Before she died six years ago, Rev. Cassandra Gould’s mother used to say that “everybody marched with Dr. King” but that she had been in Selma, Alabama, “before Dr. King got there.” As a 19-year-old from a nearby town, she would ask an older cousin to drive her to the city, where she registered voters, joined sit-ins, and marched. For the rest of her life, she carried a gash on her thigh, a reminder of the police officer who shot her on March 7, 1965, “Bloody Sunday,” the day that perhaps more than any other precipitated the passage of that year’s Voting Rights Act.
Gould and her siblings grew up faithful to their mother’s directive — “If you don’t do anything else, you vote” — but never experienced firsthand the ferocious racism of those days. Gould moved to St. Louis, Missouri — “Mississippi North,” as she only half-jokingly calls it — and became a reverend and activist. She quickly learned the subtle and insidious ways in which racism had survived and adapted in the aftermath of the civil rights era, but like many of her generation she remained relatively sheltered from racial violence.
Then, in August 2014, a few days after an unarmed black teenager was killed by a white police officer in nearby Ferguson, she found herself within feet of tanks, rows of police in riot gear, and the smell of tear gas. She wondered, “Is this what it was like for my mother?”
“Never in my life I thought I’d see something like that,” she told The Intercept during a recent interview. “That was the night that I thought, I am now living in my mother’s world, and why in the world am I living in that world when I thought that those who fought during that time fought so I wouldn’t have to?”
A mural depicting police violence during the 1965 Selma to Montgomery civil rights march. March 6, 2015, Selma, Alabama.
Photo: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Something else she never thought she’d be doing in 2016 was fighting to preserve the right to vote. Yet that’s exactly what she and dozens of other black activists have undertaken across the country, some for the second time in their lives, after a 2013 Supreme Court decision gutted a major provision of the Voting Rights Act. The elimination of that provision, which required nine states and many other localities with a history of racial discrimination to secure federal approval before changing election laws and procedures, sparked a series of measures across the country effectively restricting access to the polls with a disproportionate impact, once again, on black voters.
In Missouri, that resulted in renewed efforts to pass a voter ID law so restrictive that in 2006 the state’s supreme court found it violated the state constitution — which, unlike the U.S. Constitution, includes an affirmative right to vote. But instead of shelving the bill as unconstitutional, legislators moved to change the constitution itself, making Missouri the only state in the country that’s attempting to rewrite its supreme law in order to restrict access to the polls.
On November 8, Missourians will head to the polls to elect the president and a host of statewide officials in a deeply divided state. But this time, they will also be asked — in language that some have described as confusing — whether they want to amend their constitution to open the door to stricter voting laws. If passed, Amendment Six would give a second chance to HB 1631, which was vetoed earlier this summer by Gov. Jay Nixon after passing both state House and Senate. The proposed law aims to limit the forms of ID accepted at the polls to valid Missouri or federal IDs with photos and expiration dates — excluding currently accepted documents like college IDs, driver’s licenses from other states, expired IDs, voter registration cards, and utility bills. Voters without the required ID could sign a sworn statement affirming their identity and recognizing that such ID is “the law of the land” or they could cast a provisional ballot, not valid until they prove their identity.
A polling place on Nov. 4, 2014 near Ferguson, Missouri.
Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images
While the bill includes provisions requiring the state to cover the cost of the ID and any underlying documents necessary to get it, critics say it would pose an unreasonable and unnecessary burden on citizens who often don’t have the access to transportation or the means and time to chase paperwork from the DMV to the social security administration office or the division of vital records, even assuming the necessary documents are available. That quest can also be complicated by budget cuts and reduced operating hours: In Alabama, for instance, shortly after passing stricter photo ID requirements, state officials proceeded to close 30 DMV offices in mostly black counties — though most were later re-opened for one or two days a month.
Most commonly, obtaining a photo ID requires a certified birth certificate, which many black and elderly voters do not possess, especially if they were born in the South at a time when most African-Americans were not welcome in hospitals and gave birth at home, said Denise Lieberman, a senior attorney at the Advancement Project, who has led successful efforts to repeal North Carolina’s voter ID law and has fought Missouri’s version of that law for years. Obtaining post-dated birth certificates requires a half dozen other underlying documents, she noted, and any discrepancy in spelling or names can constitute a major roadblock, which especially affects women who changed their names through marriage or divorce, as well as minorities, mostly Latinos, with multiple first and last names.
Trying to obtain a photo ID without the right underlying documentation can be an “exercise in futility,” said Lieberman. “In a number of states, including Missouri, in order to get a copy of your birth certificate — get this — you have to present a photo ID!”
A man checks in to receive his ballot during Missouri primary voting at the Griffith Elementary School on March 15, 2016, in Ferguson, Missouri.
Photo: Michael B. Thomas/AFP/Getty Images
Ferguson Is Everywhere
In the summer of 2014, the Ferguson protests catapulted questions of institutional racism and inequality back into the national spotlight with a force not seen in decades, but as the movement reaffirming black lives sparked by the killing of Michael Brown expanded across the country and beyond policing issues, Missouri remained a hot spot as well as a state both symptomatic and foreboding of racial battles to come.
The state’s conservative politicians and residents responded to Ferguson by retreating into their entrenched rhetoric, while the street protests simmered down, leaving room for voter registration drives, packed town hall meetings, and long-disenfranchised black communities vigorously demanding a seat at the table in local politics. The state’s next battle will be fought at the voting booth, and this time, it will be about who will have access to it.
“It’s no coincidence,” said Lieberman, calling Missouri the “poster child for restrictive voting provisions.”
“What’s happening in Missouri is indicative of this struggle for racial justice and power across the country; it’s about race and it’s about power,” she said. “The reality of this country has been that we shut out communities of color, particularly African-Americans, and it’s no coincidence that just as that particular voting bloc is starting to see a surge in their ability to speak, you see measures precisely targeted at limiting the political voice of those particular communities.”
Anthony Shaheed at a get-out-the-vote rally at Greatest St. Mark’s Family Church on Nov. 3, 2014, in St. Louis, Missouri.
Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images
“I think that it’s the democratic governor’s fault, the climate that we’re in right now,” he told The Intercept. Kraus said the estimate that 220,000 Missourians lack photo IDs is “grossly exaggerated. … I’d be shocked if it’s 10,000.” He also dismissed as “talking points” the criticism from voting rights advocates that the bill would disproportionately affect black and poor residents and said that most people in Missouri, across party lines, “don’t understand why this is a big deal.”
“How do they live in today’s society without a photo ID? How do they cash a check?” he said. “I have friends that are African-Americans, and trust me that most of them have IDs.”
Kraus, who recently lost his party’s primary for secretary of state, insists that photo IDs are necessary. “One of the most important things we can do is protect and safeguard our election process, when there are people out there trying to change the outcome of the election by voter registration fraud,” he said. “Right now, all it takes to vote in Missouri is a utility bill. You can go and say, I’m Bob Schmidt. You have to register before that, but when you go in, you don’t have to show who you are.”
“We’ve had a couple situations,” he added, citing the case of two relatives of a state representative who admitting to illegally claiming a Kansas City address to vote for their nephew. In 2012, he said, one woman showed up at the polls to learn that someone had already voted for her. And he claimed that in April 2015, 27 people registered to vote from city-owned apartments he personally canvassed and saw were vacant.
But critics say that restricting access to the polls over fraud concerns is a solution in search of a problem, and that claims of large-scale voter fraud have been thoroughly debunked: It just doesn’t happen anywhere near the level proponents of voting restrictions claim. Nationwide, voter fraud is vanishingly rare. Most election irregularities happen at the administrative level and are due to election officials’ errors — something that won’t change with stricter voter ID laws. “It’s a proxy for racism and a proxy for passing laws that target particular populations with potential political power because you don’t like what they have to say,” said Lieberman. “It’s manipulating the system for political gain.”
“You can certainly understand why folks who are in power and who have benefited historically from society’s disparities in power would be running scared at the thought of a more robust and democratic electorate,” she added.
Missouri primary voting at Johnson-Wabash Elementary School on March 15, 2016, in Ferguson, Missouri.
Photo: Michael B. Thomas/AFP/Getty Images
Freedom Summer ’16
Fifty-two years after the original Freedom Summer voter registration campaign in Mississippi, Gould and a number of other black activists held their own Freedom Summer ’16 campaign in Missouri, with the goal of educating voters about the threat posed by Amendment Six.
“As a daughter of the South, realizing that the same fight that my mother had more than 50 years ago is still my fight is sobering,” said Gould. “If we allow this to happen, then the writing is on the wall. It will only get worse; our constitutional rights will continue to get eroded.”
The challenge this summer has been to rally support against an amendment that even in Missouri remains relatively obscure to many, and to do so at a time when disillusion with the political system runs deep. “Many are not excited by the presidential election, and they say they plan to sit this one out,” said Gould. “I hate to say this, but even if you don’t vote for a president, show up at the polls and say … I’m not going to allow you to take that right.”
That can be a hard sell, as many working at the grassroots level in Missouri and beyond have learned. Jamala Rogers, an organizer with the St. Louis-based Organization for Black Struggle, said her group is trying to encourage people to vote as only one way to exert power, and an admittedly limited one. “You put someone in office, and then they screw you, then you wait four years and remove them, and the next person screws you,” she told The Intercept. “We have got to come up with some different way of doing things.”
Like Gould, Rogers’s group is channeling civil rights-era organizing models, relying on churches and door knocking to mobilize people. While she warns against viewing the vote as a catch-all solution, she’s encouraging people to keep showing up at the polls, and this year to protect their very right to vote. Ferguson — where at the time of Michael Brown’s death black residents “were 70 percent of the population with no elected officials that looked like them”— made clear that voting alone would not change things, Rogers noted. But while protest, organizing, and other ways to build political power all matter, voting shouldn’t be dismissed, especially as it comes under threat.
“I believe many young people have a better sense of urgency than some in my generation, yet many are apathetic about voting,” said Gould. “But voting, particularly in this election, in Missouri, is an act of resistance.”
