North Carolina Voter ID law --"discriminatory intent"

[Gob]

No one has shon any evidence that any form of voter fraud is more than trivial in scale. Certainly not enough to justify the certain harm that the racist laws cause for large numbers of voters.

Just the KKK by another name, GOP.




Yrs,
Rubato

[Guinevere]

"Editorializing" my ass. That's a reporter reporting facts and data that are relevant to the story.

In the opinion, the court notes that North Carolina had no actual evidence of voter fraud or registration fraud and only limited evidence of fraud relating to the use of absentee ballots. However, the state did nothing to control the alleged fraud relating to the absentee ballots because those were generally used by white voters instead of black voters

[RayThom]

And from USAG, Loretta Lynch:
https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/attorney ... oting-case
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT (83 Pages):
http://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/u ... nc-4th.pdf

[Lord Jim]

Man, this "voter fraud is a myth" is one zombie that just won't stay dead...

No matter how many times you blow its head off, it just keeps coming back:

Worth re-posting:

The "myth" here is the idea that registration and voting by non-citizens is a myth. It is well documented, and widespread.:

In 2005, the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that up to 3 percent of the 30,000 individuals called for jury duty from voter registration rolls over a two-year period in just one U.S. district court were not U.S. citizens. While that may not seem like many, just 3 percent of registered voters would have been more than enough to provide the winning presiden­tial vote margin in Florida in 2000. Indeed, the Cen­sus Bureau estimates that there are over a million illegal aliens in Florida, and the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has prosecuted more non-citizen voting cases in Florida than in any other state.

Florida is not unique. Thousands of non-citizens are registered to vote in some states, and tens if not hundreds of thousands in total may be present on the voter rolls nationwide. These numbers are significant: Local elections are often decided by only a handful of votes, and even national elections have likely been within the margin of the number of non-citizens ille­gally registered to vote.

Yet there is no reliable method to determine the number of non-citizens registered or actually voting because most laws to ensure that only citizens vote are ignored, are inadequate, or are systematically undermined by government officials. Those who ignore the implications of non-citizen registration and voting either are willfully blind to the problem or may actually favor this form of illegal voting.

Americans may disagree on many areas of immi­gration policy, but not on the basic principle that only citizens—and not non-citizens, whether legally present or not—should be able to vote in elections. Unless and until immigrants become citizens, they must respect the laws that bar non-citizen voting. To keep non-citizens from diluting citizens' votes, immigration and election officials must cooperate far more effectively than they have to date, and state and federal officials must increase their efforts to enforce the laws against non-citizen voting that are already on the books.

An Enduring Problem

Costas Bakouris, head of the Greek chapter of Transparency International, says in an interview that ending corruption is easy: enforce the law. Illegal voting by immigrants in America is noth­ing new. Almost as long as there have been elec­tions, there have been Tammany Halls trying to game the ballot box. Well into the 20th century, the political machines asserted their ascendancy on Election Day, stealing elections in the boroughs of New York and the wards of Chicago. Quite regu­larly, Irish immigrants were lined up and counted in canvasses long before the term "citizen" ever applied to them—and today it is little different.

Yet in the debates over what to do about the 8 million to 12 million illegal aliens estimated to be in the United States, there has been virtually no discus­sion of how to ensure that they (and millions of legal aliens) do not register and vote in elections.

Citizenship is and should be a basic requirement for voting. Citizenship is a legal requirement to vote in federal and state elections, except for a small number of local elections in a few jurisdictions.

Some Americans argue that alien voting is a non­existent problem or dismiss reported cases of non-citizen voting as unimportant because, they claim, there are no cases in which non-citizens "intention­ally" registered to vote or voted "while knowing that they were ineligible." Even if this latter claim were true—which it is not—every vote cast by a non-citizen, whether an illegal alien or a resident alien legally in the country, dilutes or cancels the vote of a citizen and thus disenfranchises him or her. To dismiss such stolen votes because the non-citizens supposedly did not know they were acting illegally when they cast a vote debases one of the most important rights of citizens.

