Question for those who support Voter ID laws in the US

[RVonse]

I wasn’t talking about immigrants at all. I never mentioned them.

I was talking about voter ID laws that disenfranchise legal Americans by way of requiring an ID that is, for many people, quite difficult to get.

As Arctish said, it’s not that the state requires an ID, it’s that the ID costs money and is hard ot get for many citizens. So, end result, voter ID laws are a poll tax that takes away the civil rights of tens of thousands in an effort to catch one or two.

I wondered if the folks who are so enthusiastically in favor of taking away civil rights for this are also in favor of other ways to take away civil rights, say from potential rapists or those who can’t prove they aren’t. Indeed, that they think it is better to jail 10,000 innocents than to let 1 guilty go free.

Once again.

Going to jail is really really bad. Much worse than not being allowed to vote. If someone told me I couldn't vote tomorrow, I would probably say big deal since my vote doesn't count for shit in this country anyway. But if someone told me I was going to jail tomorrow, I would be really really seriously upset. So way way more important to prevent an innocent person from jail then worrying about whether a poor person can buy a drivers license so they can vote IMO. Either situation is bad....but one is a LOT more bad than the other. No comparison.

Would you rather go to jail or not vote Rhea?

 

[RVonse]

All ID should be 100% free, even including enhanced ID.

One really does have to begin to wonder if a person can not even muster the intelligence or resources to come up with a drivers license or ID......maybe they shouldn't vote after all. Even the poorest of the poor should be able to accomplish that.

 

[Juma]

The security of the computer system US usesfor voting is laughable. Fix that first, then you can discussing voter ID.
But really, its 2018 and you guys doesnt have US-wide state issued IDs...
Ridiculous...

 

[steve_bank]

Trump quietly disbanded his commision to investigate voter fraud and expose all those millions of illegals who voted or Clinton.

All of the sates say there have only been a few fraud cases and there is no systemic voter fraud.

We have big money obviously influencing elections.

 

[Axulus]

All ID should be 100% free, even including enhanced ID.

One really does have to begin to wonder if a person can not even muster the intelligence or resources to come up with a drivers license or ID......maybe they shouldn't vote after all. Even the poorest of the poor should be able to accomplish that.

I think this aspect of it is going to give people a hard time understanding what the deal is. Having an ID is such a basic, easy and essential thing to obtain I have no comprehension on how someone isn't able to get one that wants one nor how someone can get by in life without one.

I can imagine a homeless person, someone living off their parents or siblings (who should be able to help them get ID), or perhaps someone living out in the wild without one, but how is life otherwise survivable otherwise without one? Any form of income or welfare, other than black market under the table work, is going to require it.

 

[Trausti]

All ID should be 100% free, even including enhanced ID.

One really does have to begin to wonder if a person can not even muster the intelligence or resources to come up with a drivers license or ID......maybe they shouldn't vote after all. Even the poorest of the poor should be able to accomplish that.

I think this aspect of it is going to give people a hard time understanding what the deal is. Having an ID is such a basic, easy and essential thing to obtain I have no comprehension on how someone isn't able to get one that wants one nor how someone can get by in life without one.

I can imagine a homeless person, someone living off their parents or siblings (who should be able to help them get ID), or perhaps someone living out in the wild without one, but how is life otherwise survivable otherwise without one? Any form of income or welfare, other than black market under the table work, is going to require it.

Well, yes. The Progressive thesis appears to be that certain groups of people are simply too stupid to know how to get ID; thus, the virtual-signal brigade comes out as the savior of the stupid against those who do not want foreign interference in our elections. ID is so easy to get, and at such minimal cost, and is so necessary for so many other things in life, that the self-righteous cackling on this issue is obvious bullshit.

 

[repoman]

Having free ID and also requiring that free ID to register to vote and cast the vote (the former more important) would totally get rid of the poll tax objection to the use of ID in the voting process.

 

[Trausti]

Having free ID and also requiring that free ID to register to vote and cast the vote (the latter more important) would totally get rid of the poll tax objection to the use of ID in the voting process.

Somehow citizenship would also come into play as we are giving the same type of IDs to everyone.

In other countries you get a different type of ID when you are there as a non citizen.

Only if you believe that citizens should be the ones who determine the elections in their own country.

 

[repoman]

Having free ID and also requiring that free ID to register to vote and cast the vote (the latter more important) would totally get rid of the poll tax objection to the use of ID in the voting process.

Somehow citizenship would also come into play as we are giving the same type of IDs to everyone.

In other countries you get a different type of ID when you are there as a non citizen.

Only if you believe that citizens should be the ones who determine the elections in their own country.

I do.

Are you saying that some people want people other than citizens to vote? They want this openly or sneakily?

