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S08.E24: Voting Rights

PrincessPurrsALot

By PrincessPurrsALot
in Last Week Tonight

PrincessPurrsALot
Message added by PrincessPurrsALot,

As always, watch, then post.  DO not discuss what you wish they had discussed.  No personal politics. 

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Annber03

Annber03

"I could give you ten examples, but I won't." Translation: I know a bunch of ways to cheat the system, but I don't want to give away our game. Always accuse the other side of doing the very thing you're guilty of doing. 

That guy who was reading from the rule book was a real piece of work, holy shit. "You can't call people racist, that's inflammatory and hurts our feelings!" *Proceeds to use racist terminology to describe minorities* Way to prove the very point being made, genius. 

But yeah, it's flat out laughable to claim that your laws and policies aren't racist when the only people championing them are old white men. John's right, the Democrats need to get their butts in gear and get moving on getting the voting rights legislation passed. I don't care how they get it done, just get it done. We cannot afford to wait around any longer. 

(And again comes my plea for a day when my home state of Iowa is being mentioned on this show for a good reason. Please, can that day come? And soon?)

John's also right that we need to stop with the "This is not who we are" rhetoric, because, well, the news has clearly shown otherwise in many ways. This is not who we should be, no, but unfortunately, racism/xenophobia is a part of our nation. Always has been. I know immigration policy is often complex in a lot of ways, but it shouldn't be this complicated. 

As for the paintings, I personally like that red duck hunter painting. I sadly don't have the kind of money to bid on any of those, but I hope they all find good homes where they can be displayed prominently :D. 

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scarynikki12

scarynikki12

Glad we got a voting rights episode though, Ollie, let Brandon vote. Yeah, he's going to write in Bugs Bunny rather than take it seriously, but he has a right to be that stupid.

"They need to put forth a little effort when they vote." Hey, douchenozzle, voting by mail, or drive through voting, or in the middle of the night voting qualifies as a little effort.

Ugh, Dan Patrick. This fucking guy. I remember his 1 million dollar bounty on voter fraud and then his refusal to pay out.

The Freedom to Vote Act is a dream of a bill that will combat so much of the horrors Ollie talked about tonight and I'm happy (though not surprised) that it was specifically mentioned tonight.

I find lobsters creepy but "weaponized ocean bitch" was hilarious.

The duck stamp bit was great. I love the intensity of the competition, the troll, and the beautiful artwork that gets chosen. And, no surprise, Ollie entered with a bunch of options, including a Duck Hunt homage. I am disappointed that they're auctioning off the duck portraits rather than selling copies cause I would buy all five right now at a set price.

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swanpride

swanpride

Somehow strange to watch a voting rights episode just after doing my own duty to vote in the German election. Makes you really appreciate the system we have, where the biggest problem is the ever growing parliament....

The PSA was somewhat funny, because we have a saying in Germany: Who doesn't vote, votes for the far right. So...yeah, I guess I kind of agree with the underlying sentiment that it is your damned job to vote. But I guess the American people have a pretty good excuse not to considering what they have to go through just to cast their vote...even though I guess that is even more of a reason to do it. 

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Lantern7

Lantern7

Depressing episode. Basically, American policy on immigration hasn’t lurched forward as much as one would hope, and Republicans are the absolute worst when it comes to vote suppression.

While it might seem wasteful to extend an episode’s runtime past thirty minutes and use that time to look into the world of duck stamps . . . yeah, that was needed because it was funny. I went to a comic show that had video games and — no bullshit — I played a Super Smash Bros game using Duck Hunt. Basically, it’s the dog and the bird. Which means the dog’s name is Hunt, I guess. Anyway . . . seeing the Duck Hunt-inspired entry really amused me. If you’re my age, you can hear the happy tone as the dog came out of the brush with a dead duck’s neck in its paw. Good times.

Someone remind me . . . why is the filibuster considered a good thing? I mean in general, as opposed to the hassle it’s existence causes now. Because everything should be done to get rid of voter suppression. The problem is that you’d need more people in office who feel that way . . . and Republicans are set to make that difficult.

Should I look into emigration? I mean, I did stay around from 2016-2021, but it’s nice to have options. Hey, @swanpride, would I absolutely need to learn German if I moved next door to you? Once again: options.

Another old commercial I remember! It didn’t kick in until I saw Mussolini crossing his arms.

The website URL John gave us didn’t work. You’ll have to go to eBay to see how how the bidding has gone. The lowest top bid so far is the duck brokering peace . . . at $1,900. Duck Hunt is at $9,600. Guess I can’t have anything classy. I’m also thinking the portraits might go on John’s traveling art show.

