I’m rebutting your argument that all laws have to follow the exact same philosophical basis. Lots of laws have different spheres of influence, different effects, and, indeed, different legislative intent.
It’s harder to get a moose-hunting license than a driving license. It’s also possible to get a driving license without also getting a moose-hunting license.
Your insistence on a “general principle” is misguided. Voting is anonymous; marriage licenses aren’t. Different principles apply to different public regulations.
It implies no such thing! The words are clear to the point of simplicity, voting rights have a special level of civic importance, and require a special effort of protection.
No, you are talking abolishment here. “We” bear no responsibility for your fantasies.
It’s harder to get a moose-hunting license than a driving license. It’s also possible to get a driving license without also getting a moose-hunting license.
Your insistence on a “general principle” is misguided. Voting is anonymous; marriage licenses aren’t. Different principles apply to different public regulations.
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When there is actually a difference. A moose hunting license and a drivers’ license operate under completely different principles. Hunting licenses are generally for an economic purpose(prevent overhunting), and drivers’ licenses are for safety purposes.
The main reason you need to justify no ID for voting is because the public accepts the principle that ID should be required for doing, well, just about anything where there is even a small risk of fraud. In order to get the public to change that view, you need to get them to believe in a different principle. The argument presented so far do move the numbers a little, but it looks as if all it really does is make Democratic voters realize that its in their side’s interest to oppose voter ID. None of those arguments, despite being widely spread, have ever seen voter ID support drop below 70% or so. Because it’s BULLSHIT. In many of these voting precincts, they wouldn’t let people on the premises for any reason without presenting ID first, but that gets waived because it’s Election Day?
Now an effort to repeal voter ID laws combined with efforts to make it easier to get a job or board a plane or get into federal buildings for the purpose of exercising your rights, that would make sense and you’d get libertarians on your side. Making an exception to ID requirements for something that just so happens to benefit Democrats looks as shady as it is.
That is wrong as a matter of law. Our basic rights are enshrined in the Constitution, yet many of those rights require ID. Voting is not superior to those rights, in fact it isn’t even a right at all, but a benefit of citizenship, and other qualifications.
Now Congress did pass the Voting Rights Act to prevent abuses of election law to disenfranchise minorities. And some voter ID laws are so strict that they do amount to such abuse. Other voter ID laws pass muster with the courts. The reasoning however, isn’t that voting is a basic right that should not be burdened with pesky things like “requirements”, but that such requirements cannot be used as a means of disenfranchising minorities.
You sniveling little weasel. You exemplar of pond scum. You couldn’t outthink the sludge floating on the top of a flooded tar pit. A gerbil with one brain cell could beat you at tic-tac-toe ten out of ten.
Voting is the basic right; the right from which all else flows, you cretinous fool.
Is there literally any reason to read any of his posts at this point beyond pointing and laughing? Because at this point he’s a little too dumb and I’m a little too jaded to enjoy that.
Hmmm … I seem to remember something about the right to bear arms. Of course, there can’t be any restrictions on that like mental competency or non -felon, non -minor status… That would be crazy because it’s a Right, right?
And that’s where the hubris comes in. It must feel so good to be so sure of yourself.
Anyway, whether or not voting is a right is not central to my argument. What is is the fact that other rights require an ID to exercise, and unlike voting, those rights are universal. Voting, on the other hand, can only be done by qualified individuals, thus the ID requirement.
In ANY other walk of life, if someone had to be qualified to do something, would it not be prudent to require proof of that qualification? Most people think so. I’d imagine many of them wouldn’t take you seriously for suggesting that this should not be the case. Be thankful that I respect your arguments, because most of the public does not.
And now you’re getting it. The right to vote, like the right to bear arms, is conditional on being qualified to exercise the right, which in turn requires proof of qualification to exercise that right.
Now since the right to bear arms is a right, doesn’t it follow that people should not have to bear proof of their qualification to bear arms? Doesn’t it infringe that right?
Your second sentence is wrong. But then, so is your first sentence, you blithering, bloviating barrel of bile.
Felons are allowed to vote in some states; even people in prison are allowed to vote in some states. And there is no mental competency test, fortunately for you, you festering pustule.
You know how those rules are decided? No, you don’t, because you’re an imbecile. By voting, as you would know if you had had a functioning brain during civics class. Every law, every “right”, everything in this country from the Constitution on down can be changed by voting. The basic right of self-government is the vote.
Up until now, while I’ve rarely engaged you, I’ve been mostly amused and bemused by your posts and thoughts. No longer. If you seriously believe that voting is not the basic right of this democracy, you are a danger. You are a danger to the bedrock principles of this country. You, and anyone who thinks like you, are more of a danger to America than any external enemy one could imagine.
Key word is “allowed”. Do you know what the significance of this word is when applied to rights? If it’s not immediately apparent, go to the back of the class.
And no, there is not a mental competency test, but the point flew right over your little head. People declared mentally incompetent cannot vote in most states. Thankfully for you, the authorities are not on to you yet. Better hope NSA is only monitoring this board for terrorist threats and not looking for morons to disenfranchise.
Wow, this statement is even dumber than the previous. Do you understand what 'rights" are? Of course not, you inferred earlier that they are things we’re “allowed”.
On the contrary, your belief that our rights can be taken away by voting is the truly scary thought. But I’m glad you engaged, people need to hear this drivel from the horse’s mouth.
Where do you think these rights came from? (I’ll give you a hint: they were not handed down from a mountaintop engraved on stone slabs.) They were voted on by elected representatives. Any right in the Constitution can be strengthened, modified, or removed by the same means. Did you not know that? Did you think the Constitution is immutable?
Actually, it takes a two thirds vote in each chamber of Congress and 3/4ths of the states have to ratify. No constitutional right has ever been limited by amendment and the day it’s even considered it will mean war.
The right to vote, on the other hand, can be limited by simple legislation in any state legislature, so long as the limitation is not discriminatory.
The right to vote is equal to the right to get a job, or own a home, or start a business. It is subject to reasonable regulation and the bar for justifying that regulation is relatively low. As long as it’s not discriminatory based on race, it’s legal. Whereas limiting actual Constitutional rights requires that a law pass “strict scrutiny”, a very high bar indeed.
Holy fuck. The notion that “voting isn’t a constitutional right” has to be the dumbest thing I’ve ever read. News flash- it is. That’s why we’re so up in arms about it. And our right to vote isn’t subject to negotiation. It isn’t subject to the result of a poll. So (temporarily) a majority favors voter ID. Big deal. A majority believe in JFK conspiracies. A majority would establish Christianity as the state religion. A majority doesn’t have the right to take our votes away. Anyone who isn’t the dumbest of fucks knows beyond a shadow of a doubt that the reason these ID laws exist is to rig elections for Republicans. If that doesn’t offend you, then you’re un-American.
I see that friend adaher has taken advantage of a minor footnote — a comparison with Bricker — to hijack his own thread away from its stated topic. I suppose in the fragment of viral DNA that constitutes his brain, he’s hoping we’ll all get so stuck in the resulting tar pit that we’ll forget the absolute fraudulence of the original premise.