93 Y.O. TN Woman Denied Voter ID...

gimmesometruth27

usamamasan1 wrote:

No it's not. You are making shit up to spew the venom of hate and race war when it's not even the point. You listen to whatever the current occupants team wants you to hear (holder).
The current occupants admin is trying to whip up minority frenzy, propagating the myth of widespread ballot suppression. The goal is to foster a sense of racial persecution of blacks, intending to maximize voter turnout in November. You cry foul politics when its actualy all on YOUR end.
Ha
Attitudes like yours do nothing but set race relations back further for your OWN goal of getting the current occupant re-elected. You got it all backwards, AGAIN.
That's why I'm here, to help.

Actually I don't know what holder says nor do I care..

I speak from what I see. And I see these laws as a ploy to keep people from voting..

How about this.....why don't tax payers pay for the poor to get transportation to whatever government office to get an id. And how about we pay for ids for those same poor people. I know the gop will not go for that so they fucking can not have it both ways.....

Do not attack me. If I had posted that to you you would have cited a posting guideline..

I am waiting for those 5 examples of white republicans being disenfranchised.....guess I shouldn't hold my breath huh...

Byrnzie

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... raud-fraud

The Republican 'voter fraud' fraud

All over the US, GOP lawmakers have engineered schemes to make voting more difficult. Well, if you can't win elections fairly…

Diane Roberts
guardian.co.uk, Monday 31 October 2011


Presidential candidate and angry white man Newt Gingrich seems nostalgic for the good old Jim Crow poll tax days: he has called for people to have to pass an American historical literacy test before they can vote. His colleagues on the anti-democratic right have not gone quite so far, but 38 states, most of them controlled by Republicans, are concocting all kinds of ingenious ways to suppress the vote. A new report from New York University's Brennan Center for Justice says that more than five million people – enough to swing the 2012 presidential election – could find themselves disenfranchised, especially if they're poor or old or students or black or Latino.

Hyper-conservative governors and legislators, working with templates produced by a shady cabal called the American Legislative Exchange Council (Alec), have pushed through laws to cut the number of voting days, impede groups registering new voters, demand proof of citizenship and otherwise make it more difficult to cast a ballot. Alec, partly funded by the John Birch-er billionaire Koch brothers and affiliated with Liam Fox's Atlantic Bridge, is on a mission to shrink not just government (which it regards as a cancer on capitalism), but democracy itself. Ion Sancho, elections supervisor of Leon County, Florida, and veteran of Florida's 2000 presidential election fiasco, says: "Every state that has a Republican legislature is doing this, from Maine to Florida. It's a national effort."

In the 2008 election, Barack Obama benefited from extended voting hours and early voting days, as well as rules allowing citizens to register and vote on the same day. It's pretty obvious why: students, the elderly, and hourly-wage workers who can't queue for hours without making the boss angry, tend to favor Democrats. Florida – which became a byword for Banana Republicanism and electoral corruption 11 years ago – has been positively zealous in attempts to restrict voting rights on the grounds that easy voting leads to waste, fraud and abuse. One lawmaker pitched a hissy fit, claiming that dead actors (Paul Newman, for one) constantly turn up on voter rolls and that "Mickey Mouse" had registered to vote in Orlando. State senator Mike Bennett wants to make voting "harder"; after all, he said, "people in Africa literally walk 200 or 300 miles so they can have the opportunity to do what we do, and we want to make it more convenient? How much more convenient do you want to make it?"

Florida Republicans addressed the problem of "convenience" earlier this year by cutting early voting days from 14 to eight, cutting budgets for expanded polling places and eliminating Sunday voting: African American (and some Latino) churches had successfully run a post-sermon"Souls to the Polls" operation, getting out the vote in 2004, 2006 and 2008. Florida has also attacked civic-minded people trying to register new voters. Jill Ciccarelli, a teacher at New Smyrna Beach High School, wanted to foster a sense of citizenship amongst her pupils, so she helped the ones who were old enough register. She didn't know she was breaking the law. Now, all individuals or groups must file a "third party registration organisation" form with the state, and instead of having ten days to deliver the paperwork,they must now do it in 48 hours. Failure to comply could draw felony charges and thousands of dollars in fines.

The nonpartisan League of Women Voters, promoters of civic responsibility since 1920, has now abandoned its Florida voter drives: LWV is suing the state, saying that Florida's clampdown on the franchise violates the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Florida's response? Governor Rick Scott, a Republican elected in 2010 and steeped in Koch-flavored Tea, wants to largely exempt Florida – a former slave state with as rich a racist history as Alabama or Mississippi – from the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Florida's not out front on this: many states, including those fat with electoral college votes such as Texas, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Indiana, Tennessee and Ohio, have passed harsh restrictions on who can vote and how. More than a dozen states demand that people show an approved photo ID card. Surely, the middle-class reasoning goes, every red-blooded American has a driving license? But hundreds of thousands – many elderly, disabled or just plain poor – do not. Representative Terri Sewell, a member of Congress from Alabama, told the New York Times that her wheelchair-bound father had used his United States social security card as proof of identity when voting. Now that's been outlawed.

In Texas, student ID cards are no longer valid for voting; neither are ID cards issued by the federal Veterans Administration. All those students and war vets need to do is go buy a gun: concealed weapons permits are acceptable at the polls.