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swanpride

swanpride

(edited)

While it is exactly necessary that you are already able to speak German in order to live and work or study in the country, if you intend to immigrate learning German is kind of expected. It is only polite to do so. And naturally you need it if you want to pass the test in order to become a German citizen (which is btw possible after you have lived eight years uninterrupted in the country...you only have to proof that your stay was legal, you can take care of yourself, that your German is sufficient for communication and you need to pass a test to proof that you get how our democracy works). 

 

I can promise you that there won't be any people on horses hunting you, though. 

 

Edited by swanpride
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khyber

khyber

11 hours ago, ebk57 said:

I love Duck With A Pearl Earring. 

I also like Ducks Judging the Duck painting.  Reminds me of a cow judging a cow painting I have on my office wall.  Really.

These are the two that did it for me.  I laughed for at least 2-3 minutes after seeing the Pearl Earring one.

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ALenore

ALenore

13 hours ago, ebk57 said:

I love Duck With A Pearl Earring. 

The artist who painted Duck With a Pearl Earring is a friend of mine, Omar Rayyan. He does a lot of wonderful anthropomorphic animal paintings. 

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peeayebee

peeayebee

13 hours ago, scarynikki12 said:

Ugh, Dan Patrick. This fucking guy. I remember his 1 million dollar bounty on voter fraud and then his refusal to pay out.

You mean someone had evidence of voter fraud?

I so appreciate the ep ending with the wonderful duck stamp segment because the rest was depressing. First off, the segment on Haitians being sent back to Haiti was awful. I don't know how to fix our immigration policies, but people coming here seeking asylum have a right to do so. It's morally and legally wrong for this country to give them the boot.

The voting rights/laws segment was equally upsetting. Some Dems need to get their heads out of their asses and do something about the filibuster. At the least it should be changed so that Congresspeople have to actually filibuster, stand there and talk until they drop like Mr. Smith.

 

I didn't know "It's Fall y'all" was a thing.

And I didn't know that duck stamps were not postal stamps. The first time I heard about them was in the movie 'Fargo,' and I just assumed Mr. Gunderson was trying to get one of his duck paintings on a postage stamp. So this segment was illuminating and very amusing. And I want a movie about Tim Taylor and Rob McBroom, though I'm sure that Taylor wouldn't give his permission.

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khyber

khyber

1 hour ago, ALenore said:

The artist who painted Duck With a Pearl Earring is a friend of mine, Omar Rayyan. He does a lot of wonderful anthropomorphic animal paintings. 

I hope he retained the rights to sell prints of this, because I would absolutely buy one.  The original has a current bid of over $16,000 a bit rich for me. 🤑

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DoctorAtomic

DoctorAtomic

18 hours ago, scarynikki12 said:

"They need to put forth a little effort when they vote." Hey, douchenozzle, voting by mail, or drive through voting, or in the middle of the night voting qualifies as a little effort.

It's really condescending. People will wait for 7 hours+ in line to vote. Or they'll come late late after work. I mean, it's a lot, but you see it every election. That's a lot of effort to me. 

I was dying at the Adam Driver commercial and John just pointing to it. 

I thought the topic was a good bookend to the voter fraud episode. When the guy was saying "I can give you 10 ways;" well, no you can't. John largely disproved that previously and even if you can, the level of effort to change a single vote is enormous. 

I think the presence of the audience upped John's delivery of the jokes. 

 

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Hanahope

Hanahope

(edited)

Sure , let’s keep pointing out how voting rights must be addressed and the filibuster removed. But getting that to happen is another thing entirely.  That requires somehow convincing 2 Dinos to agree.  
 

John is right that more people voted last year don’t mean crap if they are refused their right to vote next year.  Or if a legislature overturns the vote.
 

John did a n episode about how hard it is to cheat at voting.  It is hard, at least when you don’t pass a law allowing the legislature to choose the winner over the voters.

Edited by Hanahope
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DoctorAtomic

DoctorAtomic

1 minute ago, Hanahope said:

Sure , let’s keep pointing out how voting rights must be addressed and the filibuster removed. But getting that to happen is another thing entirely.  That requires somehow convincing 2 Dinos to agree.  

Yes, it's a spurious argument because it's not going to happen. Saying it doesn't really mean much. However, Biden has supported going back to where if you want to filibuster you have to do it in person. Not great, for sure, but those who are 'traditionalists', you're kind of backing them into a corner. It's harder to do because you have to keep hammering away at a procedural issue, which isn't news, but you have to still keep it on the front burner. 

