I Wanna Be Sedated

Couldn’t sleep last night. Why? Election worries.

They can only win by theft, cheating and outright nefarious dirty tricks. And by they, I mean the Republican Fascist Party. Of course.

Will the Blue Wave be mondoliscious enough to counteract the treacherous vote swindling and betrayal of you, me and the whole rest of America?

Besides gerrymandering the fuck out of everyplace they touch they’ve:

• Closed polling places in communities where folks rock a darker shade of pale.
• Purged eligible voters from the rolls without letting the people know.

The Georgia gubernatorial race is practically dead-even with 25 days to go before the 2018 midterm elections. Democrat Stacey Abrams is the former minority leader of the state’s house of representatives, as well as the first African American woman to be nominated for governor by a major political party. Republican Brian Kemp is a devout Trump acolyte and the state’s current secretary of state. It’s in this role that Kemp oversees Georgia’s elections, and, on Tuesday, the Associated Press reported that over 53,000 voter applications have been put on hold  under the controversial “exact match” verification policy. Over two-thirds of those affected are African American. (source)

• Bar felons who’ve done their time from voting.

There are exceptions.
* In Maine and Vermont even the incarcerated can vote.

* In the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland,  Massachusetts, Michigan, Montana, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island and Utah, a prisoner can as soon as he/she gets out.

* In California, Colorado, Connecticut, and New York a prisoner can vote once he/she finishes parole.

* In these 19 states you need to have finished probation before you can once again exercise your patriotic duty:
Alaska, Arkansas, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, Louisiana,  Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin

* AND in Kentucky, Virginia, Iowa and Florida only the governor can restore the right to vote. If you’re a black man in that mercenary Turtle McConnell’s Kentucky or Prick Scott’s Florida or Chuck Grassley’s Iowa, I’m figuring you can bet on staying disenfranchised.

• Eliminated early voting

• Instituted bullshit voter ID laws

This week, the Supreme Court declined to overturn North Dakota's controversial voter ID law, which requires residents to show identification with a current street address. A P.O. box does not qualify.

Many Native American reservations, however, do not use physical street addresses. Native Americans are also overrepresented in the homeless population, according to the Urban Institute. As a result, Native residents often use P.O. boxes for their mailing addresses and may rely on tribal identification that doesn't list an address.

Those IDs used to be accepted at polling places — including in this year's primary election — but will not be valid for the general election. And that decision became final less than a month before Election Day, after years of confusing court battles and alterations to the requirements. (source)

So yeah...OF COURSE I'm having trouble sleeping!

I Wanna Be Sedated – The Ramones