Republicans all sing from the same hymnal on this one: voting must be tightly controlled to prevent fraud. Never mind that there is no fraud. Indeed, the Brennan Center found that voter fraud is so "exceedingly rare" that "one is more likely to be struck by lightning than to commit voter fraud." Mickey Mouse was not allowed to register. Paul Newman did not vote from beyond the grave. Hordes of undocumented Mexicans have not stuffed ballot boxes (though a great many new, legal Latino voters have registered in Florida, Texas and other large states).

But why let the facts get in the way of rigging an election? Some conservative sages have let the veil slip long enough for us to see what's really going on. Former Arkansas governor-turned-paid-Murdoch-mediaite Mike Huckabee likes to say that if people have friends who don't plan to vote the rightwing line, "Let the air out of their tires on election day. Tell them the election has been moved to a different date."

Huckabee protests he's just joking. But Matthew Vadum, a Fox News favorite and part of the paranoid right's brain trust, isn't being remotely funny when he says "registering the poor to vote is un-American." Nor was American Legislative Exchange Council co-founder Paul Weyrich back in the 1980s, when he said, "I don't want everybody to vote. Our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."

Obviously, democracy is no fun if just anyone can play.

gimmesometruth27

what i find hilarious is i can post my opinion and be called batshit crazy by "conservatives" on here and a brit who is living in china can back me up with an article from a mainstream international newspaper that was published less than 3 months ago...

that article backs me up on every point i have made in this thread...

guess i am not so damn crazy now am i???

usamamasan1

5,000

FIVE THOUSAND






GOP says 5,000 non-citizens voting in Colorado a 'wake-up call' for states
By Debbie Siegelbaum - 03/31/11 12:23 PM ET
Republicans on the House Administration Committee want to shore up voter registration rules in the wake of a Colorado study that found as many as 5,000 non-citizens in the state took part in last year’s election.

Rep. Gregg Harper (R-Miss.), the panel’s chairman, called the study “a disturbing wake-up call” that should cause every state to review its safeguards to prevent illegal voting.

“We simply cannot have an electoral system that allows thousands of non-citizens to violate the law and vote in our elections. We must do more to protect the integrity of our electoral processes,” Harper added.

Colorado Secretary of State Scott Gessler, a Republican, told the panel that his department’s study identified nearly 12,000 people who were not citizens but were still registered to vote in Colorado.
Of those non-citizen registered voters, nearly 5,000 took part in the 2010 general election in which Democratic Sen. Michael Bennet narrowly defeated Republican Ken Buck.

Colorado conducted the study by comparing the state’s voter registration database with driver’s license records.

“We know we have a problem here. We don’t know the size of it,” Gessler said in testimony to Administration’s Elections subcommittee.

He told Harper that Colorado would look to create a registration system that would allow his department to ask that some people provide proof of their citizenship in writing.

If individuals did not respond to the request, their registration as voters would be suspended.

Rep. Charles Gonzalez (D-Texas) raised doubts about the reporting, noting that the study itself said it was based on inconclusive data and that it was “impossible to provide precise numbers” on how many people who were registered to vote in the state were not citizens.

Gonzalez asked Gessler, a former prosecutor, if he would have pursued a court case on such evidence.

Gessler responded that the goal of the study was to expose voter registration issues and pursue administrative avenues to resolve them.

“We don’t have a screen for citizenship on the front end when people register to vote,” he said.

Newch91

All these articles about the new voting law seems like a horror movie or something out of a Stephen King book, but instead, it's true that there are crazy Republican lawmakers who will do anything to win an election.

I don't want to imagine our country being run by corporations if Republicans win 2012.

usamamasan1

We need to institute some checks and controls. It is critical that voters have the utmost faith in our system.
Open your minds

Woot

69%

SIXTY NINE PERCENT

But, go ahead and stir the race pot.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... riminatory

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Attorney General Eric Holder signaled last week that the Justice Department will be closely examining new state laws that require showing a photo ID before voting for potential racial bias, but voters nationwide overwhelmingly favor such a requirement and reject the idea that it is discriminatory.

Seventy percent (70%) of Likely U.S. Voters believe voters should be required to show photo identification such as a driver’s license before being allowed to cast their ballot. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 22% oppose this kind of requirement.



The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on December 18-19, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence.

usamamasan1

Here's a long one ( this is how you prove a point around here right )
Put a fork in it, she's done! Woot

http://www.heritage.org/research/report ... -elections


Abstract: Voter fraud may be a part of America’s history, but it does not have to be a part of America’s future. Six states—Georgia, Indiana, Texas, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Kansas—have recently adopted laws requiring voters to produce a photograph identification card (voter ID) when they vote at their polling places on Election Day. Such voter ID laws are under attack from opponents armed with an array of claims—specious allegations and over-the-top tales of voter disenfranchisement—but courts continue to rule in favor of voter ID requirements. Therefore, states should continue to pursue voter ID laws. They have a valid and legitimate state interest not only in deterring and detecting voter fraud, but also in maintaining the confidence of their citizens in the security of U.S. elections.

