muff528

This is reasonable. But in addition to penalties for poor performance (I presume by the issuing agency), there should also be a mandatory penalty ("tax" if you prefer) for an applicant falsifying information for the ID. The question then goes to "how do we define 'eligible'?" There is always room for disagreement there. I think that is really a lot of the disagreement right now. proactive (horrible word) -- I agree. It sounds like a hemorrhoid or acne medication. ...or a septic tank additive.

".......only ten inches high, and her face brightened up at the thought that she was now the right size for going through the little door into that lovely garden. First, however, she waited for a few minutes to see if she was going to shrink any further: she felt a little nervous about this; 'for it might end, you know,' said Alice to herself, 'in my going out altogether, like a candle. I wonder what I should be like then?' And she tried to fancy what the flame of a candle is like after the candle is blown out, for she could not remember ever having seen such a thing. After a while, finding that nothing more happened, she decided on going into the garden at once; but, alas for poor Alice! when she got to the door, she found she had forgotten the little golden key, and when she went back to the table for it, she found she could not possibly reach it: she could see it quite plainly through the glass, and she tried her best to climb up one of the legs of the table, but it was too slippery; and when she had tired herself out with trying, the poor little thing sat down and cried. 'Come, there's no use in crying like that!' said Alice to herself, rather sharply; 'I advise you to leave off this minute!' She generally gave herself very good advice, (though she very seldom followed it), and sometimes she scolded herself so severely as to bring tears into her eyes; and once she remembered trying to box her own ears for having cheated herself in a game of croquet she was playing against herself, for this curious child was very fond of pretending to be two people. 'But it's no use now,' thought poor Alice, 'to pretend to be two people! Why, there's hardly enough of me left to make ONE respectable person!' Soon her eye fell on a little glass box that was lying under the table: she opened it, and found in it a very small cake, on which the words 'EAT ME' were beautifully marked in currants. 'Well, I'll eat it,' said Alice, 'and if it makes me grow larger, I can reach the key; and if it makes me grow smaller, I can creep under the door; so either way I'll get into the garden, and I don't care which happens!' She ate a little bit, and said anxiously to herself, 'Which way? Which way?', holding her hand on the top of her...."

It doesn't make much difference to a voter whether he is prevented from voting or has his vote negated by an ineligible voter's fraudulent vote. The effect is the same. ALMOST, since -(-1) = +1 Just like a tax penalty for not having health insurance has the same effect on the outcome as a tax credit for having it in the ACA. Yes, I agree with this. Kind of like when TK said something to the effect that it doesn't really matter to the "payer" whether something is called a tax, fee or something else ...it's effectively all taxes. The payer is gonna pay. The only problem I had with that deal is the Supreme Court taking it upon themselves to change the language to "force" the law into Constitutionality. All the arguing over the tax/penalty is all penny-ante stuff anyway. The real taxation is the implementation of the ACA itself. Doesn't matter. A fraudulent vote will always reinforce one side at the same time it negates the other. It's even worse if the fraudulent voter votes in place of a legitimate voter. A double-whammy for either side. I'm against voter fraud no matter which side the fraudster is on. Edit above- In the case of a fraudulent voter replacing a lawful voter-- I mean it's worse if the fraudster votes the opposite of the legit voter but, yes it does reinforce the legit voter if the fraudster votes the same way he would.

The fact that in 94 years she apparently never got an ID and he is just following the law. You tried to claim this was voter disenfranchisement, when really it is just simply laziness on her part. She could not be bothered to get an ID in 94 years. That is not even close to what you are trying to claim. I think Chango's argument is that the "strange looking" voter is the one who is disenfranchised because the old lady gets to vote without showing her ID (because she is a harmless-looking old white lady) but the strange fellow is challenged by the crooked poll worker because he is "different". I'm just not sure how this is an argument against a photo ID. Looks like an argument for one to me. The poll worker should be arrested, too.

No matter which way the cheater votes he will cancel someone's legal vote. Why are you assuming that all the fraudsters are on one side? We don't know that ...it hasn't been documented yet.

Well, I was suggesting that you, Chango and the State of Pennsylvania were the ones ignoring "everything".

>The effect is the same. When you put it that way - you're right! And war is peace, freedom is slavery and ignorance is strength. The effects are often the same, so they must be the same FIFY

It doesn't make much difference to a voter whether he is prevented from voting or has his vote negated by an ineligible voter's fraudulent vote. The effect is the same. The effect is not the same. When the state prevents a person from voting they are denied their right to cast a vote. In the scenario I gave, the effect is quite the same. He is not being prevented from voting. The ineligible voter is voting in addition to the eligible voter and cancelling the legal vote. Same thing as preventing the lawful voter from entering the polling place ...he's been "disenfranchised". Yes, this is yet another way voter fraud can occur. How will the authorities know which voter is the eligible one? meh.

It doesn't make much difference to a voter whether he is prevented from voting or has his vote negated by an ineligible voter's fraudulent vote. The effect is the same.

That's as reasonable as saying you are counting on voter disenfrachisement to win. Voter fraud is voter disenfranchisement.

How could the State possibly know that? Did they check everyone's ID? "hundreds of thousands"? Again, how was this determined? ID check? Let's see the study. Otherwise I call BS. Get an ID!

Present the evidence for that. so far we got individual cases that don't even add up to statistical noise. Proponents want to spend more than a million dollars per illegal vote...and in the meanwhile will disenfranchise far more. Hardly seems like progress. Don't need to spend millions. Just check voters' IDs at the polls. I really don't understand why this is so difficult when it is being done without issue at thousands of polling places. Of course there will be the occasional glitch where clerical errors, changes in residence, etc. will appear. Just deal with those issues individually at the local level. Doesn't hurt the election officials to do a little extra work.

wrong question. Was the sky falling in the other 33, and did this change make a lick of difference, other than inconveniencing the people? Shall we compare crime rates in Illinois, CA, NY to those 33? I notice you're no long so eager to compare Chicago to X anymore. Well, the mayor did order the gangs to leave the children alone.

