The GOP war on voting

[Conan71]

Crockoshit. Listen Conan, the lack of integrity and the lies need to stop. PROVE there's voter ID fraud of any significance. Prove what determines an ID is valid or invalid.

Do you cheat?

Reducing the electorate through this process is cheating. Are you a cheater?

Tom Corbett doesn't even know what his law says. He can't even say what's considered valid and he signed the requirement into law.

INCREASE THE VOTER POOL IN AMERICA...it's our tradition and it's patriotic. Are you a patriot? Voter suppression laws are designed to screw Obama out of hundreds of thousands of voters. Great for the cheaters and radicals... The horror.

'Scuze me...the quote you snatched from my post is about the necessity for photo ID these days as IDENTITY FRAUD is a very real problem.

Not sure what your screed about cheating is all about.  PWI last night?

[Teatownclown]

CONANSBURRIED!

see, even a comic strip can out smarts Conan.

[Conan71]

Here's an interesting examination, speaking statistically on how the voter ID laws could affect voter turn-out.  According to the author the Pennsylvania law's effects are grossly over-stated:

With that said, there is also not necessarily a reason to think that the laws would reduce turnout by more than a couple of percentage points. It's important to keep the following in mind:

The vast majority of adults do have some sort of identification.
Many people who do not have identification are not registered to vote — or if they are registered, they are unlikely to turn out.
The laws may be inconsistently enforced by thousands and thousands of poll workers at the precinct level.
In many cases, voters without proper identification can cast a provisional ballot, which could eventually be counted in the event of a vote-counting dispute.
The campaigns have an opportunity to educate their voters about ID requirements as part of their turnout operations.
News media accounts, like some of those about the new voter ID laws in Pennsylvania, sometimes seize on the most dramatic estimates of the effects of these laws — rather than the most accurate ones.

It has been reported, for instance, that about 750,000 Pennsylvanians, or about 9 percent of the state's registered voter pool, do not have a ID issued by the state's Department of Transportation. The 750,000-voter figure, however, includes some cases where there are database-matching problems: for instance, a woman is listed by her married surname in one database and her maiden surname in another may be included on that list, even though she should have few problems voting. It includes some cases of voters whose registrations are inactive. And it includes voters who will have some valid form of ID other than that issued by the Department of Transportation, like a passport, which would still make them eligible to vote. Based on the experiences of other states, it is more likely that these laws will prevent something like 2 or 3 percent of registered voters from actually casting a ballot, rather than 9 percent.

Still, that could be meaningful depending on which candidate these voters would have chosen. None of the studies I mentioned have sought to measure how a decline in turnout could effect the Democratic and Republican candidates in particular, rather than the overall figure.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/15/measuring-the-effects-of-voter-identification-laws/

Keep in mind, these are estimates, but the effects are grossly over-stated.

[AquaMan]

This is nothing more than a Republican attack on miorities, the poor and the elderly which normally vote Democratic. There is nothing more or less sinister than that going on here.
If the government wants to require photo IDs before a citizen can vote then the government needs to deliver those IDs to the citizens. 

Tattoos are the answer. Surely we could tattoo a number for voting purposes only. Maybe digitize it. Embed a gps locator. That sort of thing. Can't be too much effort to protect the integrity, the safety and the national defense of the country.

[Teatownclown]

Conan, er CROWnan, where are the swing states?

[carltonplace]

Tattoos are the answer. Surely we could tattoo a number for voting purposes only. Maybe digitize it. Embed a gps locator. That sort of thing. Can't be too much effort to protect the integrity, the safety and the national defense of the country.

Only tatoo those filthy lefty hippie communist democrats. Republicans are wealthy and urbane enough to afford photo IDs and assault rifles.

[Conan71]

More proof that facts are like kryptonite to liberals:

By HANS VON SPAKOVSKY

Remember the storm that arose on the political left after the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of Indiana's voter ID law last April? According to the left, voter ID was a dastardly Republican plot to prevent Democrats from winning elections by suppressing the votes of minorities, particularly African-Americans.