The evidence is indisputable that aliens, both legal and illegal, are registering and voting in federal, state, and local elections. Following a mayor's race in Compton, California, for example, aliens testi­fied under oath in court that they voted in the elec­tion. In that case, a candidate who was elected to the city council was permanently disqualified from holding public office in California for soliciting non-citizens to register and vote. The fact that non-citizens registered and voted in the election would never have been discovered except for the fact that it was a very close election and the in­cumbent mayor, who lost by less than 300 votes, contested it.

Similarly, a 1996 congressional race in California may have been stolen by non-citizen voting. Republican incumbent Bob Dornan was defending himself against a spirited challenger, Democrat Lor­etta Sanchez. Sanchez won the election by just 979 votes, and Dornan contested the election in the U.S. House of Representatives. His challenge was dismissed after an investigation by the House Com­mittee on Oversight and Government Reform turned up only 624 invalid votes by non-citizens who were present in the U.S. Immigration and Nat­uralization Service (INS) database because they had applied for citizenship, as well as another 124 improper absentee ballots. The investigation, however, could not detect illegal aliens, who were not in the INS records.

The Oversight Committee pointed out the ele­phant in the room: "If there is a significant num­ber of ‘documented aliens,' aliens in INS records, on the Orange County voter registration rolls, how many illegal or undocumented aliens may be regis­tered to vote in Orange County?" There is a strong possibility that, with only about 200 votes determining the winner, enough undetected aliens registered and voted to change the outcome of the election. This is particularly true since the California Secretary of State complained that the INS refused his request to check the entire Orange County voter registration file, and no complete check of all of the individuals who voted in the congressional race was ever made.

The "Quick Ticket"

Non-citizen voting is likely growing at the same rate as the alien population in the United States; but because of deficiencies in state law and the failure of federal agencies to comply with federal law, there are almost no procedures in place that allow election officials to detect, deter, and prevent non-citizens from registering and voting. Instead, officials are largely dependent on an "honor sys­tem" that expects aliens to follow the law. There are numerous cases showing the failure of this honor system.

The frequent claim that illegal aliens do not reg­ister in order "to stay below the radar" misses the fact that many aliens apparently believe that the potential benefit of registering far outweighs the chances of being caught and prosecuted. Many district attorneys will not prosecute what they see as a "victimless and non-violent" crime that is not a priority.

On the benefit side of the equation, a voter regis­tration card is an easily obtainable document—they are routinely issued without any checking of identi­fication—that an illegal alien can use for many dif­ferent purposes, including obtaining a driver's license, qualifying for a job, and even voting. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, for example, requires employers to verify that all newly hired employees present documentation verifying their identity and legal authorization to work in the United States. In essence, this means that new employees have to present evidence that they are either U.S. citizens or legal aliens with a work per­mit. The federal I-9 form that employers must com­plete for all new employees provides a list of documentation that can be used to establish iden­tity—including a voter registration card.

How aliens view the importance of this benefit was illustrated by the work of a federal grand jury in 1984 that found large numbers of aliens regis­tered to vote in Chicago. As the grand jury reported, many aliens "register to vote so that they can obtain documents identifying them as U.S. citizens" and have "used their voters' cards to obtain a myriad of benefits, from social security to jobs with the De­fense Department." The U.S. Attorney at the time estimated that there were at least 80,000 illegal aliens registered to vote in Chicago, and dozens were indicted and convicted for registering and voting.

The grand jury's report resulted in a limited cleanup of the voter registration rolls in Chicago, but just one year later, INS District Director A. D. Moyer testified before a state legislative task force that 25,000 illegal and 40,000 legal aliens remained on the rolls in Chicago. Moyer told the Illinois Senate that non-citizens registered so they could get a voter registration card for identification, adding that the card was "a quick ticket into the unemployment compensation system." An alien from Belize, for example, testified that he and his two sisters were able to register easily because they were not asked for any identification or proof of citizenship and lied about where they were born. After securing registration, he voted in Chicago.

Once such aliens are registered, of course, they receive the same encouragement to vote from campaigns' and parties' get-out-the-vote programs and advertisements that all other registered voters receive. Political actors have no way to distinguish between individuals who are properly registered and non-citizens who are illegally registered.

