Legislation has been introduced in Congress to restore the Voting Rights Act (VRA) following the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision gutting the law, but neither the modest Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2014 or the more ambitious Voting Rights Advancement Act of 2015, which both have bipartisan support, have moved legislatively.



Today congressional Democrats unveiled a new strategy to build support for the Voting Rights Advancement Act. The bill compels states with a well-documented history of recent voting discrimination to clear future voting changes with the federal government, requires federal approval for voter-ID laws and similar measures, and outlaws new efforts to suppress the growing minority vote.

Every Tuesday while in session members of Congress will speak about the importance of voting rights, calling it “Restoration Tuesday,” spotlight stories of modern-day barriers to voting and rally on social media with the hashtag #RestoreTheVOTE & #RestorationTuesday.

William Jefferson Clinton was a very good president and Franklin Delano Roosevelt was a truly great president and therein lies the tale of the battle for the Democratic nomination for president in 2016.

While Hillary Clinton remains the clear frontrunner in the battle for the Democratic nomination, Bernie Sanders remains the conscience of the Democrats in the presidential campaign and the most influential voice—by far—in the great debate about the future of the Democratic Party.

The problem with the Hillary Clinton candidacy, to put it in terms that are brutally blunt, is that she appears to be endlessly engaging in almost hourly political calculations and maneuvers. While Bernie Sanders is the ultimate conviction politician, taking stands of principle that he has long championed and deeply believed in, Hillary Clinton is the ultimate calculating politician, taking stands that shift with political winds which lead to abnormally high levels of public distrust of her.

To understand the importance of the Sanders campaign, and the power and appeal of his message, and why it is so important to Democratic success in 2016, consider the following. Mr. Sanders is the most authentic heir to the great Democratic legacy of the New Deal of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the New Frontier of John F. Kennedy, and the Great Society of Lyndon B. Johnson. His major progressive positions happen to be highly popular with voters and more popular with voters than opposing conservative positions. I would argue that the better Mr. Sanders does in his campaign the more Ms. Clinton follows his lead in taking progressive positions that are both right and popular, and the more the Democrats are identified with these positions the better their chances of prevailing in 2016.

By contrast without the appeal of the Sanders campaign there is every reason to believe, and much evidence to suggest, that Ms. Clinton would “move to the right” and reposition herself yet again in ways that would increase her levels of distrust from voters generally, and depress Democratic turnout on Election Day.

AARP on Tuesday unveiled its plan to inform the public — in particular its 37 million members — about the presidential candidates’ plans, or lack thereof, for ensuring Social Security’s long-term fiscal health.

“They should at least be able to tell us and the voters what their plans are to keep Social Security strong, John Hishta, AARP’s senior vice president of campaigns, told reporters Tuesday.

Multiple solutions to extending Social Security’s solvency have been debated in recent years, but none have been passed by Congress. Among them: raising the retirement age, raising the cap on how much income is taxed, reducing or eliminating benefits for wealthy retirees, and allowing younger workers to put their Social Security taxes in a private retirement account.

“They are, to different extents, being specific,” Sovern said. “Where there is a lack of specificity, we are pushing for more.”

Hishta said the front-running candidates from both parties — Republicans Donald Trump and Ben Carson and Democrat Hillary Clinton — have yet to detail specific plans for Social Security.

This dispute over the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act is Hillary vs. Bernie in a nutshell. Is it better to go all in, at every moment in history, or is it better to pull your punches sometimes, for a larger good? Can you trust Hillary Clinton to do what she believes, or will she only do what is politically expedient?

I lived through the actual debate on the Defense of Marriage Act, the one in Congress, where the proponents spent months loudly warning of the dangers of pedophilia, incest, and other abuses they thought gay marriage would usher in. It was a particularly painful time — I was a reporter at the New York Observer covering the 1996 campaign, and an out lesbian. I remembered the whole episode as a nasty punch in the gut. The bill passed both houses with gigantic margins.

But Clinton signed the bill. "It was a difficult day," Clinton's openly gay White House adviser, Richard Socarides, told me. "But there’s a lot at stake in a presidential election. It was not a tough choice: do you want the guy who is signing this reluctantly because he feels he has to protect his political flank, or do you want to, by your inaction, help elect the person who’s proposing it?"

"He signed it," Clinton agreed. "But he signed it because it was something the Congress said, 'Take it or leave it. You’re going to have to do it.' They would have passed it over his veto."

