Should voters be required to show ID? (1 Viewer)

[Jim11]

Think of the jobs we can create if we started a new government department devoted to issuing ID cards to everyone in the country.

Yeah, it's too bad we don't have several systems in place to issue government, photo ID cards which could easily be subsidized to also issue free, photo ID cards for voting purposes only. Any county office could issue a card and send in a simple request for reimbursement.I want anyone who wants to vote to be able to vote, but I'd like to know we actually care that every vote is actually from a living, registered voter, and actually the person they say they are. I really don't care if this is an epidemic, small problem, or no problem at all. It's just common sense to me.

Re-read this excellent analogy from Matthias - that's common sense?

Or let's put some numbers on this.There's about 220mm eligible voters in the US.Say half the people without gov't IDs (11%) get them after it being required. So 5% lack it.Say 30% of them would have voted. That's about the average.1.5% of the 220mm voters who would have voted wouldn't.That's 3.3 million voters.On the other hand, say there's 1,000 cases of genuine voter fraud in an election. That would be an extraordinarily high number. When they litigated this at the Supreme Court, the states had to drag out voting fraud cases from the 1800s to try and make this appear like a problem.So take those numbers.A guy asks you if you want insurance on your $1,000 motorbike. You ask him how much it would cost. He tells you the insurance will be $3.3 million. What's the common sense answer?

That's not an excellent analogy; it's an excuse to continue fraud. Why are Democrats in favor of fraud?

 

[tommyGunZ]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

 

[BigSteelThrill]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

You are going to be waiting a long long long time. They couldn't even show anything worthwhile in that regards at the supreme court hearing.

 

[jplvr]

Think of the jobs we can create if we started a new government department devoted to issuing ID cards to everyone in the country.

Yeah, it's too bad we don't have several systems in place to issue government, photo ID cards which could easily be subsidized to also issue free, photo ID cards for voting purposes only. Any county office could issue a card and send in a simple request for reimbursement.I want anyone who wants to vote to be able to vote, but I'd like to know we actually care that every vote is actually from a living, registered voter, and actually the person they say they are. I really don't care if this is an epidemic, small problem, or no problem at all. It's just common sense to me.

Re-read this excellent analogy from Matthias - that's common sense?

Or let's put some numbers on this.There's about 220mm eligible voters in the US.Say half the people without gov't IDs (11%) get them after it being required. So 5% lack it.Say 30% of them would have voted. That's about the average.1.5% of the 220mm voters who would have voted wouldn't.That's 3.3 million voters.On the other hand, say there's 1,000 cases of genuine voter fraud in an election. That would be an extraordinarily high number. When they litigated this at the Supreme Court, the states had to drag out voting fraud cases from the 1800s to try and make this appear like a problem.So take those numbers.A guy asks you if you want insurance on your $1,000 motorbike. You ask him how much it would cost. He tells you the insurance will be $3.3 million. What's the common sense answer?

I think you're making a huge assumption in believing this to be the case provided Maurile's suggestion of having a mechanic at the actual polling center is in place. Why would someone not get a card if it was freely available at the very polling station where they had to vote?

 

[Jim11]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

I asked you this first - Why are Democrats in favor of fraud?

 

[MaxThreshold]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

Can't prosecute something you're not actively looking for or just half-assing. Besides, I'm of the position that anything to stop fraud - regardless of how insignificant some might see it - is better than no measures at all.

 

[tommyGunZ]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

I asked you this first - Why are Democrats in favor of fraud?

I'm not. I think each and every case of voter fraud should be prosecuted to the fullest extent. Now answer mine.

 

[dparker713]

Re-read this excellent analogy from Matthias - that's common sense?

That was actually a horrible analogy.

 

[tommyGunZ]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

Can't prosecute something you're not actively looking for or just half-assing. Besides, I'm of the position that anything to stop fraud - regardless of how insignificant some might see it - is better than no measures at all.

Why aren't folks actively looking for it? Why aren't conservative DA's who believe this is a significant problem allocating the proper resources to curtail such abuses?

 

[Jim11]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

I asked you this first - Why are Democrats in favor of fraud?