Top photo: Eileen Woofford, 84, in line to vote at Cleveland Avenue Baptist Church on Nov. 6, 2012, in Kansas City, Missouri.
Apathy is ruining this world. People can see that no matter who they vote for nothing really changes. Yet rather than try to stand up and actually do something about by setting up / supporting an alternative party they either don’t vote or just exercise their vote in favour of the same old. This is true the world over certainly in my little country. You want change stop talking about it and hoping someone else will do it for you, get up off your butt and make it happen.
One significant correction is required in this article. In the opening, the author erroneously lists “tanks” as having been on the streets of Ferguson. That is absolutely and completely untrue. There were never any tanks in Ferguson. There were some military surplus vehicles that were armored, similar to an armored personnel carrier, that were used for crowd surveillance. Those large armored vehicles were the cause of much justified alarm and outrage but tanks they were not.
I read this site regularly and I appreciate the work. I don’t always agree. But I am usually stimulated. I never comment. However, as a black man, I have to step in and say somwthing about this one. My entire adult life I have heard of these voter ID laws and the racism behind them and how they deny black folks the right to vote. I have to say, that’s pretty insulting. I mean, if y’all really think that we are such imbeciles that merely having to show an ID would stop us from voting, if voting is what we wanted to do…I don’t know what to tell you. Check your sensibilities. That, my friend, is white supremacy. Now, mind you, im not saying the spirit behind these laws is not racist. It probably is. But here’s another thing: what the heck can you do in life without an ID? You can’t drive, open a bank account, buy alcohol, get a job…pretty much nothing. If you don’t have an ID, maybe voting isn’t your biggest concern. So you have a group of people(democrats) desperately fighting for the voting rights of folks who probably need to be worried about more immediate things. They just go in the hood, to the most impoverished, least educated, least informed segment of society and mine votes. They literally go into the ghetto, register folks in droves and tell them how to vote. Im not making this up. I have been there and witnessed it. So let’s please stop pretending this fight has anything to do with justice or altruism. It has everything to do with two groups of white people,jockeying for power, and using black folks as a political football. Those are Malcolm X’s words and it is still true today. If those black people all went and voted Republican, the Republicans would stop pushing for the laws and the Democrats would start trying to enforce them. Its a game. Its completely disingenuous. And its gross. Sorry, the truth aint sexy.
That’s entirely legal, and should be. As long as no one is coercing or bribing voters to vote for a candidate, this is proper. What is not legal or proper is Republicans passing laws for the purpose of preventing some of those registered black voters from voting.
What this “has to do with” is the Fifteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States:
What you’re also forgetting is that not all small towns have a DMV. So older people will have to get a ride45 mins out of their way to go stand in line at the DMV for a non drivers license. Just to find out they need to dig up a birth certificate or apply for a lost one. All said and done it’s not worth the hassle and discourages them from voting.
Exercising the right to vote isn’t worth 20-30 bucks and sitting in a car for a while?? Do you know any ‘older people?’
“shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.”
Did this actually happen? Who was denied/abridged the right to vote **based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude?**
Nice post and I couldn’t agree more.
Good honest thoughts. But please consider that if you allow one restriction on your rights to vote, you open the door to other restrictions. Which restrictions are you will to allow and which ones will you object to? How about an education restriction, or income restriction or residency restriction?
Also, there may people who don’t have need. The self-employed, the elderly or those new high school grads who don’t yet have their license, or someone who didn’t realize their ID just expired? That’s a big price to pay for letting your ID lapse.
You should comment more often, because that was a compelling statement. And I say that not only because I said a few related things in one of my blurbs lower down :)
But who *are* the people who are being denied a birth certificate and with it any of the other cards the government wants them to have, and how *do* they get harassed in daily life by ID-demanding bureaucrats that affects them most? I wish The Intercept did have an article about that.
DeAndre, you make some good points. But there are long-retired elderly people who don’t drive, don’t buy alcoholic beverages, and would have a hard time getting to the county seat, providing proof of identity, possibly paying a “minimal” fee, in order to use a right they already have. Any limitation sets a really bad precedent, and must be resisted.
Don’t background checks and drivers’ licenses give those same people the same “hard time”??
BREAKING: The United States Supreme Court won’t allow North Carolina to implement its wide swath of voting restrictions by staying the 4th Circuit decision I quote from here.
Voter ID laws and other GOP voter suppression laws and policies violate Section 2 of the 14th Amendment which expressly grants a fundamental right to vote for minorities in federal and state elections. The 19th and 26th Amendments expanded the express grant of a fundamental right to vote in federal and state elections to women, youths, including students, and seniors.
Voter ID laws and other laws and policies to impair voting and voter registration violate Section 2 because the 14th Amendment makes unconstitutional any state action where the fundamental right to vote in federal and state elections is “denied…or abridged, in any way…”
The proffered rationale for such illegal laws is to prevent in person voter fraud. Such fraud has been extensively researched under the Bush DOJ and they found no support for claims of any problems with in-person voter fraud. Over 85,000,000 votes were analyzed in that study. President Obama commissioned a study after the 2008 election which also found that in-person voter fraud was “not a problem.” That conclusion was issued by the lawyer who had represented resident George W. Bush in Bush v. Gore, who was a member of President Obama’s commission. Other state courts, like Missouri, which have studied the issue have likewise found no in-person voter fraud.
What we do know is that certain Republican elected officials have made statements that voter ID “would win Pennsylvania for Romney” and were enacted in North Carolina to “keep blacks from voting.”
We also know there has been an extensive history of voter suppression efforts by the Republican National Committee dating back to before a 1981 consent decree issued in NJ.
In the 1981 consent decree, the RNC agreed to stop formerly broadly used tactics to suppress minority votes called “caging” and following voters to polling places and issuing false information about voting days and locations being changed. The Michigan GOP had gone so far as to challenge voters who had had their homes foreclosed upon and only stopped after another suit was filed by Democrats opposing racist voter suppression tactics of the GOP.
The violations are arguably more rampant than as previously mentioned because veterans, retired veterans, divorced persons and the disabled all may be “minorities” under Section 2 as the enactment was remedial in nature and is to be broadly construed so as to make the remedy more complete. Texas’ law was successfully challenged as was North Carolina’s but, an appellate court relying upon wrongly decided and uninformed precedent from the Roberts Court has allowed Wisconsin’s law to proceed to deny and abridge the fundamental right to vote of tens of thousands of voters, perhaps hundreds of thousands in the November 2016 elections.
The false solution of the Roberts Court that so-called “free ID” cures harms and state impediments to voting is wholly baseless in application.
The federal HAVA and REAL ID Acts only allow states to issue IDs with the use of either a certified birth certificate or a valid US Passport. So, the Indiana law upheld in a Roberts Court SCOTUS decision was wrong both constitutionally and legally as Section 2 prohibits such laws and the federal statutes previously cited prevent any state from issuing any so-called “free ID.” Certified birth certificates cost $15 or more and are often unavailable for the elderly and passports may cost as much as $300. Such costs are a hidden “poll tax” and illegal.
If Republicans want voter ID, they will have to make an express appropriation for states to provide the needed and federally required documents to get a “free ID.” If not, under Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, all state voter ID laws in all their iterations will mandate any state enacting or enforcing them lose US House seats and Electors in proportion to the number of voters harmed by the illegal and unconstitutional state voter ID laws and other restrictive laws and policies.
Perhaps the Republicans would be willing to fund “Voter ID’ by diverting some of the $163 billion a year in corporate welfare to funding truly “free” IDs?
Otherwise, I assert suits should be filed immediately to strip away US House seats and Electors from so-called “red” states and have the courts re-allocate the seats and Electors to states where there are NOT racist voter suppression; laws and policies in force, most likely “blue” states. That way, we can void the GOP gerrymandering after the 2010 Census which locked in so many safe US House seats for an intransigent and defiantly racist Republican Party.
A footnote from the Brennan Center for Justice report on (the large absence of) voter fraud:
Most proposals to require photo identification of voters do not address the absentee voting process, where fraud through forgery or undue influence, often directly implicating candidates or their close associates,
is far more of a threat. See, e.g., Commission on Federal Election Reform, Building Confidence in U.S. Elections 46 (2005), available at http://www.american.edu/ia/cfer/report/full_report. pdf; Becky Johnson, Swain Voter Fraud Investigation Sent to Feds, Smoky Mountain News (N.C.), Sept. 19, 2007; Stephanie Taylor, 2 Accused of Voter Fraud in Hale County, Tuscaloosa News (Ala.), Aug. 18, 2007; Laura B. Martinez, Potential For Fraud, Brownsville Herald (Tex.), July 22, 2007; Gary McElroy, Former Candidate Faces Charges of Voter Fraud, Press-Register (Ala.), July 13, 2007; Rex Bowman, entencing Postponed for Former Appalachia Mayor, Richmond Times-Dispatch, Jan. 19, 2007; Bill Theobald, False Counts, Indianapolis Star, Nov. 5, 2000, at 1A; Marylynne Pitz, Murphy Arraigned on ote-Fraud Charges, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, May 25, 1999, at B1. See also Minnite, An Analysis of Voter Fraud in the U.S., supra note 12.
This is indeed true. The most common opportunity to amass illegitimate votes for a candidate is to have supporters send in absentee ballots for vulnerable adults in their family or acquaintanceship, such as the elderly who have become cognitively impaired.
Almost no voter ID schemes the Republicans have offered in the last decade deal with this issue which disproportionately favors conservative candidates. They don’t attend to this issue because, as multiple courts have held, the Voter ID laws are intended to reduce black votes.
Formatting screw-up. This should be blockquoted:
Federal courts — many of them top-heavy with Republican-appointed judges — all over the nation are striking voter ID laws. Below I cited and quoted the 4th Circuit on North Carolina’s naked attempt to impede African-American voters. A Wisconsin district court reached the same conclusion about that state’s similar attempt:
And it’s not just federal courts. The Supreme Court of Arkansas — hardly a bastion of liberals — has also struck that state’s voter ID laws.
