4 ms·

I'm totally fine with requiring an ID _and_ making it easy for legitimate voters to get one. I don't understand why there are people who are opposed to voter ID

I'm totally fine with requiring an ID _and_ making it easy for legitimate voters to get one. I don't understand why there are people who are opposed to voter ID requirements (full stop), as though they are inherently racist.

jandrese 7y ago
The latter is where Voter ID laws tend to bite. They make it difficult for certain communities to obtain an ID via a variety of underhanded tricks. What you typically see is a Voter ID go into effect, and then whoops, the state budget is too tight this year so we're closing down a whole bunch of DMV locations and restricting hours on the rest.
- crooked-v 7y ago
  For example, there's that one DMV that's open only four days per year (!), with the closest alternative being 20 miles away and only open 7 to 5 two days a week (have a fun time managing that if you're a working stiff without a car). https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2016/feb/19/john-oliver/office-provides-id-voting-one-wisconsin-burg-open-/ https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2016/feb/19/...
  - weberc2 7y ago
    Is that inherent to voter ID systems, or could you imagine a world where ID issuing authorities are required to keep better hours? Perhaps we could check out Europe’s model to see how they keep their voter ID systems from regressing into a racist dystopia?
- weberc2 7y ago
  So require ID-issuing authorities to keep certain hours. This is a trivial problem; I don't understand the compulsion to paint this as a dichotomy--there's lots of middleground between Evil Racist voter ID requirements and no voter ID requirements at all; it's not even a slippery slope.
  - jandrese 7y ago
    This wouldn't solve the problem of too many inner city residents voting and messing up your legislative majority. In-person fraudulent voting is one of those problems that basically doesn't exist. People have looked for cases of it happening and have come up empty handed. Attempting to solve that problem is a waste of time. The only point of these laws is to suppress voting blocks.
    - weberc2 7y ago
      > This wouldn't solve the problem of too many inner city residents voting and messing up your legislative majority. I'm not a Republican, and I'm not advocating for a legislative majority for any party. You're not participating in good faith. > In-person fraudulent voting is one of those problems that basically doesn't exist. People have looked for cases of it happening and have come up empty handed. Attempting to solve that problem is a waste of time. The only point of these laws is to suppress voting blocks. Maybe. It's probably an order of magnitude easier and cheaper to implement some basic voter ID reqs (you know, like so many Europeans enjoy) than to continually validate that voter fraud is a non-issue _and_ persuade the country that it's a non issue. The idea that these laws only exist to "suppress [legitimate] voting blocks" is absurd; many countries have them, including those enviable European countries. How can securing our Democracy be a bad thing, any way? Recall which party was paranoid about foreign meddling in the last election, after all.
      - 9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
        ID costs here in Europe too, but it's valid 8 or 10 years so it's not a huge problem. Someone is posting this link about one dmv being opened only 4 days a year for some reason but the population of that place is ca 3000 people. In Europe you don't have a dmv in a village and you get it done after every ten years at some bigger city or town.
        weberc2 7y ago
        Right. These are simple, tractable problems, and there are successful models the world over. That people fight so adamantly against something as straightforward as voter ID indicates ulterior motives.

jandrese 7y ago

The latter is where Voter ID laws tend to bite. They make it difficult for certain communities to obtain an ID via a variety of underhanded tricks. What you typically see is a Voter ID go into effect, and then whoops, the state budget is too tight this year so we're closing down a whole bunch of DMV locations and restricting hours on the rest.

crooked-v 7y ago
For example, there's that one DMV that's open only four days per year (!), with the closest alternative being 20 miles away and only open 7 to 5 two days a week (have a fun time managing that if you're a working stiff without a car). https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2016/feb/19/john-oliver/office-provides-id-voting-one-wisconsin-burg-open-/ https://www.politifact.com/wisconsin/statements/2016/feb/19/...
- weberc2 7y ago
  Is that inherent to voter ID systems, or could you imagine a world where ID issuing authorities are required to keep better hours? Perhaps we could check out Europe’s model to see how they keep their voter ID systems from regressing into a racist dystopia?
weberc2 7y ago
So require ID-issuing authorities to keep certain hours. This is a trivial problem; I don't understand the compulsion to paint this as a dichotomy--there's lots of middleground between Evil Racist voter ID requirements and no voter ID requirements at all; it's not even a slippery slope.
- jandrese 7y ago
  This wouldn't solve the problem of too many inner city residents voting and messing up your legislative majority. In-person fraudulent voting is one of those problems that basically doesn't exist. People have looked for cases of it happening and have come up empty handed. Attempting to solve that problem is a waste of time. The only point of these laws is to suppress voting blocks.
  - weberc2 7y ago
    > This wouldn't solve the problem of too many inner city residents voting and messing up your legislative majority. I'm not a Republican, and I'm not advocating for a legislative majority for any party. You're not participating in good faith. > In-person fraudulent voting is one of those problems that basically doesn't exist. People have looked for cases of it happening and have come up empty handed. Attempting to solve that problem is a waste of time. The only point of these laws is to suppress voting blocks. Maybe. It's probably an order of magnitude easier and cheaper to implement some basic voter ID reqs (you know, like so many Europeans enjoy) than to continually validate that voter fraud is a non-issue _and_ persuade the country that it's a non issue. The idea that these laws only exist to "suppress [legitimate] voting blocks" is absurd; many countries have them, including those enviable European countries. How can securing our Democracy be a bad thing, any way? Recall which party was paranoid about foreign meddling in the last election, after all.
    - 9HZZRfNlpR 7y ago
      ID costs here in Europe too, but it's valid 8 or 10 years so it's not a huge problem. Someone is posting this link about one dmv being opened only 4 days a year for some reason but the population of that place is ca 3000 people. In Europe you don't have a dmv in a village and you get it done after every ten years at some bigger city or town.
      - weberc2 7y ago
        Right. These are simple, tractable problems, and there are successful models the world over. That people fight so adamantly against something as straightforward as voter ID indicates ulterior motives.