Michigan Messenger » Lose your house, lose your vote

Michigan Messenger » Lose your house, lose your vote.

Michigan Republicans plan to foreclose African American voters

The chairman of the Republican Party in Macomb County Michigan, a key swing county in a key swing state, is planning to use a list of foreclosed homes to block people from voting in the upcoming election as part of the state GOP’s effort to challenge some voters on Election Day.

“We will have a list of foreclosed homes and will make sure people aren’t voting from those addresses,” party chairman James Carabelli told Michigan Messenger in a telephone interview earlier this week. He said the local party wanted to make sure that proper electoral procedures were followed.

State election rules allow parties to assign “election challengers” to polls to monitor the election. In addition to observing the poll workers, these volunteers can challenge the eligibility of any voter provided they “have a good reason to believe” that the person is not eligible to vote. One allowable reason is that the person is not a “true resident of the city or township.”

You have to read the whole article. They are targeting people who have lost their homes, and who have no proof of address. Perhaps they have moved outside of their voting area, or in with family and don’t have proof of address available (such as utility bills in their name).

BBC NEWS | Business | Crude oil price drops below $106

Oil prices have dipped below $106 as traders predicted that rising US unemployment would lead to consumers cutting back on petrol use.

BBC NEWS | Business | Crude oil price drops below $106.

Perhaps I shouldn’t be so excited, especially after reading they anticipate it soaring back up, and past the low 100′s to over 250$ per barrel. But I am. We had to get gas yesterday, and it was as low as 3.679$, and I got a full tank of gas for less than 90$.

I will be the firs to admit, I don’t quite understand why gas has soared so high. I understand just fine that we’re having troubles (understatement much?) with suppliers/supply areas, and I understand it’s a limited resource. I also noted that on the pump yesterday there was a note that said “between 1% and 10% ethanol,” so why can’t we mix it a little more and bring the prices down a little more too?

I also know bio-fuel is equally as bad as oil-fuel (well, it’s still bio, isn’t it? How misleading!) but for different reasons.

So much to digest… It doesn’t help that I am operating on too little sleep, trying to think about this stuff it giving me a bit of a headache right now.

I was recently reading that bio-fuel (corn based) causes problems with the land, can cause more pollution in production and shipping, can cause poverty (I must say, that one is still beyond me, but let’s skip it for now), and a handful of other major problems.

I’ve said it before, I literally screwed myself into the need for a large car/van. I have three kids, all in carseats. Show me a smaller, fuel-efficient car that can safely seat them and doesn’t cost a fortune and I’ll jump on board! Until then, I have a minivan I can mostly afford (and owe more on than it’s worth, so no trading it in for a new vehicle) that isn’t as bad as some on gas, but not as good as others.

AAA had an article on hybrid vs. some other smallish car (I think it was a Hyundai) and the numbers over five years had the non-hybrid come out ahead in fuel efficiency and cost, so if you are looking at a hybrid to cost less… don’t. If you are looking at a hybrid to be easier on the environment, go for it!

Tangent there. Told ya I wasn’t awake.

We did major shopping today

Well, school was canceled today, impending storm and all. So what did we do? We went shopping! We left the kids home with Sara and went up to BJs and got the swingset! Yay!! I’d link to it, but I can’t see to find it anywhere. It’s pretty bad ass though. It’s got two swings, one something else IRIC, a slide, clubhouse, climbing side, it’s cool. I can’t wait to get it set up. I also picked up a new 8 gig highspeed sd card for my camera, yay! I run out quickly with the 2 gig card I currently have.

Took Malachai to therapy, got a flat tire on the way there. Took care of that, therapy went well. I was shown hot to do joint compression with him and he worked on strength and whatnot. Fun stuff! He also started speech today.

Came home, did… something. Played MouseTrap somewhere in there with the kids. Michael is making sloppy joe for dinner. I dyed my sisters hair, I haven’t seen how it came out yet. Ordered a couple of new machines for myself (a rotary machine and a craptastic cheap one to use as a learning tool). And that pretty much wraps up my day! I so want to go out, I don’t want to be home. Oh well.

And on a happy note…

I got a call from APS and we got speech right after OT on Wednesday! Yay! So we have Mon 3:45 – 5:30 and Wed 3:15 – 5. This is fantastic! It will make for long days, but at least he sees it as mostly playtime.

Michael and I went out to lunch on Monday at Salad Creations and I was asking him about some tattooing technique stuff and I taught him something! I had been asking him about lines and filling in solid colour, and he said something about doing it in straight lines. I said oh, I did it “spots,” so instead of a line of circles to make a line of solid fill, I did a largish circle of solid fill, and then moved to another area, and sort of staggered them, so it didn’t make an obvious line, or a lot of obvious stripes. He said he had never thought to do it that way. I went on to explain why I did it that way (I didn’t like the obvious striping effect of line-fill on the melon and my approach camouflaged it) and he said no, you taught me something. I’ve always done lines, because I was taught to do it that way. Go me!

Malachai turns 6 tomorrow. I told him today he was 5 years and 365 (leap year, right?) days old. Wow! Where does the time go? He got two birthday cards in the  mail yesterday, and we’re going to lunch on Sunday. Money we get the swingset! I don’t know if it will get put together or not that day. We’ll see.

a family undertaking

http://www.pbs.org/pov/pov2004/afamilyundertaking

The parlor, or “death room,” was an important part of funerary rituals for most of the 19th century, the place where deceased family members were laid out for final respects. This image dates to c. 1890-1905, a time when many funerals were still taking place at home. Soon, however, death would begin to leave the home and by end of World War I most Americans will receive their health care in doctor’s offices and hospitals and most funerals will take place in funeral homes. As the funeral “parlor” came into vogue, the home parlor was rechristened a “living room.” A 1910 issue of Ladies Home Journal declared the “death room” to be a term of the past.

interesting to read this, mainly because we have had two people, literally, deathly ill in our living room, each died in there. I never knew that what I grew up calling the “living room” used to be the “death room.” How very. Perhaps the death room is going to come back into vogue? Perhaps it is just more… natural? I fought for both of them to be brought home, to be allowed to die surrounded by their loved ones, in a setting that some part of their brain might still recognize as home. Or maybe it is just more comforting to those of us who are being left behind.