Dashboard Politik: Gun Control.

I shot a gun for the first time in my life this year. It was loud and it hurt. It was also kinda cool when I figured out how to actually hit the targets.

On the long car ride from upstate to NYC, I got into a debate about politics with people I didn't know that well ... which is so the kind of thing I'd do. Obviously, the topic of gun control came up.

My biggest beef with the topic? Everyone says "It's a constitutional right! End of Story." This pisses me off for various reasons.

Firstly, the Supreme Court has consistently upheld for the last 80 or so years that the right of an individual to own a gun is NOT constitutionally protected. Now that doesn't mean we can't have a debate about it; what is means is that there are really two debates: The first is whether you believe the Supreme Court wrongly interpreted the sentence "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to a free state, the right to bear arms shall not be infringed." The second is, if the constitution doesn't protect an individual's right to own a weapon (which, currently, it doesn't), how much, if at all, should we limit an individual owning weapons.

Let's tackle the first "debate" first. Since I'm not a constitutional lawyer, I, truthfully, don't entirely understand the nuances of the Supreme Courts decision but the gist is this: When the constitution was penned, the term "to bear arms" commonly referred to military service. Taking into consideration the beginning of the amendment ("A well-regulated militia ..."), the Supreme Court has interpreted the amendment to protect the right of individuals to form militias. Well-regulated militias ... which are necessary for a free state. Arguably, the Illinois National Guard would fall under this definition. Note that Crazy Joe with his machine gun in Alabama does not constitute a well-regulated militia.

Now during this dashboard politik as I'm calling it (which now that I'm looking it up on Wikipedia doesn't really make sense but it's catchy so I'm keeping it), someone brought up an argument that I'd never heard before and couldn't immediately refute. The argument I have come to learn is termed the "Insurrectionist Theory." It goes as follows: The founder fathers ensured the right to bear arms so that individuals could have comparable weapons to the government which they then could use to overthrow the government. It's an interesting idea. I do believe that the founder fathers crafted our government to ensure that citizens could freely oppose the government. However, for me, it seems somewhat of an illogical argument. If you were plotting to overthrow the government, why would you respect its laws? Doesn't respecting its laws, forbidding you, for instance, from obtaining an assault weapon, inherently give those laws validity?

Let's say, however, you think it is logical. It did, definitely, give me pause. So I did a little research. Apparently, The Insurrection Theory of the Second Amendment, is actually a relatively new theory and is hotly debated by legal scholars. Something to note is that it's primarily supported by selective quotes from the founding fathers ... most of whom were Anti-Federalists. In case you missed it in history class, the Federalists won (twice, actually, if you count the Civil War.)

So let's move on, with the assumption that the Supreme Court has, for the last 80 years, correctly interpreted the constitution and an individual's right to own a weapon is not constitutionally protected. Now defining something as not constitutionally protected really tells us nothing - it tells us that we, as citizens of a democracy, have a right to make laws that prohibit, limit, require gun ownership or don't say anything at all. Obviously, every state, has some sort of Gun Control laws.

One of the questions I often ask is why does any individual need a hand gun? What purpose does it serve other than to kill people? It's not good for hunting so why do you need it? Here are some arguments and my opinionated refutation:

• Protection: You need a hand gun to protect yourself. Statistically speaking, if you have a hand gun in the house, it is more likely to be used against you than you are to use it against an intruder. The argument was made that that was a skewed statistic because people with unregistered hand guns wouldn't take them out for fear of punishment for having an unregistered hand gun. But if that's the case then you aren't using that hand gun to defend yourself. Furthermore, I think this argument perpetuates the atmosphere of fear we have in this country - don't move, you might get killed! Aaah!
• Sport/Recreation: Going to a shooting range is fun and recreational; shooting is a sport. Firstly, there is no sport in which people shoot hand guns. Secondly, is the fact that someone considers something "fun" or recreational really a good litmus test for its legality? I've read that Southerns considered lynching blacks quite the recreational activity. Does that make it OK? What about drugs or drive-by shootings or gang rape?
• Everything is Dangerous: Driving in a car is dangerous too. That's true. I could get hit by a bus walking across the street looking both ways. However, a car's main purpose is transportation. A gun's main purpose - the reason it was created (regardless of how fun it is to shoot at targets) - is to kill stuff. Danger is the point not the unhappy side effect.

