Sorry, but I can’t find any posts that meet the conditions in (1).
If you find such a post, I will gladly explain why your interpretation is incorrect.
Seriously, Sept, what are you expecting, here? A straight answer, a blubbering confession? You’d have a better chance pinning a blob of mercury to your desk with a sewing needle. In the field of interpretive semantic gymnastics, he has no peer on the Boards, weasels bow their heads in solemn respect when he speaks.
You’re way out of your league here, hoss. Its like putting the St. Agnes Girls Varsity Football team up against the Steelers. He does for weasel words what Gibralter does for rocks, what Godzilla does for lizards.
You have no chance.
Is septimus referring to this post? Here Bricker writes
This seems to express that, if one side focuses on the correction of rule-breaking behavior by the other, that’s unsurprising. Whether or not you find this sentiment objectionable, he’s clearly not saying “that no legal means should be out of bounds to suppress Democrat votes” — at worst he’s saying that no legal means should be out of bounds when suppressing illegitimate Democrat votes.
What, both of them?
And he has, in a rare burst of candor, accepted that voter suppression is the desired aim of some Republicans, an act of political skulduggery that very nearly rates a “tsk-tsk”. Certainly such minor infractions do not deserve any outrage as would be appropriate to the Great Massachussets Massacre, which causes any right thinking observer to roll about on the floor, shrieking with horror and tearing his hair. Unless liberal hypocrisy.
So can you actually answer Septimus’s real question, which is what your actual opinion is? Do you think it’s good that voter ID laws were passed? Why or why not? Do you support not only the laws that were passed but the justifications that were used to pass them? Why or why not? Do you think that this entire issue says anything larger about the character of the parties involved and the positions they have taken?
If, a few years ago before this all suddenly became a big prominent issue, someone had said to you “Hey, Bricker, what are some laws that you you think should be passed, things that you think are important and would make the US a better place than it is now” would you have come up with voter ID laws, specifically ones similar to the ones under discussion?
Of course, if the reader of my words believed that illegitimate votes should innure to the benefit of Democrats, then I can see how he might feel the sentiment taregeted Democratic votes.
But of course, he doesn’t feel that way.
I’m almost certain.
If those are Septimus’ real questions, why is Septimus unable to ask them?
As a general principle, I think Voter ID laws are a net positive – not perfect, but a net positive. Why: because in general, they increase public confidence in the integrity of the election results by ensuring that real criminal consequences are possible for in-person voter fraud – by creating a deterrent for such fraud.
I support some of the justifications that were used to pass the laws – those that dovetail with the rationale I gave above – but not all justifications that were used to pass the laws. I don’t support justifications that viewed the laws as veiled attempts to suppress otherwise legitimate votes. Why: because the justifications I support are a proper exercise of state authority; the justifications I reject are improper.
Does this contain some larger message about the character of the parties involved: no.
No. But that’s because it didn’t occur to me. If someone had said that the presidential election could come down to one state, and that one state could come down to less than 500 votes, i would have rejected that as highly unlikely. I would have acknowledged the mathematical possibility but said that the the odds against it were so high it wasn’t worth worrying about.
But then it happened. And it became crystal clear to me, in a way that experience can teach what theory cannot, how important the issue was. No doubt it’s unlikely – but when the stakes are so high, even unlikely events need to be mitigated. The Washington state governor’s race in 2006, decided by less than 130 votes, made the point even further: sure, voter fraud is rare, and in the vast majority of elections can be safely ignored. Who cares if 200 votes are cast fraudulently when the election is decided by 50,000 votes? It just didn’t seem worth worrying about.
But then I looked at an election for President that was decided by 537 votes. And with that result in mind, the spectre of discouraging 200 fraudulent votes became a worthy goal.
Creating a framework that allows a prosecutor to develop legally sufficient evidence to convict a fraudulent in-person voter is a good approach. it’s not perfect, but it’s good.
Now, let me ask you a few questions.
Do you believe Septimus’ summary of my positions is fair and accurate?
If you do not, can you explain why you focus on refining my answers rather than stepping in and attacking septimus for his distorted summary?
If you do, can you find the specific passages which support his summary?
Well, you can stop worrying, then. Even if Gore had been in the lead by 537 votes in Florida, Bush would have won. Republicans held the governor’s office, the secretary of state, the House of Representatives in terms of state-votes, and, as we learned, 5 of the 9 Supreme Court votes.