So Mona..you call me a troll……..I just counted the posts here and you account for exactly 23.47% of ALL posts in this column and there are a total of 91 posts so far……..do the math. Since you are such a lover of “Facts” I thought that I would point that out for you.
Yes, I have many sources of documentationto offer on the subject at hand. You do assertion sans documentation, so you wouldn’t understand.
Honestly, I feel like this voting issue almost misses the point. How many elderly blacks have been denied for their whole lives any way to get a birth certificate or any of the other identity documents that so many government agencies and private companies love to demand? What do they have to do to work around these problems? I mean even illegal immigrants have formal papers (fake, it’s true, but most of the politicians nudge and wink at that and say on TV that they’re “law-abiding” and welcome residents anyway). So these blacks are lower on the totem pole than the next guy climbing over that big stupid wall with a ladder. I guess they always have been.
It’s pretty amazing, really. As much as the government generally seems fixated on tracking and spying on everybody, it has such contempt for these old blacks that it doesn’t even care if there’s a hole in its web of databases. I suppose if just one of them would pick up a gun and start yelling “allahu akbar”, then every one of them all over the country would be presented with some mechanism where they go down to the police station tomorrow and after getting their fingerprints taken and their retinas/irises scanned and a detailed biography taken (with their voiceprint recorded) and their ear-print taken and had sat down at a terminal and started a Facebook account and friended three or four people, they could sign some paper and come out with a big batch of fancy government cards to show around every day.
Voter ID laws are intended to disenfranchise black voters
Last month the ? US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit struck down North Carolina’s Voter ID law, finding that its transparent purpose was to impede African-American voters. The court held:
The kicker for the 4th Circuit was the legislature’s complete disinterest in potential fraud via the absentee ballot:
?
No significant problem with voter fraud exists in the United States. The urgent interest in this non-issue in recent years is nakedly driven by a desire to diminish the black vote.
No, no significant problem with voter fraud in the US:
http://www.breitbart.com/video/2012/04/09/okeefe-holder/
http://projectveritas.com/2016/08/04/james-okeefe-obtains-eminems-ballot/
I’m not clicking links to Breitbart or James O’Keefe. To say such sources lack credibility would be to understate. The notion they could undermine the 4th Circuit or the Brennan Center for Justice and its report on the (lack of) voter fraud is beyond absurd.
I’ll consider a credible authority if and when one is linked.
Didn’t expect an open mind. Just acknowledge the fact that James O’Keefe has now voted as Eric Holder, the attorney general of the US, and Eminem, one of the most well-known celebrities on the planet.
Then tell me there is no risk to the integrity of the US electoral system and no need for voter ID laws.
The antics of that clown O’Keefe are not worth my time and attention. I’l stick with courts and reputable institutions such as the Brennan Center for Justice.
So no answer then. Didn’t think so. I think I’ll go vote as “Mona” on Nov. 8. As O’Keefe proved, we can vote as anyone we like since no IDs are required…
When James O’Keefe and/or an “investigation” by Breitbart is offered into evidence in a court of law, and deemed persuasive by a court, I’ll reconsider. Until then, I have sufficient knowledge of them to dismiss them out of hand.
Mona, you have to wonder why the state republicans expend so much energy/money on a tactic that produces no measurable results other than lawsuits and hysteria in the news. In fact this tactic may produce higher turnout of black voters as was seen in ’08 and ’12 when they thought they had someone to vote for and they turned out in higher percentages than any other demographic.
It’s pretty simple: blacks overwhelmingly vote Democratic. It’s worth the gamble that the Republicans would win in court to stop as many blacks from voting as they can.
Can states be legally kicked out of the US ? I don’t want these crackers holding my country back any longer.
CROOKED HELLARY engages in 2 of the 3 types of racism. The worst being economic racism – she is a racist and NO, states cannot be kicked BUT! Crooks like hellary and all prior prezzies COULD HAVE A FEDERAL ELECTION DAY……. EASY. A Separate day, could be a weekend or a DAY OFF WORK, VOTING DAY.
But NO. The criminals in WDC whoring for the wallstreet criminals who want to dictate the economy, choices and messaging hold American rights hostage to bleed Americans to poverty. That’s how criminals operate.
Hellary could be advocating for such a day but no, SHE IS A CRIMINAL. She works with WALLSTREET CRIMINALS who REGULARLY ROB AMERICA.
No, but per Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, the Federal Government can lower a state’s apportionment in the House of Representatives by the amount of the voters denied the right to vote. (Sadly, it was never enforced. The last candidate that I know of that seriously talked about using it was Henry A. Wallace in 1948.)
Those who think obtaining a photo ID is simple have obviously not moved across state lines recently.
I cannot imagine what a pain in the ass it is for a woman who has had a name change due to marriage or divorce, or someone who was born outside the hospital system (which was common for the poor in the deep south.)
My grandmother recently had to get an ID after her driver’s license expired. (She does not drive as she is legally blind.) She had to order a birth certificate from out of state (which did cost money) and have it shipped to her before she could receive it.
And so she received it….even with all the odds ‘against’ her. Requiring an i.d. to vote is not a real impediment. Poll tax, yes. Literacy test, absolutely. ID, not at all.
VOTING. BIG DEAL. Since when in America has the will of the people ever been accomplished by voting? NEVER. Only when the elected shits are hurt do they ever act. Consider the slaughter of children. The wars. Unemployment. Food distribution. Wallstreet. Give me a frikn break – voting in America means nothing except that the shit candies like Hellary lie to America as she is so practiced at, say otherwise with her lying ass mouth.
It aint about voting- IT’S ABOUT RACE! The majority of populations of the world have decided that separation by race is the prefered method of marriage. As a result, racial congruity has become the norm and is taken for granted – and violations of that are even looked down upon by so-called non-racists. As a result of that, the planet is engaged in a power struggle largley based on race.
There are even differences in the so-called white race which white people can tell. Hellary Clinton is uni-racial. She professes not to be a racist but in practice- in reality – she is married to a typical white guy.
Donald Trump cannot be classed as a racist because in practice, he married slightly differently. People who see Donald as a racist, are racists themselves – like Hellary, whose policies of throwing away black persons or handing them popsicles, she claims proves she’s not a racist – but she is. How so? There are 3 types of racism; PHYSICAL, POLITICAL (power) and ECONOMIC. Hellary practices all 3 types of racism – her political racism is actually tokenism because being a woman, having had some empathy in the past, and suffering some guilt, she did some things to alleviate her guilt but not so much as to actually change the situation for all black persons in America – and that is currently evidenced by her sale of weapons of death and destruction which she tries to hide from the public. All she really represents is token guilt relief for others to follow in her footsteps or inherit as “voting for me means yer not a racist”.
Trump on the other hand actually understands all 3 aspects of racism and will actively eliminate economic and political racism which relies mostly on the economic aspects – the one Hellary completely fails in, refuses to address, and cannot do because she’s just a damn speakeasy who believes lawyers must rule the planet (TPP, TPIP, TISA, T3 in case you enjoyed T2) and the rules of lawyers will solve all problems…. actually, they create all problems.
disclaimer: do we need lawyers? Yes we do. But good lawyers like #GG and others who defend peoples’ rights to hold equal power thru equal ownership which means transparency. The people of the US OWN the knowledge of what their “own” government is doing (nsa cia etal). That is a good thing. But many other lawyers become crooked judges, crooked politicians, and whores for corporate ambitions. On the morality side, those types would be called “crooked” when in fact they should be called “criminal” but since the crooked lawyers write crooked laws, they’re just crooks. But from God’s perspective, they would be evil for they steal the ownership of truth from people. Luke:7:30
Have a nice day.
Trump doesn’t think that a Mexican American can’t do his job as a judge because his parents weren’t born here. Ya, that’s not at all racist. Not one iota. Or that Mexico sends us rapists and criminals and probably some decent people too. And that all Muslims shouldn’t be allowed in USA and the ones that are need to be deported. Ya “hellery”(so clever, how did anyone ever come up with that) is the bigot. For sure.
barabbas, you say “VOTING. BIG DEAL. Since when in America has the will of the people ever been accomplished by voting? NEVER” (Pardon your yelling.) How about 1960? If you think the election of Kennedy over Nixon didn’t change things, you need to read a bit of history. How would Nixon have handled the Cuban Missile Crisis? I’m glad I don’t know. Elections matter.
What is most offensive about this Clintonite voter ID meme is that it infers that poorer black people or poorer people in general are not capable of defending their right to vote by obtaining a simple piece of ID and they require the assistance of the educated Liberal Class to insure their rights. This attitude is at best paternalistic and at worst racist.
Why should poor black and also poor white people have to defend their right to vote without jumping through hoops? ….Something of a defacto means test. I’d say!
But America is not alone in effecting novel measures to restrict the vote. We here in Canada until recently, had a hard right Conservative Party in power that styled themselves on, and were advised by, the U.S. Republican Party. They too put in legislation that erected barriers to voters on the claim that there was massive voter fraud afoot. However, the senior bureaucrat that fronted up the federal voting apparatus publically refuted their claims of voter fraud, much to their consternation. While said publically oriented and honest bureaucrat was gone at the Conservatives first opportunity, his replacement set about doing everything possible to enable voting by everyone. It is certainly a comment when the people have to be saved from their elected representatives by the bureaucratic arm of government.
A side note to all this is that the above outrage and a raft of similar efforts aimed at the bottom half of Canadian society provoked a ‘community effort’ right across this country that successfully removed them from power.
You don’t need photo ID to show up and vote at your polling place in California; you do need an address where you live where you can receive voting materials.
This doesn’t mean fraudulent election results are not a problem in California – but this kind of fraud is conducted by political-governmental entities, at the level of ballot counting, as the Bernie Sanders / Hillary Clinton debacle demonstrated.
http://observer.com/2016/07/california-calls-fraud-demands-dnc-investigation/
Any serious discussion of election fraud must include the manipulation of electronic voting systems:
https://www.reddit.com/r/worldpolitics/comments/505fv9/election_justice_usa_study_finds_that_without/
oops
criminal Hellary and her “lieutenant” Debbie Wasserman Schultz….
