"Voter ID Could Unfairly Target Some" -- Duh!
That is an actual headline (except for the Duh!). Here's the story.
Finally, some actual data on who might be most affected by requiring photo IDs to vote.
The UW-Milwaukee Employment and Training Institute did the study, which found:
Among black males between ages 18 and 24, 78% lacked a driver's license, the largest percentage of any demographic in the study. Other groups in which a majority lacked a driver's license were black males of any age (55% lack a license); Hispanic women of any age (59%); and black women, Hispanic men and Hispanic women between ages 18 and 24 (all between 57% and 66%).
By contrast, only 17% of white men and white women of voting age in Wisconsin lack a driver's license.
You don't have to be a genius to figure out that the groups most likely to be disenfranchised are those who vote heavily Democratic.
Yes, the bill would let them get a different kind of photo ID from the state. But the fact remains, that it would create one more barrier for those people if they want to vote. Advantage: Republicans.
All of the "voter fraud" talk is a mere smokescreen. The photo ID bill is pure, partisan power politics at work.
posted by xoff @ 8:50 AM
5 comments
5 Comments:
Several Points:
1) It is because it is so easy to vote that we have a fraud problem in the first place.
2)This is hardly a barrier since the state will pay for the ID card anyway. If someone is deterred from voting because they DON'T WANT TO be given a state-issued ID card, I don't want that person voting. Clearly they have almost no respect for the process, if that's their attitude.
3) I find it disturbing that there are people out there who feel that the breaking of federal law and subversion of the most basic right of our country should be referred to as a smokescreen. It's my opinion that those who feel this way (all of which that I've met have been Dems) are frightened because the realize they can't rely on breaking the law to win elections.
4) Your reaction is pretty bland. Standard throwing of the race card when you're losing the argument. I wonder if it's worth mentioning that the vast majority of Wisconsinites (~80% I believe) support election reform.
Several Points seems to believe that if one repeats inaccuracies often enough they become true.
He/she is also willing to make pronouncements based on nothing more than personal prejudice. He/she says “I don’t want that person voting.”
They may be elderly, young, or poor, but that doesn’t make the right to vote of a citizen without a photo ID any less important. I don’t have a photo ID other than my passport, which would not be acceptable.
I find people who don’t want me to vote out of touch. Clearly they have almost no respect for the blood, sweat and tears that have been necessary to ensure the right to vote to all citizens.
Note to Republicans: Just because you say there is a "fraud problem" doesn't mean it actually exists.
And I didn't see any Republicans clamoring for the head of that town clerk up north who goofed up W.'s vote totals.
Running elections in this state is like trying to run the latest version of Windows XP on an eight-year-old PC -- it's not the user's fault that it crashes, it's because you're overburdening a creaky old system.
I'd start listening to the R's on this one if they'd even give half of Doyle's reform proposal the time of day.
To the second poster, I would say this. Those men who have shed their blood, sweat, and tears did not do it so that the votes of legitmate voters would be cancelled out. Passport's no good? No matter, the state will provide you with an ID free of charge if you can't afford the chump change it costs. Oddly enough, none of these "inaccuracies" have been pointed out by the poster. I wonder why...
To the third poster, get your head out of the sand. At this point, those who deny voter fraud are either delusional or feel threatened by the loss of this constituency. In case the third poster is too lazy to do their own searching, here's one article about the vote fraud in Milwaukee alone:
http://www.jsonline.com/news/metro/may05/324933.asp
Yeah, losing those 278 felons' votes is going to cripple my electoral plans. Damn you and your facts! By the way, how is your voter ID plan going to stop those felons from voting? Just wondering.
And are you going to volunteer to drive granny over to the DMV to get her state-mandated internal passport...er, photo ID? I figure if you're going to talk the talk, it's only fair for you to walk the walk.
After all, your "free" ID isn't free if she has to take a cab, considering that the DOT has done such a fine job of placing their facilities in highly accessible locations on bus lines.
So they found 200 felons voting and 100 repeat voters in Milwaukee County. I'd really, really like to know how the Republican photo ID bill is going to solve that massive 0.07% vote fraud epidemic, considering that it does absolutely nothing to fix the antiquated, overburdened system that allowed those votes to be cast in the first place.
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