Wednesday, May 07, 2014

Voter ID laws and a reality check

Jessica Levinson, Professor of Law and a student of election laws has written an op-ed piece on voter fraud, voter ID laws and the like.  Here's are excerpts from that piece:

"And perhaps even more to the point, there is really no evidence of voter fraud; At least not the kind that a photo ID would prevent. If there was evidence of voter impersonation, voter ID laws would serve an important purpose. But because there is not we must ask what purpose these laws further."

" If there is virtually non-existent voter impersonation (as there is), then at best, voter ID laws are a solution in search of a problem."

The truth is that true voter impersonation is rare, but it does exist.  One study into the subject showed that since 2000 there were 77 cases of voter fraud in the U. S. and 33 of those resulted in conviction or guilty pleas.  This study was done in 2012 by News21, a project involving Carnegie-Knight and journalism students from around the nation and claimed it could find not a single case where voter impersonation had resulted in a guilty plea or conviction.

Funny thing is, they apparently missed the case of Reyna Almanza and her son in the 2009 school board election in Progreso, TX.  According to ABC News, the son voted twice in that election, using the name of his incarcerated brother when voting the second time.  This same ABC News article points out that Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, in 2012, claimed that during the past decade, there were 51 cases of voter fraud that resulted in convictions in the state, four of which involved voter impersonation.

So we have a very reputable news organization publishing research that claims no such cases exist, and a major network news operation telling us that it does, albeit, very rarely.

As we strive for clarity in this space, I am compelled to point out that the real agenda behind most attempts to impose voter-ID laws on the population are not in an effort to prevent these rare instances of fraud, but in a blatant, partisan effort at voter suppression.  Republican strategists, unable to come up with plans to woo voters by improving the economy, healthcare or anything else of concern to voters, are trying to hold on to control of the House and gain control of the Senate by any means necessary. 

That doesn't mean we aren't a nation with a history, or a potential future fraught with voter fraud.  I doubt Professor Levinson or any other expert on elections can give any explanation other than blatant fraud for the results of the 1960 presidential election in November of 1960, in two counties in Texas, Fannin and Angelina.  Fannin County had only 4,895 registered voters when the election was held, but there were 6,138 votes cast in that county; 75% for JFK.  In one Angelina County precinct, where there were only 86 registered voters, Kennedy carried the precinct by a margin of 187 to 24 votes for Richard Nixon.  What Mayor Richard Daley did in Chicago was almost certainly outright election theft, not just fraud.

I see two arguments against voter ID laws.  One is that they are a solution in search of a problem.  In a democracy where even one fraudulent vote can change the result of an election, the problem exists as long as the system of voting is exposed to this type of fraud.  So there is a potential problem.  The other argument against voter ID laws is that photo IDs aren't easily available for anyone and everyone.

That's a better argument, but not a bullet-proof one.  The answer is not to avoid photo ID laws, but to make obtaining a photo ID easy and free for all.  Provide alternative methods of identity confirmation for those who have no birth records. 

Imagine how interesting it would be if we were encouraging rather than discouraging people to vote.

* * *

I have a business proposition for you.  I'll give you $500 to go and buy a car for me.  I'll give you the cash in the form of a cashier's check made payable to the dealership.  You go buy the car, set up insurance, then give the car to me and I'll hand you your cash.

Seem like a good deal?  Is it illegal?  Is it a criminal enterprise?  Depends on who you ask.  Dealers are limited in exporting cars to other nations.  The law is less clear when it comes to what individuals can do.

Deceptive?  Almost certainly.  But if you could buy something in the U. S. that isn't illegal to carry across the border into Mexico, for which you could double or triple your money, would you make the trip?  You sure would, every single weekday and twice or more on Sundays.

Worse, why is the Secret Service involved in this particular niche of law enforcement?  It doesn't involve protecting the president or the currency.

* * *

I have a great deal of respect for Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. He's an intelligent, thoughtful individual who speaks his mind and does it very well. In a piece on racism he wrote this:

"The clichéd example: You’re walking down a dark, deserted street and a bunch of black teens adorned with dagger tattoos and carrying bongs made from human skulls are walking toward you. If you cross the street, are you being a racist or a realist?"