Many state legislatures are considering whether to improve election integrity by requiring voters to produce a photograph identification card (voter ID) when they vote at their polling places on Election Day. Georgia, Indiana, Texas, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Kansas have answered that question with a resounding “yes” by implementing such voter-ID laws.[1] Those states understand that the United States has an unfortunate history of voter fraud and that requiring individuals to authenticate their identity at the polls is a fundamental and necessary component of ensuring the integrity of the election process.

Every individual who is eligible to vote should have the opportunity to do so. It is equally important, however, that the votes of eligible voters are not stolen or diluted by a fraudulent or bogus vote cast by an ineligible or imaginary voter. The evidence from academic studies and actual turnout in elections is also overwhelming that—contrary to the shrill claims of opponents—voter ID does not depress the turnout of voters, including minority, poor, and elderly voters.

The Need for Voter ID

Requiring voters to authenticate their identity at the polling place is necessary to protect the integrity of elections and access to the voting process. Every illegal vote steals or dilutes the vote of a legitimate voter. Opponents of voter ID claim that it can only prevent impersonation fraud at the polls, which rarely happens. That assertion is incorrect. Voter ID can prevent and deter:

Impersonation fraud at the polls;
Voting under fictitious voter registrations;
Double voting by individuals registered in more than one state or locality; and
Voting by illegal aliens, or even legal aliens who are still not entitled to vote since state and federal elections are restricted to U.S. citizens.
As the Commission on Federal Election Reform, headed by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker, said in 2005:

The electoral system cannot inspire public confidence if no safeguards exist to deter or detect fraud or to confirm the identity of voters. Photo IDs currently are needed to board a plane, enter federal buildings, and cash a check. Voting is equally important.[2]
Voter fraud does exist, and criminal penalties imposed after the fact are an insufficient deterrent to protect against it. For example, in Crawford v. Marion County Election Board,[3] the 2008 case in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Indiana’s voter ID law, the Court said that despite such criminal penalties:

It remains true, however, that flagrant examples of such fraud in other parts of the country have been documented throughout this Nation’s history by respected historians and journalists, that occasional examples have surfaced in recent years…that…demonstrate that not only is the risk of voter fraud real but that it could affect the outcome of a close election.[4]
For those trying to defend America’s electoral integrity, the stakes are high. The relative rarity of voter fraud prosecutions for impersonation fraud, as the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals pointed out in the Indiana case, can be “explained by the endemic underenforcement” of voter fraud cases and “the extreme difficulty of apprehending a voter impersonator” without the tools—a voter ID—needed to detect such fraud.[5] This nation should not tolerate even one election being stolen, but without the tools to detect these illegal schemes, it is hard to know just how many close elections are being affected.

In 1984, a dramatic example of such fraud was revealed by a New York State grand jury.[6] The grand jury detailed a widespread conspiracy that operated without detection for 14 years in Brooklyn. This conspiracy involved not only impersonation of legitimate voters at the polls, but also voting under fictitious names. As a result, thousands of fraudulent votes were cast in state and congressional elections.

One of the witnesses before the grand jury described how he led a crew of eight individuals from polling place to polling place to vote. Each member of his crew voted in excess of 20 times, and there were approximately 20 other such crews operating during that election.[7] This extensive impersonation fraud and voting under bogus voter registrations could have been stopped and detected if New York had required voters to authenticate their identity at the polls.

According to the grand jury in the Brooklyn case, the advent of mail-in registration—a form of registration that was implemented nationally with the passage of the National Voter Registration Act of 1993—was also a key factor in perpetrating the fraud.[8] In recent elections, officials have detected numerous fraudulent voter registration forms, many of which were submitted by ACORN—the ethically challenged organization that has been found to have engaged in the submission of tens of thousands of invalid voter registration forms in multiple jurisdictions. Given that most election jurisdictions engage in minimal to nonexistent screening efforts, however, there is no way to know how many invalid registrations slipped through. In states without identification requirements, election officials have no way to prevent the casting of fraudulent votes by unscrupulous individuals based on fictitious voter registrations.

The problem of possible double voting by someone who is registered in two states[9] is illustrated by one of the Indiana voters highlighted by the League of Women Voters in their Crawford v. Marion County Election Board amicus brief. This voter was used by the league as an example of someone who had difficulty voting because of the voter ID requirement. However, after an Indiana newspaper interviewed this voter, it turned out that the problems she encountered stemmed from her trying to use a Florida driver’s license to vote in Indiana. Not only did she have a Florida driver’s license, but she was also registered to vote in Florida where she owned a second home. In fact, she had claimed residency in Florida by filing for a homestead exemption on her property taxes, which is normally only available to individuals who claim residency in a state.[10] So the Indiana law worked as intended: It prevented someone from illegally voting twice.

Since the vast majority of states (and the federal government) will not issue an official identification to an illegal alien, requiring state or federally issued photo IDs can also prevent noncitizens, particularly illegal aliens, from voting in elections. Given the increase in reports of noncitizens voting, such measures are needed.[11] For example:

The Colorado secretary of state recently testified before Congress that a check of the voter registration rolls indicated over 11,000 individuals who were non-citizens at the time they registered to vote, at least 5,000 of whom likely voted.[12]
New Mexico Secretary of State Dianna Duran, reported that a preliminary check of voter registration rolls had already found 37 noncitizens that had voted in New Mexico elections.[13]
States that issue driver’s licenses to noncitizens who are in the United States legally (and those few remaining states like New Mexico that issue driver’s licenses to illegal aliens) should ensure that such licenses note on their face that the holder is not a U.S. citizen.

