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The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts will hear a case Thursday with implications for the collection of signatures for placing issues on the election ballot that has profound importance for the quality of democracy in Massachusetts. It is imperative that the court and the secretary of state find a way to maintain the prospect of citizen initiative at this critical moment in the coronavirus pandemic.

Article 48 of the Massachusetts Constitution gives citizens the right to petition the state government and make law through ballot initiatives. That is, we can put potential laws directly on the ballot in general elections and have our fellow citizens vote these up or down (recreational marijuana was legalized in this way in 2016).

To prove that a measure has core support, Massachusetts requires that a petition to put a proposed law on the ballot must include two rounds of certified signatures: 80,234 by December of the year preceding the election, and another 13,374 by the following July.

For the 2020 election, several ballot initiatives easily passed the first signature hurdle (e.g., the initiative we personally are working on ranked-choice voting attracted over 111,000). However, these ballot initiative campaigns now face a daunting challenge with meeting the second hurdle. Historically, the vast majority of signatures are collected by volunteers in public places shopping centers and the like. But this cant work during the COVID-19 pandemic, as a person handing another person a pen and a clipboard for the ballot signature is a public health threat.

To preserve what is embodied in the Massachusetts constitution, the people should be allowed for this election only to sign petitions electronically.

There is no reasonable alternative. The traditional open-air method is dangerous and so not available, and collecting signatures solely by US mail is formidably cumbersome, time-consuming, and expensive.

The Supreme Judicial Court will hear the case brought against Secretary of State William Galvin, asking him to permit electronic signatures for primary-election candidates. In his written response to the lawsuit, filed on Tuesday, Galvin appeared to show some sympathy for this cause, and even outlined a method of electronic signature gathering and certification that would meet reasonable anti-fraud standards.

We urge the court to rule that, in this unprecedented emergency, electronic signatures are acceptable and for Galvin to implement the process that he proposed himself.

Eric S. Maskin and Lawrence H. Summers are professors of economics at Harvard University and are on the advisory board of Voter Choice Massachusetts.

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In a pandemic, electronic signatures are needed to protect our democracy - The Boston Globe

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The Quarantine Report. Im Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh. We turn now to India, where officials say six major cities are coronavirus infection hot spots, calling them red zones, including the capital, New Delhi, and the financial center, Mumbai. The country has more than 420 deaths, 12,000 infections, though the number is likely far higher due to lack of testing.

This comes as press freedom and civil liberties groups are sounding the alarm that the government of Narendra Modi is using the coronavirus outbreak to crack down on opponents and dissidents. This month, police arrested a prominent journalist, Siddharth Varadarajan, accusing him of spreading discord and rumors, after he reportedly criticized a Hindu nationalist politician for participating in a religious ceremony with dozens of people during the national lockdown. Elsewhere, activist Anand Teltumbde, who is 69 years old, and journalist Gautam Navlakha, who is 67, were arrested Tuesday over charges they both say were fabricated. Teltumbde wrote an open letter to the people of India on the eve of his arrest, saying, quote, I do not know when I shall be able to talk to you again. However, I earnestly hope that you will speak out before your turn comes, he said.

Prime Minister Modi has announced Indias nationwide coronavirus lockdown, affecting 1.3 billion people the largest at any time in the world announced it will be extended until May. In Mumbai, hundreds of migrant workers left homeless and unemployed by the lockdown held a protest Tuesday demanding the government deliver food and assistance.

SHAHBAZ: [translated] We are not getting anything here. The government promised to provide money and other amenities, and nothing has been delivered yet.

SHABANA: [translated] We have nothing to do now. We have small kids, and they are not getting anything to eat. What should we do?

AMY GOODMAN: For more, we go to New Delhi, India, where were joined by the award-winning writer, author, activist Arundhati Roy. She has a new essay in the Financial Times headlined The pandemic is a portal. Its drawn from her forthcoming book, Azadi: Freedom. Fascism. Fiction. Her most recent book is My Seditious Heart: Collected Nonfiction. She won the Booker Prize in 1997 for her first novel, The God of Small Things.

