Voting Laws And The 2012 Presidential Race
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2012-09-11/voting-laws-and-2012-presidential-race
Following Republican victories in the 2010 midterm elections, legislatures around the country passed new voting laws. Today, 10 states require photo identification to vote and most states allow early voting and provisional ballots. Democrats say some of these laws discourage minorities and the poor from voting. Republicans argue they prevent fraud. Courts in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Ohio will hear arguments this week on voter ID and early voting. And in Florida, a battle over voter registration might cause a replay of the 2000 presidential election. Diane and guests discuss new voting laws and how it will impact the 2012 presidential race.
Guests
Bruce Fein
former associate deputy attorney general, Republican counsel during the Iran-Contra hearings and founding partner with the Lichfield Group.
Richard Hasen
Chancellor's professor of law and political science at the University of California, Irvine School of Law.
Spencer Overton
professor at The George Washington University Law School.
John Fortier
director of the Democracy Project at the Bipartisan Policy Institute.
Comments
Please familiarize yourself with our Code of Conduct and Terms of Use before posting your comments.
IndieLady7 wrote:
"it's amazing that you take out part of my post to suit your convouluted thinking as opposed to looking at my whole post. It's as if you're deliberately trying to start an argument."
I only wanted to respond to the one point! I have to copy your whole post to respond to one point?!
Now to that point, yeah, I was tweaking you a little, but I always forget that liberals have no sense of humor - so for that I apologize.
The Constitution never explicitly ensures the right to vote. The qualifications for voters are left to the states.
North Carolina early voting begins on October 18. Currently you can request an absentee ballot.
Many people are asking why we need ID laws to vote. Answer; Because there are millions of people in this country who are not citizens (both legal and illegal) and would vote if they thought they could get away with it because they want something from the government. This is not fear or a conspiracy theory, it is just fact. How many votes would this entail? How much would it effect an election? The answer doesn't matter, any amount of fraudulent votes are bad. We need to ensure honest elections and we can't have that without safeguards!!
In our small NC mountain county with about 7,000 registered voters, we had a fairly large (1300) number of fraudulent absentee ballots, which were filed in dead people's names. The woman in charge of ballots resigned in disgrace. She was a Republican, all the ballots were in favor of Republican, and it was enough votes to make it look like our county voted for McCain instead of Obama, even though this is a Democratic county. I would say using absentee ballots for fraud is the type of voter fraud to watch out for, because it can be a substantial number of ballots.
Bruce who has stood in the way of a national uniform voting system. Here we are in 2012 no closer to a sane voting system.
With regards to "you need an ID to fly", which one of the guests correctly pointed out has a work around, it is not our constitutional right to fly. There is a good chance that the disenfranchised people who would be affected by these laws DON"T really fly very often. Not a fair comparison.
Here in Maine we have a rather colorful Republican governor who tried to change our same day registration law—apparently fear of college student voting fraud. Out of that came a plebiscite resulting in an affirmation of the same day registration law, and a legislative committee that came to the conclusion that we as a state have noting to fear from the alleged fraud but rather need to do more to encourage voting. The committee is still meeting and no doubt it will increase out already high turn out.
Voting law changes cause confusion (among the populace as well as poll volunteers).
EVERY time I have tried to vote with my student ID (an authorized form according to the law in my state - FLORIDA) the poll volunteers have tried to turn me away. I have then asserted my right and clarified why this ID qualifies.
Not everybody is going to know to do this. If this takes place in more cases than in just mine (a fair probability since I'm just one person at one precinct) it has the capability to remove a basic tenet of representative democracy - one person, one vote. I support vigorous prosecution of voter fraud (and electoral fraud by the way).
Impersonation has happened and will again. Even so, a fake ID (or a distracted poll worker) is just as likely to subvert this problem with or without a new (and potentially confusing) law.
It's not just a photo that's req'd here in Indiana. The photo ID must show an expiration date. As a pole worker, I was shown photo IDs, mostly for schools, that I had to turn down for lack of expiration date.