Even though a small amount of fraud can sometimes tip a close election, there is no evidence that there is “massive” voter fraud in the United States—either in general or in any specific state. In fact, election officials around the country do a good job overall of administering elections, especially given their lack of resources. But there are recurring problems with America’s voter registration system because many states do not do an adequate job of checking the accuracy and validity of new voter registrations.

The potential for abuse and the casting of fraudulent ballots by ineligible voters (like illegal aliens or persons registered in more than one state) or in the names of fake voters, dead voters, or voters who have moved but whose names remain on the registration list exists, and such fraud has occurred in many reported cases. As the Supreme Court recognized, there is a “real risk that voter fraud could affect a close election’s outcome.”[14] There are enough incidents and reported cases of actual voter fraud to make it very clear that America must take the steps necessary to make such fraud harder to commit.[15] Requiring voter ID is just one such common-sense step that can stop or deter many of these problems.

Voter ID Does Not Reduce Turnout

States must protect the security of the election process, but they must also ensure that every eligible individual is able to vote. Not only does voter ID help to prevent fraudulent voting, but where it has been implemented, it has not reduced turnout. Despite many false claims to the contrary, there is no evidence that voter ID decreases the turnout of voters or has a disparate impact on minority, poor, or elderly voters; the overwhelming majority of Americans have a photo ID or can easily obtain one. Democratic Senator Harold Metts, who sponsored Rhode Island’s voter ID law, said that “as a minority citizen and a senior citizen, I would not support anything that I thought would present obstacles or limit protections.”[16]

Numerous studies have borne out the fact that requiring an ID to vote does not depress turnout. For example:

A study by the University of Missouri on turnout in Indiana showed that turnout actually increased by about 2 percentage points overall in Indiana in 2006 in the first election after the voter ID law went into effect.[17] There was no evidence that counties with higher percentages of minority, poor, elderly, or less-educated populations suffered any reduction in voter turnout. In fact, “the only consistent and statistically significant impact of photo ID in Indiana is to increase voter turnout in counties with a greater percentage of Democrats relative to other counties.”[18]
In September 2007, The Heritage Foundation released a study analyzing the 2004 election turnout data for all states. This study found that voter ID laws do not reduce the turnout of voters, including African–Americans and Hispanics. Such voters were just as likely to vote in states with ID as in states where just their names were asked at the polling place.[19]
A study by the University of Delaware and the University of Nebraska–Lincoln examined data from the 2000, 2002, 2004, and 2006 elections. At both the aggregate and individual levels, the study found that voter ID laws do not affect turnout, including across racial/ethnic/socioeconomic lines. The study concludes that “concerns about voter identification laws affecting turnout are much ado about nothing.”[20]
A survey by American University of registered voters in Maryland, Indiana, and Mississippi to see whether registered voters had photo IDs concluded that “showing a photo ID as a requirement of voting does not appear to be a serious problem in any of the states” because “[a]lmost all registered voters have an acceptable form of photo ID.”[21] Less than 0.5 percent of respondents had neither a photo ID nor citizenship documentation. A 2008 election survey of 12,000 registered voters in all 50 states found that fewer than nine people were unable to vote because of voter ID requirements.[22]
In 2010, a Rasmussen poll of likely voters in the United States showed overwhelming support (82 percent) for requiring photo ID in order to vote in elections. This support runs across ethnic and racial lines; Rasmussen reports that “[t]his is a sentiment that spans demographics, as majorities in every demographic agree.”[23]
A similar study by John Lott in 2006 also found no effect on voter turnout and, in fact, found an indication that reducing voter fraud (through means such as voter ID) may have a positive impact on voter turnout.[24]
That is certainly true in a classic case of voter fraud committed in Greene County, Alabama.[25] In that county, which is 80 percent African–American, voter turnout increased after several successful voter fraud prosecutions instilled new confidence in local voters regarding the integrity of the election process.

Actual election results in Georgia and Indiana also confirm that suppositions about voter ID hurting minority turnout are incorrect. Turnout in both states increased more dramatically in 2008 in both the presidential preference primary and the general election in the first presidential elections held after their photo ID laws went into effect than they did in some states without photo ID.

There was record turnout in Georgia in the 2008 presidential primary election—over 2 million voters, more than twice as much as in 2004 when the voter photo ID law was not in effect (the law was first applied to local elections in 2007). The number of African–Americans voting in the 2008 primary also doubled from 2004. In fact, there were 100,000 more votes in the Democratic primary than in the Republican primary,[26] and the number of individuals who had to vote with a provisional ballot because they had not obtained the free photo ID available from the state was less that 0.01 percent.

