Monday, October 17, 2011

At least the War on Voting is Going Well


Bill Clinton has called the wave of assaults
on voting rights the "worst since Jim Crow." 
Overviews of the Issues:
Why New Photo ID Laws Mean Some Won't Vote : NPR (1/28/2012)
[link to this page: http://hmny.me/waronvoting ]
My facefriend succinctly/accurately summarizes:
 It basically comes down to this: do we want to maximize or minimize the number of voters - and how difficult or easy you want to make it to participate in the democratic process. Is the proposed ban on the bilingual ballot but a new version of literacy test, and the voter ID requirement a new version of poll tax???"
My response to that question:
It IS the question. I know what my answer is. In a context where all people have the same tools and the same ACCESS to tools to allow them to vote, then OK, voter ID seems reasonable. I guess. Or at least falls in the category of "do no harm". Maybe.

But as is, the harm is CLEAR and it is disproportionate and UNrandom in its impact: 
The Old - The Non-White  - The Young  - The Poor

Is there any reason that we should be disenfranchising these groups, none of which have their hands firmly on the rudder of Power (except maybe the Old, but it took them a while and a lot of voting to get there)?

Yes? Then let's hear it. Why SHOULD we disenfranchise the Poor, the Minorities, the Young and the Old over the non-colored-middle-aged-middle-class-or-rich?  Because the non-colored-middle-aged-middleclass-or-rich are so disproportionately underrepresented now?

Policy Brief on the Truth About “Voter Fraud” | Brennan Center for Justice, 2006
    --Fraud by individual voters is both irrational and extremely rare.
    --Many vivid anecdotes of purported voter fraud have been proven false or do not demonstrate fraud.
    --Voter fraud is often conflated with other forms of election misconduct.
    --Raising the unsubstantiated specter of mass voter fraud suits a particular policy agenda.
    --Claims of voter fraud should be carefully tested before they become the basis for action.
Don't talk about voterID to me: it's all BS: Pennsylvania case study: Latest Stats on the Republican attempt to Disenfranchise Voters « Sky Dancing (2012) http://bit.ly/PL7VIF
See also: so. blog.: Disenfranchisement and race and poverty - http://bit.ly/MRJuJh
There are election problems
Voter Fraud is an Imaginary Problem
  • Hey Scott Brown: Election Day impersonation, an impetus for voter ID laws, a rarity, data show - WaPo - http://wapo.st/MRILYE 
  • Wendy Weiser, Brennan Center: Voter Fraud Claims Are Smoke Without Fire | Debate Club | US News Opinion (Jun 2012)  http://goo.gl/QDiU5
    • Most claims of voter fraud amount to a great deal of smoke without any fire. Charges of hordes of ineligible voters almost always turn out to be false. For example, South Carolina recently claimed that over 900 dead people had voted in recent elections. But when election authorities conducted apainstaking study of 207 of those allegations, they discovered nothing more than clerical errors, bad data matching, and stray marks on scanners. They found not one instance of an actual dead person voting.
  • This is typical. Study after study makes clear that voter fraud is extremely rare, and impersonation fraud—the kind of fraud used to justify tighter voter ID requirements and other voting restrictions—is even rarer. You are more likely to be struck by lightning than commit impersonation fraud, according to our exhaustive research. 
  • South Carolina Voter ID Law Author Cannot Cite A Single Case of Voter Impersonation (8/28/2012) http://bit.ly/Prs901
  • http://www.truthaboutfraud.org/
  • Bush Admin. spends 5 years looking for voter fraud--can't find it: New York Times, 2007
  • MinnPost - Number of ineligible 2008 Minnesota voters minuscule, new survey reports (1/22/2010) [RE: Felons voting]
    • 26 felons convicted of voting in 2008; another dozen convicted of registering to vote.  = "9 ten-thousandths of 1 erscent (0.0009%) of 2008 voters (in 
  • ABSENTEE BALLOTS
    • Supreme Court Weighs Voter ID Requirements (NPR, 1/9/2008) 
      • Voter fraud does exist, say the experts, but in more systematic ways [than at-the-polls fraud], through ballot box stuffing, voter machine manipulation, registration list manipulation and absentee balloting.
    • Photo ID to vote? Unnecessary, says auditor in Newton, Iowa  newtondailynews.com |  (3/29/2011)  
      • If there is any potential for fraud in Jasper County, Parrott said, the potential would be in absentee voting. Currently, Iowa law allows a person to register to vote by mail, as well as vote absentee by mail, without ever having to produce any form of ID. This creates a double standard, Parrott says, and a requirement of a photo ID to vote in person will encourage more and more voters to go the absentee route when voting. 
Election Fraud is a Real Problem
Trumping up Stories of Fraud
Republican State Legislatures are Restricting Voters' Access to Voting
Republicans Accuse Obama of Restricting Voter Access. Trouble is, they're projecting
Studies, Polls, Case Studies
Ask: Which Voters Will Be Most Affected by New Voter ID Laws? 
Trying to Push Back against Voter Disenfranchisement
Acorn, Acorn, Acorn
What about LOW VOTER TURN OUT in general?
Massachusetts

Real Stories of Fraud
2000
2004
There are positive reforms

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