Arundhati, welcome back to Democracy Now! As you speak to us from New Delhi, if you can talk about whats happening there and why you see the pandemic as a portal?

ARUNDHATI ROY: Well, in India, you know, we have a COVID crisis whose contours we dont know yet. I mean, you mentioned the figures and also the fact that we dont know if theyre reliable, because theres not that much testing happening. But on the other hand, just looking around, you know that there isnt a run on hospitals like there has been in New York, you know? The disease doesnt seem to have really got its claws into us yet. But we have the COVID crisis. We have a hunger crisis. We have a hatred crisis. And we have a health crisis apart from COVID.

So, as you said, you know, on the 24th of March, with four hours notice, which ran between 8:00 at night and 12 midnight, Modi locked down this nation of 1.38 billion people without warning. And the crisis that that has created, the lack of planning, the lack of thinking forward, although like some states like Kerala, which you talked about, have done wonderful work, but from the center, the crisis has been exacerbated into something that might might really become even more serious than the epidemic that its planning for. You have a situation where you have millions of workers and migrant workers under a lockdown, which is supposed to enforce social distancing, but it only enforces physical compression. People are crammed together. People are separated from their families. In many places, they have no food. They have no access to money even. Theyve sold their phones. You have the sense that youre sitting on some kind of explosive substance.

And yet, at the same time, like you said, arrests have been made, not just the people who you mentioned. Siddharth Varadarajan has not been arrested, the editor of Wire, but he has a case filed against him. Senior lawyers who speak out against Modi have had FIRs filed against them. Gautam Navlakha and Anand Teltumbde have been arrested. Young students and people, a lot of Muslims, who are now being accused of being part of the massacre that took place against Muslims in northeast Delhi, are being arrested. You know, the circles are closing in.

And the reason I said that the pandemic is a portal is that all over the world you have a situation now where, on the one hand, the powers that be are going to try and increase surveillance, increase inequality, increase privatization, increase control, and, on the other hand, you have populations of people who will want to increase solidarity and who will want to see and understand the fact that what has happened in the U.S., as well as what has happened in India, is that the pandemic has exposed structural problems of such egregious injustice and inequality. Even the calling of the shutdown with four hours notice was a sign of panic from this prime minister, because he knows that this infrastructure of this country, it cant even deal with normality, forget about a pandemic.

NERMEEN SHAIKH: Arundhati, I want to ask you more about that, about Modis declaration of a lockdown with just four hours notice. He declared it at 8 p.m., and it went into effect at midnight on March 24th. But the first case, reported case, of COVID-19 was on January 30th, so he had its unclear why he took seven weeks to shut down the country. But you went, when the first when the country went into lockdown, you used a press pass, and you went and spoke to some of the migrants, the hundreds of thousands of people who were forced to flee Delhi once all transportation had already been shut down. You spoke to some of these migrants in Delhi. Can you tell us what they said about their situation?

ARUNDHATI ROY: Well, as soon as the lockdown was announced, mass transport was stopped. It was the last week of March. People had not been paid their salaries, people who live virtually from day to day. The landlords in these little cramped, medieval tenements, into which five and 10 people are squashed into a room, said that they wanted their rent on time. So people just had to leave. And it was a surreal sight, you know, while there was no traffic on the streets, but suddenly the structural inequality and the horror, the shame of how our societies live, made themselves manifest.

And I just realized that these people have started walking, walking for hundreds of kilometers to their villages. And I went out because I felt like the tectonic plates were shifting. You know, it was crazy. So I went to the border between Delhi and Uttar Pradesh, where I walked with many of them. And I spoke to many of them, including Muslims who had just survived this horrific kind of wannabe pogrom against them, which didnt turn out that way because people were so prepared that they fought back. But having survived that, now they were walking these hundreds of miles home you know, carpenters, tailors, construction workers.

