Election Day Open Thread
Decatur Metro | November 8, 2016 | 9:05 am
It’s Election Day, and you know what that means…open thread on a Tuesday!!
Are there lines at the polls? (Steady stream of voters at First Christian this morning, but no real line)
Any issues at the precincts? Any last minute concerns about the ballot? etc, etc…
If you don’t know where you need to vote, you can access the State’s voter webpage to pull up the address of your assigned precinct. Happy voting Decatur!
When is everyone generally going to vote, morning or evening?
Last week.
The line is out the door at North Decatur Presbyterian and has been all morning. But it’s moving.
Can I wear my “Vote for William J Lepetomane” shirt?
A man drink like that and he don’t eat… he is going to die!
WHEN????
‘scuse me while I whip dis out
9:15AM: No wait at the Clairmont West precinct, which votes on Sycamore Drive at the Church at Decatur Heights.
I see lots of nasty women out here today… and I like it.
Women are awesome. Nasty is a choice. Nasty knows no gender.
11 am no wait at First Christian polling location. Fun celebration was done for a few first time voters!
My son got the first time voter treatment. The pollworker shouted “first time voter!” and they all pounded on the tables and cheered. My son was completely embarrassed, but a good sport. We voted about 11:00 and most of the booths were taken, but there was no line. We were voters 400 & 401.
Please tell me where the official voting location is at Renfroe, and how to get in the buildng,
There are signs pointing to the front door.
Judging from my Facebook feed, I am the only woman in America who does not own a pantsuit. And I’m including millennials.
I am not a wearer of pantsuits. I’m wearing white as a tribute to the suffragettes. I am aware that that movement was tainted by racism, but it feels appropriate to give them a bit of a hat-tip today. Happy Election Day, everyone!
Same here – no pantsuit, but I wore white for the Suffragettes. Voted a little after 11 at Winnona Park Elementary and there was no line, but they told me I just missed the crowd.
That second sentence was superfluous.
Female millennials wear pantsuits?
They definitely do not. Thus we did not need to be explicitly told as much. 😉
Voted early this morning at first Baptist, one of the driver’s license machines was inoperable. UNACCEPTABLE!! I just posted a complaint to the GA Secretary of State (Brian Kemp)
http://sos.ga.gov/cgi-bin/email.asp
The line to vote at First Baptist Church was short and moved quickly. I wish I could say the same for the line at Taqueria Del Sol when we went to get our post-voting tacos.
Tasty specials this week. Kind of surprised they didn’t try and include some sort of variant of the taco bowl.
Heard there’s a Nasty Woman drink at the Imperial…what’s in it?
I don’t know but I’m hankering for a Mazel Tov cocktail.
And you may ask yourself
Am I right? Am I wrong?
And you may tell yourself
MY GOD! WHAT HAVE WE* DONE!
“Once in a Lifetime”
-Talking Heads
*LOG edit
Burning Down the House would have worked too.
Well, that was something.
Oh, $&!#
Guess it wasn’t about sexism and racism after all. People were evidently really upset about the way things have gone the last 8 years, and simply saw HRC as a continuation of the same. Sanders and Trump were both screams for change – a break from the status quo. I guess that’s what we got.
You may be correct on voters’ opinions of HRC.
But the results tell me our society is far more sexist and racist than I could have ever imagined.
Really – based on what evidence? Seems like there were many other major drivers —
It’s hard to ignore the evidence at Trump’s own rallies, all of the signs and t-shirts using the c word and b word to describe Clinton. FWIW, the anti-Clinton cottage industry has lost its reason for being. Now it’s Trump who will be under that constant scrutiny, and the backlash against him will likely be far greater than the backlash against Bush.
More women voted for Mr. Trump than for HRC.
Not true. More white women yes.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbs-news-exit-polls-how-donald-trump-won-the-us-presidency/
Good point G Buck (though I disagree that racism and sexism didn’t play big roles). There’s a lot of overlap between Sanders and Trump. I think that played out in the Rust Belt vote. Clearly this is no victory for conservatism, but for populism. One example: Trump won Arizona with about 50 percent. The significant minimum wage increase and sick day requirement on the Arizona ballot passed with over 59 percent.