Where does it say an ID is not needed? Same place as it says a license is not needed to exercise your 2nd amendment rights. An ID is not a license. Technically, an ID is required to buy or take delivery of a firearm ...even through a private transfer.

RIP :(

It doesn't fucking matter! (excuse my english ) The voter I.D. law in isn't preventing voter fraud. It's just giving him a justification to ask for "PAPERS PLEASE" at his discretion. Did the poll worker commit fraud or not? Again. That's irrelevant. The only thing the voter I.D. law accomplishes is making it more difficult for citizens to vote. It doesn't solve any other problem. There is no evidence of in-person voter fraud to justify potentially making it difficult for hundreds of thousands of citizens to vote. To quote the poster from post #7: "It's not about grandma. It's about the fact that the poll worker decides who gets in and who doesn't. Voter ID laws simply provide them with the ability to turn away the guy who looks strange while going ahead and allowing grandma to vote."

And even though there are multiple claims of fraud at every election, we can't know how much voter fraud exists until we start counting. Problem is that some folks don't want that answer. All you have to do to count is to contact everyone who voted and verify that it was actually them using their registration info. Easiest and most efficient way to do that is right there at the poll ...face to face. Finally we agree!

The poll worker himself said he would let the lady vote. What prevents him from doing that? Do you think he's a liar? That poll worker, by his dereliction, potentially disenfranchised a lawful voter by possibly allowing his vote to be cancelled. He needs to be relieved of duty. We are concerned about each and every voter's rights, aren't we? OK. So we have a lying, derelict, poll worker. Agreed? So it appears. Did he do that or are you saying he could do that? Either way, he has demonstrated that he is willing to commit voter fraud. Did the poll worker commit fraud or not?

I think you missed Bill's point that by law it is illegal to sell beer in your house. alcohol has regulations around it that are just as uptight as gun sales. Add in Prohibition and various blues laws and the hunger for taxes and it's quite a mess. If you overbuy for a party (or wedding), you can't return the excess...that would make you a distributor. Though somehow people are able to sell wine, either on consignment or directly. Wonder how legal that is. I always thought it was strange that in my county you cannot buy liquor on Sunday and take it home to drink in the safety of your house (only beer and wine). But you can go to a bar for a few hours, drinking any kind of drink you want, and then drive home shitfaced.

And even though there are multiple claims of fraud at every election, we can't know how much voter fraud exists until we start counting. Problem is that some folks don't want that answer.

The poll worker himself said he would let the lady vote. What prevents him from doing that? Do you think he's a liar? That poll worker, by his dereliction, potentially disenfranchised a lawful voter by possibly allowing his vote to be cancelled. He needs to be relieved of duty. We are concerned about each and every voter's rights, aren't we?

To be fair she is not too lazy to vote. She "managed to find a way voting place on the right day vote." She is just too lazy to get a f'n ID over a period of 94 years. Either that or her lazy-ass son couldn't take a little time to get her down to the DMV to get her an ID. Where in the Constitution does it say that it's OK to deny lazy people the right to vote? Where in the Constitution does it say that it is the government's responsibility to spoon feed each and every citizen his rights?

I don't really care if you or others think this elderly woman is lazy, even if she may have last registered before you were born. I care about the end effect - Americans being denied their right to vote. Yes, people have duty of care and the SecState of each state/city needs to work to ensure proper elections....but THERE IS NO VOTER FRAUD. Particularly for those who despise intrusive government (hello, Davinci and other GOP hard liners), the Feds should tread lightly into existing problems to solve them. But here, we have a solution in search of a problem. By amazing coincidence, it results in the disenfranchisement of voters who just happen to bias towards the opposite party. Completely unrelated, of course. We just want to spend millions for nothing. That's the GOP motto, right? Let me get this straight. This is an example of a lady who has no ID who did "manage to find her way to the voting place on the right day". She did vote without an ID if I understand the story. Not disenfranchised. If I understand the point of the story, old white ladies with no IDs do not get disenfranchised, and that somehow that is proof that a "strange looking young male" will be denied his right to vote and that this is because he is too lazy to go get an ID.

To be fair she is not too lazy to vote. She "managed to find a way voting place on the right day vote." She is just too lazy to get a f'n ID over a period of 94 years. Either that or her lazy-ass son couldn't take a little time to get her down to the DMV to get her an ID. Ok, so we see support for disenfranchising her and others like her as a cost of stopping voter fraud. But again, we don't see the voter fraud numbers to justify disenfranchisement. This is the disconnect. I have yet to hear how someone who can register to vote cannot get an ID. You have voter drives where volunteers take carloads of folks to registration sites. Why can't they also help them get IDs? Why is the prospect of disenfranchising someone who votes illegally more egregious than that voter disenfranchising a lawful registered voter with that unlawful vote? Just get a fucking ID!

It's not about grandma. It's about the fact that the poll worker decides who gets in and who doesn't. Voter ID laws simply provide them with the ability to turn away the guy who looks strange while going ahead and allowing grandma to vote. I'd think that an ID would prevent that from happening. At my precinct my name is already on the list (from voter registration.) I tell them my name, they ask for my ID, they reconcile the ID with the list and they hand me a ballot. No muss, no fuss. I'm usually standing in line with predominantly hispanic and black voters and anyone with an ID and a matching name on the list votes.