And all of them were aware of the virus. All of them were wearing masks. They were doing their best to maintain social distance. It was impossible. There was a rumor that buses might be organized, and suddenly like 100,000 people were there together, pressed together, waiting for buses. And I asked some of them, So, what do you think of this virus? They said, Whatever we think of the virus, right now we have no food, we have no water, we have nowhere to sleep. We have to reach home. And that was so much more present for them than this.

A lot of them felt that this was a rich peoples illness brought in by planes. Why didnt they stop people at the airport instead of kicking us out of our jobs and our homes, you know? And a lot of people just one of the people who I wrote about in the Financial Times piece said he just said to me, Shaayad Modiji ko hamaare baare mein pata nahi [phon.], meaning Maybe Modi doesnt know about us, you know, which was just perhaps true in a way, that the government and everybody else who controls anything in this society has more or less airbrushed the poor out of their imagination out of films, out of literature, out of everything. You know? Except NGO brochures where the poor feature in order to raise money, you know?

AMY GOODMAN: Arundhati, I wanted to ask you about President Trumps critical trip to India right at the time the pandemic was exploding, the famous pictures of them shaking hands, the stadium of 100,000 people. When President

ARUNDHATI ROY: No, a million people. In India, it was a million people. In the U.S., it was 50,000, yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: So, as President Trump took off and was flying back to the United States, it was then that he read the comments of a U.S. scientist talking about the effects of the pandemic and what it will mean in the United States. He was so enraged by what she had to say that he canceled a meeting of scientists when he was returning, in retaliation. And then you have this whole relationship with India around hydroxychloroquine, what Dr. Trump and Im saying that very facetiously President Trump has been pushing, hydroxychloroquine, because Narendra Modi said he was going to crack down on sales, exports of this drug, until President Trump pressured him. And now one study after another is coming out saying people are dying in the studies around hydroxychloroquine.

ARUNDHATI ROY: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: Just overall, talk about what Trump has meant for Modi and what Modi means for Trump, this U.S.-India alliance, and what its doing in your country.

ARUNDHATI ROY: Well, it is giving such a great amount of legitimacy to a situation which I cant hardly explain, Amy, on TV, because Ive been writing about this for so long, you know? And what I said earlier, the crisis of hunger, and then the crisis of hatred. So, the time Modi came to the U.S. and did the Howdy Modi show, and then, when Trump came here and it was the Namaste Trump and so on, this sort of bizarre dance between these two, Im sorry to say, but not very intelligent human beings, but very, very powerful people, who are legitimizing the horror of what is happening in the U.S. with immigrants, with racism, with undocumented workers, and the horror of what the BJP regime, the RSS, which is the mothership of the BJP cultural guild to which Modi belongs, which believes that India should be a Hindu nation and that everyone else should be second-class citizens, toward which they have made new citizenship laws and are building detention centers. And all of this is being legitimized by this idea that the most powerful country in the world and the most powerful man in the world loves Modi, you know?

And between them, the I mean, its a tragedy for the world that this particular pandemic has arrived at a time where country after country is controlled by people like this, which is why I said its a portal, because, you know, are we going to are we going to sleepwalk into this fascist surveillance state that everyone has in store for us? I mean, the app, called the Aarogya Setu app, which Modi has asked people to download and became the fastest-downloaded app in the world we have 50 million downloads now I mean, every technical expert says its just a surveillance app, you know? And all various so many democratic societies are moving toward this, in this panic and fear that has been created.

And there are so many things about the coronavirus, you know, so many heartwarming things. I was reading in The New York Times today how its creating solidarity between people in the U.S. I just saw a wonderful video of people thanking a Pakistani doctor for having invented a mechanism that allows a single ventilator to be shared by many.