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ahisma

ahisma

I’m just going to copy my post from last May again:

Quote

I’m not sure why John’s reaction to Tilda wasn’t the same as his usual reaction to things that are powerful and terrifying—becoming disturbingly aroused. (What? My decades-long attraction to Tilda has nothing to do with this question. *cough*)

And this time he goes on about lobsters and proves my point?! Oh, John.

On 9/26/2021 at 8:44 PM, Annber03 said:

And again comes my plea for a day when my home state of Iowa is being mentioned on this show for a good reason. Please, can that day come? And soon?

I live in Arizona, so…. :-(

The restrictions on voting are going to hit hard for Native Americans living on tribal lands, who came through strongly in turning AZ blue in 2020. We really need national voting protections.

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andromeda331

andromeda331

Laughing hard at the lobsters. The things John comes up with.

It never stops amazing me that instead of trying to win over new voters they'll just make it harder to vote and accuse everyone and everything of fraud and cheating and it works. Their passing harder laws to vote conveniently targetting those who aren't going to vote for them. The John Lewis bill would take care of most of the problems and yet we all know there won't be enough votes to get it passed.  The Dems really need to get off their butts and get it done. Not just voters rights but abortion and other crap the Republicans are trying to pedal.  Stop being passive. 

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FoundTime

FoundTime

John didn't mention another charming provision of the Texas voting law, that it empowers partisan poll watchers and disempowers poll workers, which is another way to suppress the vote once people are actually at the polls and trying to vote. And when people are intimidated at the polls, guess who's doing the intimidating? It's not BIPOCs; they are the ones the intimidation tactics are being used on.

If ending the filibuster is the only way out of this mess, we are in a world of trouble.

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ALenore

ALenore

17 hours ago, khyber said:

I hope he retained the rights to sell prints of this, because I would absolutely buy one.  The original has a current bid of over $16,000 a bit rich for me. 🤑

He's stated on Facebook that he doesn't have the rights to sell prints of that image. But he does have lots of other prints for sale.

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peeayebee

peeayebee

16 hours ago, DoctorAtomic said:

It's really condescending. People will wait for 7 hours+ in line to vote. Or they'll come late late after work. I mean, it's a lot, but you see it every election. That's a lot of effort to me. 

Right. Plus it shouldn't be hard to vote. It's always been touted as the most civic-minded thing you can do, and should do, if you care about your community, your city, your state, your country. It should be easy to vote so people are encouraged, not discouraged, to vote and participate in Democracy. 

 

Quote

I was dying at the Adam Driver commercial and John just pointing to it.

I love how the show tied this to the horses in the border story.

 

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Kel Varnsen

Kel Varnsen

On 9/27/2021 at 1:28 AM, scarynikki12 said:

I am disappointed that they're auctioning off the duck portraits rather than selling copies cause I would buy all five right now at a set price.

I am honestly surprised that LWT didn't just make their own collectable stamps that people could buy. 

9 hours ago, peeayebee said:

Right. Plus it shouldn't be hard to vote. It's always been touted as the most civic-minded thing you can do, and should do, if you care about your community, your city, your state, your country. It should be easy to vote so people are encouraged, not discouraged, to vote and participate in Democracy. 

I am Canadian and it blows my mind every time I read one of the loss of voting rights stories. As John kind of mentioned we just had a federal election which I took part in. I voted a week early and it took me about 20 minutes, which was long, mostly because of pandemic restrictions on how many people could be in the line. My ID was the voter card I got in the mail, that Elections Canada tries to send to every citizen and my driver's license. If I didn't have a license or the voter card, I could have used my birth certificate and a bank statement or phone bill with my address on it. If I didn't have those I could just fill out a form confirming who I was, and as long as my wife or someone I knew with ID vouched for me I could vote.

On 9/27/2021 at 7:52 PM, DoctorAtomic said:

It's really condescending. People will wait for 7 hours+ in line to vote. Or they'll come late late after work. I mean, it's a lot, but you see it every election. That's a lot of effort to me. 

Wow 7 hours. I am in my 40's and if you added up the time it has taken me to vote in every federal election since I turned 18 it would be less than 7 hours. 

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swanpride

swanpride

Same here...and I vote in three elections roughly every four years, one election every five years and the occasional mini-Referendum, and since the area I live is really out of step, this translates to having to vote for something nearly every year (which is a little bit tiring). I think in all the years I was standing in a queue once, and there were only three or four people in front of me (and if it should be different one day, I would simply request mail voting online....). This time around I waited a few minutes, but that was only because I was really early and turned up a few minutes before 8 o'clock. 

It is kind of surprising that the percentage of people voting in the US has actually risen in the last years (from 54,2 to 66,4). Still a pathetic number though, considering other democracies (which don't have a rule that you have to vote) easily pull numbers between 70 and 80 percent....