A Failure to Cooperate

Obtaining an accurate assessment of the size of this problem is difficult. There is no systematic review of voter registration rolls by states to find non-citizens, and the relevant federal agencies—in direct violation of federal law—refuse to cooperate with state election officials seeking to verify the citi­zenship status of registered voters. Federal immigra­tion law requires these agencies to "respond to an inquiry by a Federal, State, or local government agency, seeking to verify or ascertain the citizenship or immigration status of any individual within the jurisdiction of the agency for any purpose autho­rized by law, by providing the requested verification or status information," regardless of any other pro­vision of federal law, such as the Privacy Act. However, examples of refusal to cooperate are legion:

-- In declining to cooperate with a request by Maryland to check the citizenship status of individuals registered to vote there, a spokes­man for the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (CIS) mistakenly declared that the agency could not release that information because "it is important to safeguard the confidentiality of each legal immigrant, especially in light of the federal Privacy Act and the Immigration and Nationality Act."

One surprising result of this policy: In 2004, a guilty verdict in a murder trial in Maryland was jeopardized because a non-citizen was discov­ered on the jury—which had been chosen from the voter rolls.

-- In 2005, Sam Reed, the Secretary of State of Washington, asked the CIS to check the immi­gration status of registered voters in Washing­ton; the agency refused to cooperate.

-- A request from the Fulton County, Georgia, Board of Registration and Elections in 1998 to the old Immigration and Naturalization Service to check the immigration status of 775 regis­tered voters was likewise refused for want of a notarized consent from each voter because of "federal privacy act" concerns.

-- In 1997, the FBI and the U.S. Attorney's office in Dallas were investigating voting by non-citi­zens. They sent a computerized tape of the names of individuals who had voted to the INS requesting a check against INS records, but the INS refused to cooperate with the criminal investigation. An INS official was quoted as saying that the INS bureaucracy did not "want to open a Pandora's Box…. If word got out that this is a substantial problem, it could tie up all sorts of manpower. There might be a few thou­sand [illegal voters] in Dallas, for example, but there could be tens of thousands in places like New York, Chicago or Miami."

These incidents show that the CIS and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the successor agencies to the INS, are either igno­rant of federal legal requirements or deliberately ignoring them. An inquiry by a state or local election official regarding voter eligibility based on citizenship falls squarely within their statu­tory authority.

To be sure, CIS and ICE databases are not comprehensive; they contain information only about legal immigrants who have applied for the documentation necessary to be in the United States and illegal immigrants who have been detained. But even access to that information would be a big step forward for election officials in their attempts to try to clean up registration lists and find those aliens who are illegally registered and voting in elections.

The Honor System

The refusal of federal agencies to obey the law compels local election officials to rely almost en­tirely on the "honor system" to keep non-citizens from the polls. As Maryland's state election adminis­trator has complained, "There is no way of check­ing…. We have no access to any information about who is in the United States legally or otherwise."

Most discoveries of non-citizens on the registra­tion rolls are therefore accidental. Though the Department of Justice has no procedures in place for a systematic investigation of these types of crim­inal violations, in just a three year period, it prose­cuted and convicted more than a dozen non-citizens who registered and voted in federal elec­tions in Alaska, Florida, the District of Columbia, and Colorado. Among them was an alien in southern Florida, Rafael Velasquez, who not only voted, but even ran for the state legislature. Eight of the 19 September 11 hijackers were registered to vote in either Virginia or Florida—registrations that were probably obtained when they applied for driver's licenses.

In 1994, Mario Aburto Martinez, a Mexican national and the assassin of Mexican presidential candidate Luis Donaldo Colosio, was found to have registered twice to vote in California. A random sample of just 10 percent of the 3,000 Hispanics registered to vote in California's 39th Assembly District by an independent group "revealed phony addresses and large numbers of registrants who admitted they were not U.S. citi­zens." This problem may be partially explained by the testimony of a Hispanic member of the Los Angeles Police Department who had been a volun­teer for the California-based Southwest Voter Reg­istration Education Project. When she reported to her supervisor that her fellow volunteers were not asking potential voters whether they were citizens, she was reprimanded "and told that she was not to ask that question…only whether the person wished to register to vote." Similarly, the Dor­nan–Sanchez investigation produced an affidavit from a non-citizen stating that the Sanchez cam­paign's field director, an elected member of the Anaheim Board of Education, told him that it "didn't matter" that he was not a U.S. citizen—he should register and vote anyway.

