{"id":200,"date":"2006-06-07T23:13:07","date_gmt":"2006-06-07T14:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2006-06-07\/200"},"modified":"2006-06-07T23:13:07","modified_gmt":"2006-06-07T14:13:07","slug":"i-was-wrong-and-other-voting-irregularities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/2006-06-07\/200","title":{"rendered":"I was wrong, and other voting irregularities"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\nWhat a pleasant surprise! The morally reprehensible ballot\nproposition<\/a> (California's Proposition 82<\/span>) that I feared<\/span> was certain to\npass was soundly defeated by a 39<\/span>\/61 ratio. Only two of California's 58\ncounties passed it (one by less than 350 votes).\n\n<\/p>

\n\nAs a bonus, the other proposition (a bond<\/span> measure) was also defeated. I have a<\/span> “guilty until proven innocent” attitude toward Statewide\nbond measures, as a state<\/span> with one of the highest tax rates in the country\nhas some very large means and should be able live within them. (Local bonds\nmeasures are a different<\/span> story.)\n\n<\/p>

\n\nDespite these results, I'm not sure<\/span> if my cynicism about the general\npopulation's lack of moral fiber should be eased, or my cynicism about the\ngeneral population's apathy should be aggravated. Voter turnout appears to\nhave been in the pitiful 20-30% range.\n\n<\/p>

\n\nDue to the low turnout, I'm sure all<\/span> kinds of groups will be doing\n“get out the vote” drives for November. I've always thought\nthose were sending the wrong message, because it's better to not vote\nthan to vote in ignorance<\/b>. If you vote<\/span> in ignorance, you're voting\nbased upon something as superficial as a name<\/span> (“oooh, I've heard of\nthis Hollywood celebrity”) or a sound<\/span> bite (“Proposition XYZ,\nfor our kids<\/i>, for our future!<\/i>”).\n\n<\/p>

\n\nThere is no<\/i> issue out there that can not be made to sound appealing. Who could<\/span> vote against something called the “safe streets and safe\nchildren act” (capital punishment for speeding) or a bill<\/span> that\n“guarantees equal opportunities for all our children, adults, and\nseniors” (makes it illegal to not hire someone who applies for\nemployment)?\n\n<\/p>

\n\nYou often have to dig to really understand something. With any ballot\nproposition, there are three unrelated levels to the issue:\n\n<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The general idea<\/li>\n
  2. The specifics<\/li>\n
  3. How it's to be done<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    \n\nAs it was with yesterday's reprehensible Proposition 82,<\/span> the first is most\noften something anyone could love, like “support our kids” or\n“support our future”. Whatever #1 is, it's usually just a bunch<\/span>\nof sound bites that have very little to do with the real considerations (#2\nand #3), and everything to do with garnering the ignorant vote. Being\nfactually correct is certainly not a requirement.<\/span>\n\n<\/p>

    \n\nIn the case of yesterday's Proposition 82,<\/span> #2 was “empower the\nTeachers' union”, and #3 was “rob others.”\n\n<\/p>\n\n

    \n\nSorry, enough ranting.... we should be back to our regularly-scheduled\nphotographs-of-my-kid<\/i> entries tomorrow.\n\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    What a pleasant surprise! The morally reprehensible ballot proposition (California's Proposition 82) that I feared was certain to pass was soundly defeated by a 39\/61 ratio. Only two of California's 58 counties passed it (one by less than 350 votes). <\/p>

    As a bonus, the other proposition (a bond measure) was also defeated. I have a \"guilty until proven innocent\" attitude toward Statewide bond measures, as a state with one of the highest tax rates in the country has some very large means and should be able live within them. (Local bonds measures are a different story.) <\/p>

    Despite [...]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/regex.info\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}