All this ruckus about voter IDs. My Virginia one is stupid. A piece of paper that is not uniform size so you can tell what it is from across a table, but it is hard to carry around with you because it is larger then card size. I still get quizzed when I walk in about who I am,where I live and my birthday.

On to the rest of the story, there are plenty of countries that have voter ID programs. Most have some sort of tamper resistant card that costs about $1.00 for the materials (issuance, design and delivery are not part of that number call it under $3 all told for a population). Germany, Mexico, Ghana, etc. all have cards. The farther you get down that list, the more you have to wonder why there and not here.

That said, I guess the counter is that you need to believe there is voter fraud in the US to some meaningful measure. I have not felt that what has been documented is meaningful. I also fail to see why a driver's license/state issued identity card cannot be purposed for this, especially with all the verification available from the document, starting with a picture on it and ending with electronic measures.

Any left wing types suggesting Texas fires are a sign of God's displeasure with Perry?

Anyone else notice that weather disasters of the past year have pretty much singled out states with Republican governors? (With the notable except of Missouri and Arkansas but those don't really count as Democratic states anyway.)

Phan In Phlorida wrote:

jerseyhoya wrote:She's not running and wouldn't be the nominee even if she ran.

Eh, I have a feeling Palin will run but won't stay in the race. Bowing out saying she needs to care for her son with Down's until he's school age (or some other excuse), and we'll see her pop up again in 2016. This way she's still in the picture and stays in the good graces of her fans, and continue to travel the circuit and suck monies from her fans. She craves the attention and adulation and doesn't want to relinquish that.

She gets all of that without becoming a candidate AND she doesn't have to give up her million dollar a minute gig at FOX. She is much better off staying in a position where she can take pot shots at Obama and other Dems (and even some GOP) but not actually have to answer for anything that she says. And she knows it.

TenuredVulture wrote:Any left wing types suggesting Texas fires are a sign of God's displeasure with Perry?

Anyone else notice that weather disasters of the past year have pretty much singled out states with Republican governors? (With the notable except of Missouri and Arkansas but those don't really count as Democratic states anyway.)

Remember that time last week when Vermont and upstate New York got washed away in historically awful flooding? Apparently not.

drsmooth wrote:

jerseyhoya wrote:It's not a perfect comparison, and clearly there's a rights vs. privileges debate that's important here too, but your prove who you are not how old you are point makes it more important that ID is used for voting, not less.

your contention is not self-evident

and you have an audience, so

In the case of booze or cigarettes, I can go into a store as many times as I want over the course of a day/week/month and buy them. The only requirement is that I'm over 21/19. It doesn't matter who I am specifically. My buying the products generally doesn't affect the ability of others to buy them.

I am only supposed to be allowed to vote once. Once I have voted, no one else can vote under my name. If someone else votes under my name, I cannot vote. It's important then in a way that it isn't with buying age restricted products that I'm actually the one voting under my name, which makes proving who I am pretty important and relevant to the equation.

Make the verification fingerprint scans and make the fingerprint data in the voting system inadmissible in court and off limits to law enforcement agencies.

Problem solved.

The Nightman Cometh wrote:Make the verification fingerprint scans and make the fingerprint data in the voting system inadmissible in court and off limits to law enforcement agencies.

Problem solved.

Hahahahahahhaha. I see that as having zero chance of success as the equipment and expertise would come from the Law Enforcement and DMV element, which in some states are the same. Making it stand alone for registration and the data base would be expensive to the states/jurisdictions. The old argument that FP scanners are commoditized and therefore easy to deploy successfully is a farce at best. I have watched these fail under the least demanding scenarios driving the solution to more expensive implementation for robustness (Texas I believe is using a 'ten slap" method and DHS uses a similar system at the borders at significantly increased expense). Under a watchful eye registration is not too error prone, but it involves experience with the registration systems.

Anyway, I have not seen that Law Enforcement can keep their hands out of any public data sources. Worse still, the election boards are so screwed up that giving them more data to protect just doubles down on the likelihood that identity theft takes root there, not that a fingerprint template is terribly useful especially since it should be encrypted but it is more personal data kept in a system that is likely slightly more secure then a tissue box under a bed.

