GOP admits voter id laws will "allow" Romney to win

[QuantumPion]

It's hilarious that the republitards actually argue that having to present something as basic as proof of rampant voter fraud is somehow an insurmountable hurdle to the point where millions would be disenfranchised by unnecessary voter ID laws. Do you republitards actually believe that drivel, or is it just a ploy to deny more American voters the right to vote?

There have been two recent prominent cases in my memory. The governor of Washington and the Al Franken. Both lost the initial count, lost the recount, lost the 2nd recount, but then mysteriously a box of forgotten, uncounted votes were "found" which allowed the democrat to win. And at that point, it was determined that the election was official. And of course the spineless republican candidate is too classy or too broke to challenge it in court.

 

[jackstar7]

"dimlibs"? "republitards"? Think about it.

You understand thraash was being satirical, right?

 

[Bowfinger]

It's hilarious that the dimlibs actually argue that having to present something as basic as an ID is somehow an insurmountable hurdle to the point where "millions" would be disenfranchised. Do you dimlibs actually believe that drivel, or is it just a ploy to allow more "undocumented" voters to be able to vote?

I know, I hear you, facts are a real bitch. Always trampling on your inalienable right as an American to cling to whatever ignorant, faith-based beliefs your tiny heart desires. Damn reality and its liberal bias anyway. It's just not fair.

 

[Bowfinger]

There have been two recent prominent cases in my memory. The governor of Washington and the Al Franken. Both lost the initial count, lost the recount, lost the 2nd recount, but then mysteriously a box of forgotten, uncounted votes were "found" which allowed the democrat to win. And at that point, it was determined that the election was official. And of course the spineless republican candidate is too classy or too broke to challenge it in court.

Two points. First, those examples, real or imagined, have nothing to do with voter photo IDs which is what we're discussing here. Second, for every example you care to cite against the Dems, there are just as many examples that can be cited against Republicans. Just look at all of the mysterious results associated with electronic voting systems a few years ago.

I'm 100% behind making sure elections are honest. Voter photo ID laws do effectively nothing to help with that, and in fact do considerable harm. That's the whole point.

 

[Bowfinger]

Documentation... that you should already have.

Yet many do not, for reasons already discussed in the thread. Obtaining it is a significant hurdle in many cases.

Time... which if you do not have a job you have plenty of.

It's not quite that simple, but I would agree in a great many cases spare time is the least of their issues.

Transportation... which you already need to vote.

Yes, and which both parties are happy to provide ... on election day. Now if you can get both parties to do this the rest of the year too, we're then down to the issues of documentation and expense. Both remain significant hurdles for many.

 

[JeffreyLebowski]

I would guess $0. Up here in Canada we require ID for voting and it doesn't seem to cause any problems.

Here's how voting in Canada works.
Voting is based on where you live. If you live at X street and Y avenue, you must vote at polling station Z. This is important because where you vote determines who you can vote for; different ridings have different candidates obviously. The polling stations will already have a giant list of people who are registered to vote in that area. People who live in the area but are not on the list can be added to the list at a moment's notice, and I had to do that last time.

1) Walk into the polling station and give them your government issued ID. You can either use a photo ID like a drivers license or you can use your social insurance card (like a SS card) and a piece of delivered mail that shows where you live.
2) They check the address on your ID or mail and verify that you are at the correct polling station. A couple months ago I was at the wrong one; the correct station was across the street. They put a check mark next to your name to indicate that you have voted, and then they give you a piece of paper.
3) You take the paper over to the cheap folding table that has some cheap cardboard on it that gives some privacy then mark the appropriate candidate with the pencil provided.
4) Take the marked ballot back to the people who gave you the paper.
5) Fold the paper in half and put it in the box; nobody else is allowed to see or touch your ballot.
6) Leave the polling station.


Maybe democrats see this as being some mind bogglingly complex problem. Paper and pencil? $20 folding tables? Senior citizens reading the address on your drivers license? Inconceivable!

Odd how the political group that is courting people that are in the country illegally, also don't want people to prove they are legal to vote.

