A woman’s place is in the voting booth
by Tom Sullivan
As if women need further proof GOP men have no use for them and their concerns….
“Absolutely most insulting conversation I have ever had with anyone,” John Kelly wrote in a private email of his telephone conversation with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.). Still secretary at the Department of Homeland Security on Feb. 8, 2017, Kelly wrote to a top aide after a conversation with Warren about the Trump administration’s travel ban.
“What an impolite arrogant woman. She immediately began insulting our people accusing them of not following the court order, insulting and abusive behavior towards those covered by the pause, blah blah blah,” Kelly wrote in the letter obtained by BuzzFeed through a FOIA request.
“Too bad Senate Majority Leader McConnell couldn’t order her to be quiet again!” the aide replied in another email released late Thursday.
The little lady just doesn’t know her place.
Warren’s call came after protesters flooded Logan International Airport in Boston in response to the Trump administration’s Muslim travel ban, BussFeed reports, adding:
A congressional source familiar with Warren’s phone call with Kelly told BuzzFeed News that the senator’s staff first tried to obtain information from the Department of Homeland Security on Jan. 29, 2017 about her constituents who were stuck abroad and prohibited from boarding airplanes to fly into Logan. But the staffers were unsuccessful. Warren then reached out to Kelly, who didn’t respond to her for a week. When Kelly finally called Warren, she told him she had been trying to reach him, which Kelly denied. Warren described her staff’s numerous email exchanges with Kelly and their conversation then became heated.
“Impolite arrogant woman” ( #ImpoliteArrogantWoman ) overnight became the new “nevertheless she persisted.” There is already a tee shirt.
Retweet if you’re proud to be an impolite, arrogant woman. #BlahBlahBlah https://t.co/7IXQH9adaG— Shannon Fx Watts (@shannonrwatts) October 11, 2018
Heading into the November 6 election, voters express concern that a “byzantine array of voter restrictions” and voter roll purges devised by Republican-male-led legislatures will impact turnout, particularly among black voters. In Georgia, notably. Republican men will defend the merits of requiring photo identity cards to vote. Yet, arguing the merits is a red herring. ID card laws are not about merits. They are about suppressing the vote of segments of the population who tend to vote for Democrats. But more than that.
GOP-imposed voting restrictions are aimed not just at black voters, but women. All women. African Americans, students and seniors are the trees. Women are the forest.
Exit polls in 2016 found 54 percent of women — all women — voted for Hillary Clinton. When it comes to Republicans shrinking the voting pool, all women are targets.
As North Carolina drafted its infamous 2013 omnibus voter law, the state Board of Elections examined the potential impact of the voter ID portion. By cross-referencing the state DMV database against voter rolls, it estimated over half of registered and 2012 voters without NCDMV IDs were black in a state not even a quarter African American. The Board estimated 67,639 registered Republicans had no photo identity cards, nearly two-thirds women (43,721). But 176,091 Democrats, also two-thirds women (116,424).
The Board estimated of the 138,425 voters with no NCDMV ID match who actually cast ballots in 2012, 30,114 were Republicans, 60 percent women. There were 81,008 Democrats, 66 percent women.
The state Board of Elections produced that amended report in March 2013. Pat McCrory, NC’s Republican governor, signed the omnibus voting bill in August. Republicans knew exactly what they were doing, and whom they were willing to sacrifice to win.
The Republicans’ argument is since voting restrictions in their majestic equality prevent rich and poor, Republican and Democrat alike from participating as full citizens without presenting IDs, nothing is amiss in passing and enforcing them.
But in professing concern for “election integrity,” fearful, white Republican politicians are playing percentages, displaying scorn not just for their opponents but their own supporters. They are willing to sacrifice the franchise of thousands, potentially, as acceptable casualties in elections, if that is what it takes to win, including their own sisters, wives, and daughters.
Impolite, arrogant women might want to register their opinions about that on November 6.
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