 

[Trausti]

Having free ID and also requiring that free ID to register to vote and cast the vote (the latter more important) would totally get rid of the poll tax objection to the use of ID in the voting process.

Somehow citizenship would also come into play as we are giving the same type of IDs to everyone.

In other countries you get a different type of ID when you are there as a non citizen.

Only if you believe that citizens should be the ones who determine the elections in their own country.

I do.

Are you saying that some people want people other than citizens to vote? They want this openly or sneakily?

Isn't the question whether citizenship matters? What value do you place on citizenship?

 

[fast]

I wondered if the folks who are so enthusiastically in favor of taking away civil rights for this are also in favor of other ways to take away civil rights, say from potential rapists or those who can’t prove they aren’t. Indeed, that they think it is better to jail 10,000 innocents than to let 1 guilty go free.

I would speculate that many people that do favor voter ID laws are not therefore in favor of taking away civil rights.

Two more things:

2) Civil rights remain intact with or without current voter ID law.

3) Even if a consequence of current voter ID laws is that some will find exercising their right to vote more problematic, it is a contortion of the mind (not reality) to think that everyone is therefore in favor of taking away civil rights if they are in favor of voter ID laws.

It seems to be a growing trend to develop the knack to identify a negative consequence of ones actions (even if the overall consequence has a net positive benefit) and assert a bad motive as a link between the two--even when consequences are unknown. It's like when the military chooses a course of action that purposefully tries to avoid unnecessary casualty. Someone will come along, identify the negatives and say it was intentional or retort ignorance or stupidity.

People's civil rights didn't enter into the equation for my position on voter ID laws, so I know that played no part in my voter ID law position. Now that I have (again) been fed information to consider, I find it easier to dismiss critics of voter ID law. The more people speak of the horrors, the more laughable it becomes--like young school kids--they can be so precious when they get upset.

That's not to say there aren't people out there that would like to see blacks with no civil rights, but to think that a smidgen of disenfranchisement is the central driving force behind why many people are in favor of voter ID laws is very (very) assumptive.

Remember my last post. I asked that you not imbue motive. Oh, and this rapist thing, WHAT?

 

[southernhybrid]

While I don't think it should be required because there has never been evidence of voter fraud in perhaps more than a few isolated cases after the linked article was written, there is evidence that Georgia's ID requirement, one of the first in the nation, didn't result in disenfranchisement of minority voters.

https://www.ajc.com/news/despite-voter-law-minority-turnout-georgia/3wOfD2SkXmTgRwbySd2ZiK/

When Georgia became one of the first states in the nation to demand a photo ID at the ballot box, both sides served up dire predictions. Opponents labeled it a Jim Crow-era tactic that would suppress the minority vote. Supporters insisted it was needed to combat fraud that imperiled the integrity of the elections process.

But both claims were overblown, according to a review of by The Atlanta Journal-Constitution of statewide voting patterns in the five years since the law took effect.

Turnout among black and Hispanic voters increased from 2006 to 2010, dramatically outpacing population growth for those groups over the same period.

On the other hand, Georgia’s top elections official could not point to a single case of ballot fraud the voter ID law had prevented.

“I think the rhetoric on both sides has been overstated,” said Edward Foley, executive director of an election law center at The Ohio State University’s Moritz College of Law.

“It hasn’t had the voter-suppressing effect that some people feared,” Foley said. Conversely, he said, rhetoric about voter fraud has largely proven to be a “scare tactic” with little basis in fact.

Almost every able bodied adult in Georgia already has a driver's license because we have very little mass transit in the state. Unless it's changed recently, the state ID is free, although I did read two conflicting articles. One said it was free and the other said it was 32 dollars or 5 dollars if you are disabled or indigent. Here's the thing. You can't even see a doctor in Georgia without a photo ID. One of my former patients didn't have one, and the staff had to help her get one so she could be seen by a doctor. Homeless people are probably the only ones that are disenfranchised by this law, but since you have to have an address to vote, that pretty much leaves them out with or without the ID.

A much larger problem in Georgia is that our voter machines are too old and it has been demonstrated that they can easily be hacked. Combine that with the fact that our GOP candidate for governor is in charge of the upcoming election, as he remains as the SOC. So, you can see why many of us are very concerned.

 

[laughing dog]

Suddenly everybody is up in arms. The root cause of the move for photo ID is illegal immigration.

No, it is not. The root cause is to game the system by making it harder for people to vote who the Republicans believe vote for Democrats.

 

[laughing dog]

I would speculate that many people that do favor voter ID laws are not therefore in favor of taking away civil rights.

Except for the civil right to vote for those who have difficulty getting an approved voter ID.

