You go girl! You are what is needed in our state capitol! Some new blood and not a career politican. You did something amazing and I think you would get the votes needed to recall Fitzgerald. Good luck!
<blockquote>Isn't it true that a person in the USA needs an ID for just about everything?'</blockquote>
The question isn't what other purposes you need an ID for, the question is what need might exist to put barriers in the way of US citizens exercising their constitutional right to vote.
No such need has been shown. The claims of non-citizens trying to vote and zombies being bussed in from the cemeteries are false. Rigged voting machines, caging lists, outsourced-to-cronies voter roll purges and troves of "lost" votes turning up on clerks' laptops are greater and more realistic dangers to democracy, as the last decade has abundantly shown.
http://www.concordmonitor.com/article/306111/give-okeefe-vote-fraud-team-the-max/
Too bad those clowns didn't wear their pimp costumes.
http://www.ncsl.org/Portals/1/Forms/exhibitorlisting11.htm
The presence of booths by ALEC and many of their corporate members should dispel – once and for all – any comparisons between ALEC and NCSL, as if NCSL was the liberal equivalent to ALEC.
Do I understand you correctly; your solution to restoring the people’s voice in elections is to pass a new amendment that will overturn the 1st Amendment prohibition which denies Congress authority to write laws abridging the right of people to assemble and use speech and the press to petition government for a redress of their grievances?
Mainstream media corporations are the ultimate Super Pacs and they are exempt from campaign laws.
From 1791 to 1886 1st Amendment freedoms of speech, press and assembly were the sole rights of flesh and blood citizens.
From 1886 to 1973 flesh and blood citizens and media corporations enjoyed equal freedoms of speech and the press.
From 1974 to present only the commercial media enjoy unrestricted freedom of speech and the press. Following reports of serious financial abuses in the 1972 Presidential campaign, Congress amended the FECA in 1974 to set limits on contributions by individuals, political parties and PACs.
2 USC 431 (9) (B) (i) The term "expenditure" does not include any news story, commentary, or editorial distributed through the facilities of any broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine, or other periodical publication, unless such facilities are owned or controlled by any political party, political committee, or candidate;
And what is the difference between slanted news stories or editorial opinions and political ads anyway? "Section 431(9)(B)(i) makes a distinction where there is no real difference: the media is extremely powerful by any measure, a "special interest" by any definition, and heavily engaged in the "issue advocacy" and "independent expenditure" realms of political persuasion that most editorial boards find so objectionable when anyone other than a media outlet engages in it
The media’s crocodile tears about the evils of money in politics is so hypocritical. Distributing political ads to the masses is the biggest expense of political campaigns. If the media were to carry political ads, as a public service, it would greatly reduce the need for money in politics! But corporate media are the recipient of billions of dollars in campaign ads.
The 1st Amendment is not a loophole in campaign laws. Campaign laws are corruption of the 1st Amendment.
Amendment 1
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people to peaceably assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
To restore equal protection under law the press exemption must be extended to citizens and citizens groups!
The excerpts below are from page 25 The Media Monopoly by Ben H. Bagdikian Fifth Edition paperback.
It is normal for all large businesses to make serious efforts to influence the news, to avoid embarrassing publicity, and to maximize sympathetic public opinion and government policies. Now they own most of the news media that they wish to influence.
Under law, the director of a company is obliged to act in the interests of his or her own company. It has always been an unanswered dilemma when an officer of Corporation A, who also sits as a director on the board of Corporation B, has to choose between acting in the best interests of Corporation A or of Corporation B.
Interlocked boards of directors have enormously complicated potential conflicts of interest in the major national and multinational corporations that now control most of the country’s media.
A 1979 study by Peter Dreier and Steven Weinberg found interlocked directorates in major newspaper chains. Gannett shared directors with Merrill Lynch stock brokers), Standard Oil of Ohio, 20th-Century Fox, Kerr-McGee (oil, gas, nuclear power, aerospace), McDonnell Douglas Aircraft, McGraw-Hill, Eastern Airlines, Phillips Petroleum, Kellogg Company, and New York Telephone Company.
The most influential paper in America, the New York Times, interlocked with Merck, Morgan Guaranty Trust, Bristol Myers, Charter Oil, Johns Manville, American Express, Bethlehem Steel, IBM, Scott Paper, Sun Oil, and First Boston Corporation.
Louis Brandeis, before joining the Supreme Court, called this linkage “the endless chain.” He wrote: “This practice of interlocking directorates is the root of many evils. It offends laws human and divine. . . . It tends to disloyalty and violation of the fundamental law that no man can serve two masters…. It is undemocratic, for it rejects the platform: ‘A fair field and no favors.”‘
* “When the first edition of The Media Monopoly was published in 1983, critics called Ben Bagdikian’s warnings about the chilling effects of corporate ownership and mass advertising on the nation’s news “alarmist”. Since then, the number of corporations controlling most of America’s daily newspapers, magazines, radio, television, books and movies has dropped from fifty to ten.” [ from the fifth edition of The Media Monopoly rear book cover] * The sixth edition says the number of corporations controlling most of America’s daily newspapers, magazines, radio, television, books and movies has dropped to six.
I find it hypocritical that Common Cause, a 501 (c)(4) corporation exempt from publicizing its donors, is pushing for accountability and an end to corporate participation in elections. And I find it priceless that Common Cause claims money is not speech while asking for donations on their website.
http://judgepedia.org/index.php/Common_Cause
http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4860191
It really is that bad, indeed!
For utter proof, see a website called "Supremely UNjust", or http://www.SupremelyUNjust.weebly.com !
The site has actual documents proving judicial corruption by 3 federal courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Other evidence relative to the case is accessible via FOIA (Freedom Of Information Act), as part of the people's right to public records.
It is heart-rending to see such 3rd-world style corruption in our own courts, and there must be more oversite of judges, many of whom are appointed with no accountability. It takes "we the people" standing up to help stop the corruption.
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