# I Pit the ID-demanding GOP vote-suppressors (Part 1) **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [June 12, 2012, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943 "2012-06-12T19:15:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 405
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8081 "2015-03-18T18:47:32Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Who cares? As all the stockbrokers will tell you, past performance is no guarantee of future success. That’s true, in the sense that stockbrokers are legally encouraged to highlight the fact that they are not promising future success. It does not follow, however, that past performance is utterly irrelevant in determining the viability of future success. In your case, your past dismal failures of prediction don’t seem to hinder your current crop of predictions, and when those fail, undoubtedly you’ll simply manufacture another excuse and begin making confident predictions about the 2018 midterms. Right? Isn’t that what you’ll do? ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8082 "2015-03-18T18:47:53Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > When did the discussion shift to a claim that non-citizen voting is a moral wrong? > > Certainly I don’t claim this. I claim non-citizens voting a poor choice for public policy, and a perfectly defensible limitation to impose. Perhaps I’m not clear on what makes someone a “bad citizen,” which is your phrase. I assumed that meant something more than voting for public policies you consider unwise. In any event, it doesn’t really matter to my point, which is this: this is fundamentally about weighing different consequences of having and not having Voter ID, and I have a hard time empathizing with those who think keeping out a small number of non-citizen votes is a policy goal that is so desirable that it merits making it harder (and in a few cases, impossible) for poor and old people to vote. And one reason for why I don’t understand people who weigh the outcomes that way is that I would expect that preventing non-citizens from voting would be regarded as a fairly minor goal, given how unimportant it has been in the history of our country and how, at many different times and places, a majority have believed that allowing non-citizens to vote is actively a good idea. ---
**Author:** ![Trinopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/2bfe46/32.png) [@Trinopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Trinopus)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8083 "2015-03-18T18:58:38Z")
This last round of posts has gone a long way toward cementing my opinion of **Bricker** as the single most dishonest person I have ever encountered in print. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8084 "2015-03-18T19:04:34Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Perhaps I’m not clear on what makes someone a “bad citizen,” which is your phrase. I assumed that meant something more than voting for public policies you consider unwise. It’s my phrase in the sense that I used it – to reply to **Bryan Ekers** , who used it to describe me: > [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > That still makes you a liar and, frankly, a bad citizen for supporting the effort. > [@Bricker](#): > > Obviously, I disagree. I think the support of election schemes that fail to exclude non-citizen voters makes you a bad citizen – or would, if you were a citizen of the country under discussion. > > As it is, I suppose it merely makes you self-interested. In my opinion, then, a more fair commentary would be that it’s his phrase. It is puzzling how he uses it, I respond to it, and it becomes mine.Is this one of of those, “I don’t care what other idiocies people on my side do; I’m here to attack you,” moments? > [@](#): > > In any event, it doesn’t really matter to my point, which is this: this is fundamentally about weighing different consequences of having and not having Voter ID, and I have a hard time empathizing with those who think keeping out a small number of non-citizen votes is a policy goal that is so desirable that it merits making it harder (and in a few cases, impossible) for poor and old people to vote. And one reason for why I don’t understand people who weigh the outcomes that way is that I would expect that preventing non-citizens from voting would be regarded as a fairly minor goal, given how unimportant it has been in the history of our country and how, at many different times and places, a majority have believed that allowing non-citizens to vote is actively a good idea. I think this summary vastly overstates the public support for the concept. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8085 "2015-03-18T19:10:07Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > This last round of posts has gone a long way toward cementing my opinion of **Bricker** as the single most dishonest person I have ever encountered in print. And of course this is supported with a citation to several of the demonstrably dishonest things I’ve said here. Right? Because otherwise, you’d just be … well… ---