It seems like a okay question, designed to make the reader examine how they would react and how their reaction could and should be labeled.  The problem is, what happens if you change the word "black" to "white" or "Asian" or "Hispanic"?  If the teens are any race other than that of the person dealing with the situation, is the response to cross the street racist or just prudence?  As Kareem points out, it's just a cliché.  Any careful individual is going to cross the street to avoid a group of teens on a deserted street at night, without regard to the race of the teams.  Particularly if they "look" like they present a threat.  Heck, I'd cross the street to avoid a group of people of any age who carry bongs made of human heads and adorned with dagger tattoos.

I'd rather be a live coward.

* * *

Random Ponderings:

Is V. Stiviano wearing that idiotic visor the most transparent attempt at fame-whoring yet?

Monica Lewinsky thinks "time to burn the beret and bury the blue dress" but the most interesting thing in her essay is that she finds Hilary Clinton's blaming of the women involved in Bill Clinton's infidelity and not the man himself, "troubling."

Let me see if I have this right.  The real-life convicted murderer who inspired the film "Bernie" is going to live with the writer/director of the film.  I can just see the follow-up "Weekend at Bernie's Place Above My Garage" being written.

When will Jay Leno and others who were protesting outside the Beverly Hills Hotel take a trip to Port Arthur, TX, to protest outside the Motiva Oil Refinery, which is owned by the Saudi Arabian royal family?  The Saudis also observe sharia law in their nation.

Any mother who tells a gossip mag like People about their child's diagnosed mental illness isn't a very good mother.

Even Larry King is taking shots at how the Crash News Network continues to cover the missing Malaysian Air Flight MH-370. 

Okay, I can see leaving money to care for beloved pets.  I get it.  But leaving money for the care of a plant, even a long-lived philodendron just makes no sense.

First head coach to take his team to the playoffs in back to back seasons and his reward was being fired?  Mark Jackson deserved better.

So of course people are trying to blame the Common Core standards for a recent middle school essay assignment "Was the Holocaust a Hoax" which is as ridiculous an assignment as is the attempt to blame this on Common Core.

* * *

May 6th in History:

