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Democrats in Congress and Republicans in many statehouses are on a collision course over elections laws, with both sides racing to get their preferred rules in place before the 2022 elections.

The Senate is set to kick off consideration of a Democratic-backed election bill (S. 1) with a hearing next week, coinciding with a $30 million advertising and mobilization campaign to push for passage of the measure. A House-passed version (H.R. 1) would outlaw restrictions on voting by mail and partisan gerrymandering, among scores of other provisions that also would change campaign finance and ethics rules.

At the same time, Republicans are teeing up bills in state legislatures they control that would tighten voting restrictions, such as by limiting options for mail-in ballots and early voting for many voters. Theyre also getting set for a new round of redistricting likely to favor GOP lawmakers, especially in southern states set to gain House seats.

Which side prevails could determine how elections are conducted and who wins for years to come, both parties say.

By designating the legislation as S.1, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Wednesday, Senate Democrats made clear we are committed to standing up to the voter suppression efforts that are threatening the core tenets of our democracy, to ending dark money in politics, and to ensuring public officials work for those they represent and not the special interests.

Schumer has indicated hes considering changing Senate rules to overcome a certain Republican filibuster to get it passed. Failure is not an option, he said.

Photo by Samuel Corum/Bloomberg

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) speaks during a news conference Wednesday.

The Senate Rules and Administration Committee will hold a hearing on the bill March 24 and schedule a markup to advance it to the floor soon after, Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) said in a statement Wednesday.

She said Congress has clear power under the Constitution to set rules for federal elections and override state rule changes. And in announcing the bill, Klobuchar called it essential to protecting every Americans right to vote.

The bill faces long odds in the Senate, where Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) promised Tuesday a scorched-earth response if they try to change filibuster rules to pass the election bill and other liberal measures on a party-line vote. Democrats and Republicans are divided 50-50 in the Senate, with Vice President Kamala Harris holding the deciding vote to give Democrats the majority.

McConnell, the Senates strongest opponent of changes in federal election and campaign finance laws, said earlier this year that the Democratic bill the House recently passed was an effort to grab unprecedented power over how America conducts its elections and how American citizens can engage in political speech.

But Republicans also are facing a backlash over their election proposals in states including Georgia, where legislation that would roll back voting by mail and early voting are seen by critics as aimed at restricting minority voting.

Rather than change their message, theyre busy trying to change the rules, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) said of Republican legislators on Wednesday in his first floor speech since being elected in January.

Tying that effort to his election as the states first Black senator, he said, We are witnessing right now a massive and unabashed assault on voting rights unlike anything weve ever seen since the Jim Crow era.

Republican lawmakers say theyre reacting to widespread concerns about election integrity. The Republican State Leadership Committee launched a commission last month for state leaders to share ideas on overhauling voting laws.

Restoring confidence in our nations elections wont happen overnight, but the RSLCs Commission on Election Integrity has served as a fantastic hub of ideas for beginning the process, RSLC President Dee Duncan said in a statement.

Recent GOP polling has shown a steep dropoff in Republican election confidence after Donald Trumps claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 election.

A poll sponsored by the conservative nonprofit R. Street found less than a quarter of Republicans believed the presidential election results were valid, even though about half GOP voters took advantage of mail-in ballots or early voting and nearly 90% said they were personally satisfied with the process they used to cast ballots.

Supporters of the Democratic election bill say their polling shows support for the voting rights and anti-corruption measures it contains. The campaign to pass the bill is being supported by the National Democratic Redistricting Council, whose chair is former Attorney General Eric Holder, along with liberal groups that have long supported revamping election and campaign finance laws.

Digital ads are already running. TV ads will start next week as Senate hearings on the bill get under way, with messages aimed at supporting Democrats who back it and at persuading Republicans. The first round of ads is set to target Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Maine, and Pennsylvania.

Democrats have used reform messages successfully to elect candidates in recent elections, according to Tiffany Muller, head of the nonprofit End Citizens United/Let America Vote, which is spearheading the latest ad effort. But this effort is aimed at getting a bill passed, not election messaging, she insisted.