I'm not. I think each and every case of voter fraud should be prosecuted to the fullest extent. Now answer mine.

Good, then you agree IDs should be presented to preclude fraud. Much better than trying to prosecute after the fact, which would tie up law enforcement and the courts, resulting in higher costs than issuing IDs.

 

[BigSteelThrill]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

I asked you this first - Why are Democrats in favor of fraud?

I'm not. I think each and every case of voter fraud should be prosecuted to the fullest extent. Now answer mine.

Good, then you agree IDs should be presented to preclude fraud. Much better than trying to prosecute after the fact, which would tie up law enforcement and the courts, resulting in higher costs than issuing IDs.

He didnt agree to, or state any of that, whatsoever.

 

[GTBilly]

Way too lazy to read the entire read or even the first post but the title caught my eye. Are there actually places in the US where you can vote and not show ID and in case someone wants to be a smart ### I mean vote for some form of government?

 

[Jim11]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

I asked you this first - Why are Democrats in favor of fraud?

I'm not. I think each and every case of voter fraud should be prosecuted to the fullest extent. Now answer mine.

Good, then you agree IDs should be presented to preclude fraud. Much better than trying to prosecute after the fact, which would tie up law enforcement and the courts, resulting in higher costs than issuing IDs.

He didnt agree to, or state any of that, whatsoever.

Well he should, as should any fair minded, above board individual. Who wants fraud? Do you?

 

[BigSteelThrill]

Way too lazy to read the entire read or even the first post but the title caught my eye. Are there actually places in the US where you can vote and not show ID and in case someone wants to be a smart ### I mean vote for some form of government?

All of it until relatively recently, with no real issues of voter fraud.

 

[Slapdash]

Republican- We need to have this in order to fight voter fraud!

What he really means- We need this in order to suppress black voting. The less blacks vote, the more likely it is that Republicans will win elections.

Democrat- Voter fraud really isn't happening, so this is unnecessary. Plus, it's antidemocratic.

What he really means- There's a lot of people out there who won't bother to vote if this goes down, mainly poor blacks who we have manipulated for years to vote how we want them to. If these people (who really don't care too much anyhow) don't vote, that shrinks down our power base.

Overall, I'm for this. But forgive me if I'm a little cynical of the motivations of both sides.

Which one of these do you think would reject MT's plan?

 

[MaxThreshold]

It's not just coincidence that the left is against voter IDs. They would lose part of their core voters if IDs were mandatory, such as dead people and people who vote multiple times.

Why aren't we prosecuting all of this voter fraud that you guys are always talking about? Can you offer some numbers regarding prosecutions, convictions, etc that would suggest voter fraud is an important issue worth 10s of millions of our tax dollars?

Can't prosecute something you're not actively looking for or just half-assing. Besides, I'm of the position that anything to stop fraud - regardless of how insignificant some might see it - is better than no measures at all.

Why aren't folks actively looking for it? Why aren't conservative DA's who believe this is a significant problem allocating the proper resources to curtail such abuses?

I would guess a lack of resources, but I can't say for sure. Until someone makes it a priority and gives the law some teeth, I guess it will always be a half-hearted effort.

 

[RCon]

Republican- We need to have this in order to fight voter fraud!

What he really means- We need this in order to suppress black voting. The less blacks vote, the more likely it is that Republicans will win elections.

Democrat- Voter fraud really isn't happening, so this is unnecessary. Plus, it's antidemocratic.

What he really means- There's a lot of people out there who won't bother to vote if this goes down, mainly poor blacks who we have manipulated for years to vote how we want them to. If these people (who really don't care too much anyhow) don't vote, that shrinks down our power base.

Overall, I'm for this. But forgive me if I'm a little cynical of the motivations of both sides.

This is only a case of one-way cynicism. If the left was simultaneously trying to fight this but then supress voters in the South or the suburbs, then I could see being cynical both ways. But there's a right fight here. It's not cynical to be on the right side.

Bull****. Dem politicians are against this because they know it will hurt them in the voting booth.

 

[BassNBrew]

Think of the jobs we can create if we started a new government department devoted to issuing ID cards to everyone in the country.