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FoundTime

FoundTime

On 9/27/2021 at 6:52 PM, DoctorAtomic said:

It's really condescending. People will wait for 7 hours+ in line to vote. Or they'll come late late after work. I mean, it's a lot, but you see it every election. That's a lot of effort to me. 

See,  this is why the Georgia law, where you can't bring food or water to people waiting to vote, is so evil. TPTB create a situation (by selectively limiting available polling places) where lines are ridiculously long and then they just make it worse. So it's not enough that you're waiting for 7 hours, now we're gonna make sure you're hungry and thirsty besides. Then maybe you'll be so miserable you'll just give up on the whole thing and go home. 

Not new news with these recent laws, but when Texas first put voter ID in place several years ago, they decided that a student ID was not a valid form of ID, but a gun license was. Of course now you don't even need a license -- or training -- to carry.

Anyway. I like the new set but the audience reactions felt intrusive to me. I  guess I'll get used to it like I have with Colbert. I certainly don't begrudge Ollie an audience -- it's unnatural to tell jokes into a void, after all, no matter how much personality the void has 😆

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Kel Varnsen

Kel Varnsen

3 hours ago, FoundTime said:

See,  this is why the Georgia law, where you can't bring food or water to people waiting to vote, is so evil. TPTB create a situation (by selectively limiting available polling places) where lines are ridiculously long and then they just make it worse. So it's not enough that you're waiting for 7 hours, now we're gonna make sure you're hungry and thirsty besides. Then maybe you'll be so miserable you'll just give up on the whole thing and go home. 

I remember hearing about that law. The funny thing is, in what I would call a normal situation, where voting takes 10 minutes, I could see the need for that kind of law. Because I wouldn't want a candidate or their volunteers giving out candy or drinks or whatever at a polling place. So the easiest way to fix that would be no giving out food or drinks. But in a case where it does take a whole day to vote, I can totally see how the benefits outweigh any negative aspects.

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peeayebee

peeayebee

5 hours ago, FoundTime said:

Anyway. I like the new set but the audience reactions felt intrusive to me. I  guess I'll get used to it like I have with Colbert. I certainly don't begrudge Ollie an audience -- it's unnatural to tell jokes into a void, after all, no matter how much personality the void has 😆

I suppose I'll get used to it, too, but right now I don't like hearing the audience. John's jokes were funny without the audience laughter, just like a sitcom doesn't need a laugh track. And I've never really liked when an audience applauds a statement they agree with. It often comes across like a knee-jerk reaction. You can bet that any time John makes a critical reference to Trump, the audience will applaud or hoot and holler their agreement, but when he makes one about Biden or the current Administration, the audience doesn't seem to know how to react. I'm not currently watching any other late night show, but I felt the same way about the audiences on Colbert and The Daily Show when I was watching those.

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Victor the Crab

Victor the Crab

10 hours ago, peeayebee said:

I suppose I'll get used to it, too, but right now I don't like hearing the audience. John's jokes were funny without the audience laughter, just like a sitcom doesn't need a laugh track. And I've never really liked when an audience applauds a statement they agree with. It often comes across like a knee-jerk reaction. You can bet that any time John makes a critical reference to Trump, the audience will applaud or hoot and holler their agreement, but when he makes one about Biden or the current Administration, the audience doesn't seem to know how to react. I'm not currently watching any other late night show, but I felt the same way about the audiences on Colbert and The Daily Show when I was watching those.

It might have to do with the fact that the audience doesn't quite share Ollie's personal views of Joe Biden. But yeah, after fifteen months, I can live without any audience on any show. Trevor Noah seems to be doing this with The Daily Show!

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paigow

paigow

22 hours ago, Kel Varnsen said:

So the easiest way to fix that would be no giving out food or drinks. But in a case where it does take a whole day to vote, I can totally see how the benefits outweigh any negative aspects.

If a bunch of kids set up a lemonade stand for profit - is that OK? Obviously assuming that they acquired Karen approved municipal permits

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SoMuchTV

SoMuchTV

On 9/27/2021 at 2:35 PM, ALenore said:

The artist who painted Duck With a Pearl Earring is a friend of mine, Omar Rayyan. He does a lot of wonderful anthropomorphic animal paintings. 

I am shocked to see (a little over a day before bidding closes) that the Duck with a Pearl Earring was the second-lowest in the bidding.  That was my favorite!  Someone may be getting a deal!

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paigow

paigow

2 hours ago, SoMuchTV said:

I am shocked to see (a little over a day before bidding closes) that the Duck with a Pearl Earring was the second-lowest in the bidding.  That was my favorite!  Someone may be getting a deal!

A lot of people must not like Dutch Ducks...

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