Here's a shocker: I don't actually think all guns should be outlawed. Mostly, because I think by making something illegal, you take it out of your control. Also, because I think it's great that Joe-Shmoe gets his meat from hunting (as opposed to the evil factory farms our government supports). I do think you should need a permit and a background check to own a gun - any gun - and I think that, for guns that aren't intended for hunting, you should have a decent reason. Most importantly, I do not think it should be legal to carrying a concealed weapon. Period. Ever. Cops don't, why should you?

My real point, though, is this: Let's all wake up and read a history book. An individual's right to own a gun is not constitutionally protected so let's have a real discussion about gun control. I don't care if you agree with me but can we please talk about it without the conversation being cut off immediately by "It's in the constitution!" because it's not. Please?

The primary system is failing us!!

I just found out that Edwards is dropping out of the presidential race. This right after Kucinich - by far the best progressive candidate and the only politician i know with the balls to risk his career to do what's right - dropped out due to a fierce re-election campaign.

I'm heartbroken and I blame the primary system. Here's why:

• Having primaries on different days in different states gives more weight to those states that come first. Super Tuesday hasn't happen yet. Four states - count them four - have voted. (Well technically 6 states have voted but since the democratic party has used its corrupted weight to disenfranchise Michigan and Floridian democrats and not count their votes, I won't either). Only 8% of the country has weighed in on primary candidates and already 4 candidates (Kucinich, Edwards, Dodd, andBiden) have dropped - one of them (Edwards) even had a real shot. Moreover, none of the states that have voted are states significant enough to swing an election. Plus I don't want Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada, and South Carolina to make voting decisions for me. Do you?
  
• Caucus's are bullshit. The caucus system (used in Iowa and I think Nevada), just like th electoral college, are fucking us time and time again. They are complex and time-consuming - we can't even get people to come out and pull a lever, let alone show up at a specific time to play musical chairs. Moreover, it gives a skewed perception of people's votes. If my candidate doesn't get enough people standing in the corner, then I have to more all my voting power to another candidate that I don't want. It makes it an all or nothing race and convinces people that a) certain policies are more popular than they are and b) that they can never vote for a long shot candidate because they'll have to pick the mainstream choice anyway. I do understand the motivation behind caucusing - it gives some semblance of a second choice. However, there are better options out there - like Instant Run-Off which allows you to rank candidates giving the politicians and the media and you a better picture of what Americans really want.
• The god damn media. Something needs to be done about the FCC and it's total unresponsiveness to the American people. (Don't believe me? The FCC recently ruled to open up media companies to even more conglomeration despite holding hearings across the country in which citizens overwhelmingly said NO to this proposal.) The media has talked about 2, maybe 3, democratic candidates - Clinton, Obama, and somtimes Edwards. And what do they talk about? Clinton's tear; whether race or gender will cause one or the other to win. It's ridiculous. Maybe, for once, CNN could mention some of their policies?
  
• Debates not being debates. This plays into the above topic. Kucinich - despite meeting their set criteria - was not allowed in multiple televised debates. Remember when we had fair access laws? Think we still do? Thanks to Reagan the media can favor a single candidate - even in a debate - for no reason what so ever. The American public - we included - tends to think that debates are run by the government or some non-partisan organization. Not so. Debates are run by the Democratic party and the Republican party period. So what you might say? So this means that they are not going to include third parties or even their own candidates if they seek to create change.

Ahh. I'm so fucking pissed about this. Now who am I going to vote for? Mrs. Corporate interests or Mr. I talk the talk but never show up for Senate votes?

Why Computers Don't Work and Touchscreen Voting Machines are BAD FOR DEMOCRACY ...

Over Thanksgiving, Adam and I visited an old friend and his new girlfriend. The conversation, predictably, turned to politics. Adam or I somehow or another, predictably, brought up Greg Palast and his investigations into systematic voter disenfranchisement by the republican party in 2000 & 2004 in FL, NM, and OH. Don't know what I'm talking about? Read about it on GregPalast.com and/or buy his book, Armed Madhouse.

