03/06/23
Good morning! It’s Monday, March 6th. National Frozen Food Day.
Frozen food gets a bad rep but you know what? On those grocery store trips when you’re looking for something healthy, but you don’t know if you’ll actually get to eating it that week, why not throw some frozen healthy food in your cart instead. Then, when you’re craving it, you’ve got your healthy food.
And by that I mean… ice cream. The joke is that I think ice cream is healthy.
Nailed the joke.
And now, the news.
Talk Voting Rights to Me, Baybee
-via AP News
-RBG Quote via Time
While the fight for voting rights is as old as the country itself, and has taken place all over the country, there is perhaps no place better known as the home of that fight than a bridge in Alabama.
It was march of 1965 and, after a series of protests and marches, culminating in the murder of Jimmie Lee Jackson while he, and others, peacefully protested the jailing of James Orange for registering and organizing voters, a series of marches took place on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.
The first of these marches was called Bloody Sunday and was, as the name suggests… not super chill. That first march, which brought the fight for voting rights out of the south and into the news broadcasts and papers of the nation, is a historical touchstone when we look back at the battle for your Constitutional right to cast a ballot.
Because the first for the right to cast a ballot continues.
The Voting Rights Act, the landmark legislation signed into law by LBJ following the series of marches, had a few sections to it. In 2013, the math portion of it, the portion that required lawmakers to recognize that some states and counties had written laws specifically to make it harder for Black Americans to cast their ballot and therefore, if they wanted to change their laws again, they needed the thumbs up emoji from a federal court, was taken away.
And it was just math – but it was also crucial and opened up the law to basically just being swiss cheese when it comes to actually protecting your right to vote.
In fact, that was the case, Shelby County v Holder, that gave Ruth Bader Ginsberg the Notorious RBG nickname. Or at least, started it. Because that was the first dissent that had fire emojis on the side. This is what she said: “Throwing out preclearance when it has worked and is continuing to work to stop discriminatory changes is like throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”
And now, ten years after preclearance has been trashed, we can even take it a little further. Because it’s like you’re in a rainstorm, but the ones throwing away the umbrella are the only ones that know more of a storm is coming. They’re the only once that know that, what you’re dealing with is just a sprinkle. That the real storm is coming. And they know that, because they’re the ones causing the storm.
Did I lose the metaphor?
Yep! Sure did! Does it matter? Not really. Because the point is this… YOUR right to vote is under attack and, this weekend, President Biden went to Selma to reaffirm the need for the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act. A piece of legislation that would, among other things, restrict partisan gerrymandering, strike down hurdles to voting, and bring transparency to campaign finances. Things that would help everything and strengthen democracy for all.
Will it pass?
No, not right now. Because remember how I said it would help everyone? And remember how Republicans don’t want that, and also Joey Manchy has a houseboat and he likes the filibuster more than the right to vote.
But that doesn’t mean it won’t ever pass. And it doesn’t mean we can stop fighting.
And, most important, it doesn’t mean the fight is only for elected officials. The fight is on all of us, because it’s for all of us.
And even if you’re not out there on that bridge, be out there metaphorically. Make sure you’re registered to vote and cast that ballot in every single election. Talk to your friends and family about it.
Be in this fight.
And of course… check out www.wearevoters.org to see how you can help us.
And you know what… eh. That’s the news.
I wasn’t planning for it to be but you know what… I think sometimes there are just some things I don’t want us to get distracted about. And of all the things I don’t want us to get distracted about… the fact that Kelly Clarkson will one day EGOT, how long it’s taking for that new season of Ted Lasso to come through (even though I know it’ll be here next week so now I’m just annoyed that we don’t know if it’ll be the last season even though it probably will be), how great of a show ER was… voting rights, the fight for them, the magic of them, the magic of your voice and the way your use it so powerfully every single time you cast that ballot… that’s always (always always always) going to be the thing I never want you to lose sight of.
So yeah… we’ll do more news tomorrow. In the meantime, check that voter registration, get out We Are Voters, and go get yourself some ice cream. You deserve it.
Why?
Because you’re great. And because you’re great… I’m proud of you.