Yeah, it's too bad we don't have several systems in place to issue government, photo ID cards which could easily be subsidized to also issue free, photo ID cards for voting purposes only. Any county office could issue a card and send in a simple request for reimbursement.I want anyone who wants to vote to be able to vote, but I'd like to know we actually care that every vote is actually from a living, registered voter, and actually the person they say they are. I really don't care if this is an epidemic, small problem, or no problem at all. It's just common sense to me.

Re-read this excellent analogy from Matthias - that's common sense?

Or let's put some numbers on this.There's about 220mm eligible voters in the US.Say half the people without gov't IDs (11%) get them after it being required. So 5% lack it.Say 30% of them would have voted. That's about the average.1.5% of the 220mm voters who would have voted wouldn't.That's 3.3 million voters.On the other hand, say there's 1,000 cases of genuine voter fraud in an election. That would be an extraordinarily high number. When they litigated this at the Supreme Court, the states had to drag out voting fraud cases from the 1800s to try and make this appear like a problem.So take those numbers.A guy asks you if you want insurance on your $1,000 motorbike. You ask him how much it would cost. He tells you the insurance will be $3.3 million. What's the common sense answer?

Yup, let's never address a problem until there's a real fiasco...like Bin Laden, alternative fuels, medical costs.Why do I need a valid id to hunt but not to vote?

 

[RCon]

Way too lazy to read the entire read or even the first post but the title caught my eye. Are there actually places in the US where you can vote and not show ID and in case someone wants to be a smart ### I mean vote for some form of government?

Pretty much most of the country, yes.

 

[dparker713]

Re-read this excellent analogy from Matthias - that's common sense?

That was actually a horrible analogy.

How so?I could see quibbling with the characterization of the costs/benefits into a tighter parallel but overall, I think the magnitude of effects is too frequently lost. Instead, people throw around abstractions which is fine for setting the framework and underpinning of the analysis. But at the end of the day, I don't think anybody would object to requiring IDs if there were mass reports of people impersonating others or elections being stolen by imposters. So you can't abstract away from the harm and benefit. And that analogy brought them into focus. Whether anyone thinks that getting an ID is terribly easy or why on earth would someone not have one, the fact of the matter is that many people don't. Many, many, many people more than there's ever allegations of voter fraud.

In your analogy, you claim the motorbike is worth 1k. But that is the value of the harm you're claiming, not the total value of the asset. A more accurate analogy would be a $220 million airplane.But even that is poor. The false data is not the same as potential lost data. False data is more likely to shake the faith the system relies upon, and false data is more likely to corrupt an outcome than less data. Afterall, less data isnt a harm to the system if the vote arrives at the same winner. Nor do you allow for the possibility of reducing the amount of lost data over time. What if the false data rate would remain the same, but the lost data rate halves every 2 or 4 years? All in all, the cost benefit framework you've used is just not at all apt. It doesn't clarify the situation, it dumbs it down.

 

[cstu]

Number of reasons but time, expense, and the required supporting documents would be up there. But there is a number (11% according to here) of eligible voters who currently don't have a government-issued photo ID. So I guess my question would be: why does anybody think that number is going to go down?

Lots of people don't have health insurance. Do you think that the mandate will have no effect on those numbers?

Apples-oranges. Different C-B analyses.Do you think the government should be able to burden your rights so long as you can denigrate the burdens as trivial and only affecting 11% of the population?

BS on 11%. How do you cash a check?eta: It's OK for the gov't to do it with hunting licenses.

Why does the government not want minorities hunting?

 

[cstu]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

 

[tommyGunZ]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes? It's one of those things that sounds okay on the surface, but make absolutely no "common sense" once you get past the political talking points and into the actual real life consequences. And it's extremely hilarious to hear so called fiscal, small gov't conservatives wax on about this.

 

[cstu]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

It's one of those things that sounds okay on the surface, but make absolutely no "common sense" once you get past the political talking points and into the actual real life consequences of such a policy.

And it's extremely hilarious to hear so called fiscal, small gov't conservatives wax on about this.

