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Comment by dx87 | Hacker News Reader

This part seems incorrect:

> There are strict laws regulating police and poll workers while the polls are open. Police are not allowed within 100 feet of the polling location, unless they're actively voting or there on official business at the request of the election board. Additionally, anyone working at the polls in an official capacity is not allowed to wear any clothing with political messaging. One of the officers who showed up earlier in the day was wearing a hoodie with the American flag on it, and the US armed forces oath of enlistment printed in place of the white stripes. As they were leaving, I pulled the officer aside and asked him to remove the hoodie before making his next stop, politely explaining the law.

The linked PDF of rules says that the following isn't allowed:

> Wearing a t-shirt or button supporting a candidate, campaign, or political party (except voters in the act of voting)

The American flag with the military oath of enlistment isn't any of those. I'd probably get upset as well if some poll worker tried to tell me I'm not allowed to wear the American flag on my clothes.

View on HN

It's not just the flag, it's a stylized flag blended with the oath. Which is much more political than a plain flag.

A simpler example might be a flag with 52 stars. It's blatantly political, even though it would likely be harder to notice than the hoodie I looked up.

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/119415827607659191/

(whether that's the exact same hoodie, who knows, but it matches the description close enough)

He was still wrong though. The ban isn't on anything that might seem vaguely political... gay pride flag, blue line flag, trans flag, UAW hat, etc.

They just can't support a candidate or political party.

It depends. In Minnesota, wearing any of the items you listed would be considered electioneering if that was a major issue of the campaign.

So if one candidate has made gay rights a major plank of their platform, then wearing a shirt with a gay pride flag would run afoul of the rules. But that same shirt would be allowed in the absence of that specific issue being promoted by a candidate’s campaign.

That means the rule would be wide open to interpretation. After all, who decides what a major issue is?

It would seem far easier, and straightforward, and not a burden on anyone is simply wearing a plain shirt.

I'm fine drawing a line for an officer carrying out election duties that goes further than for other people.

They just shouldn't wear anything that puts the election workers in a position where they have to evaluate the political message. I guess that can be tricky if a uniform somehow became partisan though.

Being a policeman is becoming a partisan issue in itself, I guess

That framing is very generous to the status quo.

There likely is a moderately sized group of people who are opposed to having police, but the real partisan divide is over what sort of policing is acceptable, not over policing itself.

And even that is not really a sufficient explanation of the differences in opinion, it's too simplistic. People disagree about whether police are biased and things like that.

> I'd probably get upset as well if some poll worker tried to tell me I'm not allowed to wear the American flag on my clothes

The flag of the United States is not adulterated with text or anything else in place of its stripes, stars, and field.

I think you may be referencing the US flag code, which yes, has a handful of explicit and implicit prohibitions against wearing the flag on clothing.

Whenever discussing the US flag code it's important to mention that the statute is unconstitutional as determined in United States v. Eichman.

What the flag code says about clothing is as irrelevant as any other hot take on the issue.

I believe United States v. Eichman invalidated 18 U.S.C. § 700 -- which is the Flag Protection Act.

The "Flag Code" normally refers to 4 U.S.C. § 1 -- which I don't think ever had any penalties for violation. It's simply advisory. The purpose is primarily to define the way the flag is used in an official capacity.

i don’t think you need to reference much of anything but the flag itself to firmly establish that the flag doesn’t have text on it.

> The flag of the United States is not adulterated with text or anything else in place of its stripes, stars, and field.

I could give you a billion examples where it is. Just do a Google image search.

Then it is not the flag of the United States.

How would you describe what it is then?

Similar to the flag of the United States but with extraneous junk on it

Art

Speaking of not being allowed to enter a polling place wearing curtain clothes:

"Since Tuesday, she has become known as the “Topless Voter.”

The woman, who ripped off her T-shirt after objections that it was too political to wear inside the Exeter polls, said she has no regrets.