1527 – Spanish and German troops sack Rome; some consider this the end of the Renaissance. 147 Swiss Guards, including their commander, die fighting the forces of Charles V in order to allow Pope Clement VII to escape into Castel Sant'Angelo.
1536 – The Siege of Cuzco commences, in which Incan forces attempt to retake the city of Cuzco from the Spanish.
1536 – King Henry VIII orders English-language Bibles be placed in every church.
1542 – Francis Xavier reaches Old Goa, the capital of Portuguese India at the time.
1659 – English Restoration: A faction of the British Army removes Richard Cromwell as Lord Protector of the Commonwealth and reinstalls the Rump Parliament.
1682 – Louis XIV moves his court to the Palace of Versailles.
1757 – Battle of Prague – A Prussian army fights an Austrian army in Prague during the Seven Years' War.
1757 – The end of Konbaung–Hanthawaddy War, and the end of Burmese Civil War (1740–1757).
1757 – English poet Christopher Smart is admitted into St Luke's Hospital for Lunatics in London, beginning his six-year confinement to mental asylums.
1782 – Construction begins on the Grand Palace, the royal residence of the King of Siam in Bangkok, at the command of King Buddha Yodfa Chulaloke.
1801 – Captain Thomas Cochrane in the 14-gun HMS Speedy captures the 32-gun Spanish frigate El Gamo.
1835 – James Gordon Bennett, Sr. publishes the first issue of the New York Herald.
1840 – The Penny Black postage stamp becomes valid for use in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
1844 – The Glaciarium, the world's first mechanically frozen ice rink, opens.
1857 – The British East India Company disbands the 34th Regiment of Bengal Native Infantry whose sepoy Mangal Pandey had earlier revolted against the British and is considered to be the First Martyr in the War of Indian Independence.
1861 – American Civil War: Arkansas secedes from the Union.
1861 – American Civil War: Richmond, Virginia is declared the new capital of the Confederate States of America.
1863 – American Civil War: The Battle of Chancellorsville ends with the defeat of the Army of the Potomac by Confederate troops.
1877 – Chief Crazy Horse of the Oglala Sioux surrenders to United States troops in Nebraska.
1882 – Thomas Henry Burke and Lord Frederick Cavendish are stabbed and killed during the Phoenix Park Murders in Dublin.
1882 – The United States Congress passes the Chinese Exclusion Act.
1889 – The Eiffel Tower is officially opened to the public at the Universal Exposition in Paris.
1902 – Macario Sakay establishes the Tagalog Republic with himself as President.
1910 – George V becomes King of the United Kingdom upon the death of his father, Edward VII.
1916 – Twenty-one Lebanese nationalists executed in the Martyrs' Square, Beirut by Jamal Pasha, the Ottoman wāli.
1933 – The Deutsche Studentenschaft attacked Magnus Hirschfeld's Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, later burning many of its books.
1935 – New Deal: Executive Order 7034 creates the Works Progress Administration.
1935 – The first flight of the Curtiss P-36 Hawk.
1937 – Hindenburg disaster: The German zeppelin Hindenburg catches fire and is destroyed within a minute while attempting to dock at Lakehurst, New Jersey. Thirty-six people are killed.
1940 – John Steinbeck is awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his novel The Grapes of Wrath.
1941 – At California's March Field, Bob Hope performs his first USO show.
1941 – The first flight of the Republic P-47 Thunderbolt.
1942 – World War II: On Corregidor, the last American forces in the Philippines surrender to the Japanese.
1945 – World War II: Axis Sally delivers her last propaganda broadcast to Allied troops.
1945 – World War II: The Prague Offensive, the last major battle of the Eastern Front, begins.
1949 – EDSAC, the first practical electronic digital stored-program computer, runs its first operation.
1954 – Roger Bannister becomes the first person to run the mile in under four minutes.
1960 – More than 20 million viewers watch the first televised royal wedding when Princess Margaret marries Anthony Armstrong-Jones at Westminster Abbey.
1962 – St. Martín de Porres is canonized by Pope John XXIII.
1966 – Myra Hindley and Ian Brady are sentenced to life imprisonment for the Moors murders in England.
1972 – Deniz Gezmiş, Yusuf Aslan and Hüseyin İnan are executed in Ankara for attempting to overthrow the Constitutional order.
1976 – An earthquake strikes the Friuli region of northeastern Italy, causing 989 deaths and the destruction of entire villages.
1981 – A jury of architects and sculptors unanimously selects Maya Ying Lin's design for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial from 1,421 other entries.
1983 – The Hitler Diaries are revealed as a hoax after examination by experts.
1984 – One hundred three Korean Martyrs are canonized by Pope John Paul II in Seoul.
1989 – Cedar Point opens Magnum XL-200, the first roller coaster to break the 200 ft height barrier, therefore spawning what is known as the "coaster wars".
1994 – Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom and French President François Mitterrand officiate at the opening of the Channel Tunnel.
1994 – Former Arkansas state worker Paula Jones files a lawsuit against United States President Bill Clinton, alleging that he had sexually harassed her in 1991.
1996 – The body of former CIA director William Colby is found washed up on a riverbank in southern Maryland, eight days after he disappeared.
1997 – The Bank of England is given independence from political control, the most significant change in the bank's 300-year history.
1998 – Kerry Wood strikes out 20 Houston Astros to tie the major league record held by Roger Clemens. He threw a one-hitter and did not walk a batter in his 5th career start.
1999 – The first elections to the devolved Scottish Parliament and Welsh Assembly are held.
2001 – During a trip to Syria, Pope John Paul II becomes the first pope to enter a mosque.
2013 – Three women missing for more than a decade are found alive in the U.S. city of Cleveland, Ohio. Ariel Castro, is taken into custody.

Famous Folk Born on May 6th:

Pope Marcellus II
Pope Innocent X
Sigmund Freund
Robert Peary
Rudolph Valentino
Toots Shor
Weeb Eubank
Orson Welles (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oSs6DcA6dFI)
Stewart Granger (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CsDitWJR7J0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNef4MC4ldo)
Patricia Kennedy Lawford
Willie Mays (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7dK6zPbkFnE maybe the best fly ball catch in baseball history)
Rubin Carter (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgDxA78CJho)
Bob Seger (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=691r2DDdWn4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G2UVsyVLLcE)
Mary MacGregor (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpLa9jPoGoA)
Robbie McIntosh (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FnH_zwVmiuE)
Fred Newman
Tony Blair
Lynn Whitfield (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKX87qdbfFQ)
Roma Downey (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfPZ3Cf9fcc)
George Clooney (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6oW2Wgs19s)   Oh, and we can't forget this:

Dana Hill (taken too soon, RIP - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6oW2Wgs19s)