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2016/7/29/1554022/-Election-Justice-USA-Study-Finds-that-Without-Election-Fraud-Sanders-Would-Have-Won-by-Landslide
or perhaps, like any mobgang organisation, DWS is really the boss and Hellary is just the face of the criminal styled organisation.
“Nationwide, voter fraud is vanishingly rare.”
Would it be rare if you could vote without proving who you are and where you live?
The headline and content of your article not only imply but outright say people are trying to take away rights but that is not happening. Nobody is saying you can’t vote if you can prove who you are and the political district you reside.
Yes, financially struggling families are more apt to have an ID with the wrong address or not have an ID at all. The solution to that is not necessarily letting everybody vote with no ID. There are other solutions. Alice had an opportunity to talk about those options but instead she chose to write a story that implies there is only one solution.
That is why advocacy journalism can be silly at times. Yall sometimes write more like lobbyists for progressive causes than journalists.
How would you know about that or anything about this specific article, since your entire comment makes it clear that you didn’t read this article. Or if you think you read it, you’re lying to yourself.
Feel free to believe whatever it is you are trying to say. But I can assure you that I read the article, concluded that it only contained one viewpoint and wrote my comment accordingly.
Voting restrictions are a problem. We can do better with local solutions when we try like the ladies quoted in the article. I’m just saying that allowing people to vote with no ID is not the only solution.
For example, free voter ID cards, proving your identity and residency through other means, maybe even waiving fees to correct an address change…
Many believe that voting should not be as easy as buying a box of cereal. Those people are not all evil racists hell bent on keeping anybody down.
Did that so called “one viewpoint” inform you at all, or was your hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil determination to overlook reality in your way?
I’m just saying that allowing people to vote with no ID is not the only solution.
As I said, your comments makes clear that you didn’t read the article comprehensively or if you did, your comments can’t be explained. I’m not going to rewrite the article for you in the comments section in order to explain what all you’re claiming to have missed.
The “I’m just saying that allowing people to vote with no ID…” was supposed to be in quotes from the resident Triple Lost Cause commenter.
Kitt, in case you haven’t observed charliethreee much before, he’s a wingnut troll who had for some time been posturing as a “progressive” who was just oh-so-concerned about “mistakes” in this or that article here. He dropped that pretense when it got to be manifestly absurd.
He has also made so many stupid errors of fact, and been shown to be wrong so often, that no one who is regularly here takes him seriously.
Many believe that voting should not be as easy as buying a box of cereal. Those people are not all evil racists hell bent on keeping anybody down.
buuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuulshi_
i’ll let you finish the word
“Would it be rare if you could vote without proving who you are and where you live?”
Everywhere in the US, with the [possible/temporary] exceptions of the places where the right-white power structure is trying to block poor people, people of color and others who may have “undesirable” voting tendencies from exercising their votes, we can and do vote without “proving” who we are or where we live.
Who the hell are you and where do you live that you don’t know that?
You answered a question that wasn’t asked. Here’s the real question…give it another try:
“Would [voter fraud] be rare if you could vote without proving who you are and where you live?”
How does one measure voter fraud if no one’s checking voters??
Yes. I’ve never had to show ID to vote in any of the three states in which I have voted. No accusations of voter fraud have ever been raised.
That there has been significant voter fraud in the U.S. in the last many decades is a myth. One of the better analyses of this fact was done by the Brennan Center for Justice. You may donwload their pdf report here.
Voter fraud is a non-issue, and those searching for its “solution” generally have a less than noble agenda.
You skipped the crux of the point.
“How does one measure voter fraud if no one’s checking voters??”
How could you possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?
Your anecdote doesn’t really allay the reality that voter fraud does exist, and has more potential for exploitation today than any other period. And what do you define as significant?
Um, excuse me, but my anecdote was merely an introductory remark to the Brennan Center Report. If you are genuinely interested in learning how voter fraud is defined and why and how it is known that it is a non-issue please see the Report. It examines many instances of allegations of voter fraud virtually none of which, upon investigation, were found to hold merit.
The Report examines various ways in which voter fraud could be effected and elucidates the barriers to implementing any of them.
“my anecdote was merely an introductory”
Granted, but it doesn’t lend any credibility to the assertion. I asked *you* these questions. If you’re familiar with the subject and able to think logically, then perhaps *you* can address the question instead of outsourcing the discussion?
“How could you possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?”
No. I linked you to an authoritative report on the issue, from and by sources with expertise on the matter. As opposed to anonymous people commenting on the Internet.
It’s quite telling that you prefer to ignore that and refer to an authoritative piece of documentation as “outsourcing.” Why, one would think you actually want there to be an insoluble problem with voter fraud which must be legislated for, legislation that adversely impacts African-Americans.
Do see my comment above quoting from the 4th Circuit on the transparent purposes for passing voter ID laws. Judges sitting on the 4th Circuit are also authorities, on constitutional rights. It’s their job to match facts to laws, and they determined there was no problem with voter fraud and that the “remedy” was a naked attempt to stop blacks from voting.
“If you’re familiar with the subject and able to think logically, then perhaps *you* can address the question instead of outsourcing the discussion?”
“No.”
Got it….you’re being intellectually lazy and think that an unexamined yield to authority supplants your having to explain your reasoning/opinion. Your attempt to question my ‘want’ is a deflective, baseless, speculative, irrelevant attack ad hominem.
Again, “how could you possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?”
Read the Brennan Center for Justice report and find out. Also be aware that many before you have attempted the psychological ploy of “you are [fill in the blank with insults and invidious characterizations]” in an attempt to get me to discuss on issue on their terms. It never works.
I read it. It does nothing to answer my question. Cite the portion of your source that answers my question – how could you possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?
“Also be aware that many before you…” It really doesn’t matter what anyone other than me did. Their behavior has nothing to do with me nor my statements.
The same way virtually ever state and federal court to consider the issue has determined, as matter of judicial fact-finding, that there is no significant voter fraud, and that virtually all attempts to “remedy” the “problem” are driven by the desire to suppress the black vote. I’m going to take the fact-finding of myriad courts, and credible academic institutions such as Brennan Center, over you.
In other words…you don’t know? Or are you just being purposefully obstinate?
The courts only address reports/allegations of fraud. It’s absurd to assert that fraud doesn’t happen unless it’s been reported. Prevalence of fraud, legislative intention and voter suppression are all completely irrelevant to answering what the process of preventing and detecting voter fraud is.
We have elections. They are inherently vulnerable to fraud. No one assumes that no precautions should be taken to prevent, detect, prosecute, and/or remedy fraud. So again, what’s the method used to identify/detect fraud?
For the ninth time, how could you possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?
“I’m going to take the fact-finding of myriad courts, and credible academic institutions such as Brennan Center, over you.”
1.) Courts don’t go on ‘fact-finding missions.’ They deal with cases that are placed before them. 2.) I don’t know what you’re ‘taking over me’? I’m not competing with courts nor the Brennan Center. I didn’t offer a thesis, I asked you a question that you have yet to answer; so why exactly are you acting as if I challenged them in some way??
How could you possibly, reasonably, be concerned about voter fraud if there’s no credible evidence that it’s a significant problem?
I think Mona’s right: You want it to be a problem because you want excuses to disenfranchise poor people, people of color and others whose voting patterns you don’t like.
Now, go read the Brennan Center report and stop wasting time and space here.
“How could you possibly, reasonably, be concerned”
That’s a straw man. My question has nothing to do with “concern” or “significance” and you failed to answer the question. Instead, like Mona, your attempt to question my ‘want’ is a deflective, baseless, speculative, irrelevant attack ad hominem.
Again, “how could you possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?”
Your refusal to read one of several authoritative reports that addresses that and other questions is quite telling. It’s the jobs of judges — state and federal — to examine the facts and match them to law. Almost uniformly they find there is no serious problem with voter fraud and that the ID laws, at best, prevent more legitimate votes than fraudulent ones they prevent.
And you run herring to your straw man. Can you cite anything that I said to suggest I refused to/didn’t read the source? Your source does absolutely nothing to answer my question. The report is not done by state and federal judges; it’s done by a voter activist/advocacy group and its entire thesis is to show that voter fraud isn’t prevalent. **That wasn’t my question.** Mine is a question of function, not precedence.
Considering the report comes from an activist/advocacy group, it can hardly be considered a non-partisan study. Nor can it be said that it’s scientific…the study’s not comprehensive; it examines a portion of cases and extrapolates outward. It doesn’t show the existing methods used to count/verify votes nor does it show the existing vulnerabilities in those methods. Your source doesn’t answer, and has nothing to do with, my question.
It’s a direct question of function: how could anyone possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?
It’s civil libertarian, which is a good “partisanship” to have. Courts accept and reference their findings because they are intellectually honest and credible.
It has everything to do with your question, and that report and virtually every court to rule on voter ID laws has found no voter fraud, and that this is a non-issue. Those courts have answered you question by showing they know there’s not significant voter fraud.
This, by the way, is an inappropriate and misguided criticism:
Not all truth-finding missions utilize the scientific method per se. The Brennan Center is a legal think tank and litigates quite frequently. Courts of law ascertain facts every day through reasoning and the Rules of Evidence which track the principles and standards of formal logic. But courts and judges are not conducting “science.”
“It’s […] a good “partisanship” to have.” That’s subjective nonsense.
“Courts accept and reference their findings because they are intellectually honest and credible.”
[Some] courts accept and reference their findings because [some courts believe] they are intellectually honest and credible.
“It has everything to do with your question, and that report and virtually every court to rule on voter ID laws has found no voter fraud, and that this is a non-issue.”