Since the election of Barack Obama, we haven't heard a word about such claims. On Jan. 14, the federal appeals court in Atlanta upheld Georgia's voter ID law.

The reasons for the silence about alleged voter suppression is plain. In the first place, numerous academic studies show that voter ID had no effect on the turnout of voters in prior elections. The plaintiffs in every unsuccessful lawsuit filed against such state requirements could not produce a single individual who didn't either already have an ID or couldn't easily get one.

Second are the figures emerging from the November election. If what liberals claimed was true, Democratic voters in states with strict photo ID requirements would presumably have had a much more difficult time voting, and their turnout dampened in comparison to other states. Well, that myth can finally be laid to rest.

The two states with the strictest voter ID requirements are Indiana and Georgia. Both require a government-issued photo ID. According to figures released by Prof. Michael McDonald of George Mason University, the overall national turnout of eligible voters was 61.6%, the highest turnout since the 1964 election.

The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies (JCPES) found that black turnout in the 2008 election was at a historic high, having increased substantially from 2004. The total share of black voters in the national vote increased from 11% to 13% according to exit polls, with 95% of blacks voting for Mr. Obama.

So what happened in Georgia where the ACLU, the NAACP and other such groups claimed the state's photo ID law was intended to depress black turnout? According to figures released by Curtis Gans at American University, Georgia had the largest turnout in its history, with nearly four million voters. The Republican turnout was up only 0.22 percentage points; the Democratic turnout was up an astonishing 6.1 percentage points, rising from 22.66% of the eligible voting population to 28.74% of the eligible population.

The overall turnout in Georgia increased 6.7 percentage points from the 2004 election -- the second highest increase in turnout of any state in the country. According to the JCPES, the black share of the statewide vote increased in Georgia from 25% in the 2004 election, when the photo ID law was not in effect, to 30% in the 2008 election, when the photo ID law was in effect.

By contrast, the Democratic turnout in the neighboring state of Mississippi -- which has no voter ID requirement but also has a large black population similar to Georgia's -- increased by only 2.35 percentage points.

In Indiana, which the Supreme Court said had the strictest voter ID law in the country, the turnout of Democratic voters in the November election increased by 8.32 percentage points. That was the largest increase in Democratic turnout of any state in the country. The increase in overall turnout in Indiana was the fifth highest in the country, but only because the turnout of Republican voters actually went down 3.57 percentage points. The nearby state of Illinois (no photo ID requirement) had an increase in Democratic turnout of only 4.4 percentage points -- nearly half Indiana's increase.

The Supreme Court answered this question in 2008 when it upheld Indiana's voter ID law. "Flagrant examples of such fraud ... have been documented throughout this Nation's history by respected historians and journalists," the court said, "[and] not only is the risk of voter fraud real but that it could affect the outcome of a close election." But ask voters in Troy, N.Y., Lincoln County, W.Va., and Florida whether voter fraud is a real problem.

Four local officials and party activists were convicted in 2011 of voter fraud in Troy for forging enough absentee ballots to "likely have tipped the city council and county elections" in 2009. Two veteran Democratic political operatives said voter fraud is an accepted way of winning elections. One of them who pled guilty, Anthony DeFiglio, told police that such fraud was a "normal political tactic."

[See a collection of political cartoons on the Republican Party.]

And it is the most vulnerable who are far too often the victims of vote thieves. DeFiglio admitted that the "people who are targeted live in low-income housing ... [T]here is a sense that they are a lot less likely to ask any questions."

In March 2012, the county sheriff and clerk in Lincoln County, W.Va., pled guilty to voter fraud. They stuffed enough bogus absentee ballots into ballot boxes to change the outcome of a 2010 Democratic primary election. Was this a one-time incident? Probably not, since the Lincoln County auditor was also found guilty of voter fraud in 2005.

http://www.usnews.com/debate-club/is-voter-fraud-a-real-problem/voter-fraud-is-a-proven-election-manipulation-tactic

