No class in WI as teachers protest union-busting governor

[Niiro]

Point is, it's difficult enough as it is for people to have access to the DMV, especially since they're closing another 10 of them down - each additional step required means that many more people will be disenfranchised.

I was just referring to the video in particular, but yea the DMV closures are absolutely ridiculous.

Be a registered voter in the proper district. You could register same-day at the polls, no waiting period, no government ID required, no "2 weeks" for a card. You may have had to bring a piece of mail to prove you were in the proper district, although I'm not sure how they dealt with the homeless at the time.

Point is there weren't problems with the old system - the "potential for voter fraud" was never shown to be an actual problem.

It certainly seems unnecessary, but aside from the DMV closures I don't see an issue with the new system to simply require either a driver's license (which almost everyone has*) or a free voter ID which, despite the attempts to slant it in the video, seems easy enough to obtain. Beyond just voting having a photo ID of some kind is required for (or at least simplifies) a lot of other things.

Basically if not for the DMV closures I don't see an issue with the system, I guess I'm just saying the voter ID aspect seems fine it's just that it's being used in a (disgustingly) obvious way to keep certain people from voting when the strategic closures are factored in.

*I'm just assuming here, I have no idea what actual portion of the voting-age population doesn't have a license/permit of some kind

[falloutboy14]

*I'm just assuming here, I have no idea what actual portion of the voting-age population doesn't have a license/permit of some kind

In the video at the top of the page, a political science guy estimates that 300k people don't have a drivers license.
This website, suggests that Wisconsin has a voting population of approx 4.3million http://gab.wi.gov/node/1391
Meaning that 7% of the voting population is presently unable to vote. Not a drastic disenfranchisement, but 300k is a massive number in a close election.

P.S. With all the crying over budgets, any clue how much all these voter ID cards will cost?

[archibaldcrane]

$6 million? Numbers are all over the place.

http://solidaritywisconsin.com/conte...ed-voter-fraud

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[Alarial]

To be fair, is there an account of how many homeless and/or people without state ID actually voted last election?

[Atreides]

not really sure about wisconsin, but there's a similar law in South Carolina that just passed that affected something like 178,000 registered voters who didn't already have a photo ID.

WI isn't the only place in the country where Republicans in state governments are trying to pass (somewhat successfully, too) laws restricting voting access to mostly democratic voters. There's similar efforts in NC, SC, FL, TX, ME, and KS at the very least.

Making people have to pay for something they didn't previously have to pay for before they can vote is a poll tax, period. Voter fraud is such a small problem in this country that there's no reason Republicans have for this push beyond making it harder for democrats to vote.

[archibaldcrane]

Voting is one of your most basic rights in a democracy - arguing that "it's not that important because it doesn't disenfranchise that many people and they don't vote much anyway" kind of disgusts me.

[Alarial]

I wasn't arguing that, I was more curious just how many votes this would cause to be lost.

I'm just as outraged by this as you are, and I'm frankly shocked there aren't any court challenges of these laws (that I know of).

[archibaldcrane]

I'm just as outraged by this as you are, and I'm frankly shocked there aren't any court challenges of these laws (that I know of).

The whole thing is modeled after Indiana's voter ID law, which passed supreme court muster. Part of the DMV closures are cost-saving so they can afford to keep others open longer and make sure there is one in each county, to meet the threshold established in the Indiana case.

[Niiro]

not really sure about wisconsin, but there's a similar law in South Carolina that just passed that affected something like 178,000 registered voters who didn't already have a photo ID.

WI isn't the only place in the country where Republicans in state governments are trying to pass (somewhat successfully, too) laws restricting voting access to mostly democratic voters. There's similar efforts in NC, SC, FL, TX, ME, and KS at the very least.

Making people have to pay for something they didn't previously have to pay for before they can vote is a poll tax, period. Voter fraud is such a small problem in this country that there's no reason Republicans have for this push beyond making it harder for democrats to vote.

The voter ID cards are free, though you could call the opportunity cost of having to obtain them (which they try to make difficult by closing DMV offices) a price in itself.

[Kuya]

There was a show on democracy now a while ago that mentioned studies that considered how wide spread voter fraud was, and the studies concluded that voter fraud is infintesimal. But like most things, republican and conservative support for this has little to do with reality. Regardless of their intentions, it's best to treat this as a specific tactic looking to maximize votes for republicans and minimize votes for democrats.

[guartz]

Come on man, what type of political understanding do people have who cant be bothered with having an I.D? Do you really want these people voting?

[Mrbeansman]

http://www.colbertnation.com/the-col.../voter-id-laws

[Yuri-G]

Come on man, what type of political understanding do people have who cant be bothered with having an I.D? Do you really want these people voting?

on the one hand they probably vote democrat, on the other hand they probably vote against gay marriage... hmm, tough call.

[Kuya]

The people who are least political, tend to be poor people, and the people who tend to be poor also tend to be black or hispanic. All of sudden, guartz, the voter base looks more deliciously white.

[aurik]

Come on man, what type of political understanding do people have who cant be bothered with having a university education? Do you really want these people voting?

Come on man, what type of political understanding do people have who cant be bothered with owning land? Do you really want these people voting?

[Bingbong]

Come on man, what type of political understanding do people have who cant be bothered with having a university education? Do you really want these people voting?

Come on man, what type of political understanding do people have who cant be bothered with owning land? Do you really want these people voting?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slippery_slope

Every citizen still gets his/her vote, and it's not like this process must be repeated every 4 years or anything, take an hour, get the silly card, and you're done for life... it takes longer to book flights online ffs. Arguing this is a great injustice is a bit silly when really, it's more like telling someone they gotta jump out of a boat and hit water.

[archibaldcrane]

What part of "this is a calculated effort to disenfranchise certain groups of voters" do you not understand?

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[WahiGuard]

What part of "this is a calculated effort to disenfranchise certain groups of voters" do you not understand?

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The whole thing. Certain people don`t vote because they dont care, not because of lack of access. States have NEVER tried to deny any stratum of society from democratic freedoms.

juss sayin

[archibaldcrane]

The whole thing. Certain people don`t vote because they dont care, not because of lack of access. States have NEVER tried to deny any stratum of society from democratic freedoms.

juss sayin

Holy shit lol.

lrn2history

Spoiler: show

might be getting trolled

[WahiGuard]

Holy shit lol.

lrn2history

Spoiler: show

might be getting trolled

k