1.) Did you even read your own source? They certainly didn’t find “no voter fraud.” Across multiple types of fraud, the report laid out a “handful” of verified cases. But again, as I pointed out earlier, the report doesn’t seek to find voter fraud where it exists. It seeks to **verify a portion of claims** of fraud and dispel what it suggests are “exaggerations.”
2.) Literally none of that answers my question. As I’ve already stated, my question has nothing to do with prevalence of fraud. My question is about function. What is the process for detecting fraud where it may be?
The report is not comprehensive, it examines a portion of cases and extrapolates outward. It doesn’t show the existing methods used to count/verify votes nor does it show the existing vulnerabilities in those methods. Your source doesn’t answer, and has nothing to do with, my question.
How could anyone possibly know if there’s voter fraud if no one pays attention to the factors that identify fraud?
“Courts of law ascertain facts every day through reasoning ” No they absolutely don’t. Facts aren’t subjective. Facts are presented to the courts and courts interpret their implications.
And I never ever asserted anything close to “courts and judges conduct science.” We’re not talking about courts and science. We’re talking about your citing *Justin Levitt’s report* to answer a question of logic and data that it never attempts to/can’t answer.
I’m a photojournalist living in central Florida. To vote, I need a state issued ID with the current address AND my matching voter ID card to vote. I think that law is overkill but not in reference to verifying my current address. I think it’s important to verify current address for local elections. When voting for POTUS it doesn’t matter where you live but it does for the local ones.
I am not sure how that position can be viewed as crazy but to each his or her own.
“Would it be rare if you could vote without proving who you are and where you live?”
Actually, in my state, since the changes to the Voter ID laws, it’s getting easier to do that, not harder. They omitted one form of ID, the voter registration card (free, no picture, but signature and address and voter registration number, not easy to forge due to lack of demand), but added several with no address (Passport, passport card) or no address or signature (Uniformed Services ID card, DoD Common Access Card, VA Veteran’s Health Identification Card, VA Veteran Identification Card). For those people, all we have to go on for their address is their word.
I wish they would fight as hard for the right to choose from more than “two” parties’ candidates as they do for the right to vote in general. What’s the point of being able to vote if, through rigged laws and fearmongering, all but the most lucky and/or courageous voters are forced to pick between “two” corrupt political parties? “Two” being in quotations because many Republicans are flocking to Hillary Clinton this year.
While it’s true that the two parties do virtually steal the election from any and all other contenders or parties, voters are able to vote for Jill Stein or whomever is their choice outside of the two parties. That is, they can do that if they are able to overcome the voter suppression scams being run against the citizenry and be able to vote at all. So even though there is much work to do to put third parties on a much closer to level playing field, there is, right now, a message to be sent by voting for a third party candidate.
All of that apples to presidential and other elective office candidate votes, but there is also much else that makes it onto ballots around the country that need to be voted in or out. We had a very important measure in my county during the primary which badly needed to be defeated. It was. It was not only defeated but it was wiped out. That sent a strong message to the sneaky ass power players who put it on the ballot in the first place.
The only reason why we have a couple of alternative choices nationally is because of the herculean effort by petitioners to overcome harsh ballot access requirements in states like Illinois. And even then, there are some state governments that are so much against alternatives that they put up impossible barriers (ie, North Carolina’s 90,000 valid signature requirement) or they suspiciously start rejecting every single ballot access petition (Georgia after they were forced by a judge to lower the requirements).
Despite there being so much disagreement with Trump and Hillary, Gary Johnson and Jill Stein are still polling on average under 10%. It’s not just the ballot access laws, bad as they are in some states, it’s the fundamental rejection of democratic elections by so many Republican and “Democrat” spoiler theorists, who fearmonger voters into voting against their beliefs, hence why we need to tackle both voter suppression and candidate/party suppression at the same time. I really wish the activists mentioned in the above article would see this, then truly democratic elections might have a chance in our country.
So I guess all those people without id’s:
don’t work
cash checks
get SSI or travel or drive….
Is this supposed to be some sort of semi-clever defense of efforts to make it harder for poor people, people of color, etc. to vote?
Whatever it is, it’s lame.
You can get a job without showing a photo ID- all you need is a Social Security Card and a birth certificate.
You can cash checks without a photo ID if you are a loyal bank customer and you know the people at your bank and they know you. (I can do that at my local bank, and I am under 40!)
You can travel by bus (and maybe train) without a photo ID. As for driving, you can walk, take a taxi, take a bus, ride a bicycle, ride a moped…)
There are also quite a few people who HAD ID’s but the IDs expired, such as my grandmother (see post above).
This voter suppression/ID laws BS is very useful Kabuki for the Parties to use as an issue that doesn’t actually effect voting in any measureable numbers. The numbers of possible disenfranchised voters is always claimed to be in the hundreds of thousands but only a handful of people can ever be produced who actually couldn’t vote for a variety of reasons.
The Democrats use this as a promotional tool to enlist the rubes who sadly believe these parasites will represent them while the Republicans stir up their base with the fact that the Dems have a history of ballot box stuffing and other electioneering and the Clintonites being caught red handed cheating in the primaries just reinforces that real perception.
Oh please, countries which are far more unstable and with similar economic barriers like Mexico, India and South Africa all require voter IDs and no one there is crying about that requirement causing disenfranchised voters-ironically those countries have higher voter turnouts than the USA but these facts someone escape these “activists”.
Not buying it.
Yet AGAIN, more mealy mouthed, racially divisive propaganda from Ms. Speri. This “unarmed black teenager” had just been involved in the robbery of a convenience store wherein he used his 6 ft 4 inch tall and 292 lb stature as the mean by which the store owner was culled into submission. When stopped by Officer Dean Wilson, Mr. Brown attempted to use his size to overpower the officer in an effort to wrestle his gun from him. In failing to violently acquire the officer’s service revolver, both suspects attempted to flee on foot. However, Brown responded to the officer’s repeated commands to stop by turning and charging the officer. Officer Wilson responded by repeatedly firing his weapon until the threat to himself was neutralized.
Less than a nano-second of urban time passed before alleged black witnesses to the shooting were already screaming “MURDER.” Within minutes, that racially charged narrative evolved into one wherein the officer was accused of shooting Brown in the back as he fled the scene. In short order, a growing mob of alleged eye witnesses claimed that Mr. Brown had been shot while facing officer Wilson with his hand’s clearly up in the air. All and all, 136 eye witnesses ultimately came forward to give sworn statements. Yet, after numerous investigations, it became indisputably clear that only eight of the sworn eyewitness statements were found to be totally consistent with the forensic evidence – which, incidentally, matched officer Wilson’s account of that which transpired. In the distant aftermath of giving false grand jury testimony, numerous eyewitness readily admitted that they intentionally lied.
Once the true facts of Michael Brown’s death had been repeatedly corroborated, a new narrative emerged wherein the integrity of the investigations themselves were called into question. Racially divisive groups like BlackLivesMatter attempted to further exploit the feverish hostilities that persistently false narratives sparked in the wake of Mr. Brown’s death by heralding the collaborative findings of numerous investigations and judicial procedures as proof of institutional racism and inequality. It is in this context that Ms. Speri’s intentional omission of fact can be best understood. She would have us believe that the official response to the shooting of an “unarmed black teenager,” and its violent aftermath, was indicative of black America’s failure to realize the dream of racial equality that was envisioned by Dr. King’s generation fifty years before. However, nothing could be further from the truth. Mr. Brown was a savage thug whose repeated violent aggression culminated in his predictably violent death.
The ever evolving aspirations of racial equality in America culminated in the back-to-back elections of an African American to the highest office in the land; in both of those elections, Mr Obama commanded an extremely high percentage of the majority white vote. This fact alone speaks to the degree to which Ms Speri’s narrative of African American disillusionment is completely out of touch with reality. When I read articles like this, I am left wondering, “Who is behind the effort to create this false, racially divisive narrative?” Who is it that is funding groups like BlackLivesMatters? Or the alt media outlets whose job it is to repeat ad nauseum the lie that the incessant drive toward racial equality in America has not been an extraordinary success thus far?
Wingnuts like Karl wish to ignore many, many unpleasant facts. Such as what the Department of Justice found about Ferguson:
Just read the entire Atlantic piece, which heavily quoted the DoJ report, to see all of these horrors that do, indeed shock the conscience regarding what law enforcement and the courts have been doing to the poor, black citizens of Ferguson.
Of course racist rightwingers don’t want to have these “divisive” discussions.
Karl wants to stop all this “racially divisive” talk, because it spotlights gross racism in our society, most especially on the part of law enforcement and the criminal “justice” system. They’d rather not hear about that, at all.
When Karl’s digested that, I’ve got a DoJ report about Baltimore that also will shock the conscience. And a long list of innocent black men shot dead by cops, innocent men who were doing nothing criminal and behaving properly. Shot dead.
Ha Ha Karl…serves you right…you should know better than to share your opinion in this column!!!!!!! Just last week I read a post by Mona decrying the state of politics and how divisiveand uncivil people are nowadays….yet here she is resorting to name calling. I just pop in here now in then to watch the freak show.
Well actually no. What I “resorted to” was a bunch of facts Karl finds unpleasant. I regularly do that to Karl, you’d think he’d be used to it by now. Ditto for you.
“….yet here she is resorting to name calling.” -Malinois
“Well actually no. What I “resorted to” was a bunch of facts…”
“Wingnuts like Karl” -Mona
Just the facts ma’am…
When the Intercept came out, I was so exited and thought that finally there would be a site where there would be rational and intelligent debate and conversation. HOW WRONG I WAS!!!!!!
You’re an embittered troll who has been debunked by facts with great frequency. Wingnuts, Israel apologists, and DNC-supporting trolls are allergic to facts. So, now all you do here is pop in to spew insults — you virtually never offer documented facts.
My accurate characterizations of commenters who are well known here does not detract from the facts I documented, facts these wingnuts prefer to avoid. That’s common for them. They often find facts deeply unpleasant.
“Accurate characterizations” must be legal speak for ‘name calling.’
