Dem Charges Republicans with trying to Deny Blacks the Right to Vote

Democrat Barbara Lee of California claims that Republicans are trying to deny African Americans the right to vote. How? By passing laws that require the voter to present an ID before voting.

Personally, I find this claim to be completely absurd. Requiring an ID seems like the most basic and simple thing that should be done to ensure the integrity of our election system.

On a personal level, as a Hispanic, I find it insulting to claim that 20% of Hispanics who are eligible to vote would be prevented from doing so by requiring an ID. Now it may be true that illegal aliens would be prevented from voting by such a requirement, but that's pretty much the point, isn't it? Any African Americans out there? Would a requirement that you show ID prevent you from voting?

Rep Lee seems to feel that minorities are completely helpless and unable to accomplish basic tasks such as acquiring an ID.

 

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Of course they are trying to limit voting rights. Whether blacks or minorities are being targeted is a matter for debate, but that is the practical effect. Given that there have been only a handful of cases of voter fraud as opposed to election fraud, you do have to wonder what they are doing.

 

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"Now many of our Christians have what I call the goo-goo syndrome — good government. They want everybody to vote. I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of people, they never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."

Paul Weyrich, co-founder of the Heritage Foundation​

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GBAsFwPglw

 

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Republican-led Voter Restrictions Are Rigging Democracy

 

Yeah, more Republican/Tea Bagger dirty tricks.

"Even at the time, there was no evidence to back up such outlandish claims. A major probe by the Justice Department between 2002 and 2007 failed to prosecute a single person for going to the polls and impersonating an eligible voter, which the anti-fraud laws are supposedly designed to stop. Out of the 300 million votes cast in that period, federal prosecutors convicted only 86 people for voter fraud – and many of the cases involved immigrants and former felons who were simply unaware of their ineligibility." - Rolling Stone

Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/the-gop-war-on-voting-20110830#ixzz1funERZ7i

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2008/oct/13/election-acorn-voter-fraud

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electoral_fraud

 

Stop Insulting People

On a personal level, as an American, I find it insulting that you expect us to sympathize with this obvious bullshit.

Okay, look: So, imagine a ninety-some year old lady who has never missed an election.

Just work with me, here, okay?

So, upon hearing that she is going to be required to present a photo ID—something she hasn't carried for a while, since she hasn't needed it—in order to vote, she goes down to her local DMV to get an ID. No big deal, right?

Except she needs, in addition to her birth certificate—which she has—her marriage certificate, since she is a woman from the era in which it was the women who changed their names.

I suppose it's her own damn fault for being so stupid as to think that her name under law and tradition would not be good enough for the government however many decades down the line, but, well, you know, this is the price she pays for being an idiot and not keeping herself adequately prepared for a Republican Party scheme to constrict voting laws and reduce the voting pool by bawling about a voter fraud phenomenon that is utterly insignificant.

There is a reason people look poorly on the GOP's scheme to reduce the eligible voting pool.

And no, we won't be so rude as to hold your bullshit against all Hispanics. We realize that their ethnicity does not automatically mean they are as dishonest as you.

Spare us the fallacious appeal to bullshit, sir. Anyone who isn't sold to bigotry and greed knows what's going on here. And if you don't like that characterization, tough fuh-reakin' shit. I'm sorry if the truth is unkind to your honor, dignity, and reputation, but since those things mean so little to you, don't expect the rest of us to bother with any vapid pretense of respect.

 

And guess what, Republican governors are shutting down DMVs in Democratic majority districts.

 

My 93 year old immigrant grandfather has an ID. My immigrant grandmother who had no birth certiificate had an ID. I don't know a single adult who does not have an ID.

We routinely get a copy of a patient's ID as part of the check in procedure at my office and pretty much everyone but children has one. Whites, blacks, hispanics, illegal aliens, even 93 year olds. I can assure you that nowhere near 20 or 25% of any demographic group fails to provide ID.

So the idea that asking for an ID is too big a hurtle for those oppressed minorities is bullshit. The only reason I can see for anyone to complain about such a trivial requirement is that it might hinder your attempts to stuff the ballot box.

 

Yes, the simplicity of what you "know" is the whole of the truth

The reason I find that argument unsatisfactory is that it does not apply to the present.

Your immigrant grandmother would not be able to get an ID in Tennessee. Well, at least until the Republicans manage to fix their screwed up voter ID law. You know, after they were embarrassed when it emerged that they might accomplish something that even Jim Crow laws couldn't accomplish—Dorothy Cooper, age 96, could not get a proper ID in order to vote because she didn't have her marriage certificate.