But here, you have Muslims being blamed for corona. Theres the whole concept of corona jihad. And Ive been reading of how, in the 1930s, the Nazi state basically blamed Jews for typhus and used it as a way of stigmatizing and ghettoizing Jews. The same thing is happening here with Muslims. You know, you have to hear the language that the mainstream media uses, and people on the street.

So, its an extremely dangerous situation, which is being completely legitimized by Trump and by all these powerful people who meet and shake hands and refuse to see how this virus is going to move in and exacerbate inequalities, exacerbate injustice and create a situation where they, too, are frightened, because they know these millions of people, hungry, starving. How are you going to deal with that anger? In India, Ill tell you how theyre going to deal with it. They are going to try and divert it into an anti-Muslim rage, which is the only thing they do always.

But at some point you know, already things are exploding. People are burning shelters and so on. And the hunger is so urgent, it has to be addressed now. The granaries are full of food which is not being distributed. You know, people need cash transfers, but they dont have bank accounts, or they dont have access to their bank accounts. Its a crisis which you feel youre sitting on some kind of explosive substance right now. And, you know, as it deepens, once you distribute that grain, where will the next batch of food come from? Because right now is the harvest season, and, you know, people are even those who have been able to harvest are not being able to sell. And, you know, the whole cropping pattern of this country has changed into cash crops.

AMY GOODMAN: Arundhati, we have 10 seconds.

ARUNDHATI ROY: Yeah. Tell me.

AMY GOODMAN: We just have I want to thank you very much for being with us, as we run out of time.

ARUNDHATI ROY: Oh, OK. Youre so welcome.

AMY GOODMAN: Were going to link to your piece, The pandemic is a portal, thats in Foreign Policy. Arundhati Roy is next Thursday, April 23rd, will be joining an online teach-in with Princeton professor Imani Perry and Haymarket Books on The Pandemic Is a Portal. And well link to your essays, as well, at democracynow.org.

Democracy Now! is working with as few people on site as possible. The majority of our amazing team is working from home. Im Amy Goodman, with Nermeen Shaikh. Be safe.

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Pandemic Is a Portal: Arundhati Roy on COVID-19 in India, Imagining Another World & Fighting for It - Democracy Now!

MINNEAPOLIS, April 17, 2020 /PRNewswire/ --Antone Melton-Meaux today called on Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.)to defend her ongoing payments to E Street Group, a political consulting firm co-owned by her husband and chief fundraiser, Tim Mynett.

According to yesterday's Federal Election Commission (FEC) quarterly filing, Rep. Omar's campaign paid her husband's firm $292,000, a significant majority of the total $460,000 her campaign raised in the same time period. At this pace, Rep. Omar's campaign will pay E Street Group well over $1 million this year.

"Another quarter, another staggering payment. Although these payments are not illegal, that doesn't make them right. Rep. Omar's decision to keep working with E Street Group without full-disclosure continues to raise legitimate questions about her transparency, integrity, and accountability," said Melton-Meaux.

To date, Rep. Omar has not disclosed when her relationship with Mr. Mynett began. Her first acknowledgment of a relationship was an Instagram post during President Trump's historic prime time coronavirus address to the nation, when she announced their marriage.

In an interview with WCCO-TV's Esme Murphy in August 2019, Rep. Omar was asked directly if she was involved with Mr. Mynett. She categorically denied a relationship. Yet, just a few weeks later, Mr. Mynett's former wife stated in her divorce filing that he and Rep. Omar were in a relationship.

"Like all of us, Rep. Omar and Mr. Mynett are entitled to their private life. That's not the issue. But how a candidate manages both their public life and political campaign are important metrics for voters to assess their fitness for office," said Melton-Meaux.

Over the past year, payments to Mr. Mynett's firm went from 15% to over 63% compared to total funds raised. Additionally, Rep. Omar's payments are a majority of E Street Group's total lifetime revenue.

