50 Points of Plight - with Poll

Superfluous (0.00 / 0)

If it takes an ID to register, then you have an ID. Therefore, it is superfluous to comply with the rule of showing an ID when voting.

Honestly, it bothers me that they don't check my ID when I vote. I could be anyone saying that my name is what I say!

Sure, you can make a fake ID, but then you are breaking even more law - identity theft, etc.

And who would make a fake ID to vote? Why would someone vote illegally? The same reason someone votes legally - to elect the candidate they are voting for.

It isn't too feasible to steal votes without presenting ID today - sure, maybe you could hit every polling location in your candidate's jurisdiction, but chances are you could only defraud a particular polling location once, maybe twice (early morning then late at night).

So in order to really steal the vote in this manner, you would need a concerted effort organized with many people to circulate all the polling locations.

However, it would be easily exposed, because all those people you voted for would (hopefully) show up and try to vote themselves.

Therefore, showing ID would not remove a potential flaw that is already rather marginal and superfluous.

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by: eastcoastivyleagueelitist @ Tue Oct 10, 2006 at 23:03:13 PM CDT

False! (0.00 / 0)

You do not need to show an ID to register.  I have personally registered over 100 young people in the past year.  I bring them the voter reg form, they fill it out, I bring it to the Town Clerk's office, and they are registered.

IIUC, the poll worker may ask that person to show proof of residence (not ID per se) the first time that person votes.  I don't think it happens often, but it is permitted to happen.

So no, ID is not required to register.  So long as a MA ID costs $15, there's no way they should be required.  It's a poll tax, plain and simple.  There's also this nuance that, frankly, the more likely a person is to vote GOP, the more likely they are to have a drivers license.  Consider the converse: how many poor inner city adults have licenses?  Far less than 100%: you don't need one to ride the bus.  As a first approximation, these people vote Democratic.  Now, how many adults living in the outer suburbs have licenses?  Damn near 100%.  They're less likely (than urban voters) to vote Dem.

So, if I were a GOoPer, I'd be pushing IDs too.  Not only can you drum up fear of fraud (while ignoring Diebold and other issues) but you can supress a Democratic bloc.  It's a scam, and its asinine.  People just don't go around commiting voter fraud in person.  It's too easy to get caught, the penalty is high, and how many votes could you cast in a day -- 20?  You'd need a vast conspiracy to generate a tenth of a percent state wide, and comspiracies get found out soon enough.

Far more votes get altered/skewed/incorrectly counted as a result of election workers not following procedures than by fraudulent voting.

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by: stomv @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 06:12:41 AM CDT

Help America Vote Act of 2002 (0.00 / 0)

It seems according to the Help America Vote Act of 2002 that you are supposed to show an ID when you register?

From the Sec State of MA site.

Do I need to attach identification to my voter registration form?

Yes, if you are registering to vote for the first time in Massachusetts. Because of a new federal law, the Help America Vote Act of 2002 passed by Congress, if you registered to vote by mail on or after January 1, 2003, you will be required to show identification when you vote for the first time in a federal election since registering by mail in 2003, or you can send in a copy of your identification with your voter registration form. Acceptable identification must include your name and the address at which you are registered to vote, for example: a current and valid driver’s license, photo identification, current utility bill, bank statement, paycheck, government check, or other government document showing your name and address. If you send in a copy of your identification with your mail-in voter registration form, it may not be returned to you.

If you do not provide such identification, the Help America Vote Act of 2002 requires that you may only cast a provisional ballot which will be counted later, but only after your eligibility to vote has been determined.

From reading this it seems if you really don't want to show it there may be a way around it.

Currently reading A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

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by: JimCaralis @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 06:36:06 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Any official document with your name and address will do. (0.00 / 0)

No need for a photo.  You can go with your utility bill, bank statement, pay check, ...  You do not need to get a photo ID or a driver's license.

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by: FrenchGirlFromMA @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 06:55:03 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Which works out great... (0.00 / 0)

except for college students.  They are legally allowed to register at the location where they live during the school year, yet very often have little or no utility bills, bank statements, or pay checks with their dormatory address on them.  Even cell phone bills are often mailed home where mom & dad take care of things.

Also, what about currently homeless persons?  They should be able to use the address of a homeless shelter or even a park bench that they consider "home"... yet they'll have no ID demonstrating it.  Do they not count either?

In general, it's also a great way to discourage new voters, rare voters, busy voters, and more transient voters.