Theres a new urgency to getting that done as we see voting rights attacked across the country, Muller said on a call with reporters Wednesday. If Republicans are allowed to set the rules for the 2022 elections it makes the ability to just have the same debate in 2023 much more difficult, she said. And theres no doubt thats what Republicans are counting on.

Theres no similar ad campaign among opponents of the election bill, David Keating, president of the nonprofit Institute for Free Speech, said in an email, but he pointed to widespread opposition from Republican officials, conservative organizations, and the American Civil Liberties Union.

To contact the reporter on this story: Kenneth P. Doyle in Washington at kdoyle@bgov.com

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Kyle Trygstad at ktrygstad@bgov.com; Bennett Roth at broth@bgov.com

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Parties Set for Election Law Clash as Senate Bill Heads to Floor - Bloomberg Government

Can the United States, under the Biden administration, responsibly end its forever war in Afghanistan?

The White House reportedly has a new idea on how to try, after watching peace talks in Qatar between the Afghan government and the Taliban flounder over the past year. Itis proposingan international summit including Afghan leaders and the Taliban. The initial goal would be to create an interim power-sharing government, which would buy time for more comprehensive peace talks thereafter. This would also allow the United States and NATO to keep their small military footprint in place for a while longer, beyond the May cutoff that some believe the February 2020deal between Washington and the Taliban requires.

Unfortunately, this diplomatic Hail Mary is very unlikely to produce a quick accord. Whatever leverage President Biden can generate over Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, including the implied threat of a quick U.S. and NATO troop departure, the Taliban is unlikely to accept the demand for a 90-day reduction in violence. Its leaders are also unlikely to agree to meaningful power-sharing especially if they sense we are already halfway out the door.

Thus, Biden will still likely have to decide: Do we stay or do we go? We believe that the correct answer is to stay. As difficult as it is to remain in this longest war, the most likely outcome of pulling out of Afghanistan would be very ugly, including ethnic cleansing, mass slaughter and the ultimate dismemberment of the country.

In weighing the United States options, the president certainly needs to bear in mind the costs of the current U.S. deployment 2,500 U.S. troops out of a NATO-mission total of9,000, perhaps $10 billion per year in expense to the U.S. taxpayers, and the prospect of perhaps 10 to 20 American casualties a year if the Taliban resumes its previous use of force against U.S. forces. But Biden also needs to form an expectation of what would likely happen after any NATO departure.

First, if we pull out the remaining U.S. troops, those of other foreign nations will leave, too. NATO depends on the United States for key combat and intelligence capabilities and leadership.

Second, despite the departure of troops, U.S. and NATO military assistance in the form of money and equipment will likely continue to flow to Afghan government forces. After all, why would we abandon them after fighting alongside them for 20 years? Thus, both the Taliban and Kabul will have the wherewithal to maintain the fight. The war will continue, and it will move into Afghanistans cities, which have generally remained under government control throughout the past two decades.

Third, no rapid progress towards a peace accord will occur. Taliban leaders will be more certain than ever that time is on their side. The Ghani government will still believe it has leverage and legitimacy by virtue of its constitution, as well as international diplomatic recognition and financial support. Their fundamental ideological differences remain: The Taliban wants an Islamist emirate, Kabul wants a democratic government.

Fourth, while existing battlefield dynamics already favor the Taliban, those dynamics could be exacerbated after a U.S. and NATO departure with terrible humanitarian consequences. As some cities fall to partial or complete Taliban control, and the Taliban exacts leverage on those it considered collaborators with the regime, there would be powerful incentives for opponents to prevent its infiltration into other cities. Most Pashtun (Afghanistans largest ethnic group) are not Taliban and do not support the Taliban. However, virtually all Taliban are Pashtun. Thus, if you are from a Tajik, Hazara or Uzbek ethnic group, the simplest way to protect yourself is to hunker down above theHindu Kush mountains in the nations north and push out all Pashtun. That is a recipe for ethnic cleansing, and massive human suffering throughout the country.

