Exactly. ID laws are no different than poll taxes or literacy tests. They’re just a procedural issue with no racial overtones.
It is a purely leftist way of thinking in America, and the left cherry-picks when to apply such logic.
For example, the proponents of cigarette taxes are by and large nanny-state liberals. Yet, by the reasoning of their opposition to voter ID laws, these taxes represent an attack on the poor, as the poor represent the majority of those who regularly smoke.
The modern left sees itself as the “guardian” of the poor. They need to legislate away unhealthy behavior (tobacco, large sodas) because the poor are too stupid to quit doing these things on their own. And similarly, they need to protect the poor from requiring an ID to vote because the poor are too lazy do what everyone else has to do to function in our society.
The shame is that such belittling pandering often works. There there, child, the Democrats can take care of you.
A bit of a hijack but…
To sign up for a health insurance plan through the marketplace on healthcare.gov, you may need to submit up to 2 (TWO!!!) forms of identification to prove your citizenship.
Does that make the ACA 2x more racist than voter ID laws?
But that won’t happen, since the only purpose of such laws is to disenfranchise people. The Republicans will not support a law that doesn’t disenfranchise people.
Garbage. There’s no truth to the Republican side in either debate.
And what do you suggest the poor* do instead of fighting such laws; take hostages?
*and non whites, especially blacks, since this is about the Republicans’ racism too
This isn’t about anyone being “lazy”, this is about the bigotry and class hatred of the Republicans, and how they’ve alienated the poor and non-whites, and how they want to suppress the vote of the people they’ve spent so long persecuting.
I’ve seen no evidence to support that. Most people don’t have to submit ANY form of identification, because their identity is verified through Experian. For those who do need to submit paperwork, the list is longer and more inclusive than what the elections offices will accept; an employer-issued or school-issued ID, e.g., is on the healthcare.gov list.
Moreover, the people most apt to lack ID (the elderly and the poor) probably aren’t going to be on healthcare.gov anyway, as neither Medicaid nor Medicare requires enrollment through that website.
I have not seen any evidence that minority customers are disproportionately burdened by the requirements at healthcare.gov, for the reasons above stated. If such evidence does appear, then I may change my mind.
Most people in the rest of the world, if asked if voters should be required to produce ID to vote, would probably look bewildered and slack-jawed…“Uh yes, duh, of course. Common sense.”
Areas where the USA lags behind much of the developed world:
- Universal health care
- Eco-friendly recycling
- Academic K-12 math and science proficiency
- Requiring voter ID
Nice strawman.
Tobacco hasn’t been legislated away. Use is now more restricted, but that’s a case of the right of some people to smoke anywhere they want and the rights of other people to avoid second hand smoke. Balancing people’s rights when they come in conflict is one of the functions of an effective government.
As for “large sodas”, that was one man’s work in New York and pretty much nowhere else. And calling Bloomberg “liberal” is hilarious. He might be socially progressive but he’s economically conservative. Even his own stated rationale wasn’t to protect people but to save money on health care.
I don’t disagree, but you keep dancing around one of the fundamental points: before you require an ID, it is reasonable to first have a universal federal ID (we don’t) and then to make it easily and freely available to all citizens.
Harp on Voter ID all you want, but unless you are more vocally calling for a universal ID that is freely and easily available, it’s a bit hypocritical.
What is the value proposition for Voter ID? What am I, the citizen, getting as a result of Voter ID?
So this thread is essentially about America-bashing?
Good to get that cleared up then.
A greater degree of confidence in the correct outcome of an ultra-close election.
We know that in-person fraud is marginal, and the number of voters disenfranchised by VID is significant. So why would any reasonable person conclude that the outcome of an election is more likely to be correct?
How much more likely is it that we going to have the correct outcome?
Depends what you mean by “correct”, don’t it?
Correct = votes correctly cast and counted.
If a voter doesn’t participate, that doesn’t affect the correctness of an election. That’s voluntarily abstaining.
You *may *have noticed some discussion going on about what is “voluntary” about it.
Or you may not have.
Awesome definition. And how many more of these are we going to have thanks to Voter ID?
There are countries with voter ID requirements and 80% voter turnout.
You misspelled states, it’s not c-o-u-n-t-r-i-e-s, it’s s-t-a-t-e-s.
Which of the states with Voter ID has 80% turnout? Also, which of the states that recently implemented Voter ID have claimed it would increase turnout to these levels?
If it were conservative voters that would be negatively impacted by voter ID laws, I have no doubt that liberals would suddenly be clamoring in favor of such laws.
Countries are countries.