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by: stomv @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 10:41:54 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

show me a college student... (0.00 / 0)

who doesn't have a student ID?

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by: dbang @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 12:58:38 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Student ID (0.00 / 0)

Isn't valid identification.

Government issued IDs are, utility bills are, landlord/lease documentation counts, and I'd bet a college student could even just have his university's dean send him a letter on university letterhead.

But, non-gov't issued IDs do not count.

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by: stomv @ Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 07:38:21 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Kerry wants to make Massachusetts like Florida (0.00 / 0)

evidently. Here one must present a valid picture and signature ID to vote or be stuck voting a provisional ballot. The claims that this is supposed to combat fraud are, of course, absurd...anyone can get an absentee ballot here, so if they wanted to (say) sell their vote they could easily do it by obtaining an absentee ballot and allowing someone else to mark it. The identification check for absentee ballots is signature matching...the voter signs the outside of the envelope, presumably after it's sealed with the ballot inside (the signature line is perpendicular to and crosses the flap at its mid-point. Of course, one could hold down the flap and sign, and then the person sealing it would have to be careful not to smudge the ink).

Of course it is crystal clear that this is all about disenfranchising the poor and African American voters. Yet most Floridians cannot concieve of a person without a driver's license (public transportation doesn't exist in most places, and you take your life in your hands trying to cross any major street) so they don't understand what the big deal is.

Another law that went into effect this year states that people who hold signs for candidates at polling places have to stay at least 100 feet away from the entrance.

Basically Florida is now a banana republic, or at least run by banana Republicans. At least we have bananas.

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by: Alice in Florida @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 06:53:51 AM CDT

Staying away from polls with signs... (0.00 / 0)

Another law that went into effect this year states that people who hold signs for candidates at polling places have to stay at least 100 feet away from the entrance.

In MA, I believe the law is 75 feet.  You can't enter that radius of the polling place with signs, buttons, T-shirts, etc that are of a political nature.

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by: stomv @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 10:43:25 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Close (or rather, far) (0.00 / 0)

It's actually 150 feet.

Free your mind, and your ass will follow.

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by: rollbiz @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 10:55:16 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

ID's are a must (0.00 / 0)

Organized voter fraud is ridiculously easy.
The best way to prevent it is to require ID.
Anyone who is serious about voting legally should have no issue with such a requirement.

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by: geo999 @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 16:30:30 PM CDT

People who study elections are virtually (0.00 / 0)

unanimous that in fact, voter fraud is almost nonexistent in this country. The big problem is election fraud...officials finding ways to weed out voters they don't want because they would vote for the other party. The biggest problem this country has is not people voting fraudulently, it's people NOT voting AT ALL. We need measures that encourage voting, not that put petty obstacles in the way.

Or, on the other hand, we can just require everybody to have an RFID chip implanted in their arm...

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by: Alice in Florida @ Wed Oct 11, 2006 at 21:47:04 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

I'm serious... (0.00 / 0)

Anyone who is serious about voting legally should have no issue with such a requirement.

Really?  Well, consider:
1.  IDs aren't free.  That means you've now got a poll tax.
2.  IDs are a hassle to get.  You've got to go to your state's DMV/RMV, which is generally known for having the longest lines of any government agency.
3.  You have to repeat this process every time you move.

For those of stable economics, this is trivial.  You buy a house, get a drivers license, and you're done.  For those who don't own a car and/or move often, this is actually a higher hurdle.  At $15 a pop, it's an unnecessary expense.

Why does this matter: well, because these phenomena don't impact all slices of the population equally.  Forcing ID at the polls marginalizes the poor and the urban dwellers.

Since voter fraud is virtually nonexistant, it's too high a price to pay.

To put it another way: when you've got a complicated method of measuring a system, you look at your errors.  You look at where the sources of your errors are, how big those errors could be, and whether or not errors are correlated.  If you want to make your system more accurate (and precise), you don't just randomly choose an error and try to eliminate it.  Instead, you look to find the errors that are most likely to make your measurement substantially incorrect.  That's not voter fraud -- other problems, including losing batches of absentee ballots, incorrect counting procedures for write ins, and machines incorrectly counting batches of ballots are a much more dire source of error, because a single error of this case could swing an election, and because there are countless documented cases of these things happening.  So, before you worry about who votes, worry about counting the votes correctly.  You'll hone in on a system that has a higher probability of correctly reporting who really won the election far more efficiently that way.

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by: stomv @ Thu Oct 12, 2006 at 07:45:15 AM CDT

[ Parent ]