**Author:** ![MaxTheVool](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9fc29f/32.png) [@MaxTheVool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MaxTheVool)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8086 "2015-03-18T19:10:07Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Note the lack of a comma between ‘parks’ and ‘and failing to observe.’ This construction shows that the latter is not a separate critique, but to be read together with the occupying of parks to form one accusation. To the extent that you are correct, what makes you correct is not the lack of a comma, but rather the fact that there’s an entire additional clause\*: > [@](#): > > The Left excels at carrying signs, occupying parks and failing to observe basic hygiene principles, **and substituting attempts to shame their opposition into compliance instead of debating the issues openly and honestly.** which does in fact suggest that you intended the entire first clause (from “carrying” through “principles”) to be read as a unit. I do think it would have been clearer with a semicolon instead of a comma between “principles” and “and”. (This was clearly one of the stupidest hijacks in the history of this thread, and that’s saying something.) \*I may be misusing the word “clause”. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8087 "2015-03-18T19:11:40Z")
> [@Trinopus](#): > > This last round of posts has gone a long way toward cementing my opinion of **Bricker** as the single most dishonest person I have ever encountered in print. But always willing to patiently expound the minutiae of his dishonesty, which I suppose is what makes him such an interesting case study. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8088 "2015-03-18T19:14:39Z")
> [@MaxTheVool](#): > > To the extent that you are correct, what makes you correct is not the lack of a comma, but rather the fact that there’s an entire additional clause\*: > > which does in fact suggest that you intended the entire first clause (from “carrying” through “principles”) to be read as a unit. > > I do think it would have been clearer with a semicolon instead of a comma between “principles” and “and”. > > (This was clearly one of the stupidest hijacks in the history of this thread, and that’s saying something.) > > \*I may be misusing the word “clause”. Agreed. Without the final clause, your interpretation would certainly be correct. And it is a clause, a _dependent clause_, inasmuch as it cannot stand on its own as a sentence given the presence of a subordinate conjunction, but has both a noun as a subject and a verb describing the actions of the subject noun. This stands in contrast to a _phrase_, which may have verbs and/or nouns but lacks the structure of a subject noun and a verb “doing,” that subject. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8089 "2015-03-18T19:15:45Z")
> [@VinylTurnip](#): > > But always willing to patiently expound the minutiae of his dishonesty, which I suppose is what makes him such an interesting case study. And another brave soul willing to run up, throw the rock, and leave. Without any cites. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8090 "2015-03-18T19:17:35Z")
Incidentally, I consider Bricker to be a bad citizen of his country based on his support for the curtailing of the rights of some of his fellow citizens whIle claiming it is for the greater good of his country when that is an obvious lie he can only sustain by willful blindness. Plus I heard he kicks puppies. AMERICAN puppies. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8091 "2015-03-18T19:24:55Z")
You assholes follow party blindly. If Voter ID helped Democrats, you’d be all for it. I am driven by application of unchanging principles to the facts. I’m defending Hillary Clinton in GD right now, because the attacks on her are dishonest and unfounded. This is alien you to pustules. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8092 "2015-03-18T19:32:25Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > You assholes follow party blindly. If Voter ID helped Democrats, you’d be all for it. > > I am driven by application of unchanging principles to the facts. I’m defending Hillary Clinton in GD right now, because the attacks on her are dishonest and unfounded. > > This is alien you to pustules. Always interesting when this **Bricker** peeks out. I’m sure you recognize, intellectually, that many of us (and maybe nearly all of us) actually oppose these Voter ID requirements because we really do equate them to past voter suppression. And per my past pledge, I’ll amend that I don’t believe **Bricker** is necessarily a bad citizen for beliefs (which don’t include anything that qualify as automatic “bad citizen” signifiers, at least to me) he posts about on the internet. He’s just stubborn and biased, and may not recognize the depth of his stubbornness and bias… but these are hardly uncommon flaws (and flaws that I probably share to some degree or other). ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8093 "2015-03-18T19:35:03Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > It shouldn’t. I never said it should. Perhaps you should direct this question to **MaxThe Vool** , who suggested that my claim of a lack of personal cleanliness among Occupy protesters was an outdated, 1960s characterization of the Left. But, it is also completely irrelevant to anything. Why did you bring it up in the first place? ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8094 "2015-03-18T19:37:03Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Always interesting when this **Bricker** peeks out. > > I’m sure you recognize, intellectually, that many of us (and maybe nearly all of us) actually oppose these Voter ID requirements because we really do equate them to past voter suppression. Of course I recognize that. My comment was certainly not directed at you. You’re an “asshole” or a “pustule,” are you? No, my comment was directed at that subset of you who blindly predict Democratic wins in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, and those of you who oppose Voter ID because it hurts your party’s chances. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8095 "2015-03-18T19:37:35Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > It’s my phrase in the sense that I used it – to reply to **Bryan Ekers** , who used it to describe me. Why would it matter that he used it first, as opposed to you introducing it, as it relates to our discussion? I genuinely don’t get what you think you’ve “Gotcha’d” here. My point in referring to it as your words is that it made more sense for you to clarify what you meant than for me to guess. > [@Bricker](#): > > I think this summary vastly overstates the public support for the concept. Since the quoted paragraph says nothing about public support for the concept, it’s hard to see how it could overstate it. My guess is that fewer than 20% of Americans would support non-citizen voting today. I don’t see why that’s relevant at all. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8096 "2015-03-18T19:42:01Z")
> [@Richard\_Parker](#): > > Why would it matter that he used it first, as opposed to you introducing it, as it relates to our discussion? I genuinely don’t get what you think you’ve “Gotcha’d” here. My point in referring to it as your words is that it made more sense for you to clarify what you meant than for me to guess. I meant to simply reflect the phrase back at Bryan – to highlight its lack of precision by showing that it can be wielded by me to describe him in just as valid a fashion as it was by him to describe me. > [@](#): > > Since the quoted paragraph says nothing about public support for the concept, it’s hard to see how it could overstate it. My guess is that fewer than 20% of Americans would support non-citizen voting today. I don’t see why that’s relevant at all. It said, “And one reason for why I don’t understand people who weigh the outcomes that way is that I would expect that preventing non-citizens from voting would be regarded as a fairly minor goal, given how unimportant it has been in the history of our country and how, at many different times and places, a majority have believed that allowing non-citizens to vote is actively a good idea.” You don’t think the tone of that suggests public support? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8097 "2015-03-18T19:49:59Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I meant to simply reflect the phrase back at Bryan – to highlight its lack of precision by showing that it can be wielded by me to describe him in just as valid a fashion as it was by him to describe me. Hah. Good luck with that. ---
**Author:** ![Richard\_Parker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/35a633/32.png) [@Richard\_Parker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Richard_Parker)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8098 "2015-03-18T20:02:53Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > It said, “And one reason for why I don’t understand people who weigh the outcomes that way is that I would expect that preventing non-citizens from voting would be regarded as a fairly minor goal, given how unimportant it has been in the history of our country and how, at many different times and places, a majority have believed that allowing non-citizens to vote is actively a good idea.” > > You don’t think the tone of that suggests public support? Huh? Doesn’t it pretty obviously suggest that I think the public is in favor of disenfranchising non-citizens? That’s why I wrote, “I would expect that preventing non-citizens from voting would be regarded as a fairly minor goal.” Not sure there’s much more fruitful to wring from this. But just in case: again my point is that I am surprised that anyone would weigh the harm of allowing a small number of non-citizens to vote as being more important than the harm of putting up obstacles for the poor and old to vote. I’m not doubting your sincerity in weighing the harms that way, or that some of the people who support voter ID are also making that same judgment. I’m just saying I find it hard to understand, given our country’s history. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8099 "2015-03-18T21:35:42Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > …and those of you who oppose Voter ID because it hurts your party’s chances. Doesn’t have to. There’s all kinds of ways to get voter ID into people’s hands without problems or hindrances. If that were the purpose, the Republicans would have done it. They didn’t do it because they didn’t want to, because stacking the electoral deck is the whole point of the exercise. You have already stipulated that “some” Republicans had malign motives. Rather a coy word, “some”. What does it mean? That a few sneaky and underhanded Republicans hoodwinked their virtuous fellows into approving a sordid and repugnant program? Can you offer us any reason to believe that? Have those gullible souls recanted their approval and made moves to correct the problem? Not that I’ve heard, perhaps you can point them out to us? And just to reiterate, for the one hundred fifteenth time: nothing wrong with voter ID just as itself. What’s wrong is using that legitimacy as leverage to an illegitimate purpose. You can defend the validity of voter ID until you’re blue in the face, and it has nothing to do with the issue. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2015, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943/8100 "2015-03-18T21:42:35Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > . . . and those of you who oppose Voter ID because it hurts your party’s chances. Do you deny supporting it because it helps yours? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943.md?page=404) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-id-demanding-gop-vote-suppressors-part-1/624943.md?page=406)