In the 2008 general election when President Barack Obama was elected, Georgia, with one of the strictest voter ID laws in the nation, had the largest turnout in its history—more than 4 million voters. Democratic turnout was up an astonishing 6.1 percentage points from the 2004 election when there was no photo ID requirement, the fifth largest increase of any state.[27]

Overall turnout in Georgia went up 6.7 percentage points, the second highest increase in the country and a striking jump even in an election year when there was a general increase in turnout over the prior presidential election.[28] The black share of the statewide vote increased from 25 percent in 2004 to 30 percent in 2008 according to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.[29] And according to Census Bureau surveys, 65 percent of the black voting-age population voted in the 2008 election compared to only 54.4 percent in 2004, an increase of over 10 percentage points.[30]

By contrast, the Democratic turnout in the nearby state of Mississippi, also a state with a high percentage of black voters but without a voter ID requirement, increased by only 2.35 percentage points. Turnout in the 2010 congressional election in Georgia was over 2.6 million voters—an increase of almost 500,000 voters over the 2006 election. While only 42.9 percent of registered black Georgians voted in 2006, 50.4 percent voted in 2010 with the voter ID law in effect, an increase of over 7 percentage points.[31] As Georgia’s secretary of state recently pointed out, when compared to the 2006 election, voter turnout in 2010 “among African Americans outpaced the growth of that population’s pool of registered voters by more than 20 percentage points.”[32]

The Georgia voter ID requirement went into effect because it was upheld in final orders issued by every state and federal court in Georgia that reviewed the law, including the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals[33] and, most recently, the Georgia Supreme Court.[34] As these courts held, such an ID requirement is not discriminatory and does not violate the Constitution or any federal voting rights laws, including the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

In Georgia, as has happened in every state that has considered voter ID legislation, organizations like the ACLU and the NAACP made specious claims that there were hundreds of thousands of voters without photo ID. Yet when dismissing all of their claims, the federal court pointed out that after two years of litigation, none of the plaintiff organizations like the NAACP had been able to produce a single individual or member who did not have a photo ID or could not easily obtain one. The district court judge concluded that:

[This] failure to identify those individuals “is particularly acute” in light of the Plaintiffs’ contention that a large number of Georgia voters lack acceptable Photo ID…. [T]he fact that Plaintiffs, in spite of their efforts, have failed to uncover anyone “who can attest to the fact that he/she will be prevented from voting” provides significant support for a conclusion that the photo ID requirement does not unduly burden the right to vote.[35]
Clearly, such erroneous claims are an attempt only to frustrate proponents of voter ID.

In Indiana, which the U.S. Supreme Court said has the strictest voter ID law in the country, turnout in the Democratic presidential preference primary in 2008 quadrupled from the 2004 election when the photo ID law was not in effect—in fact, there were 862,000 more votes cast in the Democratic primary than in the Republican primary. In the general election in November, the turnout of Democratic voters increased by 8.32 percentage points from 2004, the largest increase in Democratic turnout of any state in the nation. According to Census Bureau surveys, 59.2 percent of the black voting-age population voted in the 2008 election compared to only 53.8 percent in 2004, an increase of over 5 percentage points.

The neighboring state of Illinois, with no photo ID requirement and President Obama’s home state, had an increase in Democratic turnout of only 4.4 percentage points—only half of Indiana’s increase. Turnout in the 2010 congressional election in Indiana was almost 1.75 million voters, an increase of more than 77,000 voters over the 2006 election. Indiana was one of the states with a “large and impressive” increase in black turnout in the 2010 election: “the black share of the state vote was higher in 2010 than it was in 2008, a banner year for black turnout.”[36] In fact, the black share of the total vote went from only 7 percent in 2008 to 12 percent in 2010 (this in the state with the strictest voter ID law in the country).[37]

One misleading story constantly relied on by opponents of Indiana’s ID law is the claim that elderly nuns in Indiana “were turned away from the polls for lack of picture IDs.”[38] In fact, the nuns had pointedly refused to obtain photo IDs to vote prior to the election and were turned away from the polls by another nun who ran the convent precinct, violating federal and state law that required her to provide the nuns with provisional ballots. Those ballots would have been counted if the nuns had gone to the county clerk’s office within 10 days after the election to show an ID or sign an affidavit testifying to their identity. An office where they could have easily obtained an ID was only two miles from the convent. These nuns were also all over 65, automatically entitling them to vote by absentee ballot without an ID.[39]

The nuns could have voted without difficulty were it not for their refusal (not inability) to comply with Indiana law and the refusal of the precinct election official, their fellow sister, to comply with federal and state law.[40] This incident raises the question of whether the entire incident was trumped up to generate misleading news from gullible reporters and sympathetic activists.

Just as in the federal case in Georgia, the federal court in Indiana noted the complete inability of the plaintiffs in that case to produce anyone who would not be able to vote because of the photo ID law:

Despite apocalyptic assertions of wholesale voter disenfranchisement, Plaintiffs have produced not a single piece of evidence of any identifiable registered voter who would be prevented from voting pursuant to [the photo ID law] because of his or her inability to obtain the necessary photo identification. Similarly, Plaintiffs have failed to produce any evidence of any individual, registered or unregistered, who would have to obtain photo identification in order to vote, let alone anyone who would undergo any appreciable hardship to obtain photo identification in order to be qualified to vote.[41]
Despite the efforts of opponents of voter ID, such specious claims have failed to gain traction in any courtroom across the country.

