I Pit the ID-demanding GOP vote-suppressors (Part 1)

The BBQ Pit
1701

Huh? Since when are we not allowed to actually debate things in the pit? It happens all the time…

Whoops, you’re right, totally forgot about it the first time through.

And it’s not an easy one… hmm…

I guess it’s tricky because age limits of all sorts are always a weird ethical area. Is there something different between something 20 years and 364 days old vs someone 21 years old which means that the first one of those can’t be trusted to make the informed choice to drink alcohol while the second one can? Of course not. And yet most would say it’s reasonable for 9-year-olds to be forbidden from drinking while 35-year-olds should be able to drink. So there’s this “you have to draw the line somewhere, and wherever you draw it, it’s stupid” issue, and of course voting rights are about as important an issue as there is in a democracy.

Having never really given the issue much thought, I think that back when the voting age was being changed from 21 to 18 I would have supported that change not primarily because the status quo was antidemocratic but because it was unethical to be drafting people to fight in a war they hadn’t been legally allowed to vote for or against.
On the other hand, imagine a society where you couldn’t vote until you were 70 years old. I would definitely find that to be “less democratic” than a society with a voting age of 18 or 21.

So I guess my answer is… I’m not sure, sometimes, it depends?
(One final comment: I do think that in a situation where there’s a close national election looming, and demographics show that the youth strongly supports one candidate over the other, if the party that would presumably benefit from the youth vote suddenly starts pushing to lower the voting age, it’s quite reasonable to be suspicious of their motives and the arguments they make…)

1702

While I haven’t seen the above happening, another recent development is Republicans fighting to make it harder for students to vote from out-of-state colleges using the same scare tactics (They could be voting twice!!11!). Anyone care to expand the discussion into this area to examine the incidence rate of these purported shenanigans to see if they hold water or if it’s just another tactic to suppress a (perceived) Democratic voting block?

1703

Its a rational argument, if not a reasonable one. Friend Bricker has already clarified his “neutral justification”. In a very, very close election it is possible that it might be decided by the ten or so illegal alien votes cast. That is possible, therefore it is rational, therefore it is reasonable. Two facts, and a leap of faith.

That is why you should shove a lightning rod up your ass, and ground it to your tennis shoes, because being struck by lightning is possible! It takes a certain degree of education to grasp such an argument. Typically, this educational level is reached by the second year of college, which is probably why such arguments are commonly known as “sophomoric”.

1704

OK. Then without reference to Jim Crow, I can still answer your question:

Yes. It is possible for a law to be constitutional, have a rational justification, enjoy popular support, but still be unethical (abortion) or undemocratic (age limits on the franchise).

1705

No, I don’t agree. I think it’s rare, but not impossible.

No, but because Obama is in such a weak position this time around, Ithe “natural” result in Pennsylvania will be much less than 8%. It will be a virtual tie, and THAT is where eliminating fraudulent votes may turn the election to Romney.

Turzai’s statement referred to that outcome.

Now, you said:

So – I haven’t admitted to this, as you claimed. And you can’t claim someone “admitted” something, and when pressed, cough up a statement that only “admits” it because, gosh, you just know that’s what he meant to say.

No proponents of voter ID laws are “quite willing to admit that those laws will reduce voter turnout amongst certain segments of the voting population.” That was a lie, wasn’t it?

1706

In that case, you also agree that the fact that the voter ID laws are constitutional, have a rational justification, and enjoy popular support does not make them either ethical or nonantidemocratic?

Or to put it another, possibly ruder, way… any argument you make in support of these laws that a supporter of Jim Crow laws could have made in support of poll taxes or literacy tests (“it’s constitutional, the people have spoken, we win you lose, here’s a rational justification”) is at best inconclusive and at worst irrelevant.

1707

Well, no.

When a law is constitutional, has a rational justification, and enjoys popular support, it has a strong presumption of being democratic. I won’t say it also has a strong presumption of being ethical, because you and I derive our ethical guidance from different sources and likely to do not agree on what is ethical.

You have shown that a strong presumption is not synonymous with actually being democratic. You have not overcome the presumption in favor of these specific laws.

And I take no position whatsoever on your Jim Crow analogy.

1708

That’s probably wise.

1709

No, it isn’t impossible. What it isn’t is reasonable. And what are you sheltering behind that word “rare”? You mean to say that it has happened? But you can’t prove that it has, therefore you cannot honestly call it “rare”, since the word explicitly depends on it actually happening. The boy is as slippery as a catfish in a barrel of motor oil, I swear…

Of course, you can say that you “think” it is rare, because you can “think” anything you bloody well please.

