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Why The Mule News?
FIRST, WHY THE MULE AND NOT A DONKEY?
FIRST, WHY THE MULE AND NOT A DONKEY?
FIRST, WHY THE MULE AND NOT A DONKEY?
The Democratic Party donkey symbol needed an upgrade for this new online news service. The Mule is a bigger, stronger brand symbol to represent the challenges in getting more voters and victories all up and down the ballot in Maricopa County; and to honor our western and prospector heritage of stubborn determination to make our lives better.
Mission Statement
FIRST, WHY THE MULE AND NOT A DONKEY?
FIRST, WHY THE MULE AND NOT A DONKEY?
The Mule News is dedicated to educating Maricopa Democrats on issues and candidates to build a more accepting, inclusive and just governance from our elected officials. And to help party officials, district leaders and volunteers motivate voters to elect Democrats for every office up and down the ballot.
Advertising Supported online news Service
AFFILIATED with Turning Arizona Blue Podcast
AFFILIATED with Turning Arizona Blue Podcast
We offer periodic updates on people, issues, candidates and the Democratic community in Maricopa County, AZ. We publish articles, features and opinion editorials monthly or as needed.
AFFILIATED with Turning Arizona Blue Podcast
AFFILIATED with Turning Arizona Blue Podcast
AFFILIATED with Turning Arizona Blue Podcast
The Mule News is a subset of Turning Arizona Blue, LLC a registered business in Arizona. Advertising and donations to both are made through TAB. See Advertising Support section below.
Front Page Vol 2 Edition 6 2022
Gun Violence in America has Become Everyday
Extremism is the Vice and Moderation in Defense of Democracy is no Virtue
Arizona Fair Elections Act: Signatures for Democracy
By Jodie Galassi, co-chair North Scottsdale Democrats norscodems@gmail.com
Just another day in this America.
Another group of children on their last day of school.
Remember the last day of school before summer break and how it was filled with so much promise? It was so exciting to think about those endless days stretching out ahead of you. Planning to meet your best friends at the community pool, putting miles upon miles on your bike, playing in the sprinkler with your dog or perhaps dreaming of the vacation with your family. Anticipating July 4th now that you are old enough to hold sparklers without an adult standing right beside you.
Uvalde. Robb Elementary School. The promise of summer turned into the horror of death and violence. Buffalo, New York. Grocery shopping for the Sunday family dinner. Picking up your daughter’s birthday cake. Just another day in this America. Death, carnage, massacre.
Think of it: Every day in this America 321 people suffer injury or death because of this absurd infatuation with guns. The question is simply what will we do? What can we do? What will be done this time? Will the most recent tragedy simply pass into memory? Like the others before it?
The flowers at the makeshift memorials will fade, the crosses will be removed, the balloons will deflate, the candles will flicker their last time and the stuffed Teddy bears, bright pinks and blues, will fade in the summer sun. The school building where the shooting occurred will be razed in an effort to wipe out the horror and planning will begin for the permanent memorial to honor the dead as we move on to the next time.
Uvalde Strong. Buffalo Strong. Parkland Strong. Sandy Hook Promise. Orange shirts. Another march. Thoughts and prayers. The cycle repeats.
The only path left is to vote. Take the thoughts, prayers, anger, and disgust right to the ballot box in November. With 400 million weapons sitting in the homes of American’s this very minute, we will never disarm America. But sensible gun safety reform must be enacted. If not, we are lost.
Just another day in America.
Go to North Scottsdale Democrats.
Arizona Fair Elections Act: Signatures for Democracy
Extremism is the Vice and Moderation in Defense of Democracy is no Virtue
Arizona Fair Elections Act: Signatures for Democracy
By Eric Kramer, director, Arizona Deserves Better
Volunteers and paid circulators are working with skill and increasing confidence across Arizona to get the Arizona Fair Elections Act petitions turned in by the July 7 deadline with many signatures to spare. Add your signature to help protect Democracy in Arizona.
The measure eliminates many attempts at voter suppression, gives Arizona one of the best voting laws in the country and protects democracy into the future.