Fifth, the result of all this would be an enormous refugee strain on neighboring Pakistan, risking instability in that important country of more than220 million. Some might believe Pakistan could prop up a Taliban regime in Afghanistan, much as in the 1990s, but that assumption ignores the Talibans evolution away from Pakistani control, and Pakistans own difficult experience with militancy over the past 20 years. Todays Pakistan probably does not want an exclusively Taliban-run Islamist emirate on its Western flank.

Sixth and finally a small silver lining the new rump Afghanistan in the nations northeast would likely become a friend of the West, much like Kurdistan in Iraq. It would likely welcome not only financial aid but also Western military and intelligence capabilities. Alas, the scale of the terrorism problem would likely have grown a great deal in the meantime, as the Taliban would be even less likely to break with al-Qaeda than it is today, and most or all of the nations southeast would be under its control. Along the way, the Afghanistan wars current tragic death tolls, measured in the tens of thousands a year, would surely have multiplied.

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Why staying in Afghanistan is the least bad choice for Biden - Brookings Institution

Numerous geopolitical developments and initiatives of the last few weeks beckon attention. Most are driven by the United States latest national security estimate which places China at the head of American concerns. China is expected to overtake the US as the largest economy of the world in the next decade or so even as it rapidly transforms its military in both capacity and capability with muscle to defend its interests and secure its gains around the globe. Combined, Chinas footprint will expand even further as it enhances her perimeter of security and its regions of influence and her interest expand. Its Belt and Road (BRI) and Silk-Route initiatives are a case in point. Even as US increases its focus on China and extricates itself from trouble-spots where it found itself stuck over decades, it hopes to elicit Chinas support on facing three major challenges to humanity climate change, pandemics and technology disruptions to ease humanity through what shall define the new human age.

Pivot to the East meant focusing on China and its rapid development to a point where it challenged Americas exclusivity. To that end two major disengagements were in order. The Middle East was quite much left to its fate under Trump who clearly suggested that the US had little to do with a civilisation where enmities ran into a thousand years. Trump then followed up with the biggest geopolitical coup of the century by influencing some conservative Arab states into recognising Israel and initiating diplomatic relations between them. Israel will in due course find its anchor in the region for a more persistent presence on the edge of the Persian Gulf just across Iran and project its power with consequent effects. Also, Israels politico-military orientation has been changed from Europe to the Middle East by including it in the CENTCOM area of operation as a key US ally. Over time, in coordination with its new cohorts, it shall replace the US as a minder of its own and key US interest. The US will then be free to move east.

The second disengagement that the US seeks is in Afghanistan. The US has been stuck there for the last 40 years with little to show for. The Afghan war reduced to an unnecessary war as the US looks to opt out without affixing another Vietnam-like ignominy to its name. That is possible if warring factions find some political accommodation. The Doha dialogue is meant to enable exactly that with which Pakistan has handily assisted. A letter by the US Secretary of State to the Afghan President lays it out for him to work out an understanding with the Afghan Taliban to give political stability a fighting chance. Apprehensions exist if Ashraf Ghani is unreservedly committed to the idea of peace through power-sharing between the stakeholders. That alone will enable the social and political equilibrium in Afghan society leading to stability. It is widely understood that perpetuating strife helps Ghani hold onto power.

Both India and Pakistan make the region in which Afghanistan exists and both have had roles to play in this 40-year war in Afghanistan. Pakistan from the word go was an active if indirect participant because of its contiguity especially when the USSR invaded Afghanistan. She became Afghanistans strategic depth as millions arrived as refugees. Pakistan also helped Afghans throw the Soviets out after the latters 10-year occupation of Afghanistan. Following 9/11, the US needed an express entry into Afghanistan which Pakistan enabled. This phase of the Afghan war found Pakistan not only enabling a war against terror but fighting one kinetically as malignance of the war in the neighbourhood overflowed into Pakistan. India, the distant neighbour and a proximate state which has had its own set of problems with Pakistan was mostly the spoiler, either complicating Pakistans efforts at successfully finishing terror off or in inciting anger and reaction within Afghanistan against Pakistan by framing it for supporting the Taliban. She has also found it opportune to meddle in Pakistan using Afghan soil for as long as the strife has persisted. This has only encouraged India to play its demonic role in scuttling every effort towards finding peace. It was thus important that the two, India and Pakistan, first found accommodation between them before they could fully contribute to a search for peace in Afghanistan.