In 2006, Paul Bettencourt, Voter Registrar for Harris County, Texas, testified before the U.S. Com­mittee on House Administration that the extent of illegal voting by foreign citizens in Harris County was impossible to determine but "that it has and will continue to occur." Twenty-two percent of county residents, he explained, were born outside of the United States, and more than 500,000 were non-citizens. Bettencourt noted that he cancelled the registration of a Brazilian citizen in 1996 after she acknowledged on a jury summons that she was not a U.S. citizen. Despite that cancellation, how­ever, "She then reapplied in 1997, again claiming to be a U.S. citizen, and was again given a voter card, which was again cancelled. Records show she was able to vote at least four times in general and primary elections."

In 2005, Bettencourt's office turned up at least 35 cases in which foreign nationals applied for or received voter cards, and he pointed out that Harris County regularly had "elections decided by one, two, or just a handful of votes." In fact, a Norwe­gian citizen was discovered to have voted in a state legislative race in Harris County that was decided by only 33 votes. Nor is this problem unique to Harris County. Recent reports indicate that hun­dreds of illegal aliens registered to vote in Bexar County, Texas, and that at least 41 of them have voted, some several times, in a dozen local, state, and federal elections.

In 2005, Arizona passed Proposition 200, which requires anyone registering to vote to provide "sat­isfactory evidence of United States citizenship," such as a driver's license, a birth certificate, a pass­port, naturalization documents, or any other docu­ments accepted by the federal government to prove citizenship for employment purposes. The state issues a "Type F" driver's license to individuals who are legally present in the United States but are not citizens. Since Proposition 200 took effect, 2,177 non-citizens applying for such licenses have attempted to register to vote. Another 30,000 have been denied registration because they could not produce evidence of citizenship.

The constitutionality of Arizona's requirement is currently being litigated in federal court. The dis­trict court hearing the case refused to issue a pre­liminary injunction against enforcement of the law, and the Supreme Court vacated a preliminary injunction issued by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Trial is scheduled for July 2008. The plaintiffs will have to convince the presiding judge that the very same proof of citizenship required by the federal government before an individual can work is somehow unlawful when imposed by a state before a person can vote.

Some non-citizen registrations can be detected through the jury process. The vast majority of state and federal courts draw their jury pools from voter registration lists, and the jury questionnaires used by court clerks ask potential jurors whether they are U.S. citizens. In most states, however, and throughout the federal court system, court clerks rarely notify local election officials that potential jurors have sworn under oath that they are not U.S. citizens. In jurisdictions that share that informa­tion, election officials routinely discover non-citi­zens on the voter rolls. For example, the district attorney in Maricopa County, Arizona, testified that after receiving a list of potential jurors who admit­ted they were not citizens, he indicted 10 who had registered to vote. (All had sworn on their registra­tion forms that they were U.S. citizens.) Four had actually voted in elections. The district attorney was investigating 149 other cases.

The county recorder in Maricopa County had also received inquiries from aliens seeking verifica­tion, for their citizenship applications, that they had not registered or voted. Thirty-seven of those aliens had registered to vote, and 15 of them had actually voted. As the county's district attorney explained, these numbers come "from a relatively small universe of individuals—legal immigrants who seek to become citizens…. These numbers do not tell us how many illegal immigrants have regis­tered and voted." Even these small numbers, though, could have been enough to sway an elec­tion. A 2004 Arizona primary election, explained the district attorney, was determined by just 13 votes. Clearly, non-citizens who illegally registered and voted in Maricopa County could have deter­mined the outcome of the election.