“I said, ‘Well then, can I vote naked?’ He turned to me and said, ‘If you want to.’ So I took off my shirt,” she said.

She said she kept on her mask because removing it would have been “unhealthy.”"

https://www.unionleader.com/news/politics/voters/topless-vot...

Depressing how uncivilized and obnoxious people can be. We may want to reevaluate why we used to tech our children shame. It’s about mutual respect. Without that, we continue a downward spiral.

Because God forbid a women be topless... So disrespectful. We need to start shaming people who comment online again, remove all anonymity so we can publicly shame them for saying something stupid like a women voting topless should be shamed.

In this particular case it is. You can’t wear political clothing in a polling place. This law applies to everyone. To indignantly take your shirt off is disrespectful to the people there. It would be the same if it were a man taking his shirt off.

The fact you instantly made it into some sort of anti-feminist or sexist screed sounds paranoid. Are we really this suspicious of each other?

Do you honestly think “no shirt, no shoes, no service” makes for a worse society?

"The woman said she has always been supportive of efforts like New Hampshire’s “Free the Nipple” campaign, though she doesn’t actively participate in such movements."

Aha! Even more electioneering - where does it end with this woman? :)

The real question is, what department allows their on-duty officers to wear non-uniform clothing articles for routine public assignments?

I also worked polls in Philadelphia and we were also visited by non-uniform cops at the end of the day to do the (critical!) step of picking up the paper ballots. We got their badge numbers and names of course, but it was a little sketchy. The one who came by midday was uniformed, though.

Very interesting. Is it possible they were constables? They are very hit or miss, on uniforms and other aspects. Not sure if Philly has constables or not.

I recall that the word "constable" was used in the big voter rights posters we had to put up, but frankly don't know any more than that.

Part of the constable's duties is to open and close the polls. I'm not sure if they're required to be there the whole time or not. Our's is usually there. Sometimes he is in uniform, and sometimes not.

Here in Boston our officers were in uniform all day but they told us they drop off all the ballots out of uniform in their own personal vehicles, he surmised to be less obvious a target. I thought it was an interesting approach, perhaps not super effective but interesting.

Uh... you should report that.

In some jurisdictions --- I don't know how common this is, but it's the case in mine --- uniformed police officers are prohibited from the polling place unless requested by election judges because of the potential that it will create a voter intimidation situation (keep in mind that these law enforcement officers are under the command of one of the people on the ballot). So I would conjecture that some areas may ask police to appear in plainclothes, although here police are simply not present at all unless requested---the county did hire a private security firm to keep an eye on some locations though due to problems during early voting. This is basically because the right to eject someone from the polling place rests with the election judge, not police or security, but they're temporary employees and not trained in deescalation.

I don't think that is the case in PA. In fact, constables are required to be at the polls.

Overseeing elections is their primary duty. They also serve the courts:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvania_State_Constables

It doesn't seem much different than a "thin blue line" flag. I'd feel the same way as Drew in this situation. If you want to wear a flag, wear a flag.

A "thin blue line" flag also doesn't fit any of the banned criteria. You guys are basically saying that supporting police and military is only done by republicans.

It's a logo that is more strongly associated with one political party than another, being worn by someone who is presumably armed and in a position of authority. If you cannot see why this is a problem, I don't think I can explain it any more.

Since it is less incendiary to discuss, what if someone was wearing a Rastafarian style hat in places marijuana bills were on the ballot, is this a conflict?

If the colors/hat had become a signalling mechanism by the political movement and were being used to make a political statement, I would say wearing them would be in bad taste. Especially if a member of law enforcement or the military was doing it.

More directly, if the Rastafarian style hat was a prominent display in several recent political rallies for a single party, I think it should be absolutely called into equal question.

Rastafarianism is a religion. I assume religious attire is not restricted.

Is it religious attire if the person wearing it is not religious?

I think argument was that it was worn by an official.

If it was a police officer wearing that or a poll worker, that's not acceptable. If it was a voter in act of voting it is fine.