 

[Bowfinger]

Odd how the political group that is courting people that are in the country illegally, also don't want people to prove they are legal to vote.

Not odd that you have no clue what you're talking about. That is a voter registration issue, not a "casting a ballot" issue.

 

[bfdd]

There's pretty much no way to stop voter fraud or prove voter fraud at this moment so using the lack of voter fraud proof as to why we don't need even the most BASIC of voter fraud prevention is retarded. There is little to no security measures in place to prevent it, let alone detect it.

 

[werepossum]

Two points. First, those examples, real or imagined, have nothing to do with voter photo IDs which is what we're discussing here. Second, for every example you care to cite against the Dems, there are just as many examples that can be cited against Republicans. Just look at all of the mysterious results associated with electronic voting systems a few years ago.

I'm 100% behind making sure elections are honest. Voter photo ID laws do effectively nothing to help with that, and in fact do considerable harm. That's the whole point.

Um, no. You may at best be 100% behind accurately counting the votes of whomever shows up to cast them, but since you're also 100% behind making sure we have no way to verify identity or eligibility, you are definitely not in favor of making sure elections are honest.

An honest election would require, at a minimum:
1) Making sure every voter is eligible to vote.
2) Making sure every person casting a vote is the actual voter she claims to be.
3) Making sure that every person who becomes ineligible to vote is removed from the roles and that no one who happens to have the same (or a similar) name is not removed.
4) Using paper ballots which can be counted by machine but also recounted by hand.
5) Allowing NO copying of ballots, or altering of ballots, for any reason. (That is why we have Senator Franken - at least one county copied ballots that they deemed in bad shape and then added them with the "bad ballots". Amazingly, a judge ruled that the new total, counting the original ballots as well as the new copied ballots, be counted as the official ballots.)
6) Requiring that any interpreted ballots (i.e. hanging chads) take a unanimous decision to be counted.
7) Keeping at all times rigid control and bi-partisan overwatch of all voting machines, voter registrations, ballots, ballot boxes, etc. at all times until the count is official, AND keeping all this on video.
8) Allowing each party no more than one lawyer per county, so that a party cannot swamp local officials with minutia in attempts to wrongly disqualify voters likely to vote for the other party.
9) Running some (preferably all) of a precinct's ballots through a second machine to verify the totals.
10) Requiring mandatory stiff jail terms for violation of rules. An election official caught with a voting machine in his car, as in Broward County in 2000, needs to spend five years in federal prison.

 

[nehalem256]

Not odd that you have no clue what you're talking about. That is a voter registration issue, not a "casting a ballot" issue.

But I assume you would agree that requiring US Photo ID will make it harder for illegal immigrants to vote.

And with regards to voter registration the party that is courting illegal immigrants is also trying to block states from purging non-citizens from the voter registration rolls.

 

[nehalem256]

Um, no. You may at best be 100% behind accurately counting the votes of whomever shows up to cast them, but since you're also 100% behind making sure we have no way to verify identity or eligibility, you are definitely not in favor of making sure elections are honest.

An honest election would require, at a minimum:
1) Making sure every voter is eligible to vote.
2) Making sure every person casting a vote is the actual voter she claims to be.
3) Making sure that every person who becomes ineligible to vote is removed from the roles and that no one who happens to have the same (or a similar) name is not removed.
4) Using paper ballots which can be counted by machine but also recounted by hand.
5) Allowing NO copying of ballots, or altering of ballots, for any reason. (That is why we have Senator Franken - at least one county copied ballots that they deemed in bad shape and then added them with the "bad ballots". Amazingly, a judge ruled that the new total, counting the original ballots as well as the new copied ballots, be counted as the official ballots.)
6) Requiring that any interpreted ballots (i.e. hanging chads) take a unanimous decision to be counted.
7) Keeping at all times rigid control and bi-partisan overwatch of all voting machines, voter registrations, ballots, ballot boxes, etc. at all times until the count is official, AND keeping all this on video.
8) Allowing each party no more than one lawyer per county, so that a party cannot swamp local officials with minutia in attempts to wrongly disqualify voters likely to vote for the other party.
9) Running some (preferably all) of a precinct's ballots through a second machine to verify the totals.
10) Requiring mandatory stiff jail terms for violation of rules. An election official caught with a voting machine in his car, as in Broward County in 2000, needs to spend five years in federal prison.

