From TPM
"About 12 Indiana nuns were turned away Tuesday, from a polling place, by a fellow bride of Christ because they didn't have state or federal identification bearing a photograph.
Sister Julie McGuire said she was forced to turn away her fellow sisters at Saint Mary's Convent in South Bend, across the street from the University of Notre Dame, because they had been told earlier that they would need such an ID to vote.
The nuns, all in their 80s or 90s, didn't get one but came to the precinct anyway.
"One came down this morning, and she was 98, and she said, 'I don't want to go do that,'" Sister McGuire said. Some showed up with outdated passports. None of them drives."
What is really funny is that they were turned away by one of their own Sisters at the convent.
Yet again the Indiana Voter ID Law : a real law enacted to solve a pretend problem. Unfortunately the Indiana Law will cause a whole bunch of legitimate voters to be disenfranchised.
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7 comments:
I wonder how well publicized the law was? You'd think people would have heard about it and would show up with proper ID. But if they were in a convent, probably not.
It is a real problem, not a pretend problem, especially in some states such as California.
pretty wild...a law passed by Republicans that hinders voting and challenged by the ACLU. Voter fraud was a major problem back in the early to mid 20th century because of the political machines that existed in the populated areas of the country. Some feel that it extended to the Kennedy families victories in Massachusetts and across the country in 1960. I suppose it was a major issue up to and for sometime after the 1964 Civil Rights law too. Certainly the 2000 fiasco was a black eye on the country with its hanging chads. I suppose unscrupulous people will always be an issue.
Seems strange though that nuns would not be able to vote! I suppose that issue extends my disgust at government and academia for its pig headed approach to law - never any exceptions and hence foolish actions like prohibiting nuns to vote occurs - ugh! I guess blind Pharisaic obedience to law makes some people secure but there has to be room for exceptions.
I agree Leo, voter fraud was a big problem in a number of places in the '60s. Chicago fraud likely gave the election to Kennedy over Nixon in 1960.
Now however it does not seem a problem, and those pushing voter ID laws are only marginally hiding the fact they want to disenfranchise poor voters.
I am all about voter ID, if there is a voter fraud issue. But since the decline of the political machines in NYC and Chicago, I am not convinced it is a problem needing a solution. In fact voter ID creates a problem where none existed before.
For those who think there is a problem I say, show me.
People will talk about Daffy Duck being registered to vote. I say, show me where Daffy Duck actually was allowed, or even attempted, to vote! Until the Daffy Ducks of the world are voting, we do not have a problem.
This of course leads into a discussion of the Electoral College. A couple of days ago I had a discussion with some people who did not like the electoral college and wanted to eliminate it. Yet one person also wanted to limit voting to those who understood the issues. I had fun explaining that in my opinion ignorance was one of the reasons behind the thinking of the supporters of the electoral college. I realize the arguments for the college and find them compelling but I do wonder sometimes if fear of the masses was not an unspoken reason for the college.
Leo,
I don't even think that is up for debate. The electoral college was certainly set up out of fear of the masses. Like most things, there have been unintended consequences. The big one is that small minorities in the makeup of each state get paid attention to. Be it the religious vote, the black vote, the right to bear arms vote or the hispanic vote; they all get more attention in certain states because of the electoral collage.
I have also been frustrated with the electoral college. I still do not think I understand all the implications of banning it. My guess is that, all things considered, I like it a little more than I don't.
I think it forces politics to be local and