To avoid the religion argument, let's switch it to a shirt with a big marijuana leaf on it.

In that case, yes. Unless the person is a voter in the act of voting.

I didn't think voters were allowed to have political clothing either? I've heard of some voters asked to turn masks and shirts inside out while they're at the polls.

The PDF linked from the post clarifies the rule for PA: "Wearing a t-shirt or button supporting a candidate, campaign, or political party (except voters in the act of voting)"

(Other jurisdictions may have other rules, of course)

There is a difference between being in bad taste and being illegal.

??? do you really not get it?

If I wear a shirt with MEDICARE FOR ALL, GREEN NEW DEAL (or SUPPORT ACA and REJOIN PARIS ACCORDS) on it, that's clear partisan support. That's illegal. Thin blue line flags and "support our troops" are out of place and it's two-faced to pretend it isn't just a signal of partisan support. These are some of the major party issues.

Bad taste has nothing to do with it. If someone wears a SUPPORT THE CURRENT PRESIDENT shirt, that's support of Trump, not endorsement of the concept of government or something nonpartisan.

I agree that things like 'thin blue line' and 'support our troops' have a political element that would be out of bounds in states with these laws, but its not clear to me that the example cited in the story approaches this level of explicit political meaning.

If it is what he says, then it was simply a copy of text that all soldiers swear to when they enlist. The U.S. Army is not a political organization and contains people from all backgrounds.

What really seems to have happened here is that the author was able to reasonably infer this police officers political affiliation from his clothing and that is not what is prohibited in these laws.

> There is a difference between being in bad taste and being illegal.

It's called "letter of the law" vs "spirit of the law",

Purposely violating the principle of the law by abusing loopholes, and proceeding to claim that technically violating the spirit of the law is not illegal because you came up with a loophole that you believe is not incompatible with the letter of the law just goes to show the level of dedication that you have to break the law without being punished for your transgression.

For some reason I can't imagine many people utilizing that sort of logic with the transgender flag on a hat.

If you were working as an election official, that would still be a problem.

> It's a logo that is more strongly associated with one political party than another

I doubt the regulations around polling places consider that relevant. I'd guess one party wears cowboy hats more often than the other, but that doesn't make them a political statement.

>It's a logo that is more strongly associated with one political party than another

As long as you'll admit that BLM falls under this same logic, and should similarly be banned, then you're being consistent.

If not, you're being hypocritical.

Of course! Unlike the other imaginary hypocrisy in this thread, I actually saw someone on reddit say this exactly. They were just there to vote, and they were asked to turn their BLM mask inside out while they were there.

It's a symbol of political groups like "Blue Lives Matter"[1] and it has specific connotations in the US[2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_Lives_Matter

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thin_blue_line#Symbols_and_var...

Are you seriously suggesting the "thin blue line" or "back the blue" flags are not political messaging?

Lots of folks with different backgrounds and beliefs "support police and military"; however, the bootlick flags are closely tied to just one party.

It's definitely political messaging, but the linked PDF says that political messaging is only banned if it's associated with a specific campaign or candidate.

Only one candidate has had the "Blue lives" flags at their rallys.

What makes a "bootlick" flag, in your opinion?

The people wearing it made it political. You see them exclusively at trump rallies.

For similar reason wearing a red hat now became a political statement. In Poland for example now wearing something with a thunderbolt or 8 asterisks is sign that you support current protests. In France wearing yellow vests. Those things constantly change and at specific time it can be political. It's all about context and if you're voting you can't claim to be oblivious to it.

The people wearing it made it political

I think the message that police are all that keeps society from descending into violent chaos is inherently political.

https://www.themarshallproject.org/2020/06/08/the-short-frau...

BLM isn’t only supported by Democrats, but wearing it to the polls should absolutely not be allowed.

Imagine a group of programmers unable to tell the difference between "violates the rules" and "hurts my political feelings"... yikes.