Seems like a good system. I would add that there should be a system in place for recounts. Preferably we take the election night total and then sanity check recount it to make sure there was no obvious mistake. But no lets recount 5 times until my candidate wins.

 

[nehalem256]

Not odd that you have no clue what you're talking about. That is a voter registration issue, not a "casting a ballot" issue.

I think you meant to say there are no illegal immigrants registered to vote. After all why would they be there unless they were intending to commit voting fraud?

 

[trenchfoot]

I picture red fire engines with sirens screaming, honking and blaring and driving at breakneck speed weaving and zigzagging through traffic frantically looking for a fire to put out that nobody called in or pulled an alarm for, and then seeing a train of red elephants all connected tail-to-trunk closely trailing the fire engines screaming "put out the fires! put out the fires!"

 

[werepossum]

Absentee ballot voter fraud is certainly an issue, but an absentee ballot must be mailed to your home, thereby giving investigators an address to come interview you. And one must be previously registered to get an absentee ballot. It's certainly not fool proof, but it certainly beats someone showing up on election day and being given a ballot on the basis of a light bill or a student ID.

 

[werepossum]

Seems like a good system. I would add that there should be a system in place for recounts. Preferably we take the election night total and then sanity check recount it to make sure there was no obvious mistake. But no lets recount 5 times until my candidate wins.

Agreed. Multiple recounts with ever-increasing vote totals must be either fraud or gross incompetence. Multiple recounts with ever-increasing vote totals to the benefit of only one candidate must be either fraud or, um, fraud.

 

[werepossum]

I picture red fire engines with sirens screaming, honking and blaring and driving at breakneck speed weaving and zigzagging through traffic frantically looking for a fire to put out that nobody called in or pulled an alarm for, and then seeing a train of red elephants all connected tail-to-trunk closely trailing the fire engines screaming "put out the fires! put out the fires!"

As long as you aren't driving and the elephants don't tell you to kill anyone you're probably okay. Next time though cut the dose by half. And tell your shrink - he can't help you if you don't help yourself.

 

[Jhhnn]

There's pretty much no way to stop voter fraud or prove voter fraud at this moment so using the lack of voter fraud proof as to why we don't need even the most BASIC of voter fraud prevention is retarded. There is little to no security measures in place to prevent it, let alone detect it.

Which is just a convoluted way of saying that significant voter fraud may exist only in the fevered imaginations of the Repub faithful, & that they're entirely willing to disenfranchise non-believer voter groups to make sure it can't happen.

Given the number of seniors who traditionally vote Republican & the illustrated lack of proper documentation of that group, the consequences & backlash from the Repub quest for electoral purity may well end up being counter productive for them. Here's hoping it is.

None of this fol-de-rol applies to people who already receive absentee ballots, anyway, so that'll blunt the effect on seniors. OTOH, it seems that if any illegals are smart enough & determined enough to get through the filters to register to vote that they'd also be smart enough to vote absentee, too...

 

[jackstar7]

I hope many of you will go volunteer as poll workers.

 

[Abraxas]

Um, no. You may at best be 100% behind accurately counting the votes of whomever shows up to cast them, but since you're also 100% behind making sure we have no way to verify identity or eligibility, you are definitely not in favor of making sure elections are honest.