Probably a lot of truth to that, but I would not underestimate the impact of the existing SCOTUS vacancy and the good chance that Trump will fill at least one other. The Second Amendment was probably hanging in the balance, and could have motivated huge numbers of gun-owning people to vote for that reason. Trump was smart to disclose a list of who would be on his SCOTUS short list — he made clear that his nominee would not try to read 2A out of the Constitution, as HRC’s almost certainly would have.
Sure that was a factor, but that would have been just as true in 2012 (though there was only the possibility of a SC vacancy then) and Romney lost all those Rust Belt states. Somehow Trump, a silver-spoon billionaire, made himself the voice of lower middle class whites.
Still sorting out this election, but besides the obvious results, what stands out to me are the state minimum wage increases that generally out-performed both candidates on the ballots. This issue has pretty solid bipartisan support that doesn’t seem to be noticed much. (in addition to the increases in some states, an initiative to actually lower the minimum wage for those under 18 in S. Dakota was rejected by over 70 percent of voters.).
It was also a big year for marijuana legalization, with California likely a major turning point. Perhaps not a critical issue, but still odd that, as far as I recall, only Gary Johnson was ever asked about it.
And then one I’m not quite sure what to make of is the apparent defeat of the N.C. governor despite Trump winning there by a bigger percentage than Romney did.
Difference is actually pretty huge. In 2012, no one expected Scalia to die before Obama’s term ended, and there was no indication that any of the other conservative justices planned to retire. It was far more likely that Ginsburg or Breyer would step down, which would give Obama an appointment, but not one that would change the ideological balance of the Court.
That all changed when Scalia died — Garland, if confirmed, would have given the liberals a 5th vote on everything, including gun rights. The immediacy of that threat was surely motivational for many, many people.
Not saying there weren’t many other reasons why so many came out for Trump, but my sense is that was a big one.
Probably the most true thing, though, is that each party nominated the only candidate the other could beat. Sort of borne out by the results, with Clinton winning the popular vote and Trump the electoral college. And though I don’t totally buy the Brexit comparison, one way in which it’s similar is that Clinton definitely represented the status quo in the same way “remain” did in the UK. It’s hard to inspire people to get out and vote for that versus a clear change.
Could Sanders have beat Trump? That’s what his millennial supporters tried to say. The prevailing wisdom was that you needed an experienced campaigner and politician like Clinton to win the Presidency. Maybe Sanders would have been a better bet?
It’s hard to imagine that Sanders would have lost all those Rust Belt states. Anecdotally, a friend in Michigan (and Bernie supporter) told me on Monday that he knew a lot of Bernie supporters who switched to Trump because of his stance on trade. Clearly there was more enthusiasm for Bernie (turnout was down this year; Romney got more votes than Trump or Clinton and lost by 5 million votes) but who knows if that would have translated to higher African-American turnout (which apparently was down in some key states).
So here’s the big questions: will Trump stick to his vow to tear up trade deals? to build a wall? to disengage from some of the world’s conflicts (and cede influence to Russia)? To punish companies that export jobs? These were major parts of his platform and the ones that most diverged from the Republican Party. And if he doesn’t, will his supporters care?
There are certainly some ways a “break from the status quo” could be a good thing (see link), but who knows if Trump will stick to his promises on anything?
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/column-trumps-good-ideas/
And this from the Decatur Tax Blog…… Voters expand homestead exemptions in Decatur
Unofficial results from yesterday’s election show that all four proposals to expand property tax homestead exemptions in Decatur passed, including a ballot question that will exempt homeowners over the age of 65 from school taxes beginning in 2017. Voters also approved a fifth measure which eliminates an exemption that was no longer in effect.
The vote on Senate Bill 339, which increases the basic homestead exemption to exempt $25,000 in assessed value, was the most decisive result with 86 percent approval.
SB 340, which increases the amount of assessed value exempted for homeowners over the age of 65, passed by 83 percent.
Voters favored the creation of a new exemption under SB 342 for homeowners over 62 with income under $50,000.
SB 343, the senior school tax exemption, proved to be the most controversial of the measures, but still passed handily at 75 percent.
