What are populist priorities? I say the vote is priority one.
Get people registered to vote.We--yes, we--Democrats--rushed to kill off ACORN, for reasons that are a mystery to me.
Meanwhile, I listened to the IRS hearings on CSPAN. The big complaints about IRS scrutiny were coming from one astroturf not for profit after another, all Republican and probably teabagger. Doesn't seem coincidental.
One testified that they have a national conference call amongst themselves every Sunday night to share info and encourage each other. (Who pays for that?) My guess is that they are not focusing on registering poor people. My guess is that they are not focusing on the college youth vote, either, with the exception of Young Republicans.
Bottom line: We used to have ACORN, a not for profit that focused on getting people registered to vote who who were likely to vote Democratic. Now, we have a network of astroturf organizations that are probably focusing on getting people likelier to vote Republican registered to vote and no ACORN. What's wrong with that picture and what can we do about it?
Make voting convenient.
People should get at least a half day off from work to vote, providing they produce proof of having voted. Early voting should be an option in every state, and should include weekdays and at least one weekend. Absentee ballots should be easy to obtain.
Use paper ballots!
Boston went to paper ballots for the 2004 Presidential. Yes, a machine counted them. Over time, a voter could opt to have a machine mark them as well, or could opt to use the pencil. (Either way has its risks--pencil can be erased later and who can say if the voter was responsible for the erasure or not). In any case, though, the voter can inspect the ballot before feeding it to the machine that will count it. And, in the event of a close count, the ballots can be counted by hand.
We can lobby hard for this with our state reps and state senators. The feds can also require it for federal elections and help fund a switchover. The voting machine people will squeal, but they have fewer votes than we do, so let's squeal louder.
Enact stiff state and federal penalties for interfering with the vote in any way at all, including intentionally giving false info about when and where to vote, vote caging, etc..
I'll leave the exact wording to legislators, lawyers and staffs. I have full confidence they can do it if they wish. Force them to "wish."
INSIST!
I don't want to hear voters or politicians do any more whining about stolen elections or elections close enough to steal, while doing next to nothing to keep the vote abundant and clean.
Any suggestions?
= new reply since forum marked as read
I'd offer some free basic civics classes at unemployment offices. Might as well use the space. 
I kid. 
Thanks. Frankly, when I see what DUers describe as "basic civics," I see the subject is very controversial. Then again, everything these days seems to have a right and a left view, even basic science. And Constitutional law is far from a science, or we would not have so many 5-4 decisions.
But, more education is a great idea anyway.
And more critical thinking skills. The reason I like Bernie is he doesn't take that awkward pause before answering a question. There's no such thing as manipulation in his mind. It's here are the facts, make your choice, and he moves on.
If education in the USA wasn't so down trodden we wouldn't be having these one on one discussions and basically agreeing on the same thing. The rest of the populous needs to be doing the same thing and the 1st thing is knowing what to ask.
Education, there's a reason it's being attacked. Charter Schools = $ drain on established brick and mortar schools and don't get me started about knee capping the teachers union.
have a great night.