 

[Copernicus]

Not a single one of these defenders of requiring special IDs for voting has come up with any evidence or reason to believe that illegal immigrants are attempting to vote in our elections, and that is the rationale that they give for having these barriers to IN PERSON voting. Nobody shows a picture ID when a mail-in or absentee ballot gets counted.

What is the issue for those who worry so much about immigrants voting for Democrats? Their main concern is to focus on how easy it is for real citizens to get the credentials. Even though some admit that it is also easy to get fake credentials. However, if that is the case, then why do they think requiring a photo ID is going to prevent all of the massive illegal voter fraud that is getting Democrats elected? And why don't they worry about those sneaky immigrants doing it all with absentee ballots? They wouldn't even need fake IDs for that.

For most of my life, I have voted without having to show a picture ID. I just showed up and signed a register to get my ballot. These laws are in place now for one reason--to put up barriers for voters that are likely to vote for Democrats.

 

[jonatha]

I'm working 1099--no ID needed.

Correct me if I'm in error; I may very well be, but is the 1099, no ID needed connection a gaping loophole that's purposefully designed by Democrats to provide financial sanctuary to illegal immigrants so that they can thrive amongst us? I'm not saying that the many many people who utilize 1099 are immigrants, let alone illegal immigrants. I'm saying that keeping it no ID required is intentionally blatant so that those who have not taken the proper channnels to even legally reside in the US can hide amongst us and work.

ETA: suggesting intent isn't my style, but it happens so much around here, I thought I'd give it a go.

People who get 1099s have to file a W9 with the payer and provide a Social Security Number or other Tax ID number, which illegal immigrants ipso facto do not have.

The Federal Regulations concerning form 1099 were last revised January 6, 2017. I seem to recall the Republicans were in control of the Congress at that time, and that they have been in control of the Executive since and could easily have changed the rule if they thought it supplied the cover you suggest.

Your main beef is with the Founding Fathers, who incorporated the notion of cash into the nation's economic framework.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

But having a state or federal ID is not the issue. It is having one that will let you vote. That's why these laws are often designed to favor likely Republican voters and disfavor likely Democratic ones. So, for example, some states forbid students from out of state to use their student photo ID, even though students have a legal right to vote in those states. OTOH, a permit to carry a gun may be allowed in such states, because those who have such permits are more likely to be Republicans.

This is deception by the left. The laws call for government-issued photo ID and CCW permits are government issued and have your address and your picture. There's no evil intent in allowing them.

Student IDs, however, are issued by the school, not by the government. Hence they don't qualify.

Actually, the Supreme Court (Symm vs the United States) already decided this in 1979 in favor of using student IDs for voter registration. The only reason to bar such IDs at the polls is to suppress votes by college students, who happen to vote in larger numbers for Democratic candidates. That is the sole reason for denying students their right to use university picture IDs. By requiring the voter ID at the poll booth to be "government issued" (and not even allow IDs from state and local government-run colleges), the legislators deliberately chose to ignore settled law. Loren, you are pretty good at acknowledging the unfairness of these voter ID laws and their purpose--to skew voting patterns. Let's not try to excuse the need for laws that place voting barriers up for no good reason. There is no evidence that any of these laws are driven by a need to remedy voter fraud. If fraud is being committed on any significant scale, it is probably with ballots that are mailed in, not ballots cast by people who show up in person.

The problem with permitting school ID is what exactly constitutes a school? I see the potential for abuse.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I'm working 1099--no ID needed.

Correct me if I'm in error; I may very well be, but is the 1099, no ID needed connection a gaping loophole that's purposefully designed by Democrats to provide financial sanctuary to illegal immigrants so that they can thrive amongst us? I'm not saying that the many many people who utilize 1099 are immigrants, let alone illegal immigrants. I'm saying that keeping it no ID required is intentionally blatant so that those who have not taken the proper channnels to even legally reside in the US can hide amongst us and work.

ETA: suggesting intent isn't my style, but it happens so much around here, I thought I'd give it a go.

Disagree--you can't require ID for 1099 type work because often no such ID could exist--it's a business entity rather than an individual.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Suddenly everybody is up in arms. The root cause of the move for photo ID is illegal immigration. Photo ID is part of the anti immigration narrative, if you haven't been paying attention.

Requiring photo ID for employment is a different matter than requiring it for voting.

(And it's not all that effective, even. Unless they changed the process since we went through it long ago it's quite possible for an illegal to work here with documentation that given a sample I would have no problem simply printing.)

 

[Loren Pechtel]

random ideas

All ID should be 100% free, even including enhanced ID. CDLs are a different matter. Transportation to get the ID should be free as well even for end of life invalids. That or have mobile vans come out of and give IDs.

The real problem comes when you don't have the precursors, either.