https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/03/wallbuilders-alec-gerrymandering-south-dakota-voting
I guess we shouldn’t be surprised but it’s ALEC and a Christian Nationalist group who are funding most of these seminars.
The Right Created Boot Camps for Destroying Democracy and Voting Rights
Published
Tidewater News and Opinion Forum 
It is generally hard to see how democracy is threatened by grass-roots political movements such as those the story describes. What the Jacobin writer clearly means is that election integrity laws and gerrymandering are threats to democracy, but this notion, too, is far from obvious.
A functioning democracy doesn’t require high participation rates, but it does require verifiable vote counting. Thus, to the extent that election integrity laws produce better vote counting and verification, any participation loss may be inherently acceptable.
In a similar vein, gerrymandering may be almost impossible to avoid, but it also can be advantageous. It enables, for example, stability of government which, in turn, is conducive to long-term goal setting and accomplishment.
With these considerations in mind, I’m not inclined to scapegoat right-wing organizations for pursuing election integrity laws or pro-gerrymander policies.
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Are you suggesting ALEC is “grass-roots?”
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For purposes of my comment, yes.
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What does grassroots mean to you?
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Broadly, if refers to ordinary or common people, as opposed to political party leadership. ALEC may be an elite organiztion, but it is not the GOP.
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“ALEC may be an elite organization, but it is not the GOP.”
From the wiki page for ALEC: “The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is a nonprofit organization of conservative state legislators and private sector representatives who draft and share model legislation for distribution among state governments in the United States.”
…”conservative state legislators”.. Sure doesn’t sound like there is a Democrat to be found in the bunch
Also form Wiki: “ALEC has produced model bills on a broad range of issues, such as reducing regulation and individual and corporate taxation, combating illegal immigration, loosening environmental regulations, tightening voter identification rules, weakening labor unions, and opposing gun control.”
All of the issues listed are strictly conservative and GOP LOVED causes.
Your assertion that ALEC is grassroots is, in two letters B.S.
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RE: “Your assertion that ALEC is grassroots is, in two letters B.S.”
Do you think ALEC has no right to pursue a political agenda?
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I didn’t say that. I countered your claim that ALEC is GRASSROOTS. A point you are now deflecting from about whether I believe they have the right to pursue an agenda. They do, but they are Grover Norquist sneaky about it.
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RE: “I believe they have the right to pursue an agenda.”
So, ALEC is an elite organization that has something in common with grassroots movements: the right to pursue an agenda.
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You and I have something in common also: We both post here. That doesn’t make us equal in the way you appear to be suggesting.
Your assertion concerning ALEC is still BS.
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I don’t give this left wing “story” much credibility since I know voting integrity laws are called “voter restriction” or laughably “voter supression” by the left to raise phony alarm. Also, the left refers to GOP territory protection as gerrymandering but denies Democrats do the exact same thing. Then rags like this throw out generalizations that are plainly false like “there was no voter fraud” or founding fathers being against separation of church and state is false. Of course there was proven fraud and I’m not so sure all founding fathers were onboard with separation of church and state. It was a hot topic at the time that only Jefferson commented on that I know of and it is not in the constitution, only inferred/interpreted by the establishment clause. So to sum it up, there is no “Boot Camp” for destroying democracy or voting rights. That is clearly hyper-liberal sensationalism that makes the sane people laugh.
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Congratulations on completing boot camp.
Voter fraud is used by the right to raise phony alarms. Especially alarms that have been proven in courts and by NUMEROUS think tanks of both sides to not having ANY effect on election outcomes.
When the idea of closing polling places, limiting voting hours, limiting opportunities to vote absentee, and, G-d forbid, offering food and water to voters waiting to cast their ballots, has something to do with integrity, it is YOU who is laughable.
Yes, both sides are guilty of gerrymandering. But the GOP has it down to a scalpel level science.
The First Amendment pretty clearly addresses the idea of the separation of church and state. Whether ALL of the founders agreed is irrelevant. It was passed into law.
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Congratulations on proving you deserve the laughing stock award. I’m kind of perplexed why you would congratulate me now after 40 years since I left the gates at RTC Orlando but thanks anyway?!?!?
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When it is your rights they come after, I wish you well.
On everything else, your prive your editorial idiocy more than Tucker Carlson calling the military “woke” for not doing something that has nothing to do with military operations; freeing the container ship in the Suez.
You are both, in a simple word, idiots.
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LMAO, What in the world are you babbling about? Lay off the drinking for a while there bro!!!
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Sorry. let me be clear. YOU…ARE…AN…IDIOT….IN..THE…SAME…VEIN…AS…TUCKER…CARLSON.
By the way, I too walked out of the gates of RTC Orlando in the 80’s. I guess I just learned more than you while htere.
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Georgia’s election results in 2020 were examined, counted, recounted and recounted again by hand. State election officials ordered and carried out a standard sampling to verify the signature matching process and found a couple of possible mismatches.
GA state officials, all Republicans, verified, solidified, emulsified the results. They didn’t back down after extortion and threats personally by the ex-president.
So, the logical question to those lawmakers who conjured up a whole bunch of new rules is what voting integrity issues are you trying to solve?
The answer of course is “none”. They just don’t cotton to the “urban voters” and their rural brethren “wink, wink”. Shoot, they were in their “place” a few decades back in the good old days. Time to reestablish the “proper order” that our ancestors had.
And that is what this is all about. Uppity won’t be tolerated. “Cotton pickers” ain’t pickin’ our government folk, no way, no how.
Harsh? Of course. The new Republican Party is giving the finger to our nation, wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross, as paraphrased and attributed to Sinclair Lewis.
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RE: “So, the logical question to those lawmakers who conjured up a whole bunch of new rules is what voting integrity issues are you trying to solve?”
A more logical question is, What issues do Georgia’s lawmakers THINK need to be solved? It makes no sense to substitute our reality for theirs.
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What to they THINK? That was my exact question.
I know what they are thinking. “If we let the black voters actually vote, we lose elections.”
The excuses are what I find pretty lame. If the voting in 2020 turned up no fraud that would have changed the election, multiple recounts, signature sampling, the whole shootin’ match then any effort to change that makes no sense. They had a clean, reliable and accurate system of elections.
So it is at best a power grab by denying easy access to the ballot box at best. and at worst, a racist scam.
Probably both.
All of the 250 election rule changes proposed and some already passed are all about the excessive number of minority voters.
The Michigan election official who was willing to certify an almost all white district with more “numbers” problems than Detroit, but not Detroit itself tells me exactly where the Republican stand is: race.
The Confederate flags among the insurrectionists, die hard Trump supporters and his standby gangs, tells the true story without phony rhetoric about “trust in the elections”.
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Hugs and kisses.
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RE: “I know what they are thinking.”
I don’t believe you do. It is why I wrote: It makes no sense to substitute our reality for theirs.
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Delusional reality based on lies is NOT reality.
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