“does not detract from the facts” Absolutely true, but completely irrelevant. Malinois said you resorted to name calling. You said you didn’t. That is clearly proven to be false. ‘Wingnut’ is a derogatory name. Take your lumps or don’t pretend you don’t name call.
I just reread it, and see that it could be read that way. I do not deny that I do, indeed, “name-call” in the sense of accurately characterizing known trolls here. That I do quite a bit.
So to clarify, what’s bothering Malinois is not my “name-calling,” but that which he ignores, to wit: That I supplied “a bunch of facts Karl finds unpleasant.” I also do that “supplying facts” thing a lot, in fact it’s what I do the most. And many, including Karl and Malinois, have found that most unpalatable.
This Radley Balko article published at WAPO would also be enlightening to all but the most entrenched racist bigots, such as Karl:
Radley Balko–Washington Post
Balko’s great, and the best thing about him is the wingnuts can’t rant that he’s just a “politically correct liberal.” He’s a Cato libertarian who holds some views I find horrifying, but on civil liberties and the criminal justice system — and how racist it is — he’s utterly outstanding. (And this is a guy who probably believes that business owners should be legally permitted to discriminate.)
Oh wow. After reading both Karl’s and your posts both of you can generally be correct in your reporting of specific events that transpired, without contradicting each other, yet you are coming from very different viewpoints. You both are highly intelligent, so I’m not going to venture into a discussion about any of the factual content in either of your comments, as far as events reported (partially because I’m feeling comfortably lazy today and I don’t what to spend time to do the necessary research to back up basic arguments with either of you). Although I will say that from my limited experience with Karl, I doubt that he is a rightwing nut (unless his last name is Rove, in which case the “nut” could more accurately be replaced with leader/propagandist). Karl does appear to have a liberal character with conservative political leanings (this is the definition I’m using for liberal: 1. open to new behavior or opinions and willing to discard traditional values. 2. [of education] concerned mainly with broadening a person’s general knowledge and experience, rather than with technical or professional training). Mona I also see you possessing a liberal character leaning strongly politically left with a bent on social justice activism. Either way there is common ground that both of you could have moved forward on, yet both have squandered. Karl’s attack on Alice Speri, alt media, or Black Lives Matter and your subsequent attack on Karl have negated the points that both of you were consciously trying to make. As a result neither of you will convincing anyone who doesn’t already agree with your own specific political outlook that you are correct. In that case what is the point of putting in the effort of posting here in the first place?
Your schoolmarm shtick is just that, and is of no consequence, I deployed this thing called documentation to demonstrate that Karl is wrong. Your opinion, or his, of me, or my style, are irrelevant.
For every person who chooses to leave a comment, at least ten others merely read them. Mona, Kitt, and others have a long history of deliberately presenting a select set of alleged facts that, in absence of full context, will predictably lead the unaware to false conclusions. My only purpose in confronting either of them specifically is to reveal the degree to which ideological bias shapes their narrow opinions and undermines their capacity to acknowledge the truth in its entirety. Challenging the propaganda of paid journalists is a duty that we all have whether they hail from Fox News, Democracy Now, or the Intercept itself. Personally, I had great hopes for the intercept – but many of its writers have fallen into a pattern whereby they are just echoing that which is already prevalent on the blogosphere. The fact that the release of their stories so often coincide with the publication of identical articles from other media outlets leaves one wondering if a central agency is coordinating their publication for optimal effect. As the intercept has openly acknowledged that it is engaged in activist journalism, then its intentions are fair game to the criticisms of its readers. To its credit, there is very little “editing” of reader commentary on the Intercept website.
Your responses to Mona and Kitt, are a topic separate from the one I had originally mentioned in my response to Mona. Your attack on Ms. Speri calling her article “racially divisive propaganda,” attack on Black Lives Matters, and alternative media, is what I was referring to when I said that you are not ‘convincing anyone.’ The premise of the article that requiring ID’s in Missouri can be used as means to suppress our electorate from engaging in voting is a valid concern. In fact this article doesn’t even seem racially charged, yet you are hung up on some sort of conspiracy and divert from the premise of the article by focusing on Black Lives Matters.
“Ms Speri’s narrative of African American disillusionment is completely out of touch with reality.” This is not the narrative, voting rights make up the narrative. So what gives?
I think Karl’s characterization of Alice’s article is entirely apt. What does the old lady’s life story of oppression/the 60s have to do with voter i.d. in 2016?
Also, Alice doesn’t actually provide any basis for the suggestion that people are actually trying to disenfranchise voters. Though requiring i.d. may have that effect, the effect is incidental. One could draw the exact same conclusion from drivers’ licenses, but people don’t normally run around claiming that drivers’ licenses are a means to disenfranchise minorities. And even if incidental disenfranchisement occurs, who would reasonably suggest that licensing/i.d. is the problem, rather than cost?? Even if you find that people are indeed purposefully attempting to disenfranchise minorities with drivers’ license requirements, would you argue that license requirements should be abolished, rather than abolishing the actual cause of the disenfranchisement – the cost???
This entire article is racially charged. It’s taken something innocuous and irrelevant and turned it into a racial partisan wedge packaged neatly in a story about a sweet old lady during a particularly dreadful election season.
“One could draw the exact same conclusion from drivers’ licenses, but people don’t normally run around claiming that drivers’ licenses are a means to disenfranchise minorities.”
Not really because driving is a privilege, not a right protected by the US constitution.
“Alice doesn’t actually provide any basis for the suggestion that people are actually trying to disenfranchise voters.”
She does address it, here for example:
“In Missouri, that resulted in renewed efforts to pass a voter ID law so restrictive that in 2006 the state’s supreme court found it violated the state constitution”
“Even if you find that people are indeed purposefully attempting to disenfranchise minorities with drivers’ license requirements, would you argue that license requirements should be abolished, rather than abolishing the actual cause of the disenfranchisement – the cost???”
Yes and no. If the purpose was indeed to address potential voter fraud, then there should be some legislation tacked onto the bill to also address the need to get people easily accessible and non-cost prohibitive ID’s, so that their right to vote is not being subverted. If it was found that it was to disenfranchise voters then it make all legislation suspect, and activist should be on high alert as even minor tweaks in wording laws, access to voting stations, ect. could constantly be sought in an effort that is repressive. The premise of the article that voting ID requirements are a nefarious means of vote suppression become far more valid and the racial theme of this article gains significant legitimacy especially in Missouri which has a history of race based oppression (ie. Jim Crow, ect.).
“Not really because driving is a privilege, not a right”
We’re discussing disenfranchisement. There’s no doubt that the same monetary and procedural policy that applies to voter i.d. applies equally to a drivers’ license. The criteria to fulfill voter disenfranchisement is exactly equal to that of drivers’ disenfranchisement. Because driving allows for the most basic participation in an economy, fulfilling personal responsibility, and the ability to free association/travel, -and because preventing such impedes the ‘right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness- the analogy is apt.
But if you’d prefer to compare this issue on the basis of constitutional rights, let’s choose a different example: the 2nd Amendment. An even more costly and rigorous i.d./verification process applies to arms purchases than any voting, driving, etc. Moreover, legislation has been passed that has increased the cost of ammunition. Because the same, if not more severe, standard applies in purchasing a firearm, should we not accept the level of real disenfranchisement from the right to bear arms (incidental or not) that disproportionally affects the poor/minorities??
“Alice doesn’t actually provide any basis for the suggestion that people are actually -trying-”
“She does address it, here for example:”
No, she doesn’t show intent. She only -suggests- intent based on the court ruling.
“Yes and no.” Why??? If the mechanism/implementation is the same, why does the intent matter? The results are the same in either case.
“The premise of the article that voting ID requirements are a nefarious means of vote suppression”
That’s not really premise. The premise is that ‘black activists are fighting to preserve an affront to their right to vote,’ which isn’t really supported by the meat and potatoes of the article. The conclusion that ‘because voter i.d. may be incidentally (but not inherently) restrictive, voter i.d. constitutes an affront to voter rights’ is specious at best. And the unrelated background of the old lady does nothing to lend credibility to that conclusion. The article is predicated on race, and again, it’s taken something innocuous and irrelevant and turned it into a racial partisan wedge packaged neatly in a story about a sweet old lady during a particularly dreadful election season.
The counter argument to the sensibility of voter i.d. is that fraud isn’t measurably prevalent/consequential…which may or may not be true. But then I ask, in an election where popular votes mean absolutely nothing outside of theater, how prevalent and significant is disenfranchisement based on the requirement of voter i.d.?
I’m short on time, yet I decided a quick response is in order.
“driving allows for the most basic participation in an economy, fulfilling personal responsibility, and the ability to free association/travel, -and because preventing such impedes the ‘right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness- the analogy is apt.”
The analogy is not apt. One can participate in the economy on basic level without driving themselves and a significant portion of the country does just that. Your analogy is way too broad and can also be made about flying on a private jet, so it’s not analogous to voting.
“An even more costly and rigorous i.d./verification process applies to arms purchases than any voting, driving, etc. Moreover, legislation has been passed that has increased the cost of ammunition. Because the same, if not more severe, standard applies in purchasing a firearm, should we not accept the level of real disenfranchisement from the right to bear arms (incidental or not) that disproportionally affects the poor/minorities??”
The 2nd Amendment is a sticky one and politically polarizing. Its purpose is to empower citizens to prevent or fight tyrannical governments. Yet guns and ammo can also be used to take away the constitutional rights of other citizens. So arguments can be made that reasonable gun control, is necessary to prevent criminals, the deranged, ect. from taking the right of life away from other citizens, thus driving up the cost of weapons. This increased cost is a byproduct of safety concerns that ensure the constitutional rights of all other citizens are not violated. I’ll stop there as I don’t want to produce potent anti-gun arguments, especially as all of our other constitutional rights are being eroded. This as Bloomberg flaunts his oligarch status by flying around the nation paying to get is gun agenda enforced in individual states. After declaring that he was ready to run in the presidential elections to undermine the will of the American electorate by playing spoiler; and being one of America’s banker/Wall Street parasites that’s engineered the siphoning of America’s real economy to himself, thereby enabling him and his ilk to dominate the rest of America. Coming back to the point that the 2nd amendment is specifically in place to protect us from the likes of Bloomberg, as are voting rights.