We, thus, see signs of a rapprochement on order between India and Pakistan. In one of my earlier pieces on the subject I had outlined factors which would intrinsically encourage both India and Pakistan to ease things between them from the near-war hype driving their relations. More so India which had kept a very hawkish approach towards Pakistan or on any thought of a possible dialogue between the two. Not now. The two DGMOs spoke, not out of the blue for sure; and the two sides are meant to reconnect on the Indus Waters soon after a prolonged absence from what is meant to be a biannual meet up. Following the thaw Tony Blinken called Moscow to convene a meeting of the five regional nations including Russia, Iran, China, India and Pakistan to assume responsibility as a group to oversee the process of peace and its implementation in Afghanistan. The US has invited itself to the meeting as the key mediator to forging this combined responsibility. India has thus found a backdoor entry to the table from which it had been distanced earlier. Whether this was suitably premised on a seeming rapprochement between the two, only time will tell.

If the group can play even a cursory role in seeming to oversee some sort of peace may be enough cover for the US to exit. Others can then grapple with what is left behind; malign or propitious. If the recent eminence to Quad by Biden and Co will alleviate some Indian concerns about their imagined import it may help ameliorate some of Indias inherent angst in regional interactions and may just tone the rhetoric and animosity down a few decibels against Pakistan. It remains a composite approach by the US to appease tensions in and around Afghanistan while it transfers focus to China and the East. That is Americas new approach to Asia and the Middle East. If it also subsumes what has been a lingering conflict-in-waiting between India and Pakistan so much the better. Perhaps the two peoples can breathe easy while hoping that the imposed behavioural change will lead to fulfilling South Asias promise. Pakistan too has begun to rhyme in the essence of economic security as the more critical component of national security. Perhaps next one would see easing off trade restrictions between the two neighbours.

When may India plug into CPEC though is not only ambitious but will clash with the objectives of the Quad and the newer responsibilities the US will assign India with. For the moment, US will bolster Indias confidence with some military offerings to ease away some of her apprehensions. A more secure India will make a less belligerent India in an environment where coexistence is the order. Afghanistan may too then find peace giving US the opportunity to pivot. Nothing is unrelated.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 19th, 2021.

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Finding peace in and around Afghanistan - The Express Tribune

Editors note: Staff writer Samantha House contributed to this report.

Syracuse, NY Connie Tuori, 93, had no fear of her home in the treacherous Skyline Apartments. Just look at how she lived.

The daughter of Italian immigrants on Syracuses North Side, she paid her way through Syracuse University in the 1950s, a time when single, immigrant-family women rarely did such things. She worked summers alone as a waitress in the Adirondacks, getting free room and board in return.

After college, she taught school in Syracuse and in California, along the Mexican border. And then she taught in Italy for several years before she moved to Istanbul, Turkey, to teach English for a year and a half.

Fiercely independent, she traveled the world without being harmed, only to be killed in her home, a Syracuse apartment in a building overrun with crime and neglect.

In the early 1980s, she moved back to Syracuses Park Street -- down the street from where shed grown up. Thats when Patrick Leone, of Minoa, remembers going to her house as a preschooler, to be watched while his mother worked.

Leone is Tuoris great grand-nephew. As he grew up, Aunt Connie was the relative with all the stories.

Like the time she went on an African safari, sleeping on the ground with only a sheet. Or the postcard from Antarctica, where she bemoaned getting bored with penguins. Or the time, in her 80s, that she broke her hip getting chased by monkeys in Southeast Asia. (She flew home by herself anyway.)

Leone recalls Aunt Connies story about getting mugged as a young woman in Italy. She was unhurt and unfazed. I dont think it ever really scared her, Leone recalled. It didnt deter her.

So what did Connie Tuori think of Skyline Apartments, the place that everyone -- her own family included -- believed was too dangerous a place for her to live?

