Well, perhaps you should take it up with the likes of Mike Turzai, Richard Posner, Jim Greer, Phyllis Schlafly, and various other people already cited in this thread who have openly stated that the intent of many of the new state voter ID initiatives is to enable the discouragement of poorer voters likely to vote Democratic.
I too am amazed by such things.
I am well aware of the difference between a legal and a moral obligation.
But the problem with making a moral claim is that you and I don’t share an authoritative source of morality – that is, there’s no Big Book of Morality that we both agree accurately describes moral conduct and its boundaries. You don’t like mine, and I doubt you have one, besides a “whatever helps me and my pals.” Even if you do, it’s not one I’d recognize. So why in the world would you recognize or give any particular credence to a moral argument from me, and I certainly would not be impressed with any “moral” insights that you come up with.
Your desperate attempt to invoke morality, in fact, after a lifetime of trying to remove morality from public discourse (or to substitute whatever twisted sewage you call “moral” for actual morality) is pretty transparent.
What do you mean ‘less so in practice’? I can vote without ID or proof of who I am? The rules are pretty clear and I, for one, would like to know if they aren’t being followed. So, if you have evidence, pony up.
Really? We’ll see what your attitude to that is the next time Quebec decides to start another neverendum. I’m sure you’d like it pretty clear that only those people who have permission to vote can do so and only in the place where they are supposed to and only get to vote once because anyone who isn’t naive or deluding themselves understands that at least one party is likely to want to manipulate the vote and is quick to blame certain people when it fails.
Then you obviously did not read the statement you responded to. Essentially, he asked you “How can you support this? Why would you support this?” And you responded with “It’s legal and people voted for it”.
So you couldn’t read my post either. I’m not arguing morality. I’m pointing out that you are intentionally confounding the two. When someone asks you “Why do you oppose baby rape”, responding with “it’s illegal” is not an answer.
“Party” is more the operative word here than any racist assumptions on Bricker’s part. He’s legalistic to a startling degree, but I’ve never really thought he was racist. These are all desperate attempts to defend a party that’s been rapidly sliding into indefensibility for at least a decade and probably longer, but it’s party affiliation that’s driving it, not racism. Bricker is, himself, of Hispanic descent, IIRC. That doesn’t automagically make him not-racist, but that combined with the fact that I’ve rarely, if ever, seen even subtle racist rhetoric from him makes me inclined to dismiss the charge.
“It’s a good idea and it’s moral,” is an absurd answer to give in this environment.
Again, in this environment, there is no source of moral authority recognized by all participants. While I agree that baby rape would indeed arouse disgust in virtually all participants, the current proposition is not so clear-cut, and appeals to a moral barrier associated with photo ID are like appeals to a moral barrier concerning taxation: completely ineffectual.
I can see where you’re coming from but I don’t think it’s possible to support the Republican Party in its current mutated form without being at least somewhat racist.
Bricker, are you asserting that you cannot engage in moral debate with people who aren’t Christians? Or that you cannot engage in moral debate with anyone with a different set of political beliefs? If not, what exactly are you asserting?
The way you debate morality with anyone but Nihilists is to start with shared precepts and argue about how they should apply to the matter at hand. Pretty much like any other debate.
No, but I’ve been on this board now for fourteen years. I am well aware of the futility of identifying “shared precepts of morality” with the likes of BobLibDem (“I don’t think it’s possible to support the Republican Party in its current mutated form without being at least somewhat racist.”) or Budget Player Cadet. They, and their similarly situated brethern, have made that abundantly clear over the years. Their claims to precepts dissolve as their expediency demands.
This is nuts. Not just run-of-the mill nuts, but Der Trihs level nuts. Yeesh!
Bullshit. You have policies specifically designed to disenfranchise minority voters, one cannot support such policies without belief that said minorities should not be allowed to vote, therefore you’re a racist. You have a party vote en masse to shut down the government because there’s a black guy in the White House, therefore supporting that party is racist.
Put it this way Bricker. If there was no voting rights act striking down Jim Crow style laws would you or would you not support such laws? These laws were duly passed by state legislatures and signed by the Governor. They had similar non-racist justification (It makes sense that you would only want literate people to vote), and would likely help your side politically. Most of us view such laws as a horrible moral blot in American history, but perhaps to you it was just fine and dandy right up until 1965, when they suddenly became bad.
I disagree (with the caveat that I’m talking about the rank and file and not the cynically opportunistic or genuinely crazy-racist politicians). There are a lot of people who’ve so threaded the GOP in with their personal sense of identity that they’re going to have to go through years of cognitive dissonance before they can separate, and increasingly be required to circumlocute to the point of absurdity to defend both the party and that identity.
And I freely admit that I’m similarly intertwined with the Democratic Party. Luckily, my party isn’t in the middle of a freefall off of the ISS.
Yeah, but the Republicans outsmarted them again, they packed a parachute.
Neither of these claims is accurate. The party vote en masse was not taken to demand that Obama change his race. It was done to demand Obama kill his national heathcare plan. The GOP opposed national health care during Clinton’s years and Clinton is pasty white.
The voter ID policies are designed to ensure voter confidence in the outcome of elections.
Here’s an example of being able to appeal to a moral precept that we do in fact both share.
So what?
I agree that those laws created invidious discriminations among classes of voters. And I agree that they were constitutionally infirm.
I don’t agree those things are true for the requirement that voters obtain a free photo ID before they vote.
Is that all they are designed to do? Aren’t you on record as admitting that at least some Republicans are promoting this as a way to gain electoral advantages? Do you recant that testimony?
IIRC, you finessed that issue by claiming that since voter id has such a wonderful affect on voter confidence…a position supported by nothing more than your insistence that it is so…then the malignant motivations of Republicans doesn’t matter. Because somehow a malicious motive results in a positive boon, a miracle that makes water into wine seem like child’s play?
Well, obviously if you cannot come to complete agreement on the morality of a complex issue in a handful of internet message posts, then it must be impossible to constructively discuss the morality of issues.
Or, and this is just a “maybe,” exploring the ways in which the morality of the Jim Crow laws differs from the morality of the voter ID laws might help both of you come to understand each other’s position. In particular, it might be interesting for you to explain why you think they are different. I assume you think the justification for Jim Crow laws was pre-textual while you think the voter ID supporters are sincere about the real agenda. But my assumption could be wrong, which is why discussion is interesting and helpful.
Yeah, you don’t have to be a racist to support the GOP. You could just be stupid, or horribly uninformed, or just generally evil.
Let’s not try and go over-the-top here.
Not at all – but it is impossible to constructively discuss the morality of issues in a handful of internet message posts – especially with persons evincing the moral depravity of my interlocutors above.
Discussion with you about these issues is, in fact, often helpful.
To the extent that the justification for Jim Crow laws was held out to be anything other than “keep the blacks down,” I do in fact believe: (a) that it was pretextual; and (b) that no valid reason existed. That is, i regard the presence or absence of a pretext as a red herring. The only meaningful question is: is there a valid, morally neutral justification for the law? In the case of Jim Crow: no, there wasn’t.