These numbers become more alarming when one considers that only a very small percentage of regis­tered voters are called for jury duty in most jurisdic­tions. The California Secretary of State reported in 1998 that 2,000 to 3,000 of the individuals sum­moned for jury duty in Orange County each month claimed an exemption from jury service because they were not U.S. citizens, and 85 percent to 90 percent of those individuals were summoned from the voter registration list, rather than Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) records. While some of those individuals may have simply committed per­jury to avoid jury service, this represents a signifi­cant number of potentially illegal voters: 20,400 to 30,600 non-citizens summoned from the voter reg­istration list over a one-year period.

http://www.thecuttingedgenews.com/index.php?article=691

And what's recorded here is obviously just the tip of the iceberg, given the way the Feds have tried to block and derail every serious effort to investigate this in a systematic way.

Well, that Florida TV news piece certainly should make it more difficult for the excuse makers to cling to the self-evidently silly fiction that just because thousands upon thousands upon thousands of people who are not legally qualified to vote are on the registration rolls all over the country, doesn't necessarily mean that any of them are actually voting...

And it fully backs up my assertion that the proof of citizenship requirements in the registration process have completely broken down, making the polling place the last line of defense to try to insure the integrity of our elections...

What that investigative news team did is what the government should be doing...

Of course the real reason that many Democrats* and liberals don't see non-citizens voting as a problem isn't because it isn't happening...

It's because most non citizens vote Democratic, and they don't want to lose those votes...(even though the votes aren't legitimate; the Democrats see themselves as being on the side of the angels, so their noble ends justify the means...)

One doesn't have to be a scientist, (or even a pseudo-scientist) to figure that one out...if this weren't the case they wouldn't give two hoots about voter ID laws...in fact if most non-citizens were voting the Republican, they'd be leading the charge for voter ID laws, in fact they'd be arguing that they aren't tough enough...





*Note I said many Democrats, not all... in fact not even a majority...

As the recent Rasmussen poll I posted shows, 58% of Democrats have sufficient respect for the integrity of our election process that they favor voter ID laws that help to prevent non-citizens from voting, even though their party benefits significantly from the non-citizen votes. They would prefer to win legitimately and legally. They should be applauded.

no actual evidence of voter fraud or registration fraud

Okay, well I can understand how the could reach the "conclusion" that there's no evidence of voter fraud, since no effort is made to stop people from registering fraudulently, but how were they able to conclude that there's no evidence that people are registering fraudulently? Because no one is being cited for it?

That's like concluding that nobody's speeding on the highways after you stop enforcing the speeding laws, and then pointing to the lack of speeding tickets as proof...

[Bicycle Bill]

LJ, your cut-and-paste job does raise what — to me, anyway — could be a valid point ... people who are not legally allowed or qualified to vote (illegal aliens, for example) still being able to register to vote.  If the actual magnitude of unqualified voters on the rolls is in fact anything like the statistics you cited, then there is a problem.

But I fail to see how that problem can be alleviated by forcing someone to present a driver's license or other form of government-issued picture ID every time they approach a ballot box.  As your rather long-winded post noted under the section labeled The "Quick Ticket"

On the benefit side of the equation, a voter regis­tration card is an easily obtainable document — they are routinely issued without any checking of identi­fication — that an illegal alien can use for many dif­ferent purposes, including obtaining a driver's license, qualifying for a job, and even voting. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, for example, requires employers to verify that all newly hired employees present documentation verifying their identity and legal authorization to work in the United States. In essence, this means that new employees have to present evidence that they are either U.S. citizens or legal aliens with a work per­mit. The federal I-9 form that employers must com­plete for all new employees provides a list of documentation that can be used to establish iden­tity—including a voter registration card.

and

...illustrated by the work of a federal grand jury in 1984 that found large numbers of aliens regis­tered to vote in Chicago. As the grand jury reported, many aliens "register to vote so that they can obtain documents identifying them as U.S. citizens" and have "used their voters' cards to obtain a myriad of benefits, from social security to jobs with the De­fense Department." The U.S. Attorney at the time estimated that there were at least 80,000 illegal aliens registered to vote in Chicago, and dozens were indicted and convicted for registering and voting.

