Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder "If most states don't require any ID, how can it ever be proven fraud exists? Under our current system, massive fraud could and probably does exist with no way of every verifying that it does/does not. What are you going to do?" You'll do nothing. Possible voter fraud is a smoke screen for the GOP trying to prevent minorities from voting for a Democrat. Until it's proven therefore, voter fraud does not exist. On the other hand, we now have more proof the GOP is trying to rig elections by virtue of these bogus voter fraud claims.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder How do we know all judges aren't wearing pants under their robes? I'll bet there are a LOT of judges stark naked on the bench. We need a law that says judges have to put their robes on in open court. It's just as absurd.
Originally Posted By TMI "and probably does" Amazingly huge assumption given the facts people have already presented on this page. Wow. By the way, care to reply some more to posts 44 or 52, there's a lot of information there being ignored. "Also, it is fairly simple to forge signatures..." Also, it is fairly simple to get a fake ID.
Originally Posted By WilliamK99 I am done with this topic, way too many ignorant people on Laughingplace. This is not a GOP vs Democrat issue...This is common fricking sense, If someone doesn't have an ID, they can't prove who they are period...Not just in voting but to get a job, to apply for Welfare, for anything... So to say it would disenfranchise people if they have to get an ID is ignorant at best,, but malicious at worst...
Originally Posted By WilliamK99 Final thoughts on the matter, September 10, nobody thought terrorists could bring down a skyscraper using air planes...If anyone would have brought up the threat, they would have been laughed at and told "there have been zero reports of buildings getting taken down by airplanes". The next day people changed their tune... Didn't mean the threat didn't exist, it means people weren't aware of the threat. Same thing with voter fraud, we may not be aware of it but it does exist, and even one count of voter fraud is too much. How is it unreasonable to ask for a voter ID system to be implemented within the next 4 years, with a sizable ad campaign telling people in 2016, no ID, no vote... Just because there are no reports of any issues, doesn't mean the threat of voter fraud does not exist...
Originally Posted By TMI "care to reply some more to posts 44 or 52, there's a lot of information there being ignored" "I am done with this topic" What a surprise.
Originally Posted By SingleParkPassholder <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2012/05/republicans_are_trying_to_stamp_out_voting_fraud_that_does_not_exist_.html" target="_blank">http://www.slate.com/articles/...st_.html</a> Read it, William, before you stomp away in a huff. "Regardless of how “easy” it may be to trick an unsuspecting poll worker, it rarely happens. And there is a simple explanation why: Voter fraud is a felony that carries a federal sentence of five years in prison and a $10,000 fine. If I show up at the polls and pretend to be Michael McDonald, at best, I gain a single vote for my preferred candidate; at worst, I get sent to prison until 2017. Stealing an entire election one vote a time (and risking significant penalties for doing it) defies common sense."
Originally Posted By mawnck >>I am done with this topic, way too many ignorant people on Laughingplace.<< But one less in this topic. >>Just because there are no reports of any issues, doesn't mean the threat of voter fraud does not exist...<< Which is why Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster both invest in the Diebold Voting Machine Company.
Originally Posted By ecdc >>So to say it would disenfranchise people if they have to get an ID is ignorant at best,, but malicious at worst...<< No, it's just the truth. You're trying to protect against a phantom problem at the expense of a real one. It's been repeatedly demonstrated that voter fraud is not an issue. It's further been repeatedly demonstrated that requiring IDs is a problem because it prevents thousands of people from voting. Of course it's a GOP vs. Democrat issue, because the GOP is the one pushing for the laws because it tends to disenfranchise voters who lean Democrat. Why would they want to do that, I wonder?
