The Ted Cruz campaign has mailed “voting violation” notices to Iowans admonishing them for not voting in the past. The notice lists the names of voters and gives each a grade and score.
@RBPundit pic.twitter.com/FBjxaipH9p
— Braddock Massey (@Braddock_Massey) January 30, 2016
Text printed on the notice reads:
You are receiving this election notice because of low expected voter turnout in your area. Your individual voting history as well as your neighbors’ are public record. Their scores are published below, and many of them will see your score as well. CAUCUS ON MONDAY TO IMPROVE YOUR SCORE and please encourage your neighbors to caucus as well. A follow-up notice may be issued following Monday’s caucuses.
The Republican shaming campaign is not unique—the Democrat organization MoveOn engaged a similar tactic in 2012.
MoveOn did similar voter-shaming mailers in 2012. I knew it seemed familiar. @drawandstrike @redsteeze @rumpfshaker pic.twitter.com/8ifIvm0dLL
— D. Hawkins (@HawkinsUSA) January 30, 2016
According to the Independent Review Cruz spokesman Rick Tyler confirmed the campaign sent out the mailers. He said “the caucuses are important and we want people who haven’t voted before to vote.”
Cruz campaign confirms controversial Iowa mailer is theirs. Story to follow at @IndJournal #iacaucus
— Sarah Rumpf (@rumpfshaker) January 30, 2016
The mailer reveals the attitude of establishment politicians who apparently believe citizens are duty bound to vote for them.
In March, 2015 Obama suggested the state should make voting compulsory.
“Other countries have mandatory voting,” he said. “It would be transformative if everybody voted” and admitted there is “a reason why some folks try to keep them away from the polls.”
Only 36 percent of eligible voters participated in the 2014 election, the lowest turnout in more than 70 years.
People do not vote because it is pointless. Many long ago came to the conclusion the system is thoroughly corrupt and voting is not in their best interest.
“If voting changed anything, they’d make it illegal,” the anarchist Emma Goldman said more than a hundred years ago.
“Not voting bugs the regime, and no wonder. Such abstinence, like not complying in other ways, weakens them. What if they held an election and nobody came?” writes Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
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