Will your vote count?
You may need to bring ID to the polls - check http://www.bringyourid.org/index.htm.
You may cast a provisional ballot but it may not be counted [pdf document, 1.4 Mb]
Some states like Maryland with paperless touchscreen machines have no way to verify if
your vote was actually counted or whom it counted for!
Here's a hilarious spoof [wmv file, 1.8 Mb] of paperless Diebold voting machines.
The owner of Diebold promised to deliver Bush a victory.
Green Power - can you buy emissions-free
electricity? Learn about it here.
Opposition to the "Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate
Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism" (USA PATRIOT) Act is increasing
across the political spectrum! This dangerous law allows the FBI to
conduct surveillance on religious and political organizations with no evidence
of wrongdoing, to obtain your medical , student, financial, library, and
other records without you being allowed to know about it, and to search your
home without probable cause, among many other things. Over 200 communities
have passed resolutions or directives opposing it, now including Greenbelt
and Prince George's County! Is yours among them? Check www.bordc.org and if not,
work on being the next.
Is opposing the "Patriot Act" a Jewish issue? Read
my column in the Mishkan Torah newsletter
(page 2)
Maryland wants to close budget gap with slots or casinos and sales tax increase.
- Maryland has fallen to 48th among 50 states
in state revenue as percentage of income - low tax, low spend state (but
relies heavily on personal income tax from moderate-income folks, so looks
deceptively higher on tax day)
- Poorest 20% of Marylanders pay 10% of their
income in state and local taxes
- Richest 1% of Marylanders pay 5% of their
income in state and local taxes
- State income tax is flat, not graduated. Sales
tax hits poor folks disproportionately
- Corporations now pay only half of the fraction
of Maryland's revenue they paid 20 years ago - because of loopholes for huge
corporations, not because small family business is paying less
- If big corporations and rich folks had to pay
their fair share, Maryland could solve its budget problems without increasing
taxes on most residents and without resorting to gambling (which disproportionately
draws money from the poor, as shown in new study on Maryland lottery)
- For more information, visit Maryland Budget and
Tax Policy Institute
- This gross inequity precedes the current Republican
governor and is the result of policies enacted by Democrats in the legislature.
But there is an alternative - you can join the Maryland Green Party,
the only growing political party in Maryland!
- Tell your legislators to make everyone pay their
fair share, that you won't tolerate the sucking sound of your money going
to the rich while services for all of us decline!
Smokefree
workplace laws save lives - data from an inadvertant perfect experiment
(Helena, MT, only one hospital) show dramatic dropoff of heart attacks when
law implemented, dramatic rise back to previous levels when law overturned.
For details on the study, click
here.
|
TORNADO! Stephen's storm-chase pictures and detailed meteorological case
analysis |
Stephen's Pesach 2003/5763 Haggadah full of ???questions???
Join the People's Coalition for Police Accountability,
fighting racism and police brutality in Prince George's County. For
more information, email me (click my name above). We usually meet Sundays
at 5:30.
Pesach is upon us! A compilation
of haggadah
additions and social justice themes for Pesach brought to you from the
Jewish Social Justice Network. Also, lot's of Pesach insights/actions at
socialaction.com.
And of course, we celebrate the greening of the earth - we are told Pesach
is in the month of Aviv, meaning spring. Plus, this year it falls on the
heels of Shabbat, itself a celebration of creation. And, fittingly, Earth
Day falls just two weeks later, one week after the end of Pesach. For Jewish
environmental action and insights, visit the Coalition on the Environment
and Jewish Life! (Unfortunately,
parts of the COEJL site cannot be viewed with Netscape, use Microsoft Explorer
there)
Home Demolitions Israel has resumed destruction of
Palestinean homes. Please help stop this now - here's
the action. More on actions for peace and the Olives
for Peace campaign at the Shalom Center
website and at Rabbis for Human Rights. New
organization for responsible peace for both sides: Brit Tzedek v' Shalom.
Dazzling Aurora seen down to Mexico, then the most potent solar flare in
25 years erupted (but not directed toward earth, so no aurora this time).
The sun is active. Info on space weather and auroras at http://www.sel.noaa.gov/today.html
and http://www.spaceweather.com
and http://www.spacew.com.
US Presidential Election 2000:
Voting Irregularities Analysis Links:
http://madison.hss.cmu.edu/
http://www.research.att.com/~volinsky/florida.html
http://faculty.fuqua.duke.edu/~cfox/Bio/election2000note.pdf
http://www.indiana.edu/~playpol/pbmodel.pdf
Instant Runoff Voting!
Rank your choices,
such as 1. Nader, 2. McReynolds, 3. Gore. (or
1. Buchanan, 2. Browne, 3. Bush)
Candidate with the
fewest first place votes is eliminated first. Those ballots transfer to their
second choice. Repeat eliminations and transfers until one candidate has
a majority of the votes. In these examples, clearly the minor party candidates
will all get eliminated, so these ballots will ultimately transfer to Gore
and Bush.This
eliminates the spoiler.
Such elections are
held in other countries. We could do it here too, and at all levels right
down to your mayor, and even in all your community organizations. For more
information on Instant Runoff Voting, visit the Center for Voting and Democracy!
17 Oct 2000 Peace News!
A few picturesof me.
I work as a meteorologist for COMET which is part
of University Corporation for Atmospheric
Research which is located in Boulder,
Colorado. However, I work at the National Centers for Environmental
Prediction which is part of the National Weather Service
and is located near Washington, D.C. My job is to provide scientific content
on operational NWP modeling at NCEP for web-based training for NWS forecasters.
Some of our products are publicly available at http://meted.ucar.edu/nwp/pcu2/index.htm
and all are listed among those on the MetEd web page.
If you are
looking for good communities to live in around Washington DC, I recommend
Takoma Park and Greenbelt.
My web pages
under construction are:
Nature
Politics and
democracy
Fusing Judaism
and social justice (wholistic approach)
Jewish singles (this includes me)
Weather and tornado
chasing
My fantasy baseball
league (we actually play the games, it's not a rotisserie league)
************
special link *************
The close proximity of Chanukah to the 1999
Seattle World Trade Organization talks and protests made for a timely discussion
of an amazing thematic link explored in my Chanukah and Corporations skit
which is still timely and relevant today