Listening back to that tape — recorded on a long-gone cassette recorder — it's hard to believe how many questions Clinton took on the issue, until she eventually cried uncle. "I would have voted for it at that time but I think to go back and talk about DOMA now especially...is something that is divisive."

So then, why was she against gay marriage?

Here's the part of her answer that later became famous. "Because I believe marriage means something different. Marriage is about a historic, religious and moral content that goes back to the beginning of time and I think a marriage is as a marriage has always been between a man and a woman."

There are many arguments against the death penalty, from the inherent immorality of allowing a state to kill its own citizens, to the arbitrary and inconsistent application depending on the race of the convicted killer, and the race of the victim (black killers of white victims get the death penalty in a disproportionate number of cases). Geography matters, too. According to a 2013 report by the Death Penalty Information Center, “2% of the counties in the U.S. have been responsible for the majority of cases leading to executions since 1976 .… [A]ll of the state executions since the death penalty was reinstated stem from cases in just 15% of the counties in the U.S. All of the 3,125 inmates on death row as of January 1, 2013 came from just 20% of the counties."

Analyzing data compiled by the Death Penalty Information Center shows that since 1973 at least 156 people have been released from death row after being exonerated of the crime for which they were convicted, defined as acquitted, had all charges dismissed, or been granted a pardon based on evidence of innocence. So these aren’t the oft-cited “technicalities,” but either findings of innocence or the complete collapse of a prosecutor’s case.

The racial breakdown of the exonerated is heavily weighted to African Americans, who accounted for 81, or 52%, of the exoneration cases, while whites accounted for 61, or 40%, of the exonerations. Latinos (12 cases) and “other" (one case) accounted for the rest.

But the disparity extends further. The 156 exonerated people spent an average of 11.4 years on death row. But wrongfully convicted whites spent an average of nine years on death row, compared with the average 13.5 years blacks spent before being set free.

When you can’t be sure that the justice system is convicting the guilty, how can you rely on it to determine who lives and dies?

Not enough people vote. It’s a perennial source of concern in American politics. There’s no shortage of reforms designed to address the problem, but one idea that seems particularly promising, at least in theory, is compulsory voting. It would produce much higher turnout for the obvious reason that it requires people to vote. It’s long been dismissed, though, as an impossible pipe dream, unlikely to ever happen in the United States. But if reformers were to start at the municipal level, they could set into motion forces that might lead to its nationwide adoption.

Start with some statistics: In years with presidential elections, voter turnout peaks at just above 60 percent. In off-year elections, turnout dips to 40 percent or less. In November 2014, only 36 percent of eligible voters went to the polls—the lowest share in more than 70 years. Participation this paltry calls into question the political system’s legitimacy. It also hints that election outcomes might be quite different if more people bothered to show up.

Compulsory voting isn’t as draconian as it sounds. No one is dragged to the polls against his or her will, and no one is thrown in jail for refusing to cast a ballot. Instead, a modest fine (about $20 in Australia) is levied on people who fail to show up and have no good excuse for their absence. There also isn’t any danger of political speech being compelled—a no-no under the First Amendment. People are free to do what they like with their ballots, including turning them in blank.

(Congressman Peter Welch's) words should carry particular weight when he discusses last week’s decision by President Obama to put US troops on the ground in Syria. After the president—who once declared, unequivocally, that “we’re not considering any boots-on-the-ground approach” in Syria—ordered several dozen Special Operations troops into Syria for what The New York Times describes as “the first open-ended mission by United States ground forces in that country,” Welch said: “Make no mistake about it, this is a war.”

It is not, however, a clearly declared or authorized war.

As Welch observes: “The legal framework justifying this war is loosely tied to the fumes of a Congressional authorization approved in response to the 9/11 attack on America over 14 years ago.”

“I am deeply concerned by escalating mission creep in Syria."—Congresswoman Barbara Lee
That’s an absurd construct, argues Welch.

“A civil war in Syria did not exist 14 years ago. ISIS did not exist 14 years ago. Neither the United States nor Russia were conducting military operations in Syria 14 years ago,” notes the congressman, who says it is time for Congress to focus on the question of whether the United States should be engaged in a new war in the Middle East.

There are genuine divisions on this issue. “The senator believes that the crisis in Syria will be solved diplomatically, not militarily,” says the campaign of Democratic president campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders, while the campaign of Hillary Clinton says the former secretary of state “sees merit in the targeted use of special operations personnel to support our partners in the fight against ISIS, including in Syria.”

This debate can, and should, be had on the campaign trail.

But it must be had in Congress.