And then imagine the group of programmers arguing with them trying rule-lawyer "keep the polls civil and don't sport inflammatory clothing or accessories."

It's not a good look when the best you can make is something isn't technically forbidden. Like it doesn't make you clever trying to argue that your "cry more snowflake" shirt isn't political -- you're just an asshole.

Doing a thing that's "not a good look (according to Spivak)" != a violation of the stated rules

Being perceived as "an asshole (according to Spivak)" != a violation of the stated rules

Thanks for demonstrating my point so clearly ;]

No, but if you're working at the polls, you shouldn't be trying to push that line absolutely as hard as you can, and then arguing that what you're doing doesn't technically cross it. That isn't the point. The point is, in your official capacity, you're supposed to be neutral. Not "not biased enough to be against the rules". Neutral.

The scenario you described didn't happen.

What did happen was that a poll worker made up their own version of the election guidelines and injected their personal biases related to "specific ballot measures" and the "police organization" into their conduct.

Does that sound neutral?

What's clear from this thread is that there are a hundred ways to clearly support a candidate that don't break the rules. If you agree with the intention behind the rules don't try to undermine them. If you don't support the ban on electioneering, then be open about it and try to change the policy.

"The intention behind the rules" is a thing that lives in your imagination. It cannot be quantified. That's the point of having written rules.

Expecting that poll workers will read and adhere to The Rules as stated isn't some wild fantasy. It's literally what they signed up to do. It's foundational to the idea of an election having any legitimacy at all.

It does not require taking a position on "the ban on electioneering", just a position against poll worker vigilantism (virtue-lantism?).

> "The intention behind the rules" is a thing that lives in your imagination.

No, it's pretty straight-forward. There's no healthy democracy that believes that a blatantly partial and biased individual counting the votes generates confidence in the elections being fair and democratic. The whole idea that you can violate such a fundamental principle in such a blatant way is something that goes totally against basic democratic principles.

> No, it's pretty straight-forward.

Great! If it's so straight-forward, can you please quantify the intention behind the document entitled "Guide for Election Board Officials in Philadelphia County"[1] for me? ... I'll wait.

In the meantime, I'd love to hear more about how impossible it is for "blatantly partial and biased" poll workers to effect the perceived fairness of an election. Would you have confidence in an election where each poll worker made up their own version of the rules?

[1] https://files7.philadelphiavotes.com/election-workers/Primar...

> "The intention behind the rules" is a thing that lives in your imagination. It cannot be quantified. That's the point of having written rules.

The intention is important because not all rules can be quantified. Language is subjective and words are often ambiguous.

It's almost as if someone anticipated this phenomenon and created a section in the guidelines to further clarify and provide examples of disallowed behavior...

Clarification and examples do not make an inherently qualitative thing quantifiable.

Indeed. So when a poll worker deviates from the stated rules, it necessitates investigating why that happened (and deciding if such a deviation was proper).

What an amazing coincidence it is that this poll worker just so happened to deviate from the guidelines in a way that aligns with their admitted personal opinions and biases!

If you believe (ab)using language to conflate "political party" with "political entity" is proper, does that belief extend to the other 51 cases of "political party" found in the guidelines? Or just the single case that aligns with your biases?

They didn’t deviate from the stated rules. The rules are open to interpretation, and they interpreted them to the best of their abilities.

There are poll workers of both major parties; presumably if they interpreted the rules in a flagrantly partisan way, poll workers from the other party would have objected.

> they interpreted them to the best of their abilities

Oh wow that settles it, then! Case closed.

By the way, got any tips on how to learn mind-reading? You seem really good at it.

> By the way, got any tips on how to learn mind-reading? You seem really good at it.

This is a particularly funny response given that your entire argument hinges on inferring someone’s motive for interpreting the rules in a particular way.

> your entire argument hinges on inferring someone’s motive

Where did that happen? Or do your psychic abilities allow you to bend time and space as well?