Finally, opponents of voter ID laws have charged that requiring an ID, even when it is free, [42] is a “poll tax” because of the incidental costs, such as possible travel to a registrar’s office or obtaining a birth certificate, that may be involved. Such a “poll tax” claim, for instance, was recently raised in Georgia. The federal court, however, dismissed this claim, agreeing with the Indiana federal court that:

[Such an argument] represents a dramatic overstatement of what fairly constitutes a “poll tax.” Thus, the imposition of tangential burdens does not transform a regulation into a poll tax. Moreover, the cost of time and transportation cannot plausibly qualify as a prohibited poll tax because those same “costs” also result from voter registration and in-person voting requirements, which one would not reasonably construe as a poll tax.[43]
Clearly, these absurd cries of “poll tax,” are simply another tactic in the increasingly desperate campaign against voter ID legislation.

Conclusion

Despite all of the evidence to the contrary, opponents of voter ID refuse to admit that voter turnout is unaffected by such a requirement. Their claim that the implementation of voter ID laws “smacks of vote suppression”[44] is preposterous and an outrageous libel on the American people and their elected representatives. The vitriolic rhetoric engaged in by opponents of voter ID is a sign of desperation; their claims of “suppression” and “intimidation” have been shown to be completely untrue.

America is one of the only democracies in the world that does not uniformly require voters to present photo ID when they vote. Across the globe, democracies administer such a requirement without any problems and without any reports that their citizens are in any way burdened when voting.

In fact, America’s southern neighbor Mexico, which has a much larger rate of poverty than the United States, requires both a photo ID and a thumbprint to vote—and turnout has increased in Mexican elections since this requirement went into effect in the 1990s. Mexico’s voter ID laws are also credited with reducing the fraud that had prevailed in many Mexican elections and “allowing the 2000 election of Vicente Fox, the first opposition party candidate to be elected president of Mexico in seventy years.”[45]

Requiring voters to authenticate their identity is a perfectly reasonable and easily met requirement. Such measures are supported by the vast majority of voters of all races and ethnic backgrounds. As the U.S. Supreme Court has noted, voter ID protects the integrity and reliability of the electoral process. All states have a valid and legitimate state interest not only in deterring and detecting voter fraud, but also in maintaining the confidence of their citizens in the security of U.S. elections.

dasvidana

The whole idea that voter fraud is rampant and therefore, we need specific forms of identification is just wrong. Sure, there is no doubt that some votes are probably cast in error but on a large scale, I don't think so. However, the PERCEPTION of wide-spread voter fraud is a Karl Rove-backed strategy to sway elections. We saw it in Alabama with the Don Siegleman loss (and subsequent imprisonment), with Bush in 2000, and with Bush again in 2004. The whole US attorney firing, and particulary David Iglesias, was at the the heart of voter suppression. Greg Palast, a non-partisan, has done much investigating on this and I recommend his books, Armed Mad House, and Best Democracy Money Can Buy to anyone who is interested in the whole voter suppression movement. Quite simply, voter suppression is how corporations win elections.

gimmesometruth27

usamamasan1 wrote:

We need to institute some checks and controls. It is critical that voters have the utmost faith in our system.
Open your minds

Woot

69%

SIXTY NINE PERCENT

But, go ahead and stir the race pot.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... riminatory

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Attorney General Eric Holder signaled last week that the Justice Department will be closely examining new state laws that require showing a photo ID before voting for potential racial bias, but voters nationwide overwhelmingly favor such a requirement and reject the idea that it is discriminatory.

Seventy percent (70%) of Likely U.S. Voters believe voters should be required to show photo identification such as a driver’s license before being allowed to cast their ballot. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 22% oppose this kind of requirement.



The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on December 18-19, 2011 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence.

heritage foundation and rasmussen?

this is too funny.

again, where is the systematic disenfranchisement of white republicans?

there isn't any...

gimmesometruth27

from december 9. 2011

South Carolina's voter ID laws could disenfranchise blacks

http://www.thegrio.com/specials/the-big ... o-vote.php

South Carolina's voter ID law is one of the strictest in the nation, and that could mean thousands of voters -- particularly black voters -- in the Palmetto State could find it harder to vote on Election Day. NBC News correspondent Mara's Schiavocampo looks at the arguments for and against voter ID, in this month's "The Big Issue: Voter Denied."

SUMTER, South Carolina -- These days in Sumter, a lot of voters have questions, after the state passed one of the nation's strictest voter ID laws. Starting next year, voters in the Palmetto state will have to show a government-issued photo ID in order to vote.

Activists like Dr. Brenda Williams are working to register -- and in some cases re-register -- voters like Amanda Wolf, who doesn't have a current ID, and who are often learning that getting one is not so simple.

South Carolina is not alone. In what proponents call an effort to cut down on or prevent voter fraud, 31 states now require some form of ID to vote, including several 2012 battleground state. Some of the strictest laws were passed this year, including in South Carolina.

watch the video in the middle of that page...

dasvidana

usamamasan1 wrote:

Requiring voters to authenticate their identity is a perfectly reasonable and easily met requirement. Such measures are supported by the vast majority of voters of all races and ethnic backgrounds. As the U.S. Supreme Court has noted, voter ID protects the integrity and reliability of the electoral process. All states have a valid and legitimate state interest not only in deterring and detecting voter fraud, but also in maintaining the confidence of their citizens in the security of U.S. elections.

