Tag: american politics

Ten Terrible Reason to not Vote (and two good ones)

andthisisausername:

For Americans who are eligible to vote:

  1. “I don’t want to get jury duty!”   Being registered to vote has nothing to do with jury duty.  Anyone who pays taxes can get jury duty.
  2. “I don’t want to vote for the lesser of two evils!”   Stated wonderfully here: not voting for the lesser of two evils is like giving half a vote for the greater of two evils.  Sometimes, you get to vote on the greater of two goods.
  3. “I don’t know how to vote, or who to vote for!”  With the internet, learning about local issues is now extremely easy, and no longer time-consuming.  Also using the internet, you can learn how to vote, when to register.  If you don’t know if you’re registered, look it up here.
  4. “I don’t really care.”  Perfectly acceptable.  If you don’t care, don’t vote.
  5. “Elections are controlled by the rich!”  Corperations get fewer votes than you, and millionaires get the same amount.  Millionaires can change the vote, however, because most of them actually vote.
  6. “I physically can’t get to the polls.”  Absentee voting is annoying, but it exists.
  7. “Politics is eating my soul.”  Politics now seem to be about scaring people and raising hell and anxiety in the population.  The gridlock is annoying.  People care more about personal attacks than actual issues.  The only way to change this is to vote away from partisanship.
  8. “It’s not even a democracy.”  Yes it is.  Every American citizen can vote unless special circumstances forbid it.  It could be more representative, but you know how to change that?  You vote.
  9. “My vote doesn’t matter.”  IF EVERY YOUNG PERSON WHO USES THIS EXCUSE VOTES ONE TUESDAY EVERY TWO YEARS THEY WOULD LITERALLY BE THE DECIDING VOTE IN THOUSANDS OF ELECTIONS.

People born after 1980 make up 30% of people who can vote.  Only 21% of them vote.

  If you’re not voting, no one is hearing your voice.

Ten Terrible Reason to not Vote (and two good ones)

prokopetz:

I’m not going to say that anybody should be obliged to settle for “good enough” when it comes to their elected representatives – quite the opposite, in fact – but it seems to me that before one criticises a representative for their failure to do a thing, one ought to be aware of whether the office in question actually has the authority to do the thing.

Like how so many people seem to legitimately believe that Obama controls the price of a gallon of gas. 

Do they think there’s some magical dial on his desk that raises or lowers the price of gas to suit his political agenda???

Haiti and the United States

publius-esquire:

haitianhistory:

Hello, while we have kept you updated with posts about the U.S. Occupation of Haiti, I simply wanted to take a small break from that to share a few titles with you on another topic of great interest, that is, the ‘diplomatic’ relations between Haiti and United States during and after the Haitian Revolution. I put diplomatic in quotation marks since, from the time of Jefferson to the Civil War, Haiti and the United States did not enjoy formal diplomatic relations (given that Haiti’s independence as a state was not recognised). 

Although there seems to be this view that Haiti automatically existed in antagonism with the United States (which is not so completely false),  if we accept this too wholesomely, I think we risk missing out on the complexity posed by Saint-Domingue/Haiti to a country like the United States. Literature on American-Haitian relations suggests that different American administrations dealt with Saint-Domingue/Haiti well, differently. Indeed, it is very interesting to see how the U.S. had to reconcile the principles of its own revolution with the advent of a free black state like Haiti. 

At any rate, I hope these will be useful and feel free to add any suggestions. Happy reading!

B O O K S 

A Proslavery Foreign Policy: Haitian-American Relations during the Early Republic by Tim Matthewson

African Americans and the Haitian Revolution: Selected Essays and Historical Documents edited by Maurice Jackson and Jacqueline Bacon 

Caribbean Crossing: African Americans and the Haitian Emigration Movement by Sara Fanning

Diplomacy in Black and White: John Adams, Toussaint Louverture, and Their Atlantic World Alliance by Ronald Angelo Johnson

Encountering Revolution: Haiti and the Making of the Early Republic by Ashli White

Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America: Slumbering Volcano in the Caribbean by Alfred N. Hunt 

From Saint-Domingue to New Orleans: Migration and Influences by Nathalie Dessens

The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World by David P. Geggus 

The Diplomatic Relations of the United States with Haiti, 1776-1891 by Rayford W. Logan

The Road to Louisiana: The Saint-domingue Refugees, 1792-1809 edited by Carl A. Brasseaux and Glenn R. Conrad 

The World of the Haitian Revolution ed. by David Patrick Geggus and Norman Fiering 

Toussaint’s Clause: The Founding Fathers and the Haitian Revolution by Gordon S. Brown 

A R T I C L E S 

‘America’s Response to the Slave Revolt in Haiti, 1791-1806′ by Donald R. Hickey

‘Black Talleyrand: Toussaint Louverture’s Diplomacy, 1798-1802′ by Philippe R. Girard

‘Class Conflict and Diplomacy: Haitian Isolation in the 19th-Century World System’ by Arthur L. Stinchcombe 

’Jefferson and Haiti’ by Tim Matthewson

‘Jefferson and the Nonrecognition of Haiti’ by Tim Matthewson

‘Revolutionary Saint Domingue and the Emerging Atlantic: Paradigms of Sovereignty’ by Carolyn Fick 

‘The Haitian Revolution, Black Petitioners and Refugee Widows in Maryland, 1796-1820′ by Patricia A. Reid

‘The Haitian Revolution and the Forging of America’ by Jim Thomson

To this excellent list I’d also add the articles:

“Hamilton and Haiti” by Daniel Lang, located in The Many Faces of Alexander Hamilton

“The Power of Blackness: Thomas Jefferson and the Revolution in St. Domingue” by Michael Zuckerman in Almost Chosen People: Oblique Biographies in the American Grain

s-k-a-i-a:

this fuckin election is so wild

we’ve got Hillary Clinton, who’s like the classic democratic candidate but her only advantage over republicans is that she has sound morals and that’s about it

we’ve got Bernie Sanders, an old white straight guy that fights for the young, colored, gay, and female, who’s an open socialist and calls out republican bullshit constantly

we’ve got like fifteen interchangeable republican candidates who are all equal parts unremarkable and pieces of shit

we’ve got Donald Trump, an openly racist/sexist/homophobic man who basically just wants to strip everyone of their rights

and finally we have Mr. Deez Nuts