podpolia

Amazingly enough, I seem to agree with Hillary Clinton on some things. A lot of these proposals are good ideas. A national holiday on election day would be a good idea — but there are problems. Is it a holiday every year? Only in years when there are congressional elections? Only in the years of Presidential elections? What about primaries? It’s an excellent idea to try to boost voter turnout, but needs to be more fully defined. Besides, if it’s a federal holiday, that just means government employees get off. It doesn’t mean that anyone else would have off that day, and companies would not be likely to want to allow their workers a day off in the middle of a week.
The idea of letting felons vote, however, is not a good idea. Why should we allow people who have showed their unwillingness to follow the rules of the system to have political power to change the system to suit themselves? I’m willing to bet even Hillary and John Kerry would be loathe to accept something like that — except for the fact that a majority of those 4.7 million felons would be likely to vote for Democrats.

Bush and his administration are keeping the pressure up on Syria. Until proof comes out that the Syrian government was behind the assassination of Hariri, some restraint must be used. If such proof emerges, however, expect the pressure to be ratcheted up.