RSSCan you believe all of the hoopla that is being made about how it is a necessity to require photo id’s for people to be able to vote? This is being done to stop all of those people from coming in and falsely voting. Except where is the evidence this is occurring? (Be sure to cite your source if you’re going to argue that it does happen. In the state Legislature in Virginia one elected official was able to come up with one instance he had heard about from an elections official — that someone who had voted earlier, might have come and gotten back in line later but left — was it a twin? Was it someone who thought he might have left his ID or phone or something and came back to look for it? Since the person didn’t try to vote and didn’t apparently talk to the person who reported the incident to the elected official, guess we’ll never know
Anyway, depending upon what all happens this is going to be an expense for Virginia tax payers of somewhere between $800,000 and $21,000,000, depending upon who is asked.
The most blatant argument for having photo id’s is that stuff like phone bills and such can be faked.
Duh! Hello there. Back in the 60′s it was easy enough to get a fake id to be able to get beer. In the 70′s where the clubs became popular, the only thing that was possibly more popular than the “Hustle” was the making and buying of fake id’s in order to get into the clubs.
Now days, it is even easier. A quick Google search will give you hundreds of documents telling you the best ways to create fake id’s. You can even find places that sell them! So, we’re now going to expect our elections officers to be experts in correctly identifying fake id’s?
Problem-solving requires a two-pronged approach:
- Clearly identify a problem
- Do something to solve the problem
Neither of those criteria have been met in this case.
Photo id’s are not going to do anything more than increase costs to taxpayers, create a few additional headaches for those poll workers who are going to have to stand there and debate with someone as to whether their id is valid or nor, or create even more headaches for poll workers if there is a problem with the official id that the person has. (Did I mention that a chunk of the cost is going to be doing that media blitz thing that they did last year with the new voter ID cards all the heck over again? Last year that cost about $250,000. All wasted if this photo ID thing becomes official.)
If the whole thing weren’t so sad it would be funny. (Of course, if Saturday Night Live is watching, it could be both!)
I can think of quite a few ways that money could be put to better use by our lawmakers.
For a bit of extra insight into this new “fade” spreading across the country, check out http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/10/29/121029fa_fact_mayer?currentPage=all
In the meantime, get ready to carry Grandma, who has voted for the last 40 years without a photo id, over somewhere to get her mug shot taken.