Yes, they allow me to mentally travel back and recall past events. Behold:

> So when a poll worker deviates from the stated rules, it necessitates investigating why that happened (and deciding if such a deviation was proper).

> What an amazing coincidence it is that this poll worker just so happened to deviate from the guidelines in a way that aligns with their admitted personal opinions and biases!

Congrats on your victory against OP in the Mental Gymnastics contest!

Please never sign up to be a poll worker.

They just need to check whether the flag is on the whitelist or the blacklist

Lol have you read the Contributor Covenant or postmeritocracy.org ?

Good lord. At least the signatories have made themselves easy to identify.

not a masochist

https://www.police1.com/legal/articles/3-things-to-consider-...

Thankfully though, in America, it's not up to you or Drew to decide what others can or cannot wear. That is subject only to law, which says you can wear slogans and insignia, but not names of candidates.

Where I live slogans like MAGA hats weren't allowed at polling places

Given the other responses, consider it a gray area at best. And for something fundamental to the integrity of elections, I'd say it's best to err on the side of not having any possible appearance of impropriety.

I am pretty left- leaning and this also struck me as weird. Like the author, I too have a pretty good sense for the political affiliation that this sort of clothing represents (especially on a police officer) but it's not explicitly endorsing a political party and seems to only include the text of an oath made by all U.S. soldiers.

It seems similar to someone wearing clothing that contained text of the Pledge of Allegiance, the Constitution, or the Declaration of Independence. Yes, we know the right wing loves this stuff but I really don't think it rises to the level of 'electioneering'.

In fact, the guy was probably thinking 'Here's another lefty that hates the United States and the military'. It really does seem like there was some (unconscious?) bias at play here.

I was a poll worker in Denver, and the way it was explained to me was: you can't wear anything referencing stuff on the ballot. So for example you can wear a shirt that says "{Black|Blue} Lives Matter" because there's nothing about whose lives matter on the ballot. Same with a MAGA hat. But you can't wear a shirt that says "Vote no on 2A", or "Trump 2020", because those people/issues are on the ballot.

Denver != Pennsylvania, obviously, but perhaps it's a federal law? I don't really know where the rule comes from.

Anyway, overall takeaways working were: 1. everyone was super friendly and it was a great experience and 2. Denver+Colorado really have their shit together when it comes to elections. It's easy to vote, there's a paper trail for everything, and the default is by mail. Everyone should do it like we do.

MAGA hats wouldn’t be allowed (in California) since they’re official campaign merchandise and part of that campaign’s branding.

Source: am an SF election inspector.

That said, it’s all up to the specifics of state law.

Just curious, but how much is up to personal discretion? What if the hat was red and said "Make USA Great Again"? or simply "Make America Great"? These wouldn't be "official" merchandise, and to be honest, I have no idea how a random pollworker or inspector decides what is "official".

If a pollworker or election inspector deemed something to be electioneering, they would first let the person know and ask them to remedy the situation. 99% of cases are handled this way without incident. Of course, any citizen can do the same if a pollworker is unwilling to do so.

In the event that the person refuses to cooperate, you can call the election center to get confirmation that they're electioneering and—if so—you can simply call the police and have them deal with it if it's egregious enough.

Realistically, the situation you're asking about just doesn't happen often enough to be of concern. Most of the time, people aren't "trying" to electioneer. They're just excited about their candidate, and when told about the law and asked to take down a sign or remove a hat, they'll do so even if begrudgingly. The people who actually want to electioneer aren't shy about it and step way over the line. For anything in the middle, simply make a judgment call and go with it.

MAGA hats were allowed in the general election in California: https://elections.cdn.sos.ca.gov/ccrov/pdf/2020/september/20...

They were considered "campaign slogans or political movement slogans".

You had me until MAGA hat... It is specifically sold by and strongly associated with a campaign. How is that allowed?

No idea, but these are all examples they gave us during our training.

Yeah, MAGA and Keep America Great are both literally trademarks of Donald J. Trump for President, Inc., the official campaign.