(by the way ... note that the Chicago statistics make reference to conditions over 30 years ago; I think it is fair to assume that this had been addressed by now, don't you?  In fact, your article even admits so in the next sentence but makes it sound like they only did a one-time update of the list and then whined about how the task seemed so insurmountable)

I'm not that naive as to think that non-citizens who are able to get enrolled on voter's lists will not sometimes take the opportunity to vote if they can, but the problem as I see it is not so much that people are voting but that they are able to get enrolled in the first place.  It's been a long time since I turned 18 and got myself on the election rolls in my state, but I seem to recall that I had to present a copy of my birth certificate to the county clerk as well as sign an affidavit, under penalty of perjury, to the effect that I was in fact a natural-born US citizen and living at such-and-such an address, I was not otherwise prevented from voting because of felony convictions, mental incompetency, or whatever other reasons were considered disqualifying back then, and that I had not already registered to vote in some other jurisdiction.

Now I presume that the county clerk then verified this information (I was registering in the same county in which I was born, so it wouldn't, for example, have been all that difficult to confirm the birth certificate) before my name was added to the big books that found their way to the polling places every election ; and of course, if your name was "in the book" you were then checked off and given your ballot.  If the information was not validated, then I contend that someone else was slacking off.  But in any case, this is not a matter that would be able to be detected merely by forcing someone to present a driver's license or a state-issued picture ID card at the polling site.  Remember the "Quick Ticket" section I cited above?  If an illegal alien is able to obtain a voter registration card, it ain't gonna be that tough to come up with a driver's license.  And then keep in mind that a lot of people have obtained their driver's license long before they ever reach legal voting age to begin with.   

But that's not how the Republicans think.  By turning election officials into an American version of the NKVD ("your papers please, comrade!") or returning to the days of Jim Crow laws this will somehow make sure that all voters are strictly legitimate because only good, honest, upright Republicans American citizens will sign their loyalty oath and put up with the rest of this shit each and every time they are told to do so.

The thing we could maybe do is return to the days when you had to register to vote prior to the election itself, and charge the clerks and other registration officers with the task of confirming the information provided *BEFORE* anyone's name gets put on the roster of registered voters.  Eliminate the "walk-up", day-of-election voter registration; and while we're at it do away with this now-common practice of early voting merely for convenience.  I always thought that's what absentee ballots were for; if you knew you wouldn't be able to physically go to the polls on Election Day you requested one of those and turned it in.

So if there is a problem, there's definitely a way around it.  But making people do just about everything but give DNA for testing to prove that they are citizens?  That isn't the answer.

-"BB"-

[MajGenl.Meade]

The thing we could maybe do is return to the days when you had to register to vote prior to the election itself, and charge the clerks and other registration officers with the task of confirming the information provided *BEFORE* anyone's name gets put on the roster of registered voters. Eliminate the "walk-up", day-of-election voter registration; and while we're at it do away with this now-common practice of early voting merely for convenience.

Why, Bill! I'm surprised, shocked and surprised, that you didn't read either the full opinion or my amazingly brilliant and mind-numbingly interesting notes that show your suggestions (above) are EXACTLY what the state tried to do in order to prevent blacks from voting.

Blacks were the ones least likely to have an ID and most likely to be using "walk-up" and early voting.

[Bicycle Bill]

The thing we could maybe do is return to the days when you had to register to vote prior to the election itself, and charge the clerks and other registration officers with the task of confirming the information provided *BEFORE* anyone's name gets put on the roster of registered voters. Eliminate the "walk-up", day-of-election voter registration; and while we're at it do away with this now-common practice of early voting merely for convenience.

Why, Bill! I'm surprised, shocked and surprised, that you didn't read either the full opinion or my amazingly brilliant and mind-numbingly interesting notes that show your suggestions (above) are EXACTLY what the state tried to do in order to prevent blacks from voting.

Blacks were the ones least likely to have an ID and most likely to be using "walk-up" and early voting.

