- cross-posted to:
- leopardsatemyface
- cross-posted to:
- leopardsatemyface
White House officials, at the start of the shutdown, were certain the Trump administration was better positioned to battle the left during a funding lapse.
In early October, several Trump administration officials had a friendly pool going of how long the shutdown would last. The White House, at the time, was confident Democrats would quickly fold.
No one guessed more than 10 days.
The account, relayed by a person close to the White House granted anonymity to discuss internal thinking, underscores just how much the administration miscalculated the Democrats’ will to keep the government closed even amid furloughs and imperiled social programs like food assistance.
As the shutdown heads into its second month, Donald Trump is increasingly frustrated. On Thursday, he called for Republicans to abolish the filibuster to reopen the government — a plea he knows is futile, but that demonstrates his growing irritation with Democrats, said a second person close to the White House.
I think that voter registration should work like driver licensing. And the test you have to pass should be the citizenship exam.
Appealing as the idea is, the problem is who gets to control the exams.
That’s a fair criticism. We know how poll testing has historically been used to disenfranchise minority groups.
That’s why I suggested the citizenship exam, which is a well-established test with specific parameters and existing preparation programs.
Sure, but who decides what’s on the citizenship exam? Who updates it? Who’s in charge of making sure it’s administered fairly?
Right now there’s not really any power to be gained by subverting it, so it’s handled by people who are interested in keeping it working well. Make it the gateway to electoral control, and interest groups will worm their way into control of it - and then you have a variant on poll testing.