Because there are cases of people who were told they couldn’t vote because their name was on a list of former felons. It didn’t matter if they actually were a former felon - many people couldn’t vote because they had the same name as a former felon. And the review was done shortly before the election so there wasn’t enough time to do all the appeals before the election. And the law said your voting privileges remained suspended during the appeal process.
But do you feel the letter of the law led to the “right answer” here?
Mistakes can and DO happen, on a regular basis I might add (maybe we ought to privatize vote gathering )
Kind of like the recent Illinois scandal
To seriously answer your question, No I don’t think that was the ‘right’ way either however that is something the government needs to address (don’t you think)
Just like any other law. If I am arrested and found guilty, it really doesn’t matter if I ‘did it’
I’ll bet you could do it, Kearsen, I bet you could cobble together a sensible plan to enfranchise and protect the voting rights of the disadvantaged. Even make it affordable, clear, and transparent, so that millions of previously voteless Americans are included, with no great damage or uproar.
You’re assuming mistakes were made. The procedure was apprently designed to disenfranchise potential voters and was therefore successful. Which led to the re-election of the government officials who you say should be the people who address issues like this.
Back when ACORN was a hot topic around here part of the justification for destroying it was the accusation of voter registration fraud (often shortened to just voter fraud). Any one know if anything ever became of those accusations?
To avoid the threat of voter fraud (to follow the letter of the law), an organization was shut down, who otherwise would have helped disenfranchised voters get registered (legally).
It was believed at the time (and probably still) that ACORN’s actions were illegal, and allowed Obama to win.
Following the *letter of the law *meant than two years later people who otherwise would have registered didn’t. Balance restored, Republicans back in power.
If you want to throw out the accusation that politicians will do whatever they can to stay in power, go ahead but I think you’ll be preaching to the choir (everyone on this board). I doubt you will find a single soul here or elsewhere (other than a politician) who would tell you otherwise.
However, what you are somewhat advocating is to ‘screw the law’ as long as it’s for the common good. Slippery Slope there.
I’m not saying “screw the law” but we have to remember that the law is a monopoly.
If conservatives think ACORN is bad because it’s registering too many potential Democratic voters, then they can counteract them by setting up their own non-profit and go out and register potential Republican voters.
But if elected officials enact laws that bias registration towards the people who vote for them, then how do you counteract that? You can’t enact up a competing law. And you can’t depend on the traditional political remedy of voting them out of office - because what they’re doing is undermining the power of that remedy.
The most dangerous thing elected officials can do is monkey with the electoral system. Because if elected officials get control of the electoral system, then they can do anything else they want without fear of reprisal. So anytime an elected official even looks at any part of the electoral system, we should all be watching him with the highest level of suspicion.
I don’t believe there’s necessarily any tension here.
It’s possible to believe that people should have the government’s help to exercise a right (like funding ACORN), and at the same time complain about the manner in which people exercise it.
For example, I strongly disagreed with the pastor that wanted to burn copies of the Koran. But at the same time I would support sending in police to prevent hecklers from stealing his Korans or putting out his fire.
If Fred Phelps got in a terrible accident that injured his voice box, didn’t have health insurance, and needed surgery to continue talking, I’d support the government paying for his surgery. That doesn’t mean I’m a hypocrite for denouncing what he says afterwards in the harshest of terms.
I hear what you saying. I heard it the first time you were advocating that if feel the law is wrong it’s ok to go against it. Good luck with that when you get pulled over for a speeding ticket.
Also, gerrymandering is exactly what you describe what you don’t want to happen, yet it’s been going strong for years on end.
And again, if Acorn wants to register voters I feel that they should do so, however do so with their own funding. If conservatives wish to form an organization to register voters for their cause, they need to do so with their own money as well.
Specifically this: “But if elected officials enact laws that bias registration towards the people who vote for them, then how do you counteract that? You can’t enact up a competing law. And you can’t depend on the traditional political remedy of voting them out of office - because what they’re doing is undermining the power of that remedy.”
You can’t ‘counteract it’ other than what you’ve proposed or challenging it in court.
Is it just because most currently unregistered voters, if they registered and voted, would vote Democratic that sticks in your craw? If it were split 50/50, would you feel any differently about it?
As Jesus once said: law is made for man, not man for the law. A law should serve a specific purpose, and if the manner that we enforce that law causes it to fail to fulfil its main purpose than we need to reexamine what we’re doing.
My view of the purpose of a voting system is that it should reflect the will of the people being governed as accurately as is reasonably practicable. While it’s a bad thing to let dishonest folks go unimpeded, if the effort to do so hurts more honest people than dishonest people, than the cure is worse than the disease. Do you agree or disagree with this proposition?
I really could care less one way or the other. If I delve deeper into my own bias, I would lean toward disallowing dumb people the right to vote on issues they know nothing about. Good thing I’m not a politician!
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Elected officials always have control of the electoral system.