Say there's a vote on decriminalizing marihuana (from what I understood this happened in some states). Are you then allowed to walk around with a weed leaf t-shirt? What if its a band logo called The Amazing Cannabis with a bunch of happy leaves smoking a joint? What if its a flag in colours red/green/yellow with a black weed logo on it?

"The American flag with the military oath of enlistment" is not "the American flag", but rather an attempt to make some kind of statement. At best it's political support of the military, at worst it's a possible dog whistle.

A dog whistle for what? There's an awful lot of cagey presumption going on in every reiteration of this claim.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oath_Keepers

That is not what the Thin Blue Line represents.

That's probably what the "oath of enlistment" represents though.

No, the "military oath of enlistment" is LITERALLY the oath of enlistment for the military. As in the US military.

As in the oath that enlisted soliders/marines/sailors say: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces_oat...

Anything else or other associations are in your head, not reality.

Probably, eh? Well then sure, let's have election workers make judgment calls based on "probably".

Worked great for Pregnant Chad.

That's quite the display of mental gymnastics.

> A dog whistle for what? There's an awful lot of cagey presumption going on in every reiteration of this claim.

I'm not a US citizen nor I ever set foot in the US, and even from afar the quasi-fanarical displays of support for the US armed forces is a hallmark of supporters of the Republican party.

As an American, American politics genuinely feels like a game of dodge ball where each team captain takes turns picking virtues that the other side has to be against.

The left picked immigration so the right has to hate immigration, the right picked the military so the left has to hate the military. It's like our politics have to be polar opposites on everything, and it's exhausting.

I get you. And plenty of Republicans support the military but did not support Bush's invasion of Iraq / false hunt for WMDs and agree on limiting the size of our military.

This book had some great comments on military size and concomitant decline of power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rise_and_Fall_of_the_Great...

So which of "candidate, campaign, or political party" is it? The Biden and Trump campaigns openly supported the military.

It's a "campaign" on its own, but possibly all of those depending on context. I don't know what that exact context is, but it's not on me or the poll workers to know every political meme going around. A bastardized American flag is not just an American flag as you've asserted, but rather an overt political statement.

Wait, a dog whistle? For what? Fellow soldiers that have dog tags?

It's also possible that the officer in question purchased that hoodie because hoodies are warm and he likes its design, and that he happened to wear said hoodie on election day because it was cold. I don't really think it makes sense to speculate either way.

The US military is not a partisan tool nor a domestic political estate, so that message is not overtly supportive of one candidate or the other.

Glad to see this at the top. Indeed the officer did not violate the law. I believe some state even issued guidance that said slogans like Black Lives Matter or Make America Great Again, were okay. You simply cannot say "Vote Biden" or 'Vote Trump'.

Author here. The military is a political entity, and different voters have different opinions on. It's better to err on the side of caution when acting in an official capacity for the election, especially when your organization (the police) are the subject of ballot measures this year.

A tap on the shoulder and a polite comment seem well justified to me, and another poll worker agreed.

> The military is a political entity

Veteran here, served during the contentious 2000 election. The US military very strongly prides itself on being an apolitical entity.

There's an important distinction between the electorate having differing opinions about the role and size of the military and the scope of its missions, and the military itself being a political entity.

This is not a universally held belief.

Perhaps those with a contrary belief should review the UMJC, which restricts political statements/actions for military members, even off duty.

Sadly those lines are increasingly blurry. Isn’t there an issue right now with the new Secretary of Defence, for example, who technically has not been out of Green Berets long enough to be appointed...?

With any laws, some of the lines can be blurry. I'm not familiar with that specific situation. I just mention this because there are laws restricting military personnel pretty heavily from many political things, even just criticizing the president. The institution itself is absolutely forbidden from being involved in politics to prevent coups.

You're talking about the Hatch Act I presume. The UCMJ doesn't get into that that I'm aware of.

