Two Steps Backward: Suppressing the Vote in 2012
Wednesday, 17 October 2012 14:50 By Arlene Ash and John Lamperti, Truthout| News Analysis 
The United States has a history of promoting free elections – and of restricting them. The Constitution of 1786 left elections up to the states, and generally, only white, male property owners could vote. Since then, constitutional amendments and enabling legislation have hugely extended citizen suffrage. But it has not been a steady climb.
Until 2000, the trend favored expanding the franchise: to African-Americans, women, 18 to 21 year-olds, and those who couldn’t pay poll taxes. Recently however, and especially since the 2010 elections, the tide has turned. New York University’s Brennan Center for Justice calls what’s happening “the biggest rollback in voting rights since the Jim Crow era.” Continue reading
Breaking up Britain – commentary
Breaking up Britain
Posted By Stabroek staff On October 17, 2012 – Editorial |
It is tempting to use this title for an editorial intended to comment on the news that the British, or United Kingdom, government has arrived at a conclusion to long continuing discussion with the devolved government of Scotland on the issue of a referendum for Scotland. While some Scots have long been pressing for what many observers believe to be full independence, Prime Minister David Cameron, the head of a Conservative Party not traditionally too keen to concede that Britain should be anything less than a united Britain, has conceded the wish of the present Scottish government of first Minister Alex Salmond. He has gone even further than the Scottish leadership themselves might really have wished, by insisting that the question to be put in the referendum should be solely on secession and not any other half way house between the present arrangements and full independence. Continue reading →
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