The problem is NOT JUST someone must have an ID. The problem in many states is the type of ID. eg in PA students can use their student IDs to vote. The problem is the IDs must have an expiration date. Until now virtually every University has NOT included a expiration date. Hence the student ID can not be used
The evil genius Karl Rove and his ilk are laughing
This should be considered in a much broader assault:
Higher Incarceration
Lower education levels
Stacking supreme and district courts
Attacking funding for Acorn, NPR, PBS etc
No evidence of fraud. Apply the rule: Any regulation must bear a real and substantial relation to the public health, safety, morals, or some other phase of the general welfare.
ecgberht wrote: "Well, pulling a NYT article out of my rear is an apropos metaphor, nevertheless, this article contains the gist of the story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/07/us/07rights.html"
Thanks for the article, however, it does seem rather politicized. The people who were going against the Panthers were Bush appointees, AND there was mentions of some of the panel being part of the National Review and The Heritage Foundation--both of which are seriously conservative.
That's my observation thus far. Perhaps I'll do another read later, but something about that article still doesn't sit right with me.
Legislator Turzai's comment this summer drills down to the real reason Republican legislatures have passed all these changes to the voting process in swing states: So Romney can win.
T o pretend otherwise is just ludicrous.
Rev. Patricia Barth
Maryland
ecgberht wrote: "I only wanted to respond to the one point! I have to copy your whole post to respond to one point?!
Now to that point, yeah, I was tweaking you a little, but I always forget that liberals have no sense of humor - so for that I apologize."
I have copied whole posts of yours for discussion, so I'm not buying that.
And, I am an INDEPENDENT and refuse to be put into a party box. I find fault with both parties--as I also find things for which I agree. I've said this repeatedly, but because I don't always think your way, I'm considered the enemy. Spoken like a true conservative.
In terms of sense of humor, I do have one. Your "joke" just wasn't funny.
I would never have thought this country would have to face questions of the legitimacy of our elections. It seems those who are pushing voter ID laws are willing to allow even that to happen. It makes me sad.
CCraigS wrote: "Many people are asking why we need ID laws to vote. Answer; Because there are millions of people in this country who are not citizens (both legal and illegal) and would vote if they thought they could get away with it because they want something from the government. This is not fear or a conspiracy theory, it is just fact. How many votes would this entail? How much would it effect an election? The answer doesn't matter, any amount of fraudulent votes are bad. We need to ensure honest elections and we can't have that without safeguards!!"
If you are not a US Citizen, then you CAN'T vote. I know this because I used to date a guy who was a Legal Permanent Resident (he came here in the 1970's--as he and his family left Angola as a result of the civil war), and he couldn't vote because he wasn't officially a US Citizen.
Bort, Bort, Bort ......
You wrote:Sick of all these selfish people saying "it's not a problem for ME, so it's not a problem at all".
That is the core of many if not all of our problems, people thinking since something doesn't apply to THEM that problem doesn't exist. People lack the ability to put themselves in others position, they only understand that which they have personal experience.
As an example, people cry about criminal having more rights than victims. But let those same people be under suspicion of something they didn't do, be interrogated, and then those people MAY understand why it appears that criminals have more rights than the vic.
I wonder why in 2012 we are still having most of these problems. 1) It's too easy to make a website where a user can input their address and/or other information and get turn-by-turn directions to their correct voting location. 2) Most states now have smart id's with some kind of magnetic strip on the back. Show up at the poll with your id (there's simply no excuse for any American not to have some form of state id), swipe it in a ridiculously-easy-to-make machine, and you're automatically verified, registered to vote, & issued a ballot (paper or digital). This stuff is not hard. Have a human verify a photo match first if you're worried about it, and this would nearly eliminate these pesky provisional ballots.
IndieLady7 wrote:
"Perhaps I'll do another read later, but something about that article still doesn't sit right with me."
Thanks for the thoughtful response.
I think we are whittling around the edges here. I don't care about the article or how it is sourced. I don't care about the outcome of the court case. The basic facts of this incident have been fairly reported in multiple places. What bugs me about this is:
What was a New Black Panther member doing with a billy club outside a polling place?
I think it varies by state/locality, but in general, electioneers have to be at least 100 feet from the entrance to a polling place. I'd like to see a "no loitering" ordinance within 500 feet of a polling place. That would make the problem of intimidation go way ... on both sides.
(By the way, just to clarify, New Black Panter and Black Panther are two different orgainizations).
Forgiveness in advance for only quoting the pieces I'm responding to. If anyone wants to read the whole post they can go back and do it.
IndieLady7 wrote:
"I have copied whole posts of yours for discussion, so I'm not buying that."
How about if I write something that's just under 2000 characters? What are you going to do then? The key is whether thoughts are taken out of context and I don't think I've done that.
