The Goat Pen

Arlen Spector has died.

10ac wrote:

AlabamAlum wrote:The hunting license thing is silly. Most hunting licenses aren't even picture IDs. As far as voter fraud, I personally know of some in my area.

Anyway, If it is an organized effort to exclude legitimate voters, and on a national scale, I think we should be able to find out, and if that's the case, we need to dust off some of our capital punishments for high treason.

Allowing ineligible people to vote in essence excludes the vote of legitimate voters. Your snit is mere tartuffery.

It is widely understood and accepted, by all, that voter fraud is fairly non-existent on a national scale. These efforts, while not necessarily orchestrated by a cabal in Mordor, are definitely consistent in party affiliation, style of addressing the "issue" and rhetoric around the need for the law changes. If I add that all up, it seems like a throwback to the days of poll taxes and literacy tests that were deemed unconstitutional in 1965. History will not be kind to those who have tried to roll back the freedoms of the American people. I think this is what we are seeing. A disenfranchisement of minorities, poor and elderly (legitimate) voters.

The only legitimate case of voter fraud that was seen to impact any where near a significant amount of voters was in Florida, where a group set up to take in registration information for voters were found to be shredding the applications of registered Democrats. Additionally, this same group was found to have submitted over 100 fraudulent registration forms into the Palm Beach, FL registrar.

Seriously, how many of you on here knew of that? I would guess not many, if any.

However, 10ac calls it people being in a "snit" when people are upset over Americans are losing their right to vote under the umbrella of a law looking to "protect" the veracity of the Democratic process...while not one judge who has had these tactics laid out to them in court has upheld the proposals these (exclusively GOP) State Attys Gen have enacted. It seems like the ones in a "snit" have juris prudence and the Constitution on their side. Seems like 10ac falls on the opposite.

It is widely understood by all that voter fraud is fairly non-existent on the national scale? I don't agree with that statement.

I personally think both the 'national effort to deny democrats the right to vote' and the 'rampant polling booth fraud' that has made us go to an ID system are overblown. I also think the fear of the Black Panthers keeping whites outta inner city polling places are as overblown as the KKK keeping blacks outta rural polling places.

One thing is for sure: one's belief in either side of the above tends to fall along party lines.

Math isn't partisan.

http://votingrights.news21.com/article/election-fraud/

AlabamAlum wrote:One thing is for sure: one's belief in either side of the above tends to fall along party lines.

My belief is bolstered by the findings of the court judges. All of them that have offered their ruling, to date, have said the laws are not Constitutional. That type of thing leads me to believe it's not some overreaction. I guess I'm sensitive to this even more due to the history of these actions in this country.

Bkln,

I'm aware of that study by the journalism students. Opponents would contend that (1) the students only collected data on reported cases (2,068 since the year 2000), (2) that voter impersonation is vastly unreported (3) that the study had no method to ascertain how many bogus voter registrations were completed (4) that the study had no method to determine the number of registrations completed by the more than 12 million 'illegals' and (5) that the study had no means of determining the number of dual (or more) state registered voters.

Robert A. Pastor, former executive director of the Carter-Baker Commission on Federal Election Reform, a bipartisan group that in 2005 called for better data on voter fraud while advocating voter IDs, said both parties have fair points about the electoral system. “Republicans have a legitimate concern about the integrity of the ballot,” Pastor said. “Democrats have a legitimate concern about access. Good electoral policy is one that incorporates both, but we’re not seeing that happen today.”

I am along Pastor's line, except I believe both sides overstate their fears.

Your mileage may vary.

How is it overstating fears when the estimate is that 800,000 people in the State of Pennsylvania will lose their right to vote. How is it overstatement, when the govt is kicking off people from voting based on some partial review of death records, rushing it through to kick off a greater number of one party or the other. The only studies we have out there were brought up by Bkln which show that actual voter fraud is negligible. In response is not a study but a speculation that there may be more, not proof, not estimates, but speculation. Just look at the numbers.

No system in anything is perfect. You have to balance off the benefit to the worse effect. The numbers that say get rid of 800,000 in order stop 100 makes absolutely no sense. This isn't about partisanship. I've been a registered independent for 27 years. I've voted Republican, Democrat, and Reform. Regardless of who I supported, who I want to win, I never would support the disenfranchisement of voters, whether urban, appalachian or Cajun (for those of you that don't know, the latter 2 are predominantly Republican-leaning).

Its simple. Dems start getting the word out that you HAVE TO register to vote by Sept 1. That goes for everybody else too by the way it just that the poor usually find out on Aug 31st and repubs would like to keep it that way.

I also want an amendment stating that no political ads should be shown on tv before October 1 of an election year or 30 days before any other election.

This is besides ridiculous.

First off, my sister was never told she was removed. She just happened to check when checking on her daughter to find out she was disenfranchised. Second, people in the middle class always forget that the poor depend on mass transit and it may take them an hour just to get to a place to register. Third, they shouldn't kick people off the roles unless they are sure they have died, not that they might be. Fourth, they should accept the same documentation that they would for getting a driver's license (which includes, bills, student id's and not necessarily a picture ID). If you don't need a picture Id to get a driver's license, why should you require more to vote than you do to get a driver's license. Fifth, if you look at these rules, they are designed to go after one party's constituents as opposed to another.

Accepting a hunting license, but not a state college ID is quite obvious ploy. And no purging the roles less than 8 months before an election but all purges, the burden of proof must be on the govt with penalty for mistakes by the govt (then they'll make sure before they kick someone off that has the right to vote). Don't kick people off on a partial guess and then force them at a late date to prove that the govt was wrong.

In Florida, at one point, over 40% of the people purged were inaccurate and the vast majority were Latino and African-American.

Why does your sister hate America ?

She loves America. She hates those who abuse others within America

In her small, one-chair home office in Montana, I sit beside Rossmiller on a little tiled table normally reserved for a lamp. Outside, the vistas stretch across Big Sky Country to the Elk Horn Ridge Mountains. Inside, Rossmiller shows me what she does as perhaps America's most accomplished amateur terrorist hunter.

http://www.wired.com/politics/security/ ... ntPage=all

In honor of "Homeland," here's a good one about our clandestine ops wing of the govt:

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-a ... =fullstory

(Interesting showing of some of the things they did overseas, as well as onshore to citizens)

Spacer,

I wasn't talking about you or your sister really. I, however, do not believe that there is a national (GOP?) campaign to remove legitimate black, Hispanic, democratic voters from the voting rosters. I just don't. I think what has happened is an over-zealous approach by that group to "fix" voter fraud with partial match removals - which is bad enough and cause for concern, and it appears that those partial-match redactions have been correctly dealt with by the judges.

I also believe that they were sincere when they said that they could be reinstated at the polls. Of course, every polling site should have a monitor - and part of the monitor's job is to insure that processes are followed.

my health insurance went up $478 annually over last year, along with a $185 increase in dental and a $130 increase in disability.

I could laugh off the $100-$200 increases each year. This year hurts.

by no means do I endorse his belief but he sounds genuine in his description

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2 ... rlife.html

eCat wrote:my health insurance went up $478 annually over last year, along with a $185 increase in dental and a $130 increase in disability.

I could laugh off the $100-$200 increases each year. This year hurts.

Did you get any rebate checks last year? I did.

Bklyn wrote:

eCat wrote:my health insurance went up $478 annually over last year, along with a $185 increase in dental and a $130 increase in disability.

I could laugh off the $100-$200 increases each year. This year hurts.

Did you get any rebate checks last year? I did.

whaaaaaah???????????????????????????