Oh, so you have numbers, then? Actual facts? How many such votes are we talking about here? One? Ten? A hundred? A thousand? And I note you offload the problem on to Turzai. Not saying you believe it, nosir! Just explaining what he believes.

I have quotes from the World’s Foremost Authority on Matters Constitutional, Jurisprudential, and Semantic. Would you like to see them again?

1710

Except of course that that applies exactly as well, if not better, to our side of the argument. That is, the “natural” result will be much less than 8%, therefore a small but noticeable decline in democratic turnout may turn the election to Romney… and in fact is vastly more likely to do so than the prevention of all fraudulent votes.
Here’s an interesting thought experiment: God Himself descends from on high, shows up in Washington DC and says “hey, US government, I see that you’ve been having some issues with your elections lately… so I figured I’d step in and use my divine power to ensure that every vote ever cast in any election in the US is in fact from a legally eligible and registered voter. Anyone else who wants to try to vote will just somehow fail to do so, and maybe grow donkey ears”. Do the dems accept this? Do the repubs?

Alternatively, God Himself shows up and says “hey, US government, I see that you’ve been having some issues with your elections lately… so I figured I’d step in and use my divine power to ensure that everyone in the US who is legally eligible to vote can do so with absolutely equal amounts of effort. You tell me how difficult or easy you want the process to be, and I’ll make it exactly that difficult or easy for EVERYONE, but scaled (using my God powers) so that the actual effort and impact required is equal for all, regardless of their circumstances in life. How can I make that comparison between people in different life situations? Easy, I’m frickin’ God.” Do the dems accept this? Do the repubs?

Now, obviously an extremely silly thought experiment like this is fundamentally unanswerable and certainly never proves anything to anyone. But I do think it can help clarify one’s understanding of the situation, and the motivations that people have. And, to be clear, I’m quite certain that both dems and repubs would accept the first offer. Because hey, why not? In fact, if anything it would be repubs who would reject the first offer because if God stepped in and did that they wouldn’t have the issue as a bogeyman to use anymore. But as for actually wanting that to happen, both would be in favor. For the second issue, I believe dems would be for it, and would want the process to be as easy as possible, and repubs would be against it, but on generally flimsy grounds.

1711

Well, first of all, while I agree with what you’re saying to a certain extent, you’re presenting “When a law is constitutional, has a rational justification, and enjoys popular support, it has a strong presumption of being democratic” as some kind of proven, axiomatic fact. Which it isn’t, as far as I know. It certainly isn’t in informal debate terms.

Aside from that, however, we then get to the part of the argument where we discuss the actual issue at hand on a more practical level. And if you say “voter fraud is a super important issue and so is voter confidence, and I think this would address both of these, and I think that impact on voter turnout would be small enough to not be more important than the positives” or something, well, I disagree with every one of those points but at least you’re stating a position that is relevant to the question at hand, rather than just saying “but it’s LEGAL and CONSTITUTIONAL and WE WON so SHUT UP”, which is what you’ve been doing for at least part of this thread.

1712

For it to be rare it would have to have happened. So far I’m not seeing any evidence to support that.

Wrong again!

Please. Turzai may be an idiot but he’s not stupid. He knows full well voter fraud will not swing an election anything more than a few thousands of a percent.

How else do you parse what he said? If he believed that voter fraud won Obama the election do you think he would not have said it? He knows full well that’s not the case.

What lie? Here’s a video of the man saying it.

Either he believes that Obama won PA by 8%, (over 1 million votes) due to vote fraud or he believes that Voter ID laws will disenfranchise enough Dem voters to shift it to Romney.

The former is a statistical (and practical) improbability so close to zero there’s more chance of a fully formed elephant springing forth from the quantum soup into your living room. The latter has all but been admitted.

1713

Well, I guess you’ve come late to the party. From the genesis of this thread in earlier threads, and here, I have said that the state has an interest in ensuring voter confidence, that this is a legitimate and important interest, and that the imposition of Voter ID requirements creates only a minimal barrier which, when weighed against the strong interest being served, is easily justifiable. And that even if the motives for the law were impure, as long as there were neutral justifications and the law made sense, I didn’t care what the motives in the minds of some legislators might have been.

I got tired of repeating that. I got tired of arguing with people whose response was, “Nuh huh.”