"The electoral system cannot inspire public confidence if no safeguards exist to deter or detect fraud or to confirm the identity of voters." That was the conclusion of the bipartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform, headed by former president Jimmy Carter and former secretary of State James Baker. The commission recommended stronger photo-identification requirements at the polls. Its logic was straightforward and convincing: Americans must show photo identification for all kinds of day-to-day activities, such as cashing checks or entering government buildings. The many photo ID requirements we encounter in our daily lives are legitimate, effective security measures. Securing the ballot box is just as important.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/story/2012-03-19/voter-ID-Texas-fraud/53658158/1

[Gaspar]

Tattoos are the answer. Surely we could tattoo a number for voting purposes only. Maybe digitize it. Embed a gps locator. That sort of thing. Can't be too much effort to protect the integrity, the safety and the national defense of the country.

I think on the forehead perhaps. . .

Why not just use a simple fingerprint recognition?


Other countries use fingerprints to vote, why don't we? 

[Teatownclown]

Crownan, that article is off logic....apples compared to oranges. No need to re-jigger our voting rights act. It's worked well since the 60's.

Why do you highlight Carter in red when it's LBJ you should be targeting.

I don't think Spazzoffski understands the difference between a private company insuring against losses and what makes for a free society.

[carltonplace]

I think on the forehead perhaps. . .

Why not just use a simple fingerprint recognition?


Other countries use fingerprints to vote, why don't we?  

You know the democrats would still cheat by bringing other people's fingers to the polling place.

[Conan71]

You know the democrats would still cheat by bringing other people's fingers to the polling place.

I hear that happens all the time in the Phillipines.

[nathanm]

Here's an interesting examination, speaking statistically on how the voter ID laws could affect voter turn-out.  According to the author the Pennsylvania law's effects are grossly over-stated:

Keep in mind, these are estimates, but the effects are grossly over-stated.

Wow, I would be pissed if I were part of that 1% you think doesn't deserve to get to vote because of some wild hair up your donkey. That's just asinine. You still haven't given any indication of how or why this is actually necessary. Note that this does nothing to change how absentee ballots work, so talking about fraud in absentee ballots is completely irrelevant. Also, my mother would tut-tut at you for trying to take away her right to vote, were she still alive.

As far as turnout increases, if you don't control for increased population size and shifts in demographics, your numbers are worthless. Georgia is one of the states which is growing by leaps and bounds.

Lastly, I'll leave you with this gem:

I guess we shouldn't listen to the architects of this particular scam when deciding whether or not their motivations are suspect... (fast forward to 13 seconds if you like)

Edited to add: For my part, I figure any law that doesn't include the voter registration card or student IDs as acceptable ID for voting is actually intended to reduce turnout. If the goal was actually to reduce fraud, those forms of ID would be just as good as any other.

[Conan71]

Wow, I would be pissed if I were part of that 1% you think doesn't deserve to get to vote because of some wild hair up your donkey. That's just asinine. You still haven't given any indication of how or why this is actually necessary. Note that this does nothing to change how absentee ballots work, so talking about fraud in absentee ballots is completely irrelevant. Also, my mother would tut-tut at you for trying to take away her right to vote, were she still alive.

As far as turnout increases, if you don't control for increased population size and shifts in demographics, your numbers are worthless. Georgia is one of the states which is growing by leaps and bounds.

Lastly, I'll leave you with this gem:

I guess we shouldn't listen to the architects of this particular scam when deciding whether or not their motivations are suspect... (fast forward to 13 seconds if you like)

Edited to add: For my part, I figure any law that doesn't include the voter registration card or student IDs as acceptable ID for voting is actually intended to reduce turnout. If the goal was actually to reduce fraud, those forms of ID would be just as good as any other.

[Hoss]

Gotta admit though.  Turzai put foot squarely in mouth there.

[cannon_fodder]

Republican leaders, including governors, are on record as saying that the point of voter id and other laws is to excluded e people who are likely to vote democrat.  Voter fraud is a myth.  The issues that are challenged are not fixed by these laws ajd by signing the register there is already a base line control (ever gone to sign and had a fraudster sign your name?).

Ive challenged election results in court and know the system.

To try to win elections by excluding voters is very disappointing.

What's more, voting IS a right the state must have q compelling interest to deny.