As we are seeing at the Jan. 6th Congressional hearings, extremists had designs in 2020 of stealing Arizona’s electoral votes – actually taking the state’s 11 electoral votes won by Joe Biden and illegally giving them to an unmentionable different candidate. This would have ended America’s 250-year experiment in Democracy and our goal of a more perfect union.
The Arizona Fair Elections Act prevents such an outrage in two ways. It places the citizens of Arizona on record as demanding the state’s electoral votes go to the winner of the election – allowing the Legislature to overturn the state’s voters only with a three-fourths vote in both Chambers – something they could never achieve. Secondly, it does not allow the Legislature to change the method of choosing electors after Jan. 1 of an election year.
Requiring that Arizona’s certified electoral votes go to the winner of an election is only one feature of the proposed act. To further Democracy, the new law calls for automatic voter registration, registration of eligible high school students and allows for early voting to continue up to election day.
And it protects mail voting – the method used by 90% of Arizonans.
The volunteers and paid circulators have now collected more than the 237,000 signatures needed by July 7, and are working toward a goal of 300,000 to provide the necessary margin in case of challenges.
Don’t wait. There is a lot of validation and processing, boxing and trucking that has to happen before July 7, so get your petitions signed and turned in now.
Please go AZFE for more information and to help protect Democracy.
Extremism is the Vice and Moderation in Defense of Democracy is no Virtue
Extremism is the Vice and Moderation in Defense of Democracy is no Virtue
Extremism is the Vice and Moderation in Defense of Democracy is no Virtue
By Ron Williams, editor, The Mule News editorthemulenews.com
In these times that threaten Democracy itself, just voting in the upcoming election is not enough. While every vote counts – for the foreseeable future – such a minimalist approach to fighting the anti-democratic governing majority in Arizona pales to the enormity of the risks of failure.
Converting Barry Goldwater’s famous line, in accepting the GOP’s presidential nomination in 1964, to today’s reality of extremism, indicates the rising threat level to our democratic values and way of life.
The Arizona Republican’s original quote was “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” Then, the message was against just the threat of big government “taking over” our individual freedoms. Now, the reality of “extremism” in Arizona is the actual “taking away” of our constitutional rights to voting, women’s healthcare, protection from violence and fair election accountability.
The compelling irony is that today’s Arizona defenders of extremism against “big government” have ruled for decades the very state government that seeks to suppress voting rights, truncate protected rights to abortion access and favor gun rights over protecting life itself.
The current Republican majority in the State Legislature, Governorship and state agencies are not serving average Arizona citizens. Rather, their loyalty is to the goals and aspirations of a cult of Trump supporters, white nationalist, election deniers and insurrectionists.
As the recent January 6th US Congressional hearings have shown, the threat is not limited to the failed insurrection in Washington, DC in 2021. With extremists on the ballot like Kari Lake as Governor and Mark Finchem as Secretary of State this fall, their supporters at the levers of state government will attempt to decide the outcome of that election no matter the actual vote count.
If saving Democracy itself is to rise above “just voting,” then it must become our cause, a crusade and a “calling” beyond our minimum civic duty. Your personal commitment must grow to include:
-- identify the candidates and ballot initiatives you believe will stand against the agendas of extremists;
-- volunteer in these campaigns to sign petitions, canvass (knock on doors) for voters, make phone calls, sign post cards and support them on your social media platforms;
--take to the streets in peaceful protest to demonstrate the urgency of protecting Democracy and related causes; and
--support candidates and issue campaigns with financial contributions – literally the only “currency” capable of making a difference.
David Frum, staff writer for The Atlantic recently wrote:
“The greatest theorists of American government have again and again warned against the delusion that the Constitution is some self-balancing mechanism, “a machine that would go of itself.” People make that machine go: people who make good choices or bad ones, people who are active or who are passive when their country needs them. People like you. You.”
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About Us
The Mule News
Ron Williams is the writer/editor and publisher of The Mule News, an online news service covering Maricopa County AZ Democratic politics.
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He is also the host of Turning Arizona Blue, a podcast dedicated to changing Arizona from a traditional Red State to a Blue State.
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Ron Williams spent decades as a public affairs and public policy communicator in Washington, D.C. and Arizona.
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