Skyline Apartments at 753 James Street owned by former NFL star Tim Green and his son, Troy. The apartments are the subject of intense scrutiny by tenants for crime and alleged neglect. Photo by N. Scott Trimble | strimble@syracuse.comN. Scott Trimble | strimble@syracuse.com

For much of her life, Skyline had been a luxury apartment complex. It wasnt bad when she moved in two decades ago. And Connie Tuori wasnt going to be forced out by her family.

The stubbornness that got her around the world kept her longer (at Skyline) than she should have been, said her niece, Patti Tuori, of Arizona. She was comfortable there. She knew her building, knew her stores.

Leone agreed, noting the familys efforts to convince her to leave.

It wasnt a secret that she wasnt in a great place, Leone recalled. But she didnt want to change. Hey, why dont you move? But she didnt want to. She had been in so many exotic places, that being in an apartment in Syracuse probably didnt faze her much.

Neighbors described her as a sweet, harmless old lady who, until her death, walked by herself up to shop on Butternut Street. She refused to consider that her daily life might be dangerous, said Sharon Sherman, of the Greater Syracuse Tenants Network.

Her legendary fearlessness was a hallmark of the lifelong bachelorette.

At age 13, the fearlessness landed her on the front page of the Syracuse Herald-Journal.

Connie, then a eighth-grade student at Grant Junior High School, talked to reporters in January 1941 after a scuffle with her brother over the then-ongoing World War II. The wrestling match happened when Connies little brother teased her about a German attack on London, according to the story in The Post-Standards archives.

The teen avidly followed updates on war and was inclined to agree with the English, she told reporters. So when her brother provoked her, she threw him out the back door of their familys Park Street home. Connie then accidentally pushed her hand through a glass window while trying to lock her brother outside.

This probably marks the first bloodshed in Syracuse, and maybe the United States, over the war, she gravely told reporters.

Family said that Connie Tuoris love of history and world events drew her to the farthest reaches of the globe: Revolutionary China, before it opened to the West; Afghanistan in the 1950s; Iran, long after the Islamic Revolution (getting a visa through the United Kingdom). Relatives still have the kimono dresses she sent back from Japan.

In the end, she visited all seven of the worlds continents.

Shed work during the school year while living frugally, then travel during the summers, Patti Tuori recalled.

Shed get family to drop her off at the Greyhound station and travel the country by bus in search of a cheap plane fare. To save money, shed stay in youth hostels, even into old age. Her trips would last several months and might, for example, begin in Italy and end in Spain.

I remember dropping her off at the bus station with two little suitcases and shed be gone for three months, Patti Tuori said. She met a lot of people when she was traveling. Shed say, If I ever have troubles when Im traveling, Ill just stop somebody and get them to help me. She was very insistent. She got her way.

Connie, who retired from teaching in 1992, shared her travels in richly detailed letters published in The Post-Standard throughout 1997.

The letters focused on the people Connie had met while living and travelling abroad. She remembered a lovestruck man in Afghanistan in the late 1950s who after eating pilaf and mutton with her told her about the woman he had fallen for but was prohibited from marrying.

Connie described getting lost in Myanmar, where she traversed spice markets and bumpy country roads, during her second trip to the country in 1997. She recalled her 1956 bus trip to a 1,000-year-old temple in southern India and the time in 1970 when she ditched an obstinate tour guide in Uzbekistan.

In 1998, Connie asked the public to donate money to help a child in Uganda get an education. She had just gotten back from a five-week tour of east Africa, where her heart had been broken by the plight of a young boy struggling to pay for secondary school. She spoke to a reporter with The Post-Standard and asked interested donors to call her.

At age 85, she wanted to go on another African safari, her family said. But she was incensed to find out that the age limit for the trip was 82.

They didnt know who they were talking to, Patti Tuori said, laughing. Still, Connie made it to Malaysia as an octogenarian, fracturing her hip in the monkey episode.

In later years, she also held speaking engagements at local bookstores, like Barnes & Noble, in which shed describe her adventures.

She was kind of singularly obsessed with traveling and the world, Patti Tuori recalled.