The most egregious abuse of the voter ID laws I've seen or had to put up with here in Wisconsin has nothing to do with registering to vote — whether it's in advance or the day of the election — but has everything to do with presenting a government-issued picture ID in order to receive a ballot, regardless of the fact that persons are already registered, are on the voter rolls, and (like myself) HAVE been on the rolls for the past 40 years or more.  And yes, some people — especially students, the young, the economically disadvantaged, the handicapped or elderly who do not drive — do find it a hardship or a burden to first of all amass the necessary paperwork (such as a birth certificate; do you know right now where yours is and can you put your hands on it immediately?) and then have to locate a DMV office and take the time out of what may be a working day to go and stand around merely to get a photo ID card.

As for day-of-election registration, I am unaware that this was being phased out; in our area one can still register at the polls on election day.  It's just that if one does choose to do so they must have more documentation at hand than I needed to sign the loan papers on my car or the title transfer on my mobile home.

I'm just calling for people to take a little more personal responsibility in dealing with their civic rights and duties and planning accordingly, such as making sure they are registered ahead of time, for something as serious as casting a ballot — just as they would when buying tickets in advance for a ballgame, a concert, or an airline flight — rather than treating it like it's just another impulse purchase at the corner Kwikee-Mart.

-"BB"-

[RayThom]

THE STORY OF CHICKEN LITTLE:

http://eleaston.com/chicken.html

[rubato]

Still no evidence that the problem is greater than the one caused by the remedy. Since the injury caused is greater than the problem solved it is obviously mere racism which motivates it.


But Gob is slobbering drunk again.


Yrs,
Rubato

[Burning Petard]

This is not the bad old days, say 1940 in Kansas City where my father was employed by a division of the Pendergast machine. Back then individuals were paid and trucked around in groups to multiple voting places to vote with pre-marked paper ballots.

Now this is the 21st century and technology rules. Just manipulate the counting system, whether by biased individuals looking for hanging chads; or, much easier, hack the tally program. And many other tactics much more elegant than just wrong individuals turning in single votes.

And yes it makes a difference even tho only 30% vote. Each major party wants very much for that third to be the ones that agree with them. That has been confirmed by the success of the GOP in dominating the voter district lines by controlling the state legislatures after each decennial census, when new lines are drawn.

snailgate.

[Lord Jim]

Still no evidence that the problem is greater than the one caused by the remedy. Since the injury caused is greater than the problem solved it is obviously mere racism which motivates it.

God lord, you truly are relentlessly dedicated and disciplined in your devotion to being an ignoramus...

I've never known anyone who was more impressively resistant to absorbing factual information...it's your true super power...

Donald Trump must be envious of you...

It's been a long time since I turned 18 and got myself on the election rolls in my state, but I seem to recall that I had to present a copy of my birth certificate to the county clerk...

And there-in lies the problem Bill...

Registering to vote ain't like it was when you and I were youngsters...

The verification process for eligibility to vote at the point of registration has completely collapsed; it's non-existent, and has been for many years...

Ideally that wouldn't be the case, (if it wasn't we wouldn't need voter ID laws; we could just assume that anyone registered to vote was legally entitled to do so) but given that fact, that makes the voting booth the final firewall available to assure the integrity of our elections.

Now, I fully understand why it is so many (like rube) want to mis-define the problem and ignore the evidence so they can claim that there is no problem...

It's because (as I've pointed out before) the not-legally-eligible-to-vote group is an important and reliable voting bloc for the Democratic Party, (though also as I've pointed out before even most rank and file Democrats are opposed to this) and they don't want to lose those votes...

It really is just that simple...

It's kind of like the reason the Democratic Party is so self-righteously amped about restoring voting rights to convicted felons...

Here's a hint; it's not because they expect ex-cons to vote overwhelmingly Republican...

[Bicycle Bill]

It's kind of like the reason the Democratic Party is so self-righteously amped about restoring voting rights to convicted felons...

Here's a hint; it's not because they expect ex-cons to vote overwhelmingly Republican...

Well, looking at that from a purely neutral stance, if a person has been charged with a crime, convicted of said crime, sentenced to a period of incarceration or other penalty, and has completed same (a process we used to refer to as "paying one's debt to society"), then why should their voting rights *NOT* be restored?  Why should they be continually subjected to a penalty or other restriction long after all other obligations have been fulfilled?

