OCCUPY-WICHITA FORUM

It’s almost a year before the next election. So it’s never too soon to launch the primary Democratic Party election strategy – which can be summed up as nothing more than mobilizing the votes for certain demographics, in this case, the Latino Vote.

Here in Kansas however, there is added urgency for mobilizing registration campaigns so early. In February, new “anti voter fraud” regulations come into force which will make it extremely difficult for many class of citizens to register to vote. The standard is no longer proof of residence, but proof of US citizenship. And this new slandered is actually rather high. Most people will prove their citizenship through their birth certificate which establishes they were born in the US.

But simply presenting a birth certificate is no longer sufficient; it must now be a certified copy, meaning a copy which is produced directly from the original document and supervised under some one authorized to present the correct seal government to the document.

This greatly complicates the process of qualifying to vote. The first obvious problem is that now citizens must travel to the correct county or city of their birth and obtain a copy in person, a process that could take weeks and is not cheep. None of the Kansas counties are equipped to make copies on the scale needed to satisfy the new law, and then there are those who immigrated from outside the state who now have to acquire certified birth certifies from their home county, and the new standards are so vague and undefined that no one is sure that non-Kansas birth certificates, and that it will now fall to the local election boards to determine if these birth certificates are authentic, something else that they simply are not equipped to do.

And there is also the likelihood that this legislation runs afoul of federal regulations, specifically the motor voter act which demands state DMVs must also provide and process voter registration forms. Again, the DMVs are simply not equipped with the needed manpower or resources to comply with the new standards and will not be able to register any one.

It’s no secret why Brownback has ram-rodded this legislation through. New Mexico has recently passed similar changes which have already landed in the federal court. It’s widely bereaved that the judge in that district will overturn the legislation as unconstitutional, and SCOTUS will likely decline to hear the case as this is well established law. So thanks to ALLIC, the same legislation has been introduced in Kansas which sits in a different federal district and manned with conservative judge who just might uphold the new law.

It does have the added benefit of throwing a major monkey wrench in Democratic Partiy’s primary campaign strategy which is basically nothing more than mobilizing certain demographics which tend to vote for Democrats… including Latino voters, by making it harder for them to register to vote.

But this can’t be the primary motivation for Kansas Republicans as the Kansas Democratic Party is already very impotent as it is. The true motivation at work here is for Kansas to head the preverbal “activist judge” at the pass, preserving such laws that probably would make it harder for Democrats to compete in states that are still competitive.

It’s an obvious fact that the KDP doesn’t have the strength to stop such legislation. So they have decided to focus on getting as many people registered to vote before the new law comes into effect. But there are some major problems with this Democratic response:

First, it’s unlikely that enough new voters could be registered to dramatically change the political landscape. The Demographic mobilization strategy has been the center corner stone of Democratic campaigning for decades now, and has a very dismal showing.

Second, even if they could register enough voters to get Democrats into office, they will be short lived victories as the new law will prevent new voters from pro-Democratic Party demographics from registering or re-registering.

Beyond challenging the law in court, there isn’t really much else the KDP plans on doing to challenge the law.

This exposes a third problem, that the KDP’s response is pathetically anemic. Nothing is being done to push pressure on the supporters of the bill, or to make this an issue in the upcoming elections. Why I light to call BSASS or the “big shrug and sad sigh” strategy. Occupy Wichita is already planning several demonstrations to bring some of these issues to light.

One idea we are exploring is taking any number of prominent Wichita’s to the local DMV and getting them registered to vote… and recording the inevitably mayhem. But the KDP has already told us that they are NOT onboard with anything that could be remotely called “civil disobedience,” preferring instead to compel change within the system itself. Without there support, its going to be very difficult to get the noble citizens we need to call to attention the sort of flaws that the new voter registration codes are going to present as well as the sort of legal support the demonstrators are likely going to need in order to effectively and orderly made the demonstration.

We can’t have a riot in DMV and call it a success. Having demonstrators called out in handcuffs may make for some sensational headlines for a short while, but it will ultimately give the new laws advocates ammunition that we are here to rig the system, give the occupy movement another black eye, and still fail to expose the flaws in the new law.

Forth, we again see the DLC asleep at the switch again. We can’t pin all of this on the KDP. Indeed, the reason why Kansas was chosen in the first place is because we have the weakest Democratic presence in this federal district. Indeed, the KDP can only look after its own affairs in the state of Kansas.

But this “anti voter fraud” bill is designed to frustrate Democrat efforts in other more competitive states. How can they tell us that they are in this to win, while ignoring such blatant and overt efforts to cripple Democratic competitiveness in other districts? And if the DLC isn’t willing or able to step up to the plate on this, than all of our efforts are truly in vain.

This is one of the reasons I argue that the Democratic Party is dead. It doesn’t even seem to respond to pain. (The whole thing reminds me of a Family Guy Christmas where Stewie simply takes an arm from one of Santa’s elves.

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These observations, as well as the general passivity that Democrats have in general for the Republican agenda, that so called “pragmatism” also forces me to ask some rather hard questions about the voter registration drive itself, and my participation in the effort.

True, it’s a good thing to get people to register to vote. But if this is the end of our effort, than are really truly doing them a favor? Are we doing our selves any favors? An uninformed voter who votes a strait party ticket, or decides who they vote for by the toss of a coin is probably no better than a conservative voter, voting from a miss-informed position. And flooding the voter roles with uninformed and unmotivated voters has the effect of dummying down the voter base, making it easy for manipulators to thrive in the system.

There is also the duopoly question. What is the point of registering voters when the ballots only offer fake choices? To a certain degree, we are playing a part in the deception, telling them that their vote maters when it doesn’t.

On the specific question of weather to help average citizens to register to vote, or not; I have to admit that there is no compelling reason why not to help people register, and quite a few reasons to help them to register. But the problem is more complex than just this one question.

Would I be justified in just giving a present farmer a sword and shield and sending them strait into battle? True, a farmer with a real sword is better equipped, and would have a better chance of surviving the battle than if he was just armed with just a pitch fork. But there is still the enemy soldier to consider.

The enemy will also have his own sword and his own shield, plus he will be trained on how to use them, how to work as a team, and be disciplined to follow orders. The farmer is better with a sword than a pitch fork, but is still woefully unprepared for what faces him. In fact, the defenders that are trained, and that do have discipline, would probably be better served in sending the farmers away from the battle field, to leave the fighting to the professionals.

In the same way, simply getting some one registered to vote, and even getting them to vote on occasion, is still woefully inadequate, without also giving that voter the means to make informed and meaningful choices.

This begs the question… where is the follow up?

It’s clear that the DLC, and to a large extent, the KDP as well, are not interested in presenting any sort of further educational and intellectual support for the voters they just registered. Indeed by their strategy, such things are not necessary, instead focusing on demographics.

This is the second reason why I say that the Democratic Party is dead, its inability or unwillingness to present ideas to its base, or to challenge the ideas of the opposition.

----This is just me, asking questions.