[orillaVar]

The Republicans' strategy to fight voter fraud is akin to taking a wrecking ball to smash a house down, in order to kill a fly.

[hieklyintinee]

That's what voter registration is for.

[tramadolwithall]

James O'Keefe uncovers devastating new evidence that US citizens are voting!

FACT CHECK: ‘Non-Citizen’ Voter In James O’Keefe’s Voter Fraud Video Is Actually A Citizen

Conservative filmmaker James O’Keefe released a new video today supposedly exposing voter fraud in North Carolina by highlighting non-citizens like Zbigniew Gorzkowski who have voted in recent elections.

The problem: Gorzkowski is an American citizen.

In fact, if O’Keefe had done a simple Nexis search for “Zbigniew Gorzkowski”, he would have found a single article from the News & Observer in 2008 noting that Gorzkowski and his wife are naturalized citizens:

Customers flock through the red door of Zbigniew “Ziggy” and wife Halina Gorzkowski’s European grocery and flower shop to buy one of the 12 varieties they sell. The pierogis and 400 eastern European food items and flowers are also punching the naturalized citizen couple’s ticket for their version of the American Dream. ThinkProgress spoke with Gorzkowski this morning. He verified that this information was indeed correct and he had been an American citizen since the late 1980s. Therefore, his votes in the 2008 and 2010 elections were not only perfectly legal, but encouraged as a civic duty.

In other words, the one instance in the video where O’Keefe purports to show that a non-citizen had actually voted, in fact shows that a citizen voted.

The episode does speak to a larger underlying problem with most accusations of voter fraud. It’s what I call the “Scooby Doo routine”. People like O’Keefe make wild voter fraud accusations like non-citizens voting, only to discover a much simpler explanation for the situation.

In this case, O’Keefe is using “evidence” of foreigners voting in American elections to supposedly demonstrate the need for draconian security measures like voter ID, which could disenfranchise 20 million citizens across the country. However, his evidence actually shows nothing more than an American citizen exercising his civic duty. Earlier this year, South Carolina went through the same Scooby Doo routine after Attorney General Alan Wilson claimed to have unearthed evidence of 953 dead voters, only for his state investigation to ultimately find no dead voters — and zero voter fraud — but rather a handful of clerical errors.

O’Keefe has a responsibility as a journalist to ensure the veracity of his facts before he makes wild charges like these. A simple phone call or Nexis search would have sufficed, yet doing so would have undercut his spurious argument that voter fraud is a widespread problem in the United States. http://thinkprogress.org/justice/201...orth-carolina/

[topbonuscasino]

Oh it turns out that in Pennsylvania the GOP have decided to admit that it's not actually about fraud..

Pennsylvania Voter ID Law Trial Set To Begin As State Concedes It Has No Proof Of In-Person Voter Fraud

Defendants in a case against one of the nation's strictest voter ID laws in Pennsylvania made a major concession to plaintiffs this week, just days ahead of the start of the trial over the measure.

In a stipulation agreement signed earlier this month, state officials conceded that they had no evidence of prior in-person voter fraud, or even any reason to believe that such crimes would occur with more frequency if a voter ID law wasn't in effect.

"There have been no investigations or prosecutions of in-person voter fraud in Pennsylvania; and the parties do not have direct personal knowledge of any such investigations or prosecutions in other states,” the statement reads.

According to the agreement, the state “will not offer any evidence in this action that in-person voter fraud has in fact occurred in Pennsylvania and elsewhere,” nor will it "offer argument or evidence that in-person voter fraud is likely to occur in November 2012 in the absense of the Photo ID law.”

The possibility of voter fraud has frequently served as the ideological underpinning for voter ID measures, whose supporters claim that the integrity of elections can't be preserved without requiring would-be voters to verify their identity at polling places. Reports on actual incidents appear to counter this contention, however, as figures suggest voter fraud is a highly infrequent occurrence.

Opponents of voter ID laws argue that such legislation is an effort to establish obstacles for potential voters, particularly college students, minorities and the elderly, who tend to vote Democratic. A recent report from the Brennan Center for Justice found that a variety of factors could seriously hamper the ability of a half-million Americans in 10 states that have passed voter ID laws to obtain the required documents they would need to cast votes in November.

Pennsylvania GOP House Majority Leader Mike Turzai fueled the concerns of anti-voter ID activists earlier this year when he claimed that the recently enacted measure would "allow Gov. [Mitt] Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania."