By the way, Hans Von Spakovsky, a man from my own home town of Huntsville, AL, was a plant into the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Dept by Alberto Gonzales BEFORE the US attorney firings so that he would not investigate the letting go of David Iglesias and others. Scott Horton (of Harpers) has done great work investigating the firings and the motivations for doing so.

gimmesometruth27

from 12/14/11

Could voter ID law disenfranchise disabled residents?

http://www.wsmv.com/story/16327237/coul ... -residents

NASHVILLE, TN (WSMV) - Some people with disabilities say the new voter identification law that takes effect Jan. 1 is unfair and will keep many of them from voting.

They say simply getting the ID is a challenge.

One of the closest bus stops to the east Nashville driver testing center, where someone can get a picture ID, is about one mile from the facility. That can be a far distance for someone on foot and a real challenge for someone in a wheelchair.

Dylan Brown needs a wheelchair to get around and says it is dangerous for him to get from the bus stop to the driver testing center.

There are telephone poles and fire hydrants in the middle of the sidewalk, making it impossible for a person in a wheelchair to navigate the area. The sidewalk also gets extremely narrow with the road in areas.

It's also more than one mile from the nearest bus stop to the Centennial Boulevard driver testing center.

Brown says an extra trip like that to get a photo ID means danger, physical labor, and significant time for a person who has a disability.

"We need to make sure that our most vulnerable people in society aren't being adversely affected by it greater than the rest of the population," said Brown.

Some people with physical disabilities have the option of permanently voting absentee from home.

But Brown says most voters he talked want to be part of the public process in person.

With the new requirements, Brown says early indications through phone surveys conducted by the Tennessee Disability Coalition show about 30 percent of voters with disabilities will simply stop participating, especially in areas like the east Nashville location.

"People who otherwise would vote are not going to vote because it's another obstacle for them to do the process," said Brown.

Once a person with a disability almost makes it to the center, they still have to leave the sidewalk and walk along six lanes of traffic to get inside.

It's a process packed with obstacles that people like Brown say is enough to stop people with disabilities from coming to the polls to vote.

gimmesometruth27

Voter ID Laws Could Disenfranchise 5 Million and Cost Taxpayers Millions

http://www.politicususa.com/en/voter-id ... llion-cost

Republicans across the nation have enacted such sweeping voter ID reforms aimed at the young, minorities, low income people and those with disabilities that the Brennan Center for Justice concluded it “could make it significantly harder for more than 5 million eligible voters to cast ballots in 2012.”

Five million disenfranchised voters is a lot of people. It might even help the Republicans win the White House in 2012.

Here’s a look at these new voter ID laws in action in Wisconsin during the recall of nine state senators last summer. The Republican legislature’s Wisconsin’s voter ID laws required voters to show photo IDs at the polls this summer during the recalls, however if they didn’t have them, they could still vote (in theory). Starting next year, photo IDs will be required. In 2009, in Wisconsin alone, the cost for issuing voter ID cards was estimated at 2.4 million dollars.

Citing widespread confusion at the polls last summer stemming from improperly trained election officials and uninformed voters, the A League of Women Voters suggested improvements including hiring more poll workers at an added expense, as well as providing more training and taking action to alleviate long lines. Apparently making voting more difficult for some people is a big part of freedom for Republicans.

Other problems noted by the League included:

— In almost a quarter of the polling sites, officials were inconsistent in asking voters to show ID, in violation of the law.

— Some voters showed IDs, such as fishing licenses and employer IDs that would not be valid for voting in 2012.

— Voters were incorrectly told at some polling places to re-register if the address on their photo ID did not match the address on the poll list. The law does not require that the address on their photo ID be current in order to vote, but they do have to show proof of residency when registering.

— In at least four locations voters were incorrectly told they couldn’t vote next year if their driver’s license was expired. The law allows for licenses that have expired after November 2010 to be used.

– Observers found problems experienced by disabled voters with the requirement they sign the poll book, even though the law allows for exemptions.

In short, these voter ID laws were a costly debacle. These same Republicans in Wisconsin have been busy dismantling workers’ rights in order to save “money.” The hypocrisy of their enacting voter ID laws in a state with hardly any voter fraud issues does more than smell of deliberate voter disenfranchisement. Republicans are willing to spend 2.4 million dollars on a non-issue while they kill union rights under the guise of fiscal responsibility.

Ironically, just this year in Wisconsin there were a few widely publicized instances of voter fraud. There was Republican Marcie Malszycki, 30, an aide to state Rep. Warren Petryk, R-Eleva, who voted improperly for Walker in the 2010 election, dead people who signed the Republicans recall petitions against Democrats, the shady practices of Republicans in the recall campaign and “issues” with lost, torn and uncounted ballots in Waukesha by the Republican county clerk during the Supreme Court race (technically more of an election fraud issue).

Cokie Roberts, who served under George W Bush’s administration on the Council on Service and Civic Participation, wrote an article with her husband Steve yesterday in which she called the new voter ID laws a “miscarriage of justice” and urged the Department of Justice to challenge this assault on Americans’ rights. The Roberts wrote, “This is far more than an outrageous attempt to rig the next election. It is a tragic violation of core American principles. How can we possibly promote democracy abroad when we violate such basic rights at home?

Supporters of the new laws say they are necessary to combat voter fraud. But that, to put it bluntly, is a lie.