“Yes and no. Why??? If the mechanism/implementation is the same, why does the intent matter? The results are the same in either case.”
Really? Are you being lazy or do you think you actually made a good argument? If you killed a person walking down the street with your car, why does the intent matter? An accident, man slaughter, or murder, the mechanism/implementation are the same. I could get in more detail, but I don’t feel the need to state the obvious.
“No, she doesn’t show intent. She only -suggests- intent based on the court ruling.”
Intent base on a court ruling is really good, yet not as good as a written confession. Short of placing the individuals who’ve been crafting these bills and legislation on trial, after subjecting them to a criminal like investigation, there will always be a level of plausible deniability about intent. As with Jim Crow laws it was/became evident that suppressing the right to vote was the true intent of those laws, hence why it is also reasonable to believe that preventing voter fraud may not be the true intent behind these bills.
“The article is predicated on race,”
I’m not going to argue this much. You and Karl are correct that one the articles major themes, premise, or whatever we chose to call it, is race. My original wording should have been more precise in accurately addressing the role race plays, its relevance in Missouri, its historical significance and its possible role as a partisan or none partisan issues. Yet I don’t live in Missouri, so I really don’t have an understanding of how life is there or how people’s perceptions and beliefs (especially on the superstitious aspects of race) affect its society and individuals. Yet that’s not to say because I don’t believe in Witches or understand the belief system, that I would have ignored persecuting Americans based on those superstitions during the Salem Witch trials.
“But then I ask, in an election where popular votes mean absolutely nothing outside of theater, how prevalent and significant is disenfranchisement based on the requirement of voter i.d.?”
So to sum up your message: the will of the electorate has been undermined in federal presidential elections, so it’s no longer relevant on the local level, state level, and in federal congressional races. JohnSP is your real name Michael Bloomberg?
“One can participate” That’s a straw man. I never suggested that requiring drivers’ licensing ‘denies’ people’s participation. The word I used was “impede,” which is entirely apt considering the same criteria for voter disenfranchisement are met. And “private jet”?? Really? Do you think that most people use a private jet to participate in an economy, fulfill personal responsibility, and have the ability to freely associate/travel?? That’s reductio ad absurdum.
“The 2nd Amendment is a sticky one and politically polarizing.” So what? So is voter i.d.
A constitutional right is a constitutional right.
“Yet guns and ammo can also be used to take away the constitutional rights of other citizens.” Only by the State, so that point is quite moot. Constitutional rights can only be violated by the State. Plus, voting can also be used to take away the constitutional rights of other citizens.
“So arguments can be made that reasonable gun control, is necessary to prevent criminals, the deranged, ect. from taking the right of life away from other citizens, thus driving up the cost of weapons.”
1.) The argument can be made, but I don’t think it would hold up.
2.) That’s not even close to what drives the cost of weapons.
3.) The same argument can be made about voting. ‘Reasonable voting requirements are needed to protect the sovereignty and power of the people from despots, fraudsters and power brokers.
“This increased cost is a byproduct of safety concerns that ensure the constitutional rights of all other citizens are not violated.” No it’s absolutely not. The increased cost is the direct result of legislation aimed at DHS purchasing an enormous amount of amo, and driving up the cost. And again, citizens’ constitutional rights cannot be violated by citizen crime. Only the State/state institution can violate a person’s rights.
Anyway, you seem to differentiate the 2nd because you claim that it allows potential for abuse/negative impact. Elections do the same, and for that you err on the side of less restriction. For the 2nd, however, you err on the side of more restriction. I can only assume it’s because you think that the existence of the 2nd allows for potential abuse/murder; but that’s a fallacy because the abuse/gun murders exist *without* the right to arms. The rights of the people don’t create risk; technology + bad intentions does that. I also think that it’s a bit foolhardy to -not- assume that the integrity of an election system is essential to prevent potential for gravely consequential abuse. And how does one maintain that integrity?
“Really? Are you being lazy”
No, but I appreciate the snide remark.
“If you killed a person walking down the street with your car…”
I thought you already decided that a driver/voter comparison is a poor conflation. We’re talking about voting, not death. If in case A, requiring a driver’s license (borne out of ‘well-intended’ legislation) performs the exact same function and provides the exact same result as case B, the same legislation (borne out of ‘bad-intentions’), then explain to me the logic of why one should restrict licensing in B, but not A.
“Intent base on a court ruling is really good”
It’s not good. It’s specious, and it’s paired with the whole other extraneous mention of the old lady’s life story in a manner that poorly conflates the two issues.
“As with Jim Crow laws it was/became evident” Non sequitur. Jim Crow laws used taxes and literacy tests which did absolutely nothing to ensure the integrity of just elections. We’re talking about identifying oneself.
“You and Karl are correct”
“The article is predicated on race,” -Not strictly that, but that race isn’t actually shown to have anything to do with the focus of the article. For that reason, and the other aforementioned reasons, I don’t think it’s out of line to label this piece ‘(intentionally or not) divisive propaganda.’
“Yet I don’t live in Missouri, so I really don’t have an understanding of how life is there or how people’s perceptions and beliefs (especially on the superstitious aspects of race) affect its society and individuals”
Neither does Alice Speri.
And don’t be hyperbolic, this isn’t based on ‘magic’ or ‘witchery.’ We’re using data, logic and reason to assess the validity of the argument.
“So to sum up your message: the will of the electorate has been undermined in federal presidential elections, so it’s no longer relevant on the local level, state level, and in federal congressional races.”
That’s an extremely poor reduction of my statement. I was attempting to show the absurdity of arguing on the basis of ‘significance.’
“I thought you already decided that a driver/voter comparison is a poor conflation. We’re talking about voting not death”
Wow you are way off. Even as a spectator it was clear that the purpose of that analogy was that of intent behind ones action is significant. It is not an analogy that is using driving and licensure as a comparison to voting.
Dave, JohnSP seems to have already made up his mind. Logic will only lead to more verbal vollies that will not get anywhere. Unlike Karl, who has made logical agruements if his statements are factually correct, JohnSP is not using logic. Additionally “only state/state institutions can violate a persons rights,” reveal that he is also engaged in dangerous thinking.
“Wow you are way off. Even as a spectator it was clear that the purpose of that analogy”
Way off of what?…my own analogy??? As a ‘spectator,’ perhaps you could pay closer attention to the discussion into which you’re trying to insert yourself.
You’re conflating issues. I’ll give you the context and the breakdown:
“I think Karl’s characterization (‘racially divisive propaganda’) of Alice’s article is entirely apt. What does the old lady’s life story of oppression/the 60s have to do with voter i.d. in 2016?
Also, Alice doesn’t actually provide any basis for the suggestion that people are actually trying to disenfranchise voters.”
(Note that the only significance of ‘intent’ is tied to the credibility of Alice’s article; **not to the validity of voter i.d. laws or the analogy.** Is the racial component of her argument relevant or legitimate?? Is requiring an i.d. actually an affront to black people’s right to vote? Does her article bear that out? No, it doesn’t.)
“Though requiring i.d. may have that effect, the effect is incidental. One could draw the exact same conclusion from drivers’ licenses, but people don’t normally run around claiming that drivers’ licenses are a means to disenfranchise minorities. And even if incidental disenfranchisement occurs, who would reasonably suggest that licensing/i.d. is the problem, rather than cost?? Even if you find that people are indeed purposefully attempting to disenfranchise minorities with drivers’ license requirements, would you argue that license requirements should be abolished, rather than abolishing the actual cause of the disenfranchisement – the cost???”
(The last two sentences are exactly where I show the logical inconsistency of the argument that voter i.d. is an affront to minorities’ right to vote, because the process is the same, the disenfranchisement is the same, and purpose for having an i.d. is the same as driving. Not requiring voter i.d. is throwing the baby out with the bath water because its purpose is to verify the integrity of the electoral system. One doesn’t have to eliminate the requirement in order to eliminate the disenfranchisement that’s caused by the *cost* of the requirement.)
Dave rejected the analogy on the faulty, irrelevant basis that a discussion about disenfranchisement can’t compare a privilege and a constitutional right: “Not really because driving is a privilege, not a right protected by the US constitution.”
Dave then employed and expounded the very analogy he attempted to reject: “If you killed a person walking down the street with your car,”
(I correctly noted that: “I thought you already decided that a driver/voter comparison is a poor conflation. And I should have made my point clearer by saying, “We’re talking about [the irrelevance of ‘intent’ to the process and impact of driver/voter i.d. requirements], not [‘intent’ for determining criminal culpability]. I further explain by posing the following question:)
“If in case A, requiring a driver’s license (borne out of ‘well-intended’ legislation) performs the exact same function and provides the exact same result as case B, the same legislation (borne out of ‘bad-intentions’), then explain to me the logic of why one should restrict licensing in B, but not A.”
Summary: The analogy was my creation. You’re wrong about it and didn’t pay attention to what you [didn’t] read.
Your last paragraph is a ridiculous deflection ad hominem in attempt to obfuscate the merits of my argument. It’s especially interesting that you chose to attempt to discredit/refer to me in the 3rd person in your **response to me.**
Your self insertion, wrong assessment, and deflection ad hominem seems to paint you more as a sock puppet troll than anyone who’s trying to have a reasonable argument.
If you killed a person with your boat, then likewise intent matters. If you dropped a brick on someone’s head, intent matters. If you take something that’s not yours, intent can determines whether it’s considered accidental or theft. So if this bill obstructs sectors of the electorate from voting, then intent does matter.
So….TL;DR???
You just ignored everything I said; especially the parts that address and invalidate your argument.