Once it’s less than a thousand votes, it’s not decided by voters anyway.
I don’t agree. If Gore had been in the lead, then the decision would have gone to Gore.
In any event, the point still stands, and in fact is made stronger by your comment. When the election margin is less than 1,000 votes, it’s tough to have confidence in the result.
This isn’t some stupid “I-can-sway-more-jurors-than-you-can” debating contest. We’re interested in public policy. Naturally my summary of your position was tinted – I wrote “non-prosecutable” knowing that lawyers prefer “legal” in public. I called your heroes slimeballs, even though you think Karl Rove, etc. should be put on Mt. Rushmore. But, between the lines, I think I captured your underlying position.
Fucking bullshit. Every poster at SDMB except you understands that the GOP shenanigans and attempted shenanigans in 2012, 2008, etc. were to disenfranchise legitimate voters and would therefore have the opposite effect than you claim to seek on public confidence in election integrity.
Now you pretend you want fair responsible regulations. A few months ago you were gleeful about last-minute rule changes (or attempted rule changes) that would obviously have been unfair – Gleeful because they benefited your party.
Dopers would interact with you more politely if you were not such a blatant scumball hypocrite.
Truly, Counselor, I am impressed! How deftly you equate “rationalization” with “justification”! And that’s just for warm-ups. Truly, only a mind educated by Jesuits and schooled in the complex semantics of the law could have achieved it, it is spectacular, you have no peer, sir, none!
Your most recent endeavor…the rationale that ID laws permit prosecution that would not otherwise have been possible…is a chestnut. It stands alone, it is very nearly perfect, a Möbius strip of inverted reasoning. There is no proof of substantial voter fraud? Well, that’s because prosecutors are bereft of the necessary tools! If they had strict voter ID laws in place, they could prosecute “voter fraud”. Which would have the effect of deterring such fraud in the first place. Which would result in an absence of “voter fraud” prosecutions. The laws aren’t sufficient, as evidenced by the lack of voter fraud prosecutions, But if the laws are strengthened, there will be few, if any, “voter fraud” prosecutions, because “voter fraud” will be deterred!
I gasp in stunned admiration. It is too many for me, I fold. As you bask in the confident aplomb of a Methodist with four aces.
Magnificent! Like a dead fish in the moonlight, it shines and stinks with equal vigor! Brings to mind a habit common to Minnesota, putting the lawn troll out in the front yard to deter the venomous bites of the dreaded ice spider. Well, not that common, actually, some of our citizens are convinced that the ice spider effectively does not exist, and lawn trolls cannot prevent something that does not exist in the first place. I fear that the complexity of your argumentative skills would be lost on them, they are a sensible people, for the most part, but unsophisticated.
And this! Oh, this is truly your finest moment!
Awesome! Keeping in mind that “justification” can be synonymous with “rationalization”, you skirt the outermost boundary of disapproval, you tip-toe right up to a “tsk-tsk” and threaten stern wag of your finger! No, of course you don’t support treacherous and underhanded political skulduggery! They are “improper”! (I might have described them as “sordid”, as I described the shocking horror of the Massachusetts Massacre, but I am cursed with liberal hypocrisy, and can safely be ignored…)
“Improper”! One gasps with shock at the stern rebuke of the intention to bugger voter’s rights! Happily, you can breeze right past such questions of motivation, they are not relevant, they only signify the corrupt and cynical mindset of some unknown and unknowable number of Republicans, and they are cast into the outer darkness of your disapproval. Albeit mild disapproval. Very mild. Homeopathic. One part per million.
And how many are so motivated? Doesn’t matter, irrelevant. So long as a justification can be pasted onto their actions that can be rationalized by stretching the outermost bounds of reason, their actions are entirely kosher. Which, no doubt, accounts for the mildness of your rebuke. Are you sure that “improper” is not too strong a word? I mean, we wouldn’t want to overdo it, simply because it might be intended to fuck over the unreliable voter. How about “imperfect”, or “less than ideal”?
Its a pity that gymnastic rationalization is not a recognized Olympic sport. You could simply notify the Committee of your intention to compete, and they could mail you back the gold, silver and bronze medals by return mail.
So you admit to “tainting” my position, but remain confident that you somehow, “between the lines” captured my real position?