I think we should take every measure to make sure those who want to vote can find a way to do get their ID. If that means spending money to help them get their ID's for free, I'm all in favor of that. However, we cannot have a system that puts requirements on voting (citizen, over 18, non-felon) but then has a loophole as simple as making up a name. Even if it's only a few thousand it's a serious corruption of our election process - I hope you haven't forgotten that Bush won in 2000 by 543 votes.

 

[MaxThreshold]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

It's one of those things that sounds okay on the surface, but make absolutely no "common sense" once you get past the political talking points and into the actual real life consequences of such a policy.

And it's extremely hilarious to hear so called fiscal, small gov't conservatives wax on about this.

I think we should take every measure to make sure those who want to vote can find a way to do get their ID. If that means spending money to help them get their ID's for free, I'm all in favor of that. However, we cannot have a system that puts requirements on voting (citizen, over 18, non-felon) but then has a loophole as simple as making up a name. Even if it's only a few thousand it's a serious corruption of our election process - I hope you haven't forgotten that Bush won in 2000 by 543 votes.

Didn't the left claim voter fraud when that happened? I mean, to this day they are still #####ing about how Bush "stole" the election.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

 

[BigSteelThrill]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

Texas Republicans, after the fact, had put forth an amendment to pay for the ID when it became a big issue... then removed it as they worried about the costs. <==== So when their political life is on the line for the "extremely small price to pay" they tuck tail and decide to drop the bomb on the poor instead. Great.

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

Texas Republicans, after the fact, had put forth an amendment to pay for the ID when it became a big issue... then removed it as they worried about the costs. <==== So when their political life is on the line for the "extremely small price to pay" they tuck tail and decide to drop the bomb on the poor instead. Great.

I'm not a Texas Republican.

 

[BigSteelThrill]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

Texas Republicans, after the fact, had put forth an amendment to pay for the ID when it became a big issue... then removed it as they worried about the costs. <==== So when their political life is on the line for the "extremely small price to pay" they tuck tail and decide to drop the bomb on the poor instead. Great.

I'm not a Texas Republican.

That doesn't change anything.

 

[The Commish]

7% of the voters still wouldn't have an ID, right? That's the issue/problem we are talking about right? Why wouldn't the problem/issue still exist if it went from 11 to 7%?

It would. That's what I'm saying.

Then what problem are you talking about when you say:

Is that ok then to fix a problem that doesn't exist?

 

[The Commish]

Number of reasons but time, expense, and the required supporting documents would be up there. But there is a number (11% according to here) of eligible voters who currently don't have a government-issued photo ID. So I guess my question would be: why does anybody think that number is going to go down?

Lots of people don't have health insurance. Do you think that the mandate will have no effect on those numbers?

Apples-oranges. Different C-B analyses.Do you think the government should be able to burden your rights so long as you can denigrate the burdens as trivial and only affecting 11% of the population?

The C-B analysis is going to be completely different depending on your position on the matter.

What's the benefit to spending 10s of millions of dollars to solve a problem that doesn't exist?

What is this problem that doesn't exist that you and Matthias keep talking about?

 

[IvanKaramazov]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

Texas Republicans, after the fact, had put forth an amendment to pay for the ID when it became a big issue... then removed it as they worried about the costs. <==== So when their political life is on the line for the "extremely small price to pay" they tuck tail and decide to drop the bomb on the poor instead. Great.

I'm not a Texas Republican.

That doesn't change anything.

Right, but only because your response didn't have anything to do with what I posted. I guess it's interesting in some academic sense to know that somebody in the Texas legislature disagrees with me on this, but I don't really care.

 

[zed2283]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes? It's one of those things that sounds okay on the surface, but make absolutely no "common sense" once you get past the political talking points and into the actual real life consequences.

And it's extremely hilarious to hear so called fiscal, small gov't conservatives wax on about this.

That's just stupid.Carry on.

 

[The Commish]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

And it goes back to my question earlier that wasn't touched. If this "expense" is a real issue, what happens to the government if these people decide to go out and get a driver's license?

 

[The Commish]

What is this problem that doesn't exist that you and Matthias keep talking about?