"This concerning trend is unacceptable. Why have the payments increased and why are they increasing with no end in sight? Have Rep. Omar and Mr. Mynett taken appropriate steps to avoid any conflict of interest? And why does she refuse to answer questions about this matter? The residents of the Fifth Congressional District deserve answers," said Melton-Meaux. "I call on Rep. Omar to answer these questions and agree to public debates," continued Melton-Meaux.

He continued, "Misleading voters is a serious breach of the public's trust, whether it be the President of the United States or a Member of Congress. Rep. Omar's refusal to give an explanation is simply another indicator that she's out of touch with this district and is apparently not concerned with ethics."

"A fundamental pillar of the progressive platform is accountability and transparency in how candidates raise and spend their money. Preserving the integrity of our democracy is inherently tied to seriously reforming campaign finance laws. Particularly for such a visible member of the progressive movement, Rep. Omar's actions undermine her credibility and effectiveness on this critical issue. This does great harm to what we are trying to accomplish," added Melton-Meaux.

In Congress, Melton-Meaux will be a staunch advocate for campaign finance reform that ensures voters and donors no longer have to wonder if a campaign's contributions are being used for their intended purpose.

A progressive, lifelong Democrat, Melton-Meaux owns a small businessa mediation practicethat helps people come together and find solutions when they can't find common ground on their own. He has a long track record of public service with a strong commitment to the community.

Active in the Fifth Congressional District , Melton-Meaux serves as a volunteer minister at Salem English Lutheran Church and has served on the boards of the Page Education Foundation, College Possible, the Guthrie Theater, the Conflict Resolution Center, Northrop at the University of Minnesota, and the Children's Law Center.

Melton-Meaux was an All-American track star and Academic All-American at Washington University in St. Louis. At the University of Virginia School of Law, he served on the board of the Journal of Social Policy and the Law and was a recipient of the prestigious Congressional Black Caucus Fellowship. At Union Theological Seminary, he was a Union Scholar and chaplain at a senior center on the Upper West Side of New York City.

Melton-Meaux and his wife, Dr. Genevieve Melton-Meaux, were college sweethearts and have been together for 27 years. They live with their two school-age children in the Uptown neighborhood of Minneapolis.

To learn more, please visit http://www.AntoneForCongress.com. Follow Antone on Twitter @antone_mn Instagram @antone_mn and on Facebook at Antone For Congress.

View original content to download multimedia:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/rep-ilhan-omars-democratic-primary-challenger-antone-melton-meaux-calls-for-explanation-on-continued-payments-to-her-chief-fundraiser-and-now-husband-301042739.html

SOURCE Antone for Congress

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Rep. Ilhan Omar's Democratic Primary Challenger Antone Melton-Meaux Calls for Explanation on Continued Payments to Her Chief Fundraiser and Now...

Facts about Democracy will tell you about a type of government where the people are involved in the decision making of the state affairs. These people will choose their representative in the assembly or parliaments by using their votes in the election. Democracy is found in various countries in the world. It is very popular since the people have rights to define their government. Lets check other interesting facts about democracy below:

There are four elements which define democracy based on Larry Diamond. He was a political scientist. The first one is related to the free and fair elections where people can choose and replace the government. The second one is related to citizen participation in the politics and civil life. The third one is related to the human rights of all people. The last element is related to the application of laws where all citizens are equally treated before the law.

The term democracy is taken the word demokratia. It is a Greek word.

Democracy facts

The term democracy is taken from two words, demos and kratos. The latter one means power or rule, while the former one means people. Therefore, it is translated as rule of the people.

The Greek city states applied democracy since the 5th century BC. It was considered as the common political system there.

Facts about Democracy

The major application of democracy during the ancient time was spotted in Athens.

Aristokrata is defined as rule of elite. It is considered as the antonym of democracy.

Democracy Picture

Democracy is also different from oligarchy and absolute monarchy. The latter one is used to define a government ruled by a small number of people. The absolute monarchy is applied when a government is ruled by an individual.