Girlfriend commented that we are less sophisticated with voting that Honduras (or some Central American country) because they use touch-screen voting machines.

I was instantly transported back to my Computer Science professor's office after the 2004 elections and our, admittedly random, conversation on the horrors of touchscreen voting.

That's right: Two people with advanced degrees in Computer Science think touch screen voting machines are a bad idea. Bad bad BAD.

I think this surprises many people who equate technological advancement with 'better.' But let me ask you this: Has your computer ever crashed and lost ALL of your life's files? Has your computer ever crashed when you had a serious deadline in, like, 10 minutes? Have you ever read through a manual for a new gadget or software? Have you ever understood said manual? Have you ever had to wait days or weeks for someone to come fix your internet connection? Have you ever had to leave your computer for days or weeks to have it repaired?

Of course you have. Why? Because computers don't work.

Nah, I jest ... sort of. The truth of the matter is that computers are insanely complex. There are whole areas of theoretical computer science devoted to proving that software and computers do what they say that they can do. Most commercial software and hardware are never put to these tests - they tend to live in the minds and papers of disheveled professors and disgruntled students. The point is that a computer cannot be guaranteed to work when you need it, where you need it, and how you expect it to. And this isn't even taking security into account.

And touch screen voting machines are simply computers with fancy screens. Now it is true that there are computers systems out there (banking anyone?) that guarantee that their computers work exactly correctly and are rarely down. It takes a lot of money, planning, and techy people to make this happen.

Does every county in the state have a super tech on hand to immediately fix issues with touch screens? Do they have the money to pay for a redundant system and high security measures? Have they put in the time and effort to train the election volunteers on how to use, fix, and troubleshoot the machines?

Hell no.

In a disturbing turn of events, the Department of Justice has settled their lawsuit with the New York State Board of Elections by forcing NY State to comply with disabled-access provision in the Help Americans Vote Act of 2002. Now I am all for ensuring the voters can vote, no matter the circumstance. Who isn't? (Besides Bush, Cheney, and the Republican party) The problem with this settlement is that is defines both Paper Ballot Optical Scan Systems (PBOS) AND touch screen electronic voting systems (DRE) as acceptable disabled-access ballot marking devices.

The good news is that your precinct has a choice. The bad news is that many people, like Girlfriend, think that touch screen voting machines - machines that have been proven to be unreliable and easily tampered with - are better. Remember kids - shiny and pretty aren't better! Never forget the Ford Pinto.

Alright, now for some facts. I am totally stealing these talking points from the NY Chapter of Progressive Democrats for America:

OPTICAL SCAN TECHNOLOGY (PBOS) IS BETTER THAN TOUCH-SCREEN VOTING MACHINES (DRE’s)
TOUCH-SCREEN VOTING MACHINES HAVE A TRACK RECORD OF FAILURE

One Example: AccuVote-TSX machines (Diebold) in Cuyahoga County, Ohio
May 2006.

• The poll workers were baffled on how to work the machines and the manuals from Diebold were useless.
• 143 machines broke down. Dozens of other machines had printer jams or mysteriously powered down.
• More than 200 voter-card encoders (which create the cards that let voters vote) went missing
• One audit of the election discovered that in 72.5 percent of the audited machines, the paper trail did not match the digital tally on the memory cards.

TOUCH-SCREEN VOTING MACHINES ARE BEING REJECTED BY
ELECTION OFFICIALS AND LEGISLATORS ACROSS THE COUNTRY

• Spring 2006: Florida decides to get rid of their electronic voting machines.
• July 2007: California decertifies every electronic voting machine in the state after a Top-To-Bottom Review.
  
• December 2007: Colorado decertifies about half of its touch-screen devices.
• December 2007: Ohio secretary of State Jennifer Brunner releases a report that states touch-screens “may jeopardize the integrity of the voting process.” Brunner is now ordering Cuyahoga County, Ohio to scrap its touch-screen machines and go back to paper-based voting before the Ohio primary, scheduled for March 4th 2008.
• December 2007 Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) sponsor a bill (S.2295) that would ban the use of touch screen machines across the country by 2012.