Just weeks after those comments, Pennsylvania officials released a study finding that more than 758,000 registered voters in the state -- many of them in its urban center of Philadelphia -- lacked driver's licenses. While the law allows for a variety of other forms of identification to be used at polling places, the figure suggested that a large number of Pennsylvanians still didn't meet the criteria needed to cast ballots in the fall.

A lawsuit filed against the state's voter ID law by the ACLU and NAACP on behalf of lead plantiff Viviette Applewhite, a 93-year-old woman who claims she will be disenfranchised by the legislation because she won't be able to get valid documentation before the election, is set to go to trial on Wednesday. On Monday, the U.S. Department of Justice also announced that it was investigating whether the law discriminates against minorities.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...p_ref=politics

[RSAccountssy]

Driving is a privilege and not a right.

[xsVfF9Em]

I still haven't seen proof of mass voter fraud. Only allegations. Where's the proof?

[maxsobq]

It obviously suppresses minority voter turnout as evidenced in Georgia...

I still haven't seen proof of mass voter suppression. Only allegations. Where's the proof?

[Joircarm]

It obviously suppresses minority voter turnout as evidenced in Georgia...

I still haven't seen proof of mass voter suppression. Only allegations. Where's the proof?

So we can assume that theres no fraud, no voter suppression, no lowering of turnout and in fact no effects full stop? So the GOP want to spend millions of dollars of taxpayer money to achieve... nothing?

[violalmina]

You're right. You know, murder's pretty rare, robbery's rare, all these crimes are rare. So there's no point in enforcing the law, right? Because it's broken so rarely? We all know it's just a waste of money, because nothing will happen if the law isn't enforced. Like Tammany Hall, which never happened. Or Jim Crow, which never happened.

Let's imagine a little town in Iowa called Bumfck, population 400. In Bumfcks long and glorious history it has never experienced a murder, a rape, a robbery or a violent crime of any description. One day the mayor of Bumfck announces that despite the town already being in financial peril, they have decided to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on an assault vehicle, body armour and machine guns for ol' Sheriff Buttkiss because there's always a chance that in the future the town could be invaded by Mexican drug cartels.

Does that seem like a sensible use of taxpayer money to you?

[jeraveike]

Let's imagine a little town in Iowa called Bumfck, population 400. In Bumfcks long and glorious history it has never experienced a murder, a rape, a robbery or a violent crime of any description. One day the duly elected reresentatives of Bumfck announces that despite the towns long standing history of being capable of making financial decisions with respect to the towns safety (not to mention loegal authority to do so), a federal governmental body decided to intrude into the towns most recent decision to purchase assault vehicles machine guns etc. by stating that many people would be offended and feel threatened by the presence of an assualt vehicle and thus their ability to freely associate would be infringed. The federal government continued making these claims despite the fact that all pilot programs showed that all objective means of showing freedom of association were increased after similar pilot programs at other small towns.


The town proceeded to go with their legally approved actions only to find that tourism trade jumped substantially as more people flocked to the area. Rather than being frightened away, it created a windfall of revenue for the citizenry.

I love these little exercises.

[sportlife]

Au Contraire, the effects were not nothing... to the contrary voter turnout and in particular for minorities was in fact higher than previous elections pre voter registration verification. Thus the action had a positive effect on the democratic process both from a reliability and representational perspective.

So you're saying that the GOP is deeply invested in trying to raise the number of blacks and latinos who vote?

As for this issue being a GOP issue not really. The issue is a matter of states having the ability to police their own elections as is duly authorized them.

..and completely coincidentally the states who wish to do this all happen to be under GOP control?

[77chawzence]

..and completely coincidentally the states who wish to do this all happen to be under GOP control?

Rhode Island must cause consternation among people suffering under this delusion.

Incidentally, here's another example to go along with the Georgia one Ogie provided.

[ViaplyVuple]

Its Philly he has a better chance of being beaten down at the polling place then being disenfranchised.

[bonyclayd]

Are you a Democrat? I was addressing you, not Democrats.

[Amfdaaandhaq]

I routinely ignore Democrats. Why on the other hand do you hate the democratic process?

[corsar-caribean]

Now, on the other hand, having rampant voting fraud (which happens in Philly; that's a FACT), does abridge my rights by limiting the power of my vote. Though to be honest, my vote doesn't carry any weight anyway on local, house of representatives, and presidential elections. I think only on gubernatorial and senate elections does it count, right?