When home, Tuori would walk or take the bus wherever she wanted to go. She didnt drive. In planning trips, shed take a bus to the downtown library to get one travel guide for the trip.

Once, Leone recalls seeing her, by chance, walking by herself on Hiawatha Boulevard near Destiny USA Where are you going? he asked her. She hitched a ride with him back home.

But for someone who couldnt go a mile without walking it herself, Connie Tuori did more in her life than most dream of.

Ive been too many places. Its boring to go back to them, shed say, half-joking, in later life.

That spirit never left her.

She had no fear, Patti Tuori said. Shed been everywhere, shed seen so much. Shed been walking around the slums of whatever country on her own. Living in a bad neighborhood in Syracuse was just another trip for her.

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Staff writer Douglass Dowty can be reached at ddowty@syracuse.com or 315-470-6070.

Continued here:
Connie Tuori, 93, survived Afghanistan, Antarctica and African safari, only to be killed in her Syracuse apar - syracuse.com

Forty two years ago, my grandfather Mohammad Naim Khan and his brother Mohammad Daoud Khan, the first President of Afghanistan, were martyred along with 16 members of our family including women and children--one was only 18-months-old--in a bloody communist coup. That coup was singular in its brutality and signaled the start of a tragic war that has plagued Afghanistan since. Every moment since has been war. Generation after generation has come and gone knowing only war. Millions have been killed, maimed, orphaned, widowed, or have become refugees. Afghanistan bleeds.

This must end. And today there is a small but tangible window of opportunity to end the more than four decades of war, and reach an enduring peace. The ability to live in peace is a universal right, and after over four decades of death and destruction, my people deserve to live in peace too.

As a common citizen, a devout patriot, a responsible member of my community, and a carrier of a legacy of my grandfathers and their predecessors, I am raising my voice.

To my fellow Afghans, who have suffered in the last four decades, your sacrifices will not go in vain--be hopeful that an end is in sight. Our losses have been unthinkable. We have more reason than ever to bring an end to the barbarism of the last four decades. We must have hope that peace is possible and is our right.

To the government, the Taliban and to political leaders, I call on you to earnestly work in these final days and hours and to put the interest of the Afghan people above all else. We owe it to Afghanistan and our people. Our history has proved time and again that no external force can impose their will upon this freedom-loving nation and that ultimately we as a nation carry the responsibility of shaping our shared future. All Afghan leaders have made mistakes but the time has come for us to have the courage to forgive one another and to move on. We have paid and are still paying a high price for exchanging bullets and accusations, while we should know better now that the only path to lasting peace is to open our hearts and arms to one another.

To our international partners, who have paid in the past two decades in blood and treasure, this great nation is in your debt. We Afghans are known for our hospitality but we also remember who helped us in times of need. I urge you to not let the sacrifices of the past 20 years go in vain, dont diminish the hopes and dreams of a bright and talented new generation, who have the passion and the determination to build Afghanistan, by abandoning Afghanistan, so close to the finish line. Whatever you decide, the candle that has been lit in the heart of this nation will never dim or be blown out.

To our neighbors and regional powers who have had direct and indirect roles in the past four decades, I need you to have a solemn outlook. The cost of this war has been millions of lives and a trillion dollars and while Asia as a continent is emerging as an economic powerhouse, its heart, which geopolitically is Afghanistan, is bleeding. The great philosopher and writer Allama Iqbal wrote:that Asia is a body of water and earth,of which the Afghan nation is the heart.From its discord, the discord of Asia;and from its accord, the accord of Asia.

I consider myself lucky to have been born in what is now considered the golden era of peace and stability in Afghanistan during the reign of my maternal grandfather King Zahir Shah. Deep in my heart I truly believe that we can get there again. We have all paid high prices. Afghans have been forced to show a resilience that shouldnt be asked of anyone. But we have done it. And today we must use that resilience and heartbreak to bring peace to our land. This war must end. Peace must come. And I, for one, am ready, hopeful and embracing an end state of an Afghanistan at peace.

Read more:
The End of War and the Start of Peace in Afghanistan - TOLOnews