This is a problem of 2 problems.First problem: Right now there is some # (the Brennan Center says 11%; people are free to find competing data) of American citizens who are qualified to vote who don't have a government-issued photo ID. If you require a photo ID tomorrow to vote, those people won't vote and can't vote. If you require a photo ID to vote in 2014, then some %age of that %age will assumedly still not have a photo ID and can't vote, won't vote even they can vote, would vote.Second problem: People may be committing voter fraud by giving the name of someone else and using their name to vote. This would be prevented by requiring a photo ID to vote.This discussion is a comparison of these 2 problems.

So which one doesn't exist? That seems to be the crux of your defense along with "expense". I'm trying to understand the position. It seems to me in one breath you are saying the problem doesn't exist and then the next breath that the problem is too expensive to fix. So which is it? If it doesn't exist, then there is nothing to fix and thus no expense.

 

[bigbottom]

7% of the voters still wouldn't have an ID, right? That's the issue/problem we are talking about right? Why wouldn't the problem/issue still exist if it went from 11 to 7%?

It would. That's what I'm saying.

Then what problem are you talking about when you say:

Is that ok then to fix a problem that doesn't exist?

I think he's saying the problem would be that the 7% would now be prohibited from voting.

 

[bigbottom]

Matthias, I'm pretty damn liberal on a lot of subjects but I can't understand how you think it's taking away someone's right to vote simply by asking them to provide the most basic of identification. If someone truly wants to vote it's not that hard to go to the DMV one time in their life.

If we are to believe the data from those who have actually studied the issue, millions of otherwise eligible voters will be disenfranchised due to this additional hurdle. Are you in favor of spending 10s of millions of tax payer dollars to enact a program that will yield those results, in an effort to better guard against a few thousand (at most) fraudulently cast votes?

Also, can we knock it off with the "tens of millions" stuff? First of all, $50 million (say) is an extremely small price to pay to improve the perceived integrity of the electoral system. If I told you that it would cost $50 million to pay for electonic voting machines that generated a clear, unambiguous paper trail -- as opposed to the kind where your vote vanishes into the grid but we promise that it's being counted, really -- you'd be completely in favor of this and making the exact same argument. But that's beside the beside the point. The DMV already exists, and most of its expenses are fixed costs. I find it very hard to believe that the expense of providing IDs to a few more people, given that the machinery is already in place and utilized by the overwhelming majority of the popultion right now, is even as large as you're making it sound like. Providing IDs to people is not a difficult thing to do -- the government does this now, it's beeing doing it for a long time, and it's pretty good at it. This isn't like putting a guy on the moon.

I agree that the expense issue is largely beside the point. That said, from a budgetary standpoint, I think this is about more than just providing free IDs to "a few more people." It's about providing free IDs from here on out to all who apply for them. That likely will increase the demand for such IDs and eliminate a stream of revenue (the fees previously charged for such IDs). I think that may be what concerns the bean counters in state government when they are dealing with budget shortfalls. But as I said in the other thread on this, I don't find the government expense argument to be particularly compelling in the voter ID debate.

 

[The Commish]

7% of the voters still wouldn't have an ID, right? That's the issue/problem we are talking about right? Why wouldn't the problem/issue still exist if it went from 11 to 7%?

It would. That's what I'm saying.

Then what problem are you talking about when you say:

Is that ok then to fix a problem that doesn't exist?

I think he's saying the problem would be that the 7% would now be prohibited from voting.

Ok. But if they are ok with it (and I'm assuming they are sense they don't care enough to go get the ID) why shouldn't we be ok with it? At that point it's a choice for the person. Making the decision to get off my butt to vote isn't much different from making the decision to get off my butt and go get an ID.ETA: I don't think that's what he's saying, and I certainly don't expect you to answer a question on his logic. I pose the question in general even if we some day get by a problem existing that doesn't exist

 

[The Commish]

What is this problem that doesn't exist that you and Matthias keep talking about?