The social norm, political equity and upward control are some fundamental elements of democracy based on one theory. Check facts about David Ben Gurion here.

Democracy Image

The elements found in liberal democracy include civil liberties, equality before the law, political pluralism, human rights and due process.

The application of democracy is not only seen in government, but also in the system of various organizations in the world. Get facts about David Cameron here.

Democracy Pictures

Do you like reading facts about democracy?

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10 Facts about Democracy | Fact File

Media watch: A Disaster for Democracy

Americans have mixed feelings about many institutions amid the virus crisis, a recent Gallup poll found, but theyre unanimous in their disdain for one institution: the media. Thats a disaster for a liberal democracy, sighs National Reviews David Harsanyi and the blame lies with the press own blinkered, sanctimonious and transparently partisan temperament. That especially includes prestige outlets like The Washington Post and The New York Times. While institutional bias at the two papers isnt new, both used to have a corresponding level of professional gravitas that engendered reader trust. No longer, as shown by the frivolous gotchas rather than pertinent questions theyve flung at President Trumps coronavirus task force briefings. Bottom line: The medias ineptitude and malfeasance are especially dangerous during a pandemic.

Physician: Next Up, Herd Immunity

At Spectator USA, critical-care physician and medicine professor Matt Strauss cheers draconian measures to suppress COVID-19 through enforced social distancing, which have already suppressed the outbreak in Wuhan, China, and will likely achieve the same in the West in coming weeks and months. But in the long term, policymakers should aim to achieve herd immunity in a controlled and strategic manner, lest the virus return with a vengeance once lockdown measures are lifted. That would involve deploying widespread testing, as Germany and South Korea have done, plus exploiting the virus unique mortality profile people under 50 are 25 times less likely to die of COVID-19 than people over 80 to gradually expose less vulnerable groups until herd immunity is achieved. Yes, social distancing was necessary, otherwise neither young nor old would have taken the pandemic seriously. That said, once these measures have proved their effect, and the virus is demonstrably suppressed, public health authorities could consider ratcheting restrictions down while remaining mindful of demographic vulnerability among the elderly and infirmed.

Conservative: Dons Inconvenient Popularity

When polls showed that President Donald Trump was receiving unusually high marks for his handling of the coronavirus pandemic, liberals and their media allies went, first, through the denial stage, quips The Federalists Mollie Hemingway. The left had tried to craft a narrative that the coronavirus spread was Trumps fault and just couldnt believe the American people wouldnt accept it. Then ideologies began blaming [Trumps] press conferences and now theyre demanding he shut them down. Its shameful but unsurprising and all too telling that such calls for censorship have also gained the support of a spokesman for Communist Chinas Foreign Ministry.

Libertarian: Digital to the Rescue

A vibrant digital economy is catering to the publics myriad needs as the pandemic forces the world to retreat indoors, cheers the Taxpayers Protection Alliances Ross Marchand at The Washington Examiner. Thanks to e-commerce and countless tech firms, people can be #TogetherApart and support each other. Companies and organizations can hold meetings via Skype and Zoom. Those seeking health information can follow epidemiologists and intellectuals on social media. The digital domain also offers speedy deliveries of foodstuffs and other essential items. The vital role of these tech services shouldnt be lost on lawmakers, like Sen. Josh Hawley, who question their value and scheme to regulate them out of existence. Over-regulation will only make us less prepared in the future.

Religion beat: A Corona Great Awakening?

In The Wall Street Journal, Robert Nicholson wonders: Could a plague of biblical proportions be Americas best hope for religious revival? After all, the pandemic has remade everyday life and wrecked the global economy in a way that feels apocalyptic. For a nation with a biblical foundation, however, cataclysms need not mark the end. They are a call for repentance and revival. As the pandemic subjects US hospitals to a fearsome test, Americans can find solace in the faith of their forefathers. Great struggle can produce great clarity.

Compiled by The Post Editorial Board

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A disaster for democracy and other commentary - New York Post