Meanwhile, over ten percent of Tennesseeans don't have sufficient identification to vote under the new laws. And not everybody will face equal requirements. All the women who were dumb enough to take their husbands' last names will need to cough up marriage certificates in addition to their birth certificates. At least, in Tennessee. Unless Republicans fix the law they passed by allowing people over the age of sixty to vote absentee without photo ID.

You know, back in the 1990s, when several states adopted voting by mail, the theory was that more voters would participate. If this isn't about trimming the voter pool, what with all the random coincidences going on—you know, like the bit in Wisconsin where, by pure coincidence, the DMV offices that it makes the most economic sense to close are in Democratic districts, and the ones to expand are in Republican districts, and other such strange notions—then why are Republicans invoking a fictitious vote fraud fear to justify themselves?

 

not to mention these laws only apply to voting at the polls where its more slanted to democratic voters. while you don't need to provide anything for abseentee ballot where it mostly republican voters.

 

The issue is not "an ID." Only certain forms of ID are acceptable; some municipalities require a state-issued photo ID with current address, etc.

It's also interesting that you are introducing the red herrings of age and gender into the discussion ("93-year-old grandmother"), when nobody has suggested that there is any disparate impact along such axes, nor accepted the bizarre premise that being an old female renders someone less likely to possess the correct form of ID than does being a poor black person.

But more generally, the set of people that you know (and know the ID status of) is not a representative sample of the electorate. You've indicated as much before, in expressing bafflement that anybody wouldn't have a credit card, or rent movies from Blockbuster, etc. In fact, haven't you also recounted having up and moved municipalities (states?) for the express purpose of avoiding policies aimed at social integration? Or was that someone else?

Here's an actual statistical survey of the state of Indiana (and elsewhere), showing how possession of relevant ID breaks down on racial and partisan lines:

http://faculty.washington.edu/mbarreto/papers/PS_VoterID.pdf

Among all registered voters, 84.2% of whites have the correct ID credential in Indiana compared to 78.0% of blacks, statistically significant
at the 0.10 level. When we only focus on likely voters, those who consistently voted in 2002, 2004, and 2006, a 6-point gap between blacks and whites is still evident. Thus, if the Indiana law is applied strictly to the letter of the law, about 14% of likely white voters could be turned away from the polls and over 20% of likely black voters could be turned away. While both numbers are regrettable, the data demonstrate that blacks are disproportionately impacted by the Indiana law.​

Finally, income demonstrates a predictable pattern with the lowes tincome category of voters significantly less likely to have acceptable photo ID.​

Registered voters in Indiana who identify as Republicans were more likely to have proper ID credentials than those who identified as Democrats. While the gap of 4.5 points is not huge, it is large enough to affect election results in a close or competitive contest.​

[The] Supreme Court conceded that there is no evidence that falsely impersonating a voter has occurred in Indiana. [...] Our research of extant findings in this area clearly indicate that voter impersonation is extremely rare, and more importantly strict laws such as the Indiana case upheld by the Supreme Court do not effectively limit the much more rampant mail-in based fraud.​

Also, here's a longer, more technical paper by the same authors:

http://faculty.washington.edu/mbarreto/research/Voter_ID_APSA.pdf

The only bullshit evident here, are your fallacious assertions and their basis in anecdote and sheer innuendo. The real data pointedly disagrees with you. Try spending five minutes on Google the next time you want to call bullshit on a factual claim advanced by a politician - those types tends to have staffs to vet these kinds of things.

On the contrary, these requirements are non-trivial and do nothing to meaningfully address voter fraud (which is overwhelmingly done via mail-in ballots that are not covered by the requirements). They are clearly an intentional effort by the GOP to disenfranchise voters who are minorities and/or poor (more to the point - likely to vote Democrat). Indeed, the GOP has a long and storied history of exactly such tactics, going back decades, so this should not surprise anyone in the slightest. Such is, in fact, the default presumption when one encounters a GOP-backed effort to tighten voter registration/ID requirements.

But, hey, way to get out in front of that issue by pre-emptively issuing a totally baseless accusation of vote-rigging at your opponents. Still on-message with the whole ACORN attack strategy, I see.

 

An appropriate response would be for volunteer groups to go out there, make sure racial minority voters get their "proper" ID's and provide whatever assistance is necessary (transport, information etc.), and then make damn sure those people go out and vote next time they get the opportunity, in high numbers, specifically because racist f***ing slime-eating far-right crooks want to take away their ability and right to vote, and to Gerrymander their way to victory. The people responsible for this BS need to be punished severely for their misdeeds, but I fear there might be too much apathy amongst the impoverished electorate to make it happen, and that's probably what the Republicans are gambling on.

