But Seriously...

I was an undecided voter last election. I knew where the candidates stood, but I wanted to see the debates, and see who was going to hold onto to their positions or adjust them accordingly to the new middle ground of winning the general election. Sadly in most the debates they just quote mined each other's past statements and parroted the other's views.

Call undecideds pseudo intellectuals, arrogant, morons, or whatever else. Just as being a republican or a democrat doesn't make someone stupid for having firm points that fall in either camp, being an undecided because you have pros and cons either way and want to discern which candidate best fits those views also doesn't make you stupid. I think there are far more birther, communist take over, everything is racist, paid FMLA until when I feel like working idiots than there are undecided voters, but the dullest knives fall in every drawer.

 

I understand your sentiment and agree to a certain point. I'll be the dickhead to point this out since I'm a dickhead anyway: Do you remember how people would lose their minds at the faintest whiff of a discussion requiring identification to vote? That was considered the most appalling and racist thing ever...people compared it to poll taxes and Jim Crow laws; that was a piece of plastic that they could easily obtain at the DMV. Now consider what the reaction would be if you told people that they need to take a test of intelligence and based on the results, they may not be able to vote.

I am undecided. I am holding out hope for a billionaire a la Monty Brewster to enter the race as a third party candidate who can convince all of the lemmings that their best option is none of the above. Absent that option, I won't be taking part. I no longer support this system and am more interested in finding ways to break it completely with the goal of actually fixing it than continuing to be cowed into any of the foolish beliefs held by America that 'this is as good as it gets' or that 'if you don't vote you don't have the right to complain'.

 

I wasn't going to post about this, because it had already been passed by for several posts, but ODEN brought it up.

Crown, how is that much different from literacy tests required back in the day? (And I'm not even 100% against literacy testing, either; what if an illiterate person says that they want to vote for "X" candidate, but they don't know what "X" candidate's name looks like? Then a crooked person could tell them that the name looks like "Y" candidates name. That would be a vote stolen. )

I realize that you were probably being facetious, but it would be unconstitutional.

And for the record, I support voter ID laws. The first time I ever voted (2000 election), I was SHOCKED that they didn't ask to see an ID.

You know what's really fucked up? The fact that felons can't vote.

 

See I'm interested to hear the counter-arguments to this. Currently, I am in 100% complete support of not letting felons vote. But I'm willing to hear you out.

They committed a crime against man or society, they lost the right to vote. Simple. Why would you allow someone to have a say in how the country should be run, when they cannot even legally run their own lives?

The only real counter arguments that I see are that there are certain crimes which are felonies which should not be (I'm looking at you, marijuana, and NOT at you DUI laws). And also that some people do get wrongfully-convicted.

 

They can petition to have those privileges reinstated. Also, if it's shown they were wrongfully convicted, they would get that privilege back. Notice I said privilege and not "right". It's starts off as a right as soon as you are old enough. But that right is a privilege that others in the world do not always have.

If you can't keep your shit together and potentially endanger the lives of others, and you get caught, you shouldn't have that right.

 

The clear argument for allowing felons to vote is that they've paid their debt to "society" and have the same rights as other free men.

 

THANK YOU. What the fuck was the point of going to prison in the first place if you're still treated like shit once you become a "free man?" (or woman)

Also, if your crime had nothing to do with the political process, I don't see why it should be taken away to begin with.

If I was a politician convicted of corruption while in office, by all means, I'd deserve to have my voting rights stripped.
If I was convicted of voter fraud, take away my voting rights.
If I was caught bribing politicians, then I shouldn't vote.

However, most felonies have nothing to do with this, Nerds.

As xrayvision said, you can TRY to get your rights back, but there's no guarantee. And as I understand it, it's an expensive process.

 

I'll agree with you on this.

Obviously, the larger problem is our prison system. For some types of offenders, there can be no rehabilitation, and it should be punishment. They're called "prisoners" for a reason, after all. However, for the majority, I believe it should be treated with a focus on rehabilitation. A lot of the things like drug and alcohol abuse (and crimes resulting from them or in the periphery) are the result or certainly a symptom of some type of illness which can be cured, if both the offender and the system wants to.

However, the problem occurs when people get out of prison having thought they did nothing wrong other than being caught. Can't fix someone who doesn't think they're broken. If that's the case, keep their rights and keep them on probation too.

But yeah, like you said, there should be a statute of limitation on things; people should be allowed to "grow up" and society should understand that people don't always make the best decisions but are still good people. Say someone gets a felony DUI (causes harm, damages property, not first offense, whatever), does time in jail, completes rehab and probation and does some community service. Great, give them their rights back. If there is a way to show that they are genuinely rehabilitated. White collar crimes, great, make your victims whole, pay your debt to society, not re-offend for a certain period of time and go back to voting and shooting shit.