There is no evidence — none — that fraud is a major problem in any state. Rolling Stone magazine reports “a major probe by the Justice Department between 2002 and 2007 (during a Republican administration) 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.”

You might remember Cokie for her comment about candidate Barack Obama visiting his dying grandmother in Hawaii during the 2008 campaign. Roberts said “I know Hawaii is a state, but it has the look of [Barack Obama] going off to some sort of foreign, exotic place.” So it appears that her opinions regarding our democracy don’t come from some vested interest in the reelection of Barack Obama. Cokie’s passion for voting rights is no doubt influenced by her father, the late Democratic Congressman from Louisiana, Hale Boggs, who endorsed Lyndon Johnson’s 1965 Voting Rights Act.

In 2007, The Brennan Center for Justice found that the sort of voter fraud addressed by overly restrictive identification requirements is more rare than death by lightning. They wrote in the report, “Overly restrictive identification requirements for voters at the polls — which address a sort of voter fraud more rare than death by lightning — is only the most prominent example.”

The Republicans Voter ID restrictions were a debacle last summer in Wisconsin and will end up costing the state untold amounts of money to address a non-existent issue; an issue so rare it occurs less often than being killed by lightning. These same laws are being enacted all over the country and are set to disenfranchise over 5 million voters.

This, from the party of “freedom.” Republican legislatures have done this in 19 states and two states’ laws were changed by executive order.

Every citizen has the right to cast their ballot. Discriminating against the poor, the young, minorities and the disabled is an unthinkable violation of the evolved principles of this great country. Republicans are going after those who vote Democratic in a deliberate attempt to rig elections and in doing so, they are proving that the GOP is no longer the party of liberty.

In fact, I can’t think of a more antithetically un-American action than stealing votes away from others because of the way they vote. I registered voters in 2008 for the Obama campaign, but I registered anyone who wanted to vote. Some Republicans were shocked that I would do so. My response to them was this is America and I love this country, so I support every citizen casting their ballot for the candidate of their choice. I don’t need to agree with them in order to passionately support their right to do so, and use my free time to assist them in doing so. I wouldn’t want to win an election by cheating or by taking someone else’s vote away from them. That’s not how this country is supposed to work.

The modern day Republican Party is killing the modern American spirit of expanding voters’ rights as we saw in 1965, with the help of misinformation central from Fox News and the con artists who carry their water. The only reason they are doing this is because they fear that they can’t win elections the American way.

What kind of political party fails to believe in the tenets of the very government they seek to control? The Republicans’ voter ID laws will cost us more than money we don’t have; they will cost us our honor as a free democracy in the eyes of the world.

usamamasan1

Halifax2TheMax

gimmesometruth27 wrote:

usamamasan1 wrote:

Like I said, you are using the wrong lens again. This isn't about race.

what they are doing now is absoulutely about race. it is about race and class war and voter suppression.

if the republicans were not scared of losing, why would they be doing this in the first place....it is about gaining and maintaining power.

AND how do you republicans reconcile your desire for freedom with these freedom stealing laws?????

it is the highest form of hypocracy.

Because the republicans cannot possibly win in the arena of ideas. And they know it. 2012 will be stolen via the voter ID laws as well as where, how many and which types of voting machines are used in states with republican governors and election boards. Pretty simple really. And the Supreme Court? Yea, they're not possibly biased nor influenced or corrupted. Sleep tight.

Peace.

Byrnzie

usamamasan1 wrote:

Colorado conducted the study by comparing the state’s voter registration database with driver’s license records.

...Rep. Charles Gonzalez (D-Texas) raised doubts about the reporting, noting that the study itself said it was based on inconclusive data and that it was “impossible to provide precise numbers” on how many people who were registered to vote in the state were not citizens.

In other words, if you don't have a driving license, then you should be classified a non-citizen and denied the right to vote?

:think:

gimmesometruth27

Byrnzie wrote:

usamamasan1 wrote:

Colorado conducted the study by comparing the state’s voter registration database with driver’s license records.

...Rep. Charles Gonzalez (D-Texas) raised doubts about the reporting, noting that the study itself said it was based on inconclusive data and that it was “impossible to provide precise numbers” on how many people who were registered to vote in the state were not citizens.

In other words, if you don't have a driving license, then you should be classified a non-citizen and denied the right to vote?

:think:

see, it is about limiting the vote of the people who are lacking means, such as money, transportation, health, etc.. i can not for the life of me figure out why people in this country can not grasp that.

Jason P

If you can transport yourself to a voting station, you can just as easily transport yourself to get a photo ID.

If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball.

This seems to be such a strange issue to get riled up about.

gimmesometruth27

that is the thing. a lot of people can't transport themselves. i am talking the poor who have no car. those on a fixed income via social security. you are going to make them pay bus/cabfare, make them stand in line at the license bureau only to be turned away for not having the proper documentation. can this 93 year old woman find her 93 year old birth certificate??? what if they have to go back 2 or 3 times? and how are they going to pay for the cost of the id? a new license is nearly $20 in missouri.

this is not as simple of a process as some of the people supporting these laws make it out to be..

Jason P wrote:

If you can transport yourself to a voting station, you can just as easily transport yourself to get a photo ID.

If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball.

This seems to be such a strange issue to get riled up about.

catefrances

whats that i smell burning??? mississippi?