This is a problem of 2 problems.First problem: Right now there is some # (the Brennan Center says 11%; people are free to find competing data) of American citizens who are qualified to vote who don't have a government-issued photo ID. If you require a photo ID tomorrow to vote, those people won't vote and can't vote. If you require a photo ID to vote in 2014, then some %age of that %age will assumedly still not have a photo ID and can't vote, won't vote even they can vote, would vote.Second problem: People may be committing voter fraud by giving the name of someone else and using their name to vote. This would be prevented by requiring a photo ID to vote.This discussion is a comparison of these 2 problems.

So which one doesn't exist? That seems to be the crux of your defense along with "expense". I'm trying to understand the position. It seems to me in one breath you are saying the problem doesn't exist and then the next breath that the problem is too expensive to fix. So which is it? If it doesn't exist, then there is nothing to fix and thus no expense.

The problem which doesn't really exist is the effect of the second problem, namely that an election will arrive at the wrong result because of the number of people who voted improperly.

Ok, but you acknowledge that the problem of voter identity does exist, right? Whether you think it's a big deal or not shouldn't preclude you from understanding that fact. If there is an easy solution to a problem, what's the big deal in fixing it?

 

[RCon]

What is this problem that doesn't exist that you and Matthias keep talking about?

This is a problem of 2 problems.First problem: Right now there is some # (the Brennan Center says 11%; people are free to find competing data) of American citizens who are qualified to vote who don't have a government-issued photo ID. If you require a photo ID tomorrow to vote, those people won't vote and can't vote. If you require a photo ID to vote in 2014, then some %age of that %age will assumedly still not have a photo ID and can't vote, won't vote even they can vote, would vote.Second problem: People may be committing voter fraud by giving the name of someone else and using their name to vote. This would be prevented by requiring a photo ID to vote.This discussion is a comparison of these 2 problems.

Correct.Matthias and tommyGunz and some others believe that #1 above is a significant problem, and that it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to fix. They also believe that #2 above is not an issue, and that it is actually not a problem at all.Most people in this and other similar threads believe the exact opposite. Namely, that #2 is a problem, and that #1 is not a problem at all.

 

[timschochet]

I really am pretty biased about this, because I've always believed the less people that vote the better. So when I hear people complain that this will discourage people from voting, I'm thinking, good.

I really hate all the ads encouraging people to vote every 4 years. I would love to see an ad which reads: "If you haven't paid attention and don't know what you're doing, please stay at home." (And yes, I am making the assumption that if a person is unable or unwilling to produce a picture ID, that person is unlikely to have paid attention to the election, and I don't want that person voting.)

 

[timschochet]

On the other hand, though, this fear of voter fraud is total crap. It's an extension of the conservative fear of illegal immigrants, IMO. It's completely bogus, doesn't exist.

 

[tommyGunZ]

What is this problem that doesn't exist that you and Matthias keep talking about?

This is a problem of 2 problems.First problem: Right now there is some # (the Brennan Center says 11%; people are free to find competing data) of American citizens who are qualified to vote who don't have a government-issued photo ID. If you require a photo ID tomorrow to vote, those people won't vote and can't vote. If you require a photo ID to vote in 2014, then some %age of that %age will assumedly still not have a photo ID and can't vote, won't vote even they can vote, would vote.

Second problem: People may be committing voter fraud by giving the name of someone else and using their name to vote. This would be prevented by requiring a photo ID to vote.

This discussion is a comparison of these 2 problems.

Correct.Matthias and tommyGunz and some others believe that #1 above is a significant problem, and that it would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to fix. They also believe that #2 above is not an issue, and that it is actually not a problem at all.

Most people in this and other similar threads believe the exact opposite. Namely, that #2 is a problem, and that #1 is not a problem at all.

That's fine. Which side do you think the data supports?

 

[Sarnoff]

On the other hand, though, this fear of voter fraud is total crap. It's an extension of the conservative fear of illegal immigrants, IMO. It's completely bogus, doesn't exist.

The fear came from the other side, too, when Halliburton was manufacturing the voting machines...I still don't get why we shouldn't close the barn doors now instead of waiting until after the horses have left.