I get isolating victims and witnesses from certain agencies because the greater good is getting them to testify, but why do we want people with warrants out on them voting willy nilly?

/whitey

jerseyhoya wrote:It's not a perfect comparison, and clearly there's a rights vs. privileges debate that's important here too, but your prove who you are not how old you are point makes it more important that ID is used for voting, not less.

I initially imagined a couple of 15-16 year olds going for the hat trick of coolness... booze, smokes, voting. Then I re-read and realized you kinda inverted my "point".

My only point was the booze/smokes/vote nugget that some people dust off is specious. A better comparison would be that Publix makes you show your driver's license when you pay by check (although the people in line behind you would prolly assault you in the parking lot afterwards).

Hey, I'm for implanting RFID microchips in every American as a mandatory form of national ID. All it needs is SS# for database lookup. Would make it easier to round up illegals. Make it easier for employers and potential employers to check things like how often you go to casinos and/or the horse track, check your credit card debt, how often you hit the booze store, hotels/motels, etc. And if you get lost and someone drops you off at the SPCA...

jerseyhoya wrote:I am only supposed to be allowed to vote once. Once I have voted, no one else can vote under my name. If someone else votes under my name, I cannot vote. It's important then in a way that it isn't with buying age restricted products that I'm actually the one voting under my name, which makes proving who I am pretty important and relevant to the equation.

I'm not convinced it makes proving who you are pretty important. It makes saying who you are relevant, because someone has a chance of confirming that, at that polling place, you're the only joe smith to have cast one vote.

That is, if it comes down to cases, in a post-audit, someone can check for double or multiple voting. I've not seen substantial justification for even a fairly simple ID process. If votes are so narrowly decided that a vote (or 10, or 50) one way or another is deciding the matter, we're doing bigger things incorrectly (like devising how candidates are chosen, apportionment of power to elected officials, etc).

Said another way, the debacle of 2000 is not principally a signal that we don't have tight enough control over how we authenticate voters.

Houshphandzadeh wrote:I get isolating victims and witnesses from certain agencies because the greater good is getting them to testify, but why do we want people with warrants out on them voting willy nilly?

/whitey

Because as of now only people who have been arrested or their job requires it have been fingerprinted and I'm not sure how receptive the general public would be to being finger printed by big brother.

Because as of now only people who have been arrested or their job requires it have been fingerprinted and I'm not sure how receptive the general public would be to being finger printed by big brother.[/quote]

There are plenty of opportunities to be fingerprinted out there. Several states are requiring it as part of getting a state issued ID. California has a requirement for medical professionals, which I believe is related to access to controlled substances. I would guess concealed carry permits as well. There are doubtless others, especially as states strive to recapture their investments.

Facial Recognition is done frequently. You can make a template from a decent picture. Assume that all states are doing this these days to comb their databases to see who is not who they say they are, who is wanted, who has several identities, who is collecting state benefits under a different name, etc. Aside from popular belief, it is not terribly easy to do via video, especially at an obtuse angle, but you will also notice that camera are now mounted lower to the ground to get a better facial image for comparison. The newer techniques that combine template with things like "skin mapping" are really very solid. Add to that various eye print methods (retinal, mapping, templating, etc.) combine and it is powerful stuff with a reasonably low false positive rate.

Read my mannequin lips: No. New. Taxes.

TenuredVulture wrote:Any left wing types suggesting Texas fires are a sign of God's displeasure with Perry?

Not a left winger. Correlation with Perry, dunno. But it's quite obvious that...

GOD HATES TEXAS!!!











CONNECT... THE... DOTS!!!

I'm not saying people can't get fingerprinted, I'm saying no one wants to be fingerprinted and would be resistant to it.

... or maybe it's Al Gore's fault

NPR:

Rick Perry is not a master debater

Just like 8th grade.

RedState turned on Sarah Palin today - see here and here

Seems like even the dumb people are getting it. Well some of them, as the comments demonstrate not everyone is on board.