We made the list
Here’s a new distinction – for the first time ever the US is on the Reporters Without Borders list of most dangerous countries for journalists. High five?
At least 63 professional journalists were killed doing their jobs in 2018, a 15 percent increase over last year, said the group, Reporters Without Borders. The number of deaths rises to 80 when all media workers and people classified as citizen journalists are included, it said in its annual report.
The world’s five deadliest countries for journalists include three — India, Mexico and, for the first time, the United States — where journalists were killed in cold blood, even though those countries weren’t at war or in conflict, the group said.
“The hatred of journalists that is voiced … by unscrupulous politicians, religious leaders and businessmen has tragic consequences on the ground, and has been reflected in this disturbing increase in violations against journalists,” Secretary-General Christophe Deloire said in a statement.
The Annapolis shoot-up is what put us on the list.
Is it fair to say Trump has made the US a lot more dangerous for journalists? Damn right it is.
Trump (aka Captain Bonespurs) is a symptom, IMHO. Not the disease. The key is his slogan: “Make America great again.”
What was the single biggest factor or event contributing to her ‘ungreatness’? That would have to be her defeat under Kennedy-Johnson-Nixon and the His Eminence Grease Henry Kissinger in the Vietnam War.
Trump is the last squawk of ‘Manifest Destiny’, that gave America black slavery, the Indian Wars and finished up making her a colonialist power in other countries’ colonies.
Violence has been so much of her history. But what goes around, comes around.
I wish Trump were not the disease.
OB:
Worth considering. I have long maintained that power should never be given to anyone who seeks it.
The ancient Athenians used to choose all non-military leaders by lot: the way modern juries are still chosen. After all, if I was in the habit of hanging around court houses asking all and sundry to help me get appointed to a jury, eyebrows would be raised, and I would either be shown the door or arrested as a public nuisance. Yet we tolerate (cynically, I must admit) such antics in the seekers who want to get their hands on the levers of (Australian) parliamentary power. In fact, if you want to get in touch with your inner cynic, listen to a parliamentary broadcast or two.
If introduced into the US, it would be a powerful stopper of the likes of Trump, as they would not be able to buy their way onto the ballot. For that reason alone, it would be worth a try.
A relatively simple constitutional amendment would do it: popular election of candidates put onto the ballot paper by what amounts to drawing names at random out of a hat; and let those so chosen present themselves for presidential office as best they can. And it would take a helluva lot of persuading to convince me that such a procedure would be just as bad as the one that gave America Trump.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/dec/25/break-brexit-deadlock-ancient-athens-sortition?fbclid=IwAR37WWSH0kdlUx1p9wnvfusurJCWEpYEdQx_eMkY5ymLn1KT0kxqkKtb6V0
Actually, Omar, I was reading recently about early history, and it appears that a lot of elections were run that way at first. People just voted for who they wanted to vote for, not for people who were running. (I don’t think president was ever elected that way, but I won’t swear to it, as I am not a historian). The paper ballot was introduced to control the ballot – you had to write down who to vote for. That got rid of the illiterate, and certainly most of the black vote (in areas where black men were free and able to vote). It was aimed in large part at immigrants.
Then they started having people on the ballot that you had to read and mark who to vote for, because people were getting their ballots written by someone else and bringing them in. Eventually the idea grew that ballots should be secret. That was scorned at first, but I like that because it does make it less subject to coercion, though I’m not sure it is less subject to manipulation if some is determined and evil enough.
Iknklast:
My understanding has been that the secret ballot’s main purpose was to prevent retribution for voting against some standover man’s wishes. The main means used to stop blacks voting in areas of the US South where their numbers were considerable, was the poll tax: effectively an income/wealth test.
Re Omar and OB (1&2) i think a good analogy for Trump like entitities is opportunistic infections such as Haemophilus Influenzae. They’re always present, but when the system is weakened by another infection, they strike. IOW Trump is both a symptom and a cause.
Omar, whatever the main reason (or main method) of preventing blacks from voting, many measures, such as requiring the ability to read the ballot, had that effect. And I think the poll test was as much, if not more, of a means than the poll tax. Both also had the effect of reducing the vote of poor white trash, and probably women in those areas where women were able to get at least partial suffrage, since in many places women were not able to control their own money and many women were not given an education.
The desire to stop the “wrong” people from voting or to prevent the “wrong” candidate from being elected were many and nefarious, though most are now gone, to be replaced with voter ID laws, difficult to access polling places, and limited times for voting…plus the lies that suggest you will be immediately arrested if you have any outstanding traffic tickets or other warrants. And the extremely devious attempts to publish the wrong polling days in some neighborhoods, telling them that Republicans vote on Tuesday and Democrats on Wednesday. If anyone thinks that is apocryphal, by the way, I saw some signs stating just this when I lived in Texas.
Don’t Americans have to register as either Republican or Democrat to be able to vote (I’ve heard the phrase ‘registered Rep/Dem voter many times and assume that’s the meaning)? If so, and even if some do vote contrary to how they registered, to all intents it isn’t really that secret a ballot.
No. We don’t have to vote either Republican or Democratic either. You have to register to vote in party primaries, but not in the general elections.
Well, you do have to be registered to vote in general elections, but you can be independent. In some states, there are other choices, as well. When I moved to Nebraska, you could take the option of registering Green, but they lost their official status because they didn’t get enough votes. Libertarians often register independent, too.
I have been subjected to the smug righteousness of some Independent voters who are like Freethinkers or Skeptics – they think the title is descriptive of them, rather than just a label that helps sort them into official boxes. They choose to call themselves Independent, and believe that means they are superior, because they don’t declare loyalty to a party. I was registered Independent for a while, but never thought it meant anything other than my being so mad at the Democrats I switched parties for a few years. The Democrats never noticed, though. They still sent me begging letters all the time, and addressed me as though I were a member of the party. So any protest value did no good.
Do you have to register as something? One party or another? I don’t recall having to do that, but maybe that’s because I just don’t recall it. Only I’d think I would recall it, because it’s so absurd. I’m not “a Democrat.” I vote for the Dems but that doesn’t mean I am one.
Alabama does not have party registration at all. You are just a “registered voter”, not a “registered Democrat/Republican”. I don’t know what other states are like that, but I don’t think Alabama is alone.
In Nebraska, we have to register, but we can register ‘Independent”. Of course, then we can’t vote in the primary, and we nearly always have important state or local questions on the primary. When I was in Oklahoma, I also had to select a party designation, but again, they had the option of Independent.
Primaries in Alabama let you choose which ballot you want. The only restriction is that you cannot vote in one party’s primary and another party’s primary runoff.
In Massachusetts, the term for “registered without affiliation with a party” is “unenrolled”. For a while, there was a party called the Independent Voters Party, and registering “independent” meant registering as an IVP member. Much confusion.
Sackbut:
So the notion of the secret ballot is about as likely as the idea of free will under an omniscient god.
Votes are secret, but they recorded that you voted in a primary and which party’s ballot you selected. When there’s a primary runoff, they know who is allowed to vote in which runoff.
There are only runoff elections for party primaries, so the ballots are specific to a party, just like they are for the primary.
Virginia’s another state that doesn’t have party registration. If you want to vote in the primary, you show up and request either a Democratic or a Republican ballot. (Also, no runoffs here, so that doesn’t come into play.)