THE BEST CHOICE IS “OPTICAL SCAN” TECHNOLOGY

• The voter marks her votes on a paper ballot, filling in bubbles to indicate which candidates she prefers. Voters with disabilities or non-English languages directly mark and verify their ballot by using an accessible ballotmarking-device (BMD).
• The vote is immediately tangible to the voters; they see it with their own eyes, because they personally record it.
• The tallying is done rapidly, because the ballots are fed into a computerized scanner. There are no delays for voters because one scanner can countthousands of ballots a day (3500). With DREs you may have to stand in line because it takes twice as long to vote on a DRE as on a lever machine or paper ballot. You need at least two DREs to replace each lever machine. If a DRE breaks down, you are stuck, but if the scanner breaks down, you can keep on voting on paper ballots.
• If there’s a recount, the elections officials can simply take out the paper ballots and count the votes by hand.
• The voter-marked paper ballots prevent endless fighting over tight election results.
• Optical scanning is used in what many elections experts regard as the “perfect elections” of Leon County, FL where the error rate — how often his system miscounts a ballot — is three-quarters of a percent at its highest, and has dipped as low as three-thousandths of a percent.
• PBOS systems are MORE COST EFFICIENT to acquire, maintain, and use PBOS machines cost about one third what DREs cost. One DRE serves 200-300 voters, while one optical scanner and one accessible ballotmarking-device serves 2000-3000 voters, so far less equipment is needed. The cost efficiency of PBOS over DRE’s has been acknowledged by New York County Elections Commissioner Douglas Kellner.

myspace message from adam entitled "My Mind Has Just Been Fucking Blown"

"An analysis of the National Election Study exit poll data by Harvard political scientist Barry Burden showed that only 9% of the people who thought Nader was the best candidate actually voted for him. If people had not voted strategically, but instead voted for their favorite candidate, Nader would have had over 30 million votes instead of 2.9 million and might have won the election"

The full Barry Burden study is on line(PDF), but it's 23 pages long, and written by a political scientist at Harvard....so it's very fucking boring. I took this from the Draft Nader Page. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.

Oh, and a reminder, that's 30 million votes for a guy who spent about 80 million less than the other two candidates and wasn't in the debates. Which leads to think....maybe he should have run as a Democrat.

my mind has similarly been blown ... like, to pieces.

Green on Gore ...

Harsh words from the Green Party directed at leftist Gore supporters ...

It was under the Clinton/Gore administration that Depleted Uranium weaponry was first authorized. It was under was the Clinton/Gore administration that 1,000,000 innocent Iraqi children died from the sanctions, which is still a greater death toll than the Bush administration, although the Bushies are catching up quickly.

The Clinton/Gore administration first authorized "extraordinary rendition" and signed the 1996 Telecommunications Act which has further consolidated the corporate media, which is, in my opinion the biggest risk to democracy we face today. Let us also not forget "Welfare Reform" and the "War On Drugs", both an attack on poor people. Clinton/Gore again.

Then let us not forget that Gore actually won the 2000 election and instead of standing up for those who voted for him, including the 90,000 illegally purged from the voting rolls, Al Gore told the Congressional Black Cacaus to "sit down and be quiet", as noted in the Michael Moore movie Farenheight 9-11.

The WTO protests of Seattle in 1999 were targeting the policies of the Clinton/Gore administration. This includes signing up for NAFTA, GATT, the WTO, the IMF, massive give-a-ways of public land to the Mining Industries and of large tracts of our forests to the Lumber Industries.

None of this was mentioned in his cute little film. Instead of targeting the corporate responsibility for the crisis of global warming, he tells us what "we little people" can do. Buy a Prius, change a light bulb etc, not what General Motors should be forced to do. Just us "little people" changing bulbs etc. He also obviously did not target the policies started under his vice-presidency. No talk of NAFTA or corporate globalization in his movie.

Al Gore is a well packaged, corporate friendly "environmentalist." Al Gore is a "green-washed" corporate prostitute who has been green-washed just as surely as British Petroleum or any other corporate polluter. My fullest apologies to prostitutes for comparing you to Al Gore.