The earth being round is not universally held, either, but it is true. The military is patriotic, yes, as are its members (it is difficult to imagine how they could be effective were they not), but the military tries very, very hard to be apolitical. Yes, individuals in the military have strong political opinions, just like many other individual Americans.

It seems to me that any country at a point where the combination of its flag together with an oath of office, oath of enlistment or commissioning oath is seen as political rather than patriotic cannot be in a good place. It is not too far from that to one where calling for fair and unbiased administration of elections is considered political rather than patriotic.

Thank you for assisting in the election, and thank you for your excellent software projects, but in this case I think that you were incorrect.

In many countries other than the US it is uncommon for private citizens in daily life to fly or display flags at all, let alone with some nationalist or political slogan adorning it, except when associated with right-wing activism.

> political rather than patriotic

Unfortunately patriotism itself is highly political; the ultimate question of "my country, right or wrong" results in some people noticing that it is in fact wrong in some cases.

Do they not teach Clausewitz in the US military? "War is the continuation of politics by other means". Every shot fired in anger is a political act. Not the politics of the person firing it, but those directing the fire.

It is possible to try to be non-partisan, but an apolitical military is an oxymoron.

The US military is the guarantor of a host of political lines across the world; supporting South Korea or Taiwan or Israel or Germany or Bosnia is a political act.

You can't sign up and then disclaim responsibility for the political results of following orders "apolitically". The last people who tried that got shot at Nuremberg.

> Not the politics of the person firing it, but those directing the fire.

... you're almost there... and yet ...

> It is possible to try to be non-partisan, but an apolitical military is an oxymoron. > > The US military is the guarantor of a host of political lines across the world; supporting South Korea or Taiwan or Israel or Germany or Bosnia is a political act.

At the direction of the duly elected civilian leadership.

> You can't sign up and then disclaim responsibility for the political results of following orders "apolitically". The last people who tried that got shot at Nuremberg.

This isn't considered a matter of politics. Its a matter of honor and lawfulness.

Who is elected as citizen leadership is a matter of politics. What is lawful is a matter of politics.

Americans need to stop confusing "non-partisan" (or worse "partisan but not along R/D lines") for "apolitical".

The electorate isn't able to express meaningful opinions on the role and size of the military, thus support of the institution itself has become political.

The vote and free speech remain powerful tools for meaningful expression. And they do have an impact. Even if it seems like you're being ignored, each voice really does matter, and policy does change in response.

But that policy flows from the civilian political realm. Military leadership doesn't decide which missions to take on. Congress and the President do. The military won't decide the fate of this election, no matter how contentious it gets. The civilian bodies will.

Voting between candidates that all support ongoing military actions is not meaningful. It's similar to the treasonous NSA - discussing it is simply outside of the mainstream Overton window, primary candidates who dare touch it are branded "unelectable" etc.

Speech gets swamped by mass propaganda. I don't see how it's possible to look at say the run up to the Iraq war and think that antiwar had a meaningful voice. When it comes down to it, the warmongers are just better funded, better connected, and take advantage of basic human nature.

Since it seems impossible to prevent the military from being used for elective wars, or even to simply downsize it, discouraging general support for the military makes sense (when voice fails, try exit). I'm not asking you to agree with my arguments above, but you don't get to make a unilateral call that this isn't a political viewpoint.

If there was any political support for changing the approach to the NSA one of the candidates would back it.

That's tautological. If one of the candidates backed it, there would be more political support for holding the NSA accountable.

Democracy is a closed feedback loop, and thus causality works in both directions. Given the very few bits of input a person has into decisions, it's likely that most influence flows the opposite direction.

It is "impossible to prevent the military from being used for elective wars" because most people disagree with that goal. (according to observed preference, not stated preference) We just tossed out the only president in many decades to refrain from starting a new war, instead choosing one who voted for the Iraq war. The people have spoken, and they want war.

I find the narrative that Trump hasn't started a new war interesting, but not particularly compelling given his actions with Iran and ongoing incitement of civil unrest.

> The people have spoken, and they want war

I see where you're coming from, as usually I vote third party or abstain to avoid thinking I support one candidate that differs only by an epsilon of cultural preferences. But when one of the choices is responsible for the deaths of a quarter million Americans, it's a little different.

So you're saying no one would have died from CoVid-19 if Trump weren't in office? Citation needed.

No, but fewer people would have. By contributing to it he's responsible for the entire outcome. It's similar to how two people can both be charged for one instance of murder.

It seems likely that if the national response to covid had tracked with, say, the NY State response, that yes: we'd have seen far fewer deaths. The first 60-100k, mostly in the northeast, probably couldn't have been saved. The initial outbreak happened too fast and too hard. But after that, NY has been flat. They controlled it. The same could have been true for the rest of the country, yet we collectively chose not to.

And yeah, that national response is the job of the executive branch. So very roughly 150k americans are dead now because Trump was in office. Somewhere around there.

The NY state response included sending sick patients into nursing homes. Had other states done that uniformly we'd have even more deaths, not fewer.

That happened in March and April, and obviously it was a mistake. But they controlled it, is the point. Their response after the initial wave has been excellent.

But it's a silly digression anyway. If you don't think NY is a good example, then pick Oregon. Or Canada. Or Germany. The point is that lots of large-scale responses of the form a "typical" democratic administration would have taken have very clearly been effective. While the US response, nationally, has not.

Ordering people to wear masks and shut down businesses is like ordering people to exercise, avoid alcohol, eat vegetables, avoid tobacco, and wear sunscreen. It might be fine as friendly advice, but it becomes dictatorial when the leader requires it. I find the demand for less freedom to be deeply disturbing. If it wasn't so scary it would be funny, because people accuse the president of acting like a dictator and then complain when he isn't enough of a dictator.

> I find the demand for less freedom to be deeply disturbing. If it wasn't so scary it would be funny, because people accuse the president of acting like a dictator and then complain when he isn't enough of a dictator.

You seem to be considering "freedom" as equivalent to irresponsibility. Being a leader means convincing people to do work they don't want to do, like wearing masks during a pandemic. We don't even need to debate whether the federal government should have implemented a national mask mandate. Simply having a president that recommended wearing masks instead of encouraging indignant irresponsibility would have saved tens of thousands of American lives, no laws required.

Trump gets called a dictator because he unilaterally picks nonsensical ideas and then barks them at everyone to get done, while accepting no feedback about how things are actually working out. This is the behavior of a dictator, regardless of how much power he actually wields or how effective he is. The latest example is his hissy fit over losing the election - there's no basis in reality, yet he's continuing to push it anyway. Seeing someone acting like the law does not matter sets off the fascist alarm bells.

I agree, and think that not wearing that kind of thing at the polls is appropriate to keep it apolitical.

With every election cycle, my CO has constantly reminded people that they cannot wear their uniform to political rallies, post on the internet without a disclaimer; the military is not political in any sense.

Thank you for upholding these principles and acting upon them. Having experienced how quickly disagreements with cops can escalate, I probably wouldn't have done anything. It's refreshing knowing that someone did, though.

You just publicly admitted to breaking Philadelphia election code.

>Author here. The military is a political entity, and different voters have different opinions on.

The USA is a political entity that different voters have different opinions on. The city, state, school district, utility district, sanitst district, etc. are all political entities that different voters have different opinions on.

The specific guidelines you linked on electioneering do not ban flag t-shirts, or anything military related (the military is not a candidate, campaign, or political party, and is strictly apolitical).

It's unconscionable that election officials are publicly admitting to breaking election code in 2020.

Would you rather they not admit to it?

I'm simply pointing out the brazenness that this comment section has become.

Multiple election officials are here posting anecdotes of them breaking election code. I assume this is due to their biases and hatred of the right.

The gall of it all...

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