Homeowners in Decatur who currently have the existing age 65 homestead exemption, the “GH2,” will be granted the new school exemption automatically in 2017. Homeowners with the basic homestead exemption do not have to reapply to receive the increased exemption amount; that will also be granted automatically. The City of Decatur will provide further guidance to homeowners on how and when to apply for the new exemption under SB 342 after the election results have been certified.
Can’t wait to see what Melania wears to the Inauguration and the Inauguration Ball. I’m betting not a pantsuit and not suffragette white.
From where I sit, I learned the following:
1) America is much more divided than I ever realized;
2) I vastly overestimated the common sense & intelligence of roughly half the voters in this country;
3) I vastly underestimated the basic decency of roughly half the voters in this country;
4) Trump was correct when he said, two years ago, that the Electoral College should be eliminated; and
5) Hearing a voice call out, “Kill Obama!” at Trump’s acceptance speech, along with the celebration rallies David Duke & the KKK threw celebrating Trump’s win as “a victory for white people”, tells me that HRC was absolutely correct that a large number of Trump voters properly belong in that basket of deplorables she talked about.
I have friends & family that include people of different races, who are LGBTQ, who are Muslim, Jewish, and immigrants. With Trump ascending to the Presidency, they are deathly afraid that their civil liberties will be stripped away from them, and that they are no longer safe in America. I am ashamed of, and for, my country.
It’s scary, Cubalibre. I guess we can hope Trump was full of crap on a lot of stuff he said (already looking like that on his vows to punish Clinton, though I still expect Obama will pardon her anyway). Will he just go along with Republicans because he doesn’t know what to do and just wants the title (my guess), or will he truly be unpredictable, which could involve sticking his thumb in the eye of some Republicans (especially on trade and domestic spending) or actually being harsher on immigration than even he dared to promise?
I think there’s a good chance that Trump may do something that is both impeachable and pisses off Congress enough that even his own party will be willing to impeach him.
I also think that those Rust Belt, rural, and industrial worker voters who are unhappy with their job and economic status are not going to find the help they seek from this new Administration. It can’t magically make the industrial age return. Their formerly secure jobs and pensions have not just gone off-shore, they’ve become automated or their industry has disappeared altogether. They flip from party to party every 4-8 years with a false hope that the new guy or gal can restore the good old days. (And I say this as someone with plenty of fondness for the good old days when my grandfather had a mill and my Dad had a secure life-long middle class white collar job with a pension with retiree medical benefits, now disappeared with the collapse of the company.) It’s natural to blame the current President and party for your ills.
I’m sort of in agreement with what some are saying about the Rust Belt voters: it’s not that they necessarily believe Trump can bring back those jobs, but here’s a giant middle-finger to those in both parties who didn’t protect them. This election, apparently, was big rejection of both neo-liberalism and neo-conservatism. I’d expect the populist, Bernie Sanders wing of the Democratic party to have a lot more influence now.
+1
Here’s a commentray on that: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/trump-voters-will-not-like-what-happens-next/2016/11/09/e346ffc2-a67f-11e6-8fc0-7be8f848c492_story.html
” I vastly underestimated the basic decency of roughly half the voters in this country;”
Looking at some of the turnout numbers, some of the blame has to go to Democrats who didn’t vote. Perhaps most critically, African-American turnout was down in swing states.
… and equally most critically: milennial voters in swing states. Of course, the very existence of the Electoral College also didn’t help.
These are the same kind of things conservative said after Obama was elected. It’s always the end of the world. I find it interesting that you only mention awful things Trump supporters say. Have you checked social media lately? Hillary supporters are vicious as well. You know, like even questioning the intelligence of 50% of the population.
Oh, by the way, if you want to see minority oppression, then get rid of the electoral college and go to majority rules. Majority rules scared the hell out of our founders, scares the hell out of me, and should scare the hell out of you (you know, being that 50% of the population are dumb dumbs).
Getting rid of the Electoral College would require a constitutional amendment – not an easy process.
The reason people are upset isn’t that a Republican won and a Democrat lost. It’s because the candidate that won built his entire campaign on hate, diviseness and fear. There are too many vulnerable people in our country who are now scared, and legitimately so.
One “change” you can take to the bank. Taxes down/spending up. Seen that before?