Now that is really an "inconvenient truth" and I can guarantee that this is something you will never hear from the Sierra Club, Dennis Kucinich or any of the local versions of him here in Minnesota. That is another "inconvenient truth."

In other words, wake up people. Pay attention to the actions instead of the words. You are being lied to, again.

it's worse than i thought ...

read this.


and let me just say, honestly without any giddy glee (in fact, it's more like horror) ...

i told you so.

Wayne's World

if you don't get feminist news like me, you may not know that a debate has been raging about the opening of a new Planned Parenthood in none other than my home state of Illinois in the town where Wayne and Garth lived. the city blocked the opening saying that planned parenthood did not obtain permits legally and anti-abortion groups rallied.

but so did pro-choicers ... and now the clinic, which i believe is the largest in the state, is open. hooray.

read the planned parenthood myspace blog here.

in other lame, anti-feminist moves, verizon decided to block NARAL's short code which allowed users to voluntarily sign up for news via text from NARAL. eventually, after thousands of customers wrote the ceo of verizon, he relented.

read some blogs about it on Huffington Post or where ever else you want.

which brings me to ....

drum roll please ....

capitalism and the importance of the following:

1. government regulation in capitalism. once upon a time, telephone companies (and gas and electric and other types of industries where a service was deemed essential and a monopoly deemed a necessary evil) were heavily regulated. the government told them that they couldn't take advantage of their decidedly un-capitalistic position of controlling our communications, heat, electricity, water, etc. They had to provide services to people. Good service. Unbigoted service. remember that time? me neither but it should be returned to none the less.

we assume that our sources of news are accurate and that we are being given information. news flash. we're not. no, we can't all spend all our time gaining all the itsy bit of info on everything that happens in this country. that's why we have journalists. journalists, who until recently, took seriously their ethical responsibility to be as fair as possible in their reporting, to protect whistle blowers, and to not bow to the powers that be. it's hard for reports to do this when their pay check comes from ... the powers that be.

plus my electric bill is outrageous.

2. consolidation of big business is anti-capitalistic. in fact, having only a handful of corporations operating in a single industry (or related industries) comes pretty damn close to monopoly. and monopoly is essentially the same as communism. that's right, communism. both involve one large, omnipotent entity controlling the production, pricing, and consumption of a product.

i don't how many people remember (or ever learned?) basic economics but adam smith, the "founder" of capitalism had this little theory of an "invisible hand." the idea being that all these small businesses compete in a market for customers and an invisible hand determines the price based on supply and demand. the key part here is small businesses. it's much like democracy. individuals make small decisions that collectively decided the direction of our government (baring violations of the bill of rights etc ... again importance of the role of government ...). nothing pisses me off more than small business owners who are fiscally conservative, which in today's political sphere is essentially pro-big business. which in turn, is anti-small business. perhaps you didn't notice but bush has consistently cut (and proposed further cuts) of the small business administration budget. not to mention he tax "cuts" which only benefit the rich and wealthy.

i saw the premiere of "An Unreasonable Man", the documentary about Ralph Nader. afterwards there was a Q & A with the film makers and someone asked a question about Ralph's support of capitalism. this girl was shocked to hear the Ralph was pro-capitalism and pro-small business (which in my head should ... and do go hand in hand).

when adam and i were first dating we would play a game where we'd ask each other random questions. once he or i asked what we most disagreed with about popular liberal politics. both our answer was that we felt that socialism was not the answer. i feel that this is another thing that the exceptional right wing pr machine has twisted: that all liberals are commies; that being anti-big business is equivalent to being anti-capitalism. i believe in entrepreneurship and supporting small businesses in america. i believe in capitalism. but i also believe in learning from history. a history that smacked us across our heads and told us that the government was an essential part of the economy and must regulate capitalism, i.e. the great depression.

so what can you do to support small business? i don't have all the answers but here are a few ideas:

buy handmade at etsy.com

buy things at locally owned stores

join a csa

choose to use a small business for things like: web sites/hosting/design/development, financial planning, real estate, insurance ...

yes, it might be a bit more work and a bit more expensive but think of it as moving towards a culture where walmart gets taxed more than you. which is really money in your pocket.

AND then there might be a real Wayne's World ... you know, locally produced media. it'd be awesome!