So evolved my second position: you may not agree with how I weigh those factors. But you don’t get to decide.

And that of course was equally ignored, and thus led inexorably to my third position: too bad, sucks to be you, because that humor of people asserting stubbornly that we just can’t make these laws until I prove something or other to their satisfaction tickled me pink, since the laws were already in place.

So if you’d like to hearken the thread’s attention back to the first argument, I’m game.

1714

How does that make me wrong? That’s how Obama’s numbers look now. The economy will get weaker, and Obama will lose ground.

Right. And together with the economy’s continued poor performance, which will push Pennsylvania so closer that a few thousands of a percent may well tip the balance.

Florida in 2000 was within a “few thousands of a percent.” Why not Pennsylvania in 2012?

OR he believes that Pennsylvania will be a toss up state naturally, and a few thousands of a percent may well be in play.

Bullshit. Florida, 2000 happened, and no elephants ensued. How about Washington 2004 governor’s race? Also no elephants.

What you said he admitted was not what he said – it’s what you believe his words should be inferred to mean.

That’s not a lie if you acknowledge your interpretation is in play. But when you say he admitted it, you lied. And certainly when you say I admitted it, you lied.

1715

nm

1716

Impressive! Not only a lawyer, psychic as well!

Are you even bothering to click on the data we’re linking too? A casual glance at the chart would have revealed that Obama’s lead in PA is strengthening. It was an average 3% difference at the beginning of the year, it’s now over 7%.

And it had nothing to do with voter fraud. It was due to shitty ballot design and inappropriate tallying methods. Paper punch cards? What is this? The 60s? You want to increase voter confidence? Spend your energy on that.

And need I remind you that Gore won the popular vote by over 500 000 votes. Again you want to increase voter confidence? Take a good hard look at the Electoral College.

Do you actually have data or evidence to present of voter fraud or are you just going to keep on throwing out these Foxnews style “Accusations as a question?” entendres. It really does get tiresome.

Well he better say it then because all I’m hearing directly out of his mouth is that Voter ID will somehow swing a state that Obama won by a million votes the other way.

Dude you’re going to bring up Washington again? We’ve gone over this. The Republicans screamed voter fraud and they were found badly badly wanting, to the point that they were the ones who actually lost votes. You might want to bring cases that actually support your position

Either he believes voter fraud is rampant in PA, which for a person of his position and knowledge of elections in PA is so ignorant of the facts he should vacate office immediately if he does because he is borderline incompetent, or he believes Voter ID will suppress the Dem vote sufficiently to bring PA into play. Occam’s Razor only points to one of those answers.

You’ve stated you don’t care how many legit voters get turned away at the polls if the Voter ID law is passed and constitutional. You’ve also stated (if I remember correctly) that politicians who are pushing these laws are doing so because they believe it will be advantageous for them in elections.

We’ve demonstrated that voter fraud is a non-issue when you actually look at the data. You claim to support it out of increasing ‘voter confidence’ and we have shown that there are fare more efficient ways to increase ‘voter confidence’ .

You continue to support the laws in spite of the evidence against it, I can only assume you believe the evidence to be wrong (and refuse to refute it so far) or you believe in the validity of these laws because it is advantageous to the political positions you support.

1717

Bingo. Correct. That is in fact all you heard. Anything else, you made up and then claimed you heard from his mouth.

1718

Do you believe that simply because you assume it, you can categorically state that I said it?

1719

Correlation doesnt equal causation. An interesting tidbit. And when I posted that every other jurisdiction on the planet who has stricter requirements for Voter ID has higher turnout at the polls, Im told it is because they have different cultures. Did the culture change in Georgia overnight along with the Voter ID law (assuming the stated facts are true)? So, I`m left wondering when does causation equal correlation.

1720

What does this mean? What other interpretation is possible, except that he believes that less votes will be going to Obama, and that change is due to a reduction in voter fraud? Unless you would like to propose that these laws will create a mad enthusiasm for Romney?

You want to imply that the obvious is not the obvious? Have you an alternative to offer? Electoral pixies, perhaps?

Google him, and you see he got a lot of attention for those remarks, most of them reflecting our common sense view. If that interpretation were wrong, we would most likely see a “clarification”, yes? No, no, as in no we don’t see any such “clarification”. Hence we may reasonably conclude that the said what he meant, and meant what he said.

If he had been misunderstood, wouldn’t he say so? And if he doesn’t, isn’t the reasonable conclusion that he was not misunderstood?