’s still not a dimes’ worth of difference between the two parties.
When the Democrats have their majority, as surely they will, the first and last items on the agenda will be pay-back. GWB will certainly be impeached or otherwise neutered; Karl Rove will finally be stripped of his clearance; Gerrymandering will rise to newer and more outrageous heights; And Dick Cheney may yet have to answer for his meddling, if he doesn’t hole himself up in an intensive care unit to die; the list goes on …
But in the mean time we will still NOT have consistent policy nor even clear direction for the troubles that truly ail our people and our politics. Ear marks will still exist, and Ted Stevens “Bridge to Nowhere” will probably get funded again for his behind-the-scenes cooperation in some Democrat scheme; Richard Shelby will likely switch parties, again; Our dependence on foreign energy sources will likely increase; Our Armed Forces will still be streched too thin, and eventually forgotten (again); Abortion will still be the litmus test for Court appointments; Signing statements will become the norm, rather than the exception; The media will still follow a policy of “If it bleeds it leads;” Stupid people will still have stupid pseudo-political bumper stickers on their stupid gas guzzlers; And the new Senate Majority Leader will still time legislative discussions to conincide with political races.
This notion that Ralph Nader has some special overt responsibility for the current administration’s ascension to power is reprehensible - and plays right into the collusion of the two parties, but you already know that. The premise of this argument seems to be that votes “belong” to this party or that. When the fact is that the voters of our country have the sole responsibility for casting (or not casting) their votes in whatever direction they choose - THAT is the nature of democracy - WE THE PEOPLE are responsible for whom we choose to administer our government, not the ditto heads, theocrats, party-hacks, and otherwise bumbling idiots who actually win the election. That we overwhelmingly prefer “Straight Ticket” voting is only because we voters prefer to be uninformed about the nature of politics so that we can pretend someone else is responsible for our abdication. And the two parties like it that way, thank-you very much.
To cling to the untenable notion, (let alone repeat it for all the world to read), that competition in politics is somehow wrong simply defies logic. How is it that competition is good in every field, (research, consumer pricing, real estate, sports, etc.), EXCEPT politics? How is a duopoly in … say telecommunications or satellite radio … BETTER than open and free competition? If you do nothing else in response to this, please - please - please provide one salient argument to uphold this ridiculous notion.
The two-party system is certainly the essence of our democracy, but that is not because it is better than a true multi-party system. We have a two-party system because two parties can much more easily work together to manipulate the process than can three or four parties. Additional voices in the discussion would likely tip off the public that decisions in government are, in fact, made in the smoke-filled halls of members-only clubs, rather than on the floor of the House and Senate. If every piece of legislation, policy, or agenda is only framed in terms of “left” and “right,” then the process and the people suffer - and only the two parties win. It is simply delusional to believe that more people in the discussion will harm the process, but it is a nice “talking point” to fool the blissfully underinformed public.
While reviewing your most recent post, “Stories on Alabama Election System Misleading,” (http://www.locustfork.net/blog/alabama_governors_race/stories_on_alabama_election_sy_1.html), this quote caught my eye: “Judge Watkins also ruled that the court would adopt Secretary Worley’s proposed plan to implement a statewide voter registration database before the 2008 primary election …” Isn’t it peculiar that a U.S. District Judge would make such a ruling to favor the parties’ primary elections? Primary elections, in my view, should be no more relevant to the State or Federal government elections cycle than are elections for officers in a country club or a sorority. However, such language makes it clear that the entrenched party operatives will take every opportunity to further embed party politics into government administration thus making it nearly impossible for the average citizen to distinguish where the party ends and the government begins, or for any so-called “third party” to achieve any success.
But perhaps you misunderstood my previous post. I am not in favor of “a third party.” I’m in favor of thirty or more parties! I’d like so many parties alive in the process that they do NOTHING unless they do something meaningful and positive. I would prefer decades of absolute gridlock to another piece of legislation which has Congress abdicating its oversight responsibilities or handing over to the Executive Branch the authority to declare war (again)! I’d rather see the term “bipartisan” outlawed on the floor of the Congress! I’d rather tune in to C-SPAN to watch “fisticuffs” on the floor of the House, as the legislators ACTUALLY FIGHT for what they believe, than to watch them slap each other on the back and refer to “my friend across the aisle,” with a wink and a nod, while they raise their own salaries and, only as a mid-term election-year afterthought, raise the miniumum wage to barely half of a living wage.
lane holcombe
July 30th, 2006 at 7:00 pm
First you must understand two things.
One, you must understand the history and development of American democracy, which has always been a two-party system. The third parties emerge when certain issues are not being addressed by the ruling parties. Populism. Civil Rights. George Wallace. Ross Perot.
They influence the policies of the other parties. About four times in our history they formed a new party and caused a major realignment in the parties - but it was still two dominant parties.
You should not mistake my reporting what is, versus your what should be. You may be right about that, but to accomplish it here, now, is tilting at windmills or, if you wish, dreaming about Utopia.
I would just like to get through four or eight years of even a few half-assed progressive Democrats in power. At least we could spend a little more time heading down the river in a canoe, blogging about nature and nature’s laws - rather the fucking president breaking them and getting away with it.
Think about what kind of world you want to create. Then ask yourself, would we more likely to get anywhere close to that world with Republicans or Democrats in charge? That is your choice - NOW, TODAY, THAT’s the choice.
I’m with you in the long haul, but we have absolutely no chance - whatsoever - of getting to your utopia as long as the Bush-Corporate-Criminal-Network is in power. They have to be taken down first.
Listen to Margaret Atwood’s arguments on the PBS show with Bill Moyers.
These fuckers are literally trying to make a one-world, one-religion empire. To do that, they have to destroy all the other world powers, including all the world’s other religions.
If we had more parties, do you believe that would result in SOMEONE standing up and SAYING: Stop the Jihad and the Crusade! You are all crazy and you are killing the world - the one that spawned you.
Once we stop that, we can debate more local issues where third party candidates might have a chance to influence their communities in positive ways.
Until we stop that, there is no way enough people are going to focus on your issue to make a difference.
Sorry, but that’s the world I see - and the one I report on - which by my definition, is the ultimate in objective journalism. It’s empirical.
July 31st, 2006 at 2:26 pm
‘Thus ever it has been’ is hardly a salient argument. But you are right; it’s your world view that you report.
Thanks, again, for the entertainment of locustfork.net
August 1st, 2006 at 4:20 pm
Actually, it is quite salient. Look it up.
It’s not my world view. It is The World as it is, now. It is the world I see in front of my face, by following and reporting the news.
More power to anyone who wants to go to Washington and try to talk the power’s that be into transforming American democracy into a European-style parlilamentary system with multiple parties.
Hey, this crowd might actually listen, especially if you couch it in terms of going backwards in history from being a democracy to a Monarchy.
Just watch out for that one state religion thing, one of the things we took the long boat trip over here to escape.