Edit: I'm getting disturbing flashes in my mind of another regime which was famously obsessed with racial fixations and making sure everyone has the proper identity documents.

 

You mean like, say, ACORN used to do?

Doing anything like that, on any scale, makes you a huge target for politicized, underhanded attacks by GOP activists. Not that it shouldn't be done as well, but the requirements designed to produce disparate impact (and the gerrymandering) need to be addressed directly and decisively.

 

Just going out and voting already makes them targets for those activists anyhow, which is why they're being squeezed out of the democratic process in the first place. So f*** the GOP vote manipulators, put them out on the streets where they belong.

Yes, and it starts by tossing out the established officials who tried to restrict the right to vote, and demanding that their replacements make a priority of investigating and punishing anti-democratic human rights violations.

 

All these things start out as good ideas.

It costs money to run elections. Why not have a small fee at the ballot box to cover the costs? It would cut taxes overall, and that way if you don't want to participate you don't have to pay for the election. And if you can't afford a buck or so you obviously don't care enough about your country to vote.

It inconveniences people who use libraries, community centers etc to have their facility shut down for the election. Why not put polling places in national parks in places that no one ordinarily uses? Would reduce the impact of elections. And if you can't be bothered to make a short walk you don't deserve to vote.

Uninformed people shouldn't vote. Why not have a very simple test before allowing people to vote? Just things like "how many branches does the US government have." It would help inform voters, and anyone who doesn't even know that doesn't deserve to vote.

Mightl all be good ideas. Then democrats realize that more republicans won't bother to walk a quarter mile to a polling place - and they are all over the national park idea. Democrats realize that in their state, the average IQ of democrats is higher - so they're all for the test. Republicans realize that overall, republicans have more money and are more likely to be willing to pay a poll tax. So they support that.

And such ideas thus get hijacked by people who want to win at any cost.

So yes, the ID requirement might be a good idea. But it has been hijacked by people who want to win at any cost, and hope to sway the election by keeping a certain demographic from voting. Which is why it's a bad idea in the end.

 

How about "Do voter identification requirements have the effect of disenfranchizing minorities?" Anyone who answers along the lines of, say "Obviously not, my old grandmother has a photo ID!" getssent home without voting. Anyone who looks up the data before answering, gets their vote counted.

 

The results speak for themselves, among all registered voters, 84.2% of whites have the correct ID credentials in Indiana compared to 78.0% of blacks

So in BOTH cases approx 1/5th of the people have to go get valid ids to vote.

Regardless though, it certainly isn't a major barrier and having a valid id is FAR more efficient/reliable then the previous method of voter identification:

Which is why modernization to use of a valid ID, which almost all adults now need anyway, makes sense.

SCOTUS ruling on this issue:

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/07-21.ZS.html


So while I don't disagree that a few more percent of blacks and poor and young and old are likely going to have to go and get valid ids, that doesn't mean, as the SCOTUS said, that there isn't a valid reason for requiring valid IDs.

I doubt it has any measurable impact at all on illegal immigrants since I really doubt many ever risk registering to vote.

Arthur

 

Interesting, I am always amazed at the hypocrisy in Republican Party ideology. Republicans/Tea Baggers say they are against big government and government intervention in individual lives. But then requiring each individual to obtain a government issued identification card is perfectly fine, so long as it benefits the Republican Party. So it appears Republican/Tea Party devotees have two standards.

 

BS
You can't drive a car without a valid State Issued ID.
You can't go outside the US without a Govt issued Passport anymore, even to Canada or Mexico.
You can't buy Alcohol in most states without a valid State Issued ID (doesn't matter if you are 80 either)
You can't do most banking functions without a valid ID.
You can't deal with the Medical system (mostly before, but for sure under Obamacare) without a valid ID.

http://www.tricare.mil/tma/privacy/...on of Identity Prior to Disclosure of PHI.pdf

So no, it REALLY isn't a big issue anymore.

And it's much faster/easier/reliable than comparing signatures, which change over time, on voter logs.

 

LOL, yeah. The party which is supposed to be against government intervention in our individual lives is making yet another exception to their "principals" because it is in conflict with their number one goal, party power at all cost.

For the first two hundred plus years of our existence as a country, we have not been required to have identification cards to vote. And it worked just fine. The unpleasant fact Arthur is that your party is requiring individuals to get a Republican approved ID card in order to execute our Constitutional rights.

There is no constitutional right to driving a car or any of the other things you mentioned. But there is a Constitutional right to vote.