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <Also, it is fairly simple to forge signatures...> From your link: "This may take several tries and some practice, but is possible, and easy after a few times. Put the sheet with the signature on it over the sheet where you want the signature. You may have seen this method used by forensic investigators to recognize forged signatures. Place it over, use a powerful desk light, or simply eye co-ordination to pinpoint exactly where you want it to appear. Use the pen or pencil, and push in on the paper very very slightly as you run the letters, if you do it too hard it will be obvious as the ink will be very deep in the paper (careful not to rip it). Just slightly, enough to be seen on the other paper. Once this is complete, check so you didnt make it too deep, again, I suggest you practice before attempting to forge the real paper. Now, this is the hardest part of this, you have to run the pen throughout the tiny groove you left from the other paper, simply run it through the imprint you left. Slowly and carefully, if you screw up your screwed, people are very cunning (especially teachers) on seeing when their signature has been tampered with. Slowly fit the pen into the groove and, preferably in shorter strokes write out the whole signature, again, dont press too hard." Need I point out that the lady at the voting booth would not let you employ this slow-trace, paper-over-paper method? I guess I need to. #87 also points out what I figure most people would intuit - talk about common sense! - but I guess not. If I want to impersonate someone else at a voting booth, I have to a). risk 5 years in jail; b). pick someone who I know is on the rolls in that precinct; c). hope to God I show up before him - if he's already voted, I'm instantly busted; d). hope to God the registrar doesn't know him and thus that I'm not him (at my local high school I see the same lady just about every year, who knows me by name. That doesn't happen everywhere, but in many places it does); e). congratulate myself that I pulled off one more vote in a contest that will probably be decided by thousands. Once in a while there are close elections, but to influence most you'd need to have thousands of impersonators, which of course would exponentially raise to chance of getting caught. OR - if you really want to influence an election unduly - and this is why the current GOP efforts are the REAL voter fraud as far as I'm concerned - you can change the rules for hundreds of thousands of people (as in PA or TX) and even if 90% of them - unlikely, but let's go with it - manage to jump through the hoops that they shouldn't have to jump through, you've still disenfranchised tens of thousands of voters, mostly Democrat-voting voters. That IS a game-changer, potentially, and that's why we're seeing these efforts. Don't kid yourself that there's any other reason. <You're trying to protect against a phantom problem at the expense of a real one. It's been repeatedly demonstrated that voter fraud is not an issue. It's further been repeatedly demonstrated that requiring IDs is a problem because it prevents thousands of people from voting.> Exactly, exactly, exactly.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <a href="http://www.philly.com/philly/columnists/karen_heller/162018875.html" target="_blank">http://www.philly.com/philly/c...875.html</a> "Here's the fairy tale House Majority Leader Mike Turzai told lawmakers in March before Pennsylvania's voter ID bill passed: "I certainly think and advocate that this is actually going to protect the enfranchisement of every single citizen's vote, no matter what your background, beliefs, religion, race, or ethnicity are." And here's what he told the Republican State Committee last month to wild applause: "Voter ID, which is going to allow Gov. Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania, done." ...Please note the difference between what the official, publicly-stated reason was for passing this... and the REAL reason that he bragged about to the GOP State Committee. "Before passage, Pennsylvania Secretary of State Carol Aichele estimated that 99 percent of voters would have the necessary identification to vote. Uh, no. Almost 10 percent of the commonwealth's 8.2 million voters lack proper ID for the November election, and 18 percent of voters in Philadelphia, the birthplace of democracy and, by far, the most affected county. For this accomplishment, Pennsylvania earned its place on the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights' Map of Shame. In the immortal words of state Sen. Daylin Leach, "If you have to stop people from voting to win elections, your ideas suck." ...Somebody please buy me this T-shirt. "Logic has almost nothing to do with the law. Enforcement and education are handled by one department (State), while registration is conducted by another (Transportation). You have to go to a PennDot office to get a non-driving ID, but may have trouble getting there if you don't drive. People born in Pennsylvania will have an easier time securing ID than folks who were not. If you were born at home in another state, it gets worse. And you really don't want to know what happens to voters born in Puerto Rico." ...Again, jumping through hoops just to exercise a basic right that no hoops should be required for. You proved your citizenship, age, etc. when you registered. And the idea that masses of people are going to show up to the polls impersonating others is just illogical. "Voter ID is not merely a horrendous law, built on a fallacy of pervasive voter fraud, that disproportionately affects the poor, old, disabled, and folks of color - though it most surely does hurt them - but it also disenfranchises the largest city in the state, actively trying to make Philadelphia a lesser player in the 2012 presidential election. Four years ago, 83 percent of Philadelphians who went to the polls, almost 600,000 residents, voted for Barack Obama. So now, in addition to registering voters, and getting registered voters back to the polls, the Obama campaign must help voters get ID. It's like running an obstacle course wearing a 50-pound backpack." ...Gee. The city that provided the largest plurality of votes for Obama is the one most affected. Quel suprise. "Eighteen percent is a whole lot of folks," Mayor Nutter says, and the impetus for the law "a solution looking for a problem." He notes of so many people affected, "This is the kind of information that is important to have before such game-changing legislation. "I have yet to see any legitimate documented information or research that indicates some small, medium, or large issue about fraudulent voting in Philadelphia or Pennsylvania." To cite an example, the Secretary of State's Office had to go back to the 1994 William Stinson state Senate race, where fraud involved absentee ballots cast in the names of dead people. Yet the current law doesn't concern absentee ballots." So they went back 20 years and couldn't even find examples of the problem they're "fixing." Lovely.