I guess maybe the penal system is looking for a one-size-fits-all answer to wide range of problems. But if that's the case, I'd rather err on the side of caution and keeping priviledges away from some people who are still, ultimately, criminals, rather than err on the side of being not cautious enough and allow our country's future to be placed in the hands of people who are don't realize that what they did was wrong, are not sorry for what they did, or more likely than not will re-offend.

 

I think voting should be pretty dammed inalienable - it's what makes us a democracy. Felons should absolutely get their right to vote back once they complete their sentences, and I'm not entirely keen on taking it away from them in the first place. The concept of "intelligence tests" being required to vote is complete bullshit. Because let's be honest, when most people think of the "stupid voters" it's inherent they consider the stupid voters those people who don't vote for the candidates they favor. I'm also against voter ID laws because all the ones legislated are such obvious attempts at voter suppression; no reputable study I've seen has ever uncovered any widespread voter fraud existing in current times. As far as I'm concerned you should have to be stripped of your citizenship in order to be denied the right to vote.

 

I guess I don't understand. If you aren't a citizen you shouldn't be able to vote but we aren't validating voters identity/citizenship prior to voting? In addition, since they don't ID, how many felons vote or people double vote, or any other easy way around a system that doesn't verify your identity?

 

I'll admit, I thought the some minorities are poor therefore racism card was the stupidest possible analysis of last night's debate, but I have been proven dead wrong.

Edit: Oh sweet Jesus, the comments.

Kill them. Kill them all.

 

Is this LEO training for real?

http://www.lifewithdogs.tv/2016/03/woman-that-stepped-between-dog-and-cop-about-to-shoot-acquitted/

I suppose he gets the slightest amount of credit for hesitating shooting the poor dog long enough for the owner to get in between them, but it's still fucked up. What a piece of shit.

 

How is voter ID even remotely considered bad or wrong by anyone? I have to show ID to buy a beer, tobacco, in some cases to get into a movie, to buy insurance, to board a flight or buy airline tickets. None of which are as important as voting. I still can't fathom how that is voter suppression or racism in any form since you have to be a citizen and registered to vote to be on the rolls anyway.

 

The issue for vote ID laws is the time and money cost of having an ID in the first place. You're putting a state-changable barrier between the person and their ability to vote; the state can always increase costs or close DMV service centers making it much much harder to get an ID.

For me, I would pair a Vote ID law with a Free ID law as well. I'm ok with paying for voter IDs, seems an ok use of govt. money.

the real quandary is this creates an even more universal form of ID which is on the road towards requiring "papers" to live or be detained.

 

There's nothing wrong with it, it's just another reason to get outraged because your party might lose some of the homeless/forever unemployed vote. If you're an adult and so irresponsible you won't get one, even to vote, it means you don't give much of a shit anyway.

Getting an ID shouldn't be hard, but if you're 45 and STILL don't have one I imagine it would be, because what else are you going to have to prove your identity at that point? Then, it's unfair you can't be given an ID by walking in and just saying that you happen to be yourself.

 

Emphasis mine. That right there should be reason enough. Seems rather convenient that by not allowing convicts to vote you're locking out a disproportionate number of minorities out of the democratic process. But I guess it's a happy accident that a convict can't vote against a policy that put them in prison to begin with (ie. drug possession).

Voter ID cards are just another way to prevent Hispanics from voting. If I was brought to this country illegally when I was a baby and grew up an American, through no fault of my own, should I therefore be prohibited from voting? And why is there a need to create/expand a government department to enforce laws against a crime that statistically speaking, doesn't happen?

 

Absolutely yes. Until there is a process that grants these people citizenship they should not be allowed to vote. Nor is the idea that illegal immigrants should be able to vote on their status a sensible one.

Just to be clear, the people you're talking about already can't vote, unless they're pretending to be someone else.

I do support a path to citizenship for the kind of people you're talking about, but that's a decision that should be decided through the democratic process, not by subverting it because you and I don't agree with everyone else.

 

Does it really stop any legal citizens from voting though. I guess that was my original question. You have to have some form of ID to get a job or almost anything else you want to do or need to do. I'm not saying that we have an issue with illegal aliens voting but it seems a very simple request that you bring some form of picture ID with you to vote. I guess I'm having a hard time with why that is an issue for anyone.

 

It's an issue because it's creating a solution to a nonexistent problem. For whatever reason, a lot of minority voters don't have a picture id of some sort. Pair that with making having one a requirement and then closing down all the dmv's in certain geographic/demographic areas and you have widespread voter suppression.