There are a number of interwoven themes in the article which are commonly referred to as subtext. Subtext can be narrowly defined in this instance as that which is not announced explicitly by the author, but is meant to be implicitly understood by the reader. In citing the case of Michael Brown, the author is making a cynical attempt to rekindle the deeply irrational, long simmering racial animus of black Missourians that was “sparked” by his death and resulted in over 100 witnesses giving false eyewitness testimony against the police officer who shot him. The fact that the police officer’s actions were repeatedly determined to be justified by multiple investigative parties doesn’t dissuade Ms.Speri from dishonestly using Michael Brown’s death as a symbol of “institutional racism and racial inequality” in a manner that is every bit as politically exploitative as that employed by BlackLivesMatter when they echoed the exact same sentiment at the the time. Thus the author’s thinly veiled reference to the “movement” that emerged in the wake of Michael Brown’s death to “reaffirm black lives” is clearly meant to be understood as BlackLivesMatter. This intended perception is reinforced with the photo of Anthony Shaheed who is shown with both his hands in the air at a get-out-the-vote rally in Ferguson in Dec 2014. The “Hands up, Don’t shoot” meme was nationally popularized by Black Lives Matter on August 9, 2014 when its members took their grievances to the streets for the first time in their “Freedom Ride” to Ferguson, Missouri.
If we could read Karl’s mind these are the thoughts we’d find: “Goddam it, I’m just going to ignore that Department of Justice report documenting the gross injustice Missouri law enforcement and courts inflict on African-Americans. Those damn blacks need to just get over it already, and so I’m just going to toss out words like “irrational” and claim it is the blacks who have “racial animus.” Cuz I’m sick of divisive talk and that DoJ report really pisses me off.”
I understand the subtext of the article, yet Missouri’s history of racial segregation gives validity to the racial subtext of this article. The degree to which racial themes play in this article could be arguable, yet in my opinion its moot as there is a valid recent (ie. one generation) context. If one of this articles themes was slavery, then your protests would be valid. With your objections to Michael Brown, you have a point when referencing the specific incident and Mona has valid points when referencing the entire atmosphere that led up to the event (I would say the article is open to interpretation). Its like talking about Rodney King and highlighting the mans personal transgressions. While someone else is talking about the larger issue that led the LA riots, which were the LAPD’s interactions and behavior towards the individuals in their communities.
My objection to the death of Michael Brown being dishonestly used as a symbol of institutional racism by Ms. Speri speaks more broadly to a cultural ethos wherein the false sworn testimony against a “white” police officer by 100 racist African Americans is rationalized and legitimized by groups like Black Live Matter or self–aggrandizing, self-identified civil libertarians like Mona. The deeply flawed historical narrative that informs such behavior is intentionally skewed by those who feel ideologically driven to throw the clean baby out with the filthy bath water. Personally, I agree with Chomsky’s perception that the US has evolved into one of the most socially progressive nations in the world.
Karl translated: “Mona, Kitt and some others here are annoyingly capable of documenting myriad facts that I find deeply unpleasant. It’s so obnoxious to have my unsupported claims and bigoted assertions smacked down, over and over, with an inundation of facts. “
It is rather curious that Mona has chosen to cite an Atlantic article to tell you what the Department of Justice concluded rather then cite its finding directly, is it not? Here is what the DOJ report actually concluded:
https://www.justice.gov/sites/default/files/opa/press-releases/attachments/2015/03/04/doj_report_on_shooting_of_michael_brown_1.pdf
Thus, in one fell swoop, Mona has only succeeded in strengthening my thesis that the facts surrounding the case of Mr. Brown’s death are being intentionally misrepresented by biased media outlets as proof that racism in America is institutional in nature. But let not stop there… Mona also cites the same source which claims in exactly the same paragraph:
Yet an examination of the March 15, 2015 “DOJ report on the shooting of Michael Brown” never addressed these issues. However a March 4, 2015 report issued by The Civil Rights Division of the United States Department of Justice, entitled “Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department”, went to great lengths in revealing “a pattern or practice of unlawful conduct within the Ferguson Police Department that violates the First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, and federal statutory law.” Thus in attempt to reinforce the false perception that the United States is systemically racist (in Mona’s mealy mouthed vernacular: “grossly racist”), Mona has clearly demonstrated that which even a rudimentary understanding of US history reveals – the drive toward racial equality within America has been unremitting since its inception. If this were not so then the US Justice Department would not have been so openly critical of the way in which a single US city had chosen to systematically violate constitutional and federal law at the expense of ALL OF ITS CITIZENS – albeit its African American population suffered disproportionately.
The USDJ report entitled “Investigation of the Ferguson Police Department” (ferguson_police_department_report.pdf) can be readily found on their website.
Karl translated: “I’m very annoyed that Mona cited the DoJ report that shows how oppressively racist the Ferguson police and courts are to blacks, and why they blew up at the Michael Brown shooting independent of the facts particular to that case.
And so I’m gonna spew a wall of irrelevant text pretending she didn’t do that.
I’m also gonna ignore she could demonstrate even worse, as she said, about Baltimore, and entirely ignore (and I know she can do it) that she offered to site a list of black men shot dead by cops for no conceivably acceptable reason. Because I don’t like this discussion, it’s divisive!“
“there is no credible evidence to disprove Wilson’s account of what occurred inside the SUV. ”
And thus the problem with the DOJ who did not prosecute wallstreet for crimes against Americans. Let’s restate their propaganda…
“there is no credible evidence to prove Wilson’s account of what occurred inside the SUV. “
The DOJ is owned by wallstreet and wallstreet holds the pension plans and VALUES and that’s how criminals operate. It’s called LEVERAGE. Wallstreet criminals do not believe in the equal power of a democracy – instead they beilieve in middle east leverage – from whence they originated.
It is in Wall Street’s best interests to divide it’s perceived opposition along racial lines rather than along class lines as the latter brings its own political shenanigans into sharp focus.
You have a point here. There is an effort to divide and conquer by Wall Street, yet that tactic can only be neutralized by addressing the issues that are divisive and/or preventing them from getting in the way of politics when focusing on war or corporatism in America. I’ve read many of the contracts and laws that are being forced onto American tax payers by corporations, ultimately controlled by Wall Street. Unfortunately this late in the game this is not going to end well for Americans if political changes aren’t implemented immediately.
Many of America’s past elites understood that they sat at the top of a social-economic system, which (despite their faults) gave them a sense of responsibility and drive to keep America stable and provide opportunities to Americans. They were wise enough not to destroy an economic-social system in which they gained more than anyone else. In contrast, our current elite moneyed class has no sense of proportion. They care not for stability and in their unquenchable pursuit of greed they will turn the best parts of our country (esp. those of the Middle Classes) into an economic, political, social, and environmental wasteland.
General Hercules, a resident wingnut, spews:
Jackie Robinson has a reply for the General, written in his 1970s autobiography:
It is very well known that Crooked Hillary can win the election only under two circumstances; 1) voter fraud, and/or 2) voting machine fraud. The ID issue will thwart the Dems from bringing in busloads of voters and rigging specific polling stations.
There is still time. All that those blokes have to do is go out now and get their ID’s so they can cast their votes properly, instead of crying foul as if they have been captured by ISIS.
Also, please learn to stand up and show respect to the national anthem and flag. These are symbols of the country we love and which gives us the right to vote. We must earn that right, not take it for granted.
This election will be decided by “Russian” hackers.
This “Russian” is a bogey created to distract from all the shameful and crooked emails the Dems have been writing.
They were outed by one of their own who developed some conscience that he was not supposed to. In revenge they killed him. Long live Seth Rich.
Hillary Lies Matters … to all those who have died due to her crooked machinations. Vote Trump so we can dump her forever.
““How do they live in today’s society without a photo ID? How do they cash a check?” he said.”
This argument is such bs. Obviously millions of poor people do live in today’s society without photo IDs, or cars, or accompanying driver’s licenses since such are useless if one doesn’t drive and even renewal fees every five years are better spent elsewhere. And what does “cash a check” even mean? If one has a bank account all one needs is their atm card to verify the account and deposit a check, at least at my bank. Or they can have their employer direct deposit, if available.
If it means paying bills, obviously sending a check through the mail doesn’t require a photocopy of a picture ID. If it means paying for groceries/stuff at stores with a check–at least in my experience I’ve been asked to provide ID while doing so about 0.001% of all times I’ve done so.
Banks are required to ask for a picture ID when one opens an account. However, Let’s assume the worst case scenario wherein an individual does not have a picture ID. Every state provides the option of acquiring a State issued I.D. at approimately the same cost as a driver’s license. But lets not stop there… would it be satisfactory with you if every adult could acquire a free, state issued picture I.D. in absence of a license?
Perhaps the time has come for a mandatory human microchip implant program?
Yes, it would be satisfactory to have a state ID issued at the same price or less than a driver’s license. (Fun fact: Thanks to the impatience of officials in my state, State IDs are now free, thanks to a consent decree signed with the Justice Department! (Had they waited until after Shelby County, it might not have happened.))
However, this assumes that the state offices that issue the IDs are all easily accessible. In my state, there are only six DMV offices open on Saturdays (And if you work a 9-5 job, you have to be there on Saturday or in the morning at 8:30 to get your ID!). One is open only Tuesdays and Thursdays. I’m fortunate that there is at least one DMV per county in my state. Other states, like Alabama and Wisconsin, have been more than willing to close offices where people could get licenses, often in minority and/or rural areas.
Yes accessibility is a problem in many rural areas. I believe that a mobile unit would be a good solution to that particular deficiency. Another solution might be the placement of more Registrys inside of malls.
I do not understand why we continue to live in the past. You have to have history to have the present and the knowledge of that history to change the future for the better!
Lots of other people here live in the past and assume things will always suck and be unfair. That doesn’t mean you have to.
The Constitution gives him the right to honor that symbol of this nation or not. And that right is given to us by God. From whom Liberty and Justice come. Equality is a birth right , not a privilege distributed by the government. We also have a right to honor that same national symbol without infringement.
Your god isn’t about liberty and justice.