 

[MaxThreshold]

I really am pretty biased about this, because I've always believed the less people that vote the better. So when I hear people complain that this will discourage people from voting, I'm thinking, good. I really hate all the ads encouraging people to vote every 4 years. I would love to see an ad which reads: "If you haven't paid attention and don't know what you're doing, please stay at home." (And yes, I am making the assumption that if a person is unable or unwilling to produce a picture ID, that person is unlikely to have paid attention to the election, and I don't want that person voting.)

Good Posting, Tim. I agree whole-heartedly with this. Enough of the "Get out to Vote" drives. All you're doing is herding sheep who have no business in the direction of their government if they aren't paying attention.

 

[GeauxTigers]

The justice department struck down a Texas law this week that would have required voters to show identification on the grounds that it was discriminatory against minorities:

What? How the #### is this discriminatory against minorities? Minorities can't get an ID now? Ridiculous!

 

[MaxThreshold]

On the other hand, though, this fear of voter fraud is total crap. It's an extension of the conservative fear of illegal immigrants, IMO. It's completely bogus, doesn't exist.

Bad Posting, Tim. I whole-heartedly DISAGREE with this. I think preventing voter fraud as much as possible is a mandatory job of government to keep our elections as "free from dispute" as possible.

 

[timschochet]

I really am pretty biased about this, because I've always believed the less people that vote the better. So when I hear people complain that this will discourage people from voting, I'm thinking, good. I really hate all the ads encouraging people to vote every 4 years. I would love to see an ad which reads: "If you haven't paid attention and don't know what you're doing, please stay at home." (And yes, I am making the assumption that if a person is unable or unwilling to produce a picture ID, that person is unlikely to have paid attention to the election, and I don't want that person voting.)

Good Posting, Tim. I agree whole-heartedly with this. Enough of the "Get out to Vote" drives. All you're doing is herding sheep who have no business in the direction of their government if they aren't paying attention.

Well I think you're agreeing with me mostly because you think that if less uninformed people vote it will help Republicans. But that might not be so in every case. For instance, if I had my way about 90% of all the conservatives who voted last night should have stayed at home. These are the ones who either believe that Obama is a Muslim or are unsure about it. To me, these sorts of viewpoints prove their ignorance and make them ineligible in my book. Maybe only 10% of everyone living in Alabama and Mississippi should be voting.

 

[Rayderr]

As an aside, we're comfortable with people voting absentee even though that doesn't have the same level of surety as someone voting in person with an ID that says they are who they say they are and people voting with state IDs which could be faked (they could ask college students for tips on this) because we as a society believe that the benefit of these two things is greater than the theoretical harm than something more stringent.

I think this attitude is perfectly sensible.

Unless the practice has changed, one of the keys to fake IDs is that you use a state far away from where your actually at, since the person carding you probably won't know what an ID from 2000 miles away would look like but is an expert on what their own state's ID looks like.

 

[MaxThreshold]

I really am pretty biased about this, because I've always believed the less people that vote the better. So when I hear people complain that this will discourage people from voting, I'm thinking, good. I really hate all the ads encouraging people to vote every 4 years. I would love to see an ad which reads: "If you haven't paid attention and don't know what you're doing, please stay at home." (And yes, I am making the assumption that if a person is unable or unwilling to produce a picture ID, that person is unlikely to have paid attention to the election, and I don't want that person voting.)

Good Posting, Tim. I agree whole-heartedly with this. Enough of the "Get out to Vote" drives. All you're doing is herding sheep who have no business in the direction of their government if they aren't paying attention.

Well I think you're agreeing with me mostly because you think that if less uninformed people vote it will help Republicans. But that might not be so in every case. For instance, if I had my way about 90% of all the conservatives who voted last night should have stayed at home. These are the ones who either believe that Obama is a Muslim or are unsure about it. To me, these sorts of viewpoints prove their ignorance and make them ineligible in my book. Maybe only 10% of everyone living in Alabama and Mississippi should be voting.

No, actually that's not why I'm agreeing with you at all. I don't want uninformed idiots from EITHER side voting. I believe people should stay on top of their government. I don't want someone voting because they believe Obama is a muslim or voting because they think they are going to get Obama-money to help with their bills.But then again, who gets to decide who is an idiot? Yikes, I think I've just opened another can of worms..