I’m sorry, but I disagree that you did, and your inability to actually offer quotes from me supporting your claim only further belies your summary.
And, yes, we’re all interested in public policy, and that’s why we’re debating it. Naturally, i hope my positions and arguments sway readers to understand and support my point of view. Why you think that’s “bullshit” is unclear to me.
I’m sure a considerable number feel that way – but I doubt it’s every single poster except me.
Are you sure the numbers are quite as lopsided as that?
Maybe you’re “tinting” again - just a bit?
You probably trust Katherine Harris, even though she was being advised by Karl Rove at the time. You probably trust that she would not have accepted favorable recounts, or rejected lots of in-person ballots while preserving every absentee ballot from overseas.
It’s easy to trust somebody when they’re on your side.
If Gore had been in the lead by 537 votes, here’s my honest guess as to what would have happened - the state legislature would have decided they couldn’t send any delegates to the electoral congress, since nobody could really be sure who won. The election would have gone to the House of Representatives, and Bush would have still been president.
Satan really wanted Bush in the White House.
I tried to take my cue from the fury that you unleashed on the Massachusetts legislature. And then, of course, I dialed it back, because in this case the motives may have been mixed, but the result was an appropriate one; in Massachusetts, the result was a blatant power grab, one that you were pretty happy about until I forced you to grit your teeth and condemn it.
I absolutely believe you – that’s your honest guess. You’re not saying that to win points now; you’re are convinced that’s how it would have played out.
But I don’t agree that that’s what would have happened.
We are surely blessed to have such a stern advocate of ethical purity amongst us. I humbly submit that “sordid” is rather stronger a word than “improper”, but I lack your gifts for finely parsed semantic distinction.
Septimus, old sport, I have no real disagreement with you, your reasoning is sound and your goals admirable. But you are not enjoying yourself, and this is unfortunate. A lack of joy will curdle your chi and sour your disposition.
Allow me to point out the bright spot. They, the Forces of Darkness, are losing. That’s why they are doing all of this. It started modestly, an effort to trim a few percentage points off the Democrat voter rolls. And they still lost. So now they are expanding their efforts, thrashing about in desperation, trying to bugger the electoral votes, for instance.
Bricker is but the rear guard of the French Army retreating from Moscow. Beset by partisan snipers, trudging through the ever mounting snow drifts, and shrinking every day. And you know what? I think he knows it. The boy is stubborn, but not stupid. (Not sure if “stubborn” is the adequate word, but not sure there is one.)
Enjoy! May your day be blessed by chuckles bubbling up from your enthusiasm for justice, as well it should, as well it might. A nice cup chamomile tea, a cat in the lap, a volume of P.G. Wodehouse. After all, why do they call it a political party?
Venceremos!
I’m not sure which specific summary you’re talking about. Nor, in general, do I feel that it is my responsibility to play referee or judge or mommy to other posters.
And if in fact he posted a distorted summary of your position, which is certainly possible, that’s at least partly because you have a tendency to be cagey about exactly what position it is that you yourself are taking. It’s easy and fun to poke holes in things other people say, and any time 10 liberals post on the SDMB about a topic they’re passionate about, 2 or 3 of those posts will almost certainly contain logical or factual errors or exaggerations or assumptions or what have you. So you can just spend the rest of your life sniping at such things, and probably have a grand old time and walk away feeling superior to the SDMB liberals, because you specifically chose the interactions in which you were attacking weakness. It’s more of an intellectual commitment to clearly lay out the position that you support and the reasons you support it. Which is why I pushed you on that, and why I’m appreciative that you have now in fact stated your position. And if someone else responded to that post and said “so you’re saying X, well that’s stupid because Y”, where X was a clear misstatement of the position you had just stated, well, I might notice that and respond. Or I might not. Because it’s not my job to do so, and I’m kind of lazy.
Sure, “sordid” is stronger than “improper.”
But you didn’t directly call the Massachusetts’ legislature’s actions “sordid.” Here is your condemnation of the Democratically-controlled Massachusetts legislature:
It takes an act of inference – and some strong prescription glasses – to understand that you are condemning the Democrats here. The passage reads much more like you’re condemning the Republicans for somehow forcing the Democrats to play keep-away with the governor’s senatorial appointment power.
Frankly, when it comes to strength of condemnation, I believe my quiet “improper,” aimed directly at GOP legislators, is quite a bit stronger than your lurid apologetic prose.