Crawford v. Marion County Election Board

[Vermouth]

"The [Supreme Court] will hear oral arguments next month in a critically important election case. Crawford v. Marion County Election Board is a challenge to Indiana’s harsh voter ID law. The law ... requires registered voters who cast ballots in person to provide current government-issued photo ID."

http://theboard.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/11/will-the-supreme-court-decide-the-2008-election/

I'm not sure how I feel about this. Voter fraud should be taken seriously, but is this a solution?

[they call me MR. GRUMPY god damn it!]

exactly what is it that you are not sure of??  what is harsh about requiring official id to vote?

[Vermouth]

If photo IDs are provided free at the time that you register to vote, fine.
However, most states charge a fee for IDs. Wouldn't that be considered a poll tax? The 24th amendment states "The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any State by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax."

[they call me MR. GRUMPY god damn it!]

likely that is the argument that will be made although i am not sure that you will sell scotus on it.  personally if you don't have $20 to get a state id which incidentally is required for numerous pursuits, what are you voting for.  i mean seriously what do you have at stake in an election.  this is not an argument against the poor voting in this country this is an argument against homeless being picked up of the streets or out of detox to vote. 

[Gunit Hussein Sangh]

First off, I agree that providing an ID to vote should not be a big deal since one is necessary for so many activities and feel the arguements against it are bogus.

But I also feel the arguements FOR it are bogus also -- Grumpy -- in recent history when has there been an organized effort to pick up a bunch of homeless drunks and take them to vote?

[Vermouth]

How would you certify absentee ballots?

[Gunit Hussein Sangh]

AAHHHH ... This article at the Houston Chronicle explains it:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/4814978.html

Among Republicans it is an "article of religious faith that voter fraud is causing us to lose elections," Masset said. He doesn't agree with that, but does believe that requiring photo IDs could cause enough of a dropoff in legitimate Democratic voting to add 3 percent to the Republican vote.

This is no different than gop efforts to purge voter rolls of people with similar names to felons, caging (that's where gop sends a certified letter to a dem and if they refuse to sign for it, they obviously don't live where they say they do and their right to vote is challenged), and not providing enough voting machines in precints that lean towards Democrats.

They just want to stack the deck in their favor 

[conley]

this is probably a stupid question, but i'll ask anyway

why would requiring id cost democrats 3% of the vote? i would think republicans would be hurt the same...everyone has a photo id, right? its not just rich people that have drivers licenses. or are there really that many illegals that vote? i cant think that many illegals would vote...they'd probably be afraid of being arrested

[Gunit Hussein Sangh]

It probably wouldn't -- My state is one of those that do require an ID and I haven't read of any issues of voters not voting because of it. Heck, we just tossed out a repug gov.

Remember, these are political geniuses at work and therefore doesn't need to based on any type of reality. Besides -- do you really think republicans can win in 2008 on the ideas they've represented over the past several years? They have to pull every trick they can to suppress the votes of people they know won't vote for them. How else will they win 

btw -- did you hear about the trick they tried to pull in California recently? They tried to get enough signatures to get a referendum onto the ballot to allow their electoral college votes to be split based on who won each district instead of winner take all, effectively giving republicans an extra 20 electoral votes. They had difficulty in getting enough signatures so they placed the referendum on a clipboard under another petition about children's cancer or something like that and asked the people to sign multiple times and didn't tell them what was under the top petition.

This is the modern day gop at work!
(p.s. the referendum failed to get enough signatures)

[conley]

thanks gunit...i hadnt heard about that in california! i cant believe thats not illegal -- it should be

thank god it didnt work