"I've said this repeatedly, but because I don't always think your way, I'm considered the enemy. Spoken like a true conservative."
The enemy?! When did I say you're the enemy? In fact, I didn't "speak" that at all!!! Which is worse; a partial quote, or a complete fabrication?! I think you tend toward the liberal (and I'll add the term "progressive") point of view. That doesn't make you "the enemy". I think it makes you misguided, but that's my own bias toward conservatism. And why such a violent metaphor as "the enemy", IndieLady?
As far as a "party box", I don't think I mentioned "party" anywhere.
"In terms of sense of humor, I do have one. Your "joke" just wasn't funny".
Sorry, I forgot how seriously you liberals take yourselves! And, yes. That was a tweak!
Hey, it's an internet MB, not Harvard debate club!
Curious that "if it's hard for people to get something, the government needs a program to make it easy for them", and yet when it comes to getting a photo ID to vote, suddenly that is just too difficult. People need free contraception, darn it, but there's nothing government can do to help people get photo ID. We'll scour poor neighborhoods to register voters, we'll bus them to the polls, but we won't help them get photo IDs?!?
And why does the left seem so unconcerned about preventing potential voter fraud? The only way to claim this is about vote suppression is to concede up front that the potential votes being suppressed are fraudulent. I don't want someone stealing my vote by pretending to be me, and there's no mechanism in place to confirm identity. And I don't want people who aren't eligible or don't exist casting votes.
If photo ID is not a good means, and could create a problem for people who are eligible, then pray tell us what solution does the left offer? Or does the left have no interest in making sure only citizens vote, and only once?
And of course the left never attempts to suppress votes right? With distorted polls designed to demoralize Republicans into not voting?
All this is typical misdirection. It is a solution in search of a problem where none can be shown to exist. Where is the data showing that it is a significant problem? Other than that it is a sideshow intended to take our eye off the ball, but more than that, it is intended as a barrier to easy voting without complications...
I do not want to dismiss the voter ID movement; however, I think a greater threat to democracy is the gerrymandering that has resulted in locks on a particular districts for the different political parties. There are simply too many districts that mapped to keep a specific party in office in many, but not all states. Why is there not more outrage on this manipulation of voting?
Gary
I’m in Arizona. I moved when my landlord’s property was foreclosed. I was unable to change my address online. I last voted in 2010. With no response to 2 emails, I called a representative to change my address. She said my ID (I ‘m legally blind and don't have a DL) could not be used because the address no longer matched my new one. She said to bring in a bank statement or bills mailed to me at my new address in order to vote.
All my banking/bill-paying is on-line, so I have no bank statements or bills mailed to me.
It was 109 degrees when I left my home to obtain a bank statement with my new address. It took 3 hrs to bus and walk several blocks to my vote. When moved to AZ the round bus trip to get an ID took 6 hrs.
I'm a former college professor, and feel I'm competent to vote, but I feared a heat stroke from the 109 degree heat. How many elders and disabled ppl might have given up, rather than jump through all these hurdles?
"IndieLady7 wrote:
@ecgberht--it's amazing that you take out part of my post to suit your convouluted thinking as opposed to looking at my whole post. It's as if you're deliberately trying to start an argument.
September 11, 2012 - 10:39 am"
Eggie believes he may be experiencing Early Onset Alzheimer's and admits to working lots of Puzzles to forestall development of the disease.
He also admits to staying sharp by engaging in the debates he starts and, in his mind, believes he has won. He 'Wins" by Straw Man arguments and by picking minute pieces of Comments out of context which he then spins into a completely perverse and irrelevant counterclaim.
He is either a very underhanded debater or no longer able to see the gaping holes in his reasoning.
He also presents huge sweeps of imagination and/or speculation which he expects to be believed on his Say-So, yet when cornered by others facts, demands detailed documentation.
Monte Haun mchaun@hotmail.com
You will notice that McChaun does not offer a single example of same to be refuted - just innuendo and propaganda.
That should tell you all you need to know about him.
Oh, also the fact that he begged me "Please leave me alone." (in the 5/31 thread).
What did Truman say? "If you can't stand the heat ..."
Eagledancer wrote:
"All my banking/bill-paying is on-line, so I have no bank statements or bills mailed to me."
So why didn't you just print one out and take it to the polls. And you're a former college professor? You have NO official documents mailed to you that has your address on it? Highly doubtful.