An honest election would require, at a minimum:
1) Making sure every voter is eligible to vote.
2) Making sure every person casting a vote is the actual voter she claims to be.
3) Making sure that every person who becomes ineligible to vote is removed from the roles and that no one who happens to have the same (or a similar) name is not removed.
4) Using paper ballots which can be counted by machine but also recounted by hand.
5) Allowing NO copying of ballots, or altering of ballots, for any reason. (That is why we have Senator Franken - at least one county copied ballots that they deemed in bad shape and then added them with the "bad ballots". Amazingly, a judge ruled that the new total, counting the original ballots as well as the new copied ballots, be counted as the official ballots.)
6) Requiring that any interpreted ballots (i.e. hanging chads) take a unanimous decision to be counted.
7) Keeping at all times rigid control and bi-partisan overwatch of all voting machines, voter registrations, ballots, ballot boxes, etc. at all times until the count is official, AND keeping all this on video.
8) Allowing each party no more than one lawyer per county, so that a party cannot swamp local officials with minutia in attempts to wrongly disqualify voters likely to vote for the other party.
9) Running some (preferably all) of a precinct's ballots through a second machine to verify the totals.
10) Requiring mandatory stiff jail terms for violation of rules. An election official caught with a voting machine in his car, as in Broward County in 2000, needs to spend five years in federal prison.

You missed the far more important step zero; to make sure anyone eligible to vote has a fair chance to. I suspect the reason for this is the process you are advocating directly impinges upon this. Or is it still a fair election to you if thousands of American citizens are prevented from participating in democracy, just so long as they people who would have voted against the guy you like?

 

[nehalem256]

You missed the far more important step zero; to make sure anyone eligible to vote has a fair chance to. I suspect the reason for this is the process you are advocating directly impinges upon this. Or is it still a fair election to you if thousands of American citizens are prevented from participating in democracy, just so long as they people who would have voted against the guy you like?

The right to vote does not mean society is required to make it so you can vote anymore than freedom of the press requires the government to provide you with a printing press.

And having months to acquire photo ID is fair. They are not being "prevented" from participating in democracy.

 

[Abraxas]

The right to vote does not mean society is required to make it so you can vote

Gentlemen, I give you the Republican Party.

anymore than freedom of the press requires the government to provide you with a printing press.

False analogy. Voter ID laws force one to spend time and money to participate in the electoral process, printing presses are an optional way to participate in freedom of the press and most people who make use of that right don't use or need one.

And having months to acquire photo ID is fair. They are not being "prevented" from participating in democracy.

That is your opinion. That research shows it will prevent thousands of citizens from voting who otherwise would indicates it is a bad and poorly thought out opinion.

 

[Jhhnn]

The right to vote does not mean society is required to make it so you can vote anymore than freedom of the press requires the government to provide you with a printing press.

Audacious authoritarian doublespeak, the foundation of totalitarian govt. Maybe they should just make it so that nobody can vote, huh?

 

[nehalem256]

Gentlemen, I give you the Republican Party.
False analogy. Voter ID laws force one to spend time and money to participate in the electoral process, printing presses are an optional way to participate in freedom of the press and most people who make use of that right don't use or need one.

This is already true. I do not seem to recall being able to vote telepathically or being reimbursed for the gas spent driving to the polling place.

That is your opinion. That research shows it will prevent thousands of citizens from voting who otherwise would indicates it is a bad and poorly thought out opinion.

Just because someone cannot be bothered to prove their identity before voting does not make it unreasonable.

 

[nehalem256]

Audacious authoritarian doublespeak, the foundation of totalitarian govt. Maybe they should just make it so that nobody can vote, huh?

Because requiring the same standard of ID needed to get a job to vote is clearly the same as banning voting 😵

Isn't funny that liberals have no problem with forcing private businesses to verify citizenship. But throw a fit anytime a state tries to do so.

 

[glenn1]

This has been covered in the thread already, but briefly there are two concerns. First, there are today millions of perfectly eligible American voters who do not have a valid, state-issued photo ID. Second, many of those people have have mobility and financial issues that make it difficult to obtain a state ID. While this may not be intuitive to you or me, it is nonetheless true. Put the two together and the net result is that voter photo ID laws do, in fact, disenfranchise a certain percentage of those otherwise eligible voters who do not currently have valid state photo IDs. Some will jump through the hoops to get IDs; some will not.

If Democrats can require everyone to buy health insurance, then Republicans can require everyone to get a photo ID. Problem solved.