Incidentally, I feel the same way about the "sexual predator" list whereby persons — usually male — convicted of specific crimes are then bound to register as a "sexual predator" and keep law enforcement apprised of their whereabouts FOR LIFE.  Again, how many other crimes force one to bear such a stigma 20, 30, or more years after the 'punishment' has been completed?  You might as well fire up the barbecue grill and brand the poor bastard; it's almost that permanent and demeaning.

-"BB"-

[Joe Guy]

Incidentally, I feel the same way about the "sexual predator" list whereby persons — usually male — convicted of specific crimes are then bound to register as a "sexual predator" and keep law enforcement apprised of their whereabouts FOR LIFE.  Again, how many other crimes force one to bear such a stigma 20, 30, or more years after the 'punishment' has been completed?  You might as well fire up the barbecue grill and brand the poor bastard; it's almost that permanent and demeaning.

The brand should be burned into their foreheads.

[Lord Jim]

I think the actual legal term is "sex offender"...

I think that there are some limited situations where this lifetime appellation is grossly inappropriate and shouldn't be put into effect, (an 18 year old who has consensual sex with his 16 year old girlfriend for example) so I believe judges should have some leeway in ordering it.

But given the very high recidivism rate for pedophiles, I believe a lifetime designation is generally fully appropriate. People living in communities (particularly people with children) have a right to know who the convicted pedophiles in their neighborhood are. In my opinion the public safety consideration trumps privacy rights in cases like this.

[Crackpot]

what about the dunk guy that got pissing on a bush?

[MajGenl.Meade]

what about the dunk guy that got pissing on a bush?

Doughnut forsake him!

[Joe Guy]

The child molester's tattoo would say "Child Molester". The guy who exposed himself while peeing on a bush would have a tattoo that said, "caught peeing in front of people in public" in small fonts. The guy who was dunk would have a tattoo that said, "Damn those Spellcheckers".

Doughnut forsake him!

[Guinevere]

How does a lie come to be widely taken as the truth?

The answer is disturbingly simple: Repeat it over and over again. When faced with facts that contradict the lie, repeat it louder.

This, in a nutshell, is the story of claims of voting fraud in America — and particularly of voter impersonation fraud, the only kind that voter ID laws can possibly prevent.

Last week, a Washington Post-ABC News poll found that nearly half of registered American voters believe that voter fraud occurs “somewhat” or “very” often. That astonishing number includes two-thirds of people who say they’re voting for Donald Trump and a little more than one-quarter of Hillary Clinton supporters. Another 26 percent of American voters said that fraud “rarely” occurs, but even that characterization is off the mark. Just 1 percent of respondents gave the answer that comes closest to reflecting reality: “Never.”

As study after study has shown, there is virtually no voter fraud anywhere in the country. The most comprehensive investigation to date found that out of one billion votes cast in all American elections between 2000 and 2014, there were 31 possible cases of impersonation fraud. Other violations — like absentee ballot fraud, multiple voting and registration fraud — are also exceedingly rare. So why do so many people continue to believe this falsehood?

Credit for this mass deception goes to Republican lawmakers, who have for years pushed a fake story about voter fraud, and thus the necessity of voter ID laws, in an effort to reduce voting among specific groups of Democratic-leaning voters. Those groups — mainly minorities, the poor and students — are less likely to have the required forms of identification.

Behind closed doors, some Republicans freely admit that stoking false fears of electoral fraud is part of their political strategy. In a recently disclosed email from 2011, a Republican lobbyist in Wisconsin wrote to colleagues about a very close election for a seat on the State Supreme Court. “Do we need to start messaging ‘widespread reports of election fraud’ so we are positively set up for the recount regardless of the final number?” he wrote. “I obviously think we should.”

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/09/20/op ... -myth.html

Full article and live links to the source material in the URL.

[Lord Jim]

I see the "voter fraud is a myth" zombie has grown yet another head...

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=16189&p=210814&hilit=zombie#p210814

[Guinevere]

It doesn't fit your narrative, we know that. Now grow up and read the piece and stop acting like a Trumpanzee. Or like the liars pointed out in the piece (all Republicans, coincidentally).

Or you and ol' mein kampf Bill can keep on proving the Fourth Circuit utterly correct.