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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Since California has a semi-direct democracy, we also got to vote on a lot of new propositions today. Some of the more notable ones:
-Prop. 30: Increases funding for education, and pays for it by raising income taxes on those making over $250,000 a year. You can prolly guess how I voted on this one.
-Prop. 32: Its stated purpose is preventing unions and corporations from making campaign contributions ("To keep money out of politics"), but what it effectively does (and what it was designed to do) is weaken unions and make it nearly impossible for third-party candidates to get elected, because Super PACS, the two main political parties, and thousands of large businesses are exempt from the restriction (It's more like "Keeps their money out of politics, but not ours"). I voted against it.
-Prop. 34: Abolishes the death penalty. I voted for it, not because I have any moral objections to the death penalty, but because it's actually more expensive to execute someone than to lock them up for life.
-Prop. 37: Requires any foods that contain GM Os to be labeled as such. This one preys on the irrational fear of genetic engineering (it's no more dangerous than selective breeding, which we've been doing for thousands of years), and just raises food prices by a stupid amount. I voted against this one, but with how popular the organic craze is around here and how dumb the average voter is it'll probably pass.
And for the first time ever, both shows will stream live on comedycentral.com, iOS and Android enabled devices, Xbox consoles and through The Daily Show Headlines App.
Getting the latest, up-to-the-minute election night hilarity while you poop* has never been easier!
- Please don’t poop in Times Square.
YAY!
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.I agree with you on all of those positions, R Taco. The GMO one makes me go kind of oogy (an actual word, that is!) because I fundamentally support full disclosure in labeling, but in this case it is going to be used as a way to play to people's irrational fears. At the risk of sounding like an Appeal to Worse Problems, I would say that it's more important to get sugar properly labeled (aggregated rather than in a whole bunch of different forms) than it is to label foods containing GMO material.
@Best Of: Well, I know what I'll be tuning into at 11 PM. I do have a World Of Warcraft raid but I hope they'll understand.
edited 6th Nov '12 2:53:56 PM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Arizona also has propositions on the board, I believe (I was there last week and they were running ads for them).
Desperately hoping that the reports of increased Hispanic voting are accurate. This is the state that keeps on electing Sheriff Joe Arpaio
, a man who has boasted in court about lying to juries and whose deputies are worryingly like the Gestapo in their racial purging of Latinos from the streets of the state.
EDIT: Adding link for clarity.
edited 6th Nov '12 2:56:27 PM by CaissasDeathAngel
My name is Addy. Please call me that instead of my username.I have a feeling that something important is happening today but I can't put my finger on it...
Oh yeah, Halo 4 comes out. Gotta go pick that up.
What's the last minute word on Ohio AKA the only state that matters?
Is using "Julian Assange is a Hillary butt plug" an acceptable signature quote?6 AM... Now I can either
- Skip the Comedy Central coverage of the election and instead look at something else until I go to bed, OR
- try to get some sleep now and wake up to watch that stuff, OR
- stay up all night and skip tomorrow's lectures.
I already know that I'll probably go with the last option on the list.
Lectures would be about Shakespeare. What's that for political satire and drama compared to Stewart and Colbert, eh? Eh?
I'm not at all confident that I'd be able to forgive myself if I missed Colbert's reaction to Obama's victory. He'll have to pretend that he's upset; I want to see if he can keep a straight face (or other in-character expression.)
Silver says Ohio is 90.6% likely to go Democrat.
edited 6th Nov '12 3:03:59 PM by BestOf
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.@Working Families Party: Yeah, I can vouch for that in New York.
Hugging a Vanillite will give you frostbite.![]()
The habit of Democratic nominees to put their names in both that and the Working Families Party sections of the ballot.
edited 6th Nov '12 3:07:22 PM by rmctagg09
Hugging a Vanillite will give you frostbite.And, again, her Democratic opponent is calling himself a member of the Working Families Party... But he's excused because he's a Democrat?
Call out and bitch about both, or don't complain about either...
Okay yeah, I remember. Yeah, the thing though is that it's legal in New York and pretty normal so long as you file all the paperwork. And it's not this lying and saying you're Independent when you're a Republican.
ELECTORAL FUSION! That's what I was thinking of.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elections_in_New_York
There's why it's legal in New York, and it's not what Mac Mahon is doing right now.
edited 6th Nov '12 3:13:43 PM by AceofSpades
BBC has an article that gives some figures about when the polls close and results start coming in.
Great for European tropers 'cause the times are in GMT and thus easier (IMO) to convert than the confusing time zones of the US. (Yes, I do know that our time zones are probably equally confusing to you. For instance, who would normally associate Finland, Greece, Egypt and South Africa with each other? Yet we're on the same time zone.)
Looks like we can expect first predictions based on exit polls in less than an hour. The Presidential election can probably be called somewhere between 3-7 in the morning GMT, so that's 5-9 for me.
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.

Cast my ballot a few minutes ago. The local polling location was pretty empty, seems that a good majority of the local votes were cast early. I think I leaned more towards the Democrats for the larger candidates, and more towards Republicans for the local guys.
Seems everything stayed pretty civil near the town, though I noticed quite a few of the little "Obama/Biden 2012" signs had been stolen again.