This morning I was asked a very important question about the "line" on election ballots. This was my response. Readers should be aware of the fact that Facebook would not allow me to post the following response on my own profile page. This is the reason that you see it here. The 1st Amendment is still in effect in America.
Reader friendly text of The Bill of Rights
The average person misses the single most important detail in voting. That is the position of the candidate on the ballot. For example, both democratic candidates for 4th Ward council should have been on line 2 clearly showing them as Democrats. The voters should have been instructed to vote for 1. That would have been a true representation of the fair and Democratic process. (taking into consideration that each candidate should have done all that is required to get on the ballot in the first place) Folks who control this know that the average person will complete the process the easy way. As in the general election, they go straight down the line. Most people think that if you are off the line there is something wrong, that you are not a Democrat. People do not understand the significance of what people in the green party are fighting to protect. Even worse, society has taught the aveage person that people off the line might be some type of subversive saboteur of the democratic process. In school board elections, a person with no backing may win if placed on line 1. The further down the line you go the more financial backing you need.
Now let us get to SEEK. School board elections are supposed to be non partisan. (this means that the candidates do not have to declare party affiliation. A deeper meaning is that no one candidate should be a fanatical follower of any one organization. That is one definition of partisan. SEEK is the very good example of that type of organization. Candidates must deny and detach themselves from all other groups in order to get SEEK's financial backing. (2 of the current board members called me and resigned from a Community Ed. group) At this point, every single person on the board of Education has sworn allegiance to SEEK and not to the taxpaying members of Englewood. Under the covers, we find that SEEK gets much of its funding and support from wards that actually supported Romney for president or just plain old did not vote. Check the election results. The same people just engineered the outsourcing of Paraprofessionals and Secretaries. Is that enough? SEEK actually picks the candidates and funds their campaigns. SEEK does, not the community. The people who now control SEEK have perverted the original mission and made the organization a tool for segregation and union busting. Need I say more here in this open forum?
Oh and these same people support the candidate who did not follow the Democratic process and still got on the ballot. They ignored Title 19:13-20 NJ Election Law the same as the current school board and supporters ignored 18A:27-10.1-4. This does not bode well. It becomes even more tragic when we trace the money and support to our elected officials on a local, county, state and federal level. Englewood is a petry dish that mirrors the events in America today.
Word on the street is that people who voted in Hackensack had a different view of the ballot than we did in our polling booth. That is an interesting concept since our City Clerk went on a rant on Tuesday morning that supports this allegation. This rant lead to she and the mayor forcing the removal of candidates for 4th ward city council from the polling place where they were legally allowed to be since their names appeared on the ballot.
Reader friendly text of The Bill of Rights
The average person misses the single most important detail in voting. That is the position of the candidate on the ballot. For example, both democratic candidates for 4th Ward council should have been on line 2 clearly showing them as Democrats. The voters should have been instructed to vote for 1. That would have been a true representation of the fair and Democratic process. (taking into consideration that each candidate should have done all that is required to get on the ballot in the first place) Folks who control this know that the average person will complete the process the easy way. As in the general election, they go straight down the line. Most people think that if you are off the line there is something wrong, that you are not a Democrat. People do not understand the significance of what people in the green party are fighting to protect. Even worse, society has taught the aveage person that people off the line might be some type of subversive saboteur of the democratic process. In school board elections, a person with no backing may win if placed on line 1. The further down the line you go the more financial backing you need.
Now let us get to SEEK. School board elections are supposed to be non partisan. (this means that the candidates do not have to declare party affiliation. A deeper meaning is that no one candidate should be a fanatical follower of any one organization. That is one definition of partisan. SEEK is the very good example of that type of organization. Candidates must deny and detach themselves from all other groups in order to get SEEK's financial backing. (2 of the current board members called me and resigned from a Community Ed. group) At this point, every single person on the board of Education has sworn allegiance to SEEK and not to the taxpaying members of Englewood. Under the covers, we find that SEEK gets much of its funding and support from wards that actually supported Romney for president or just plain old did not vote. Check the election results. The same people just engineered the outsourcing of Paraprofessionals and Secretaries. Is that enough? SEEK actually picks the candidates and funds their campaigns. SEEK does, not the community. The people who now control SEEK have perverted the original mission and made the organization a tool for segregation and union busting. Need I say more here in this open forum?
Oh and these same people support the candidate who did not follow the Democratic process and still got on the ballot. They ignored Title 19:13-20 NJ Election Law the same as the current school board and supporters ignored 18A:27-10.1-4. This does not bode well. It becomes even more tragic when we trace the money and support to our elected officials on a local, county, state and federal level. Englewood is a petry dish that mirrors the events in America today.
Word on the street is that people who voted in Hackensack had a different view of the ballot than we did in our polling booth. That is an interesting concept since our City Clerk went on a rant on Tuesday morning that supports this allegation. This rant lead to she and the mayor forcing the removal of candidates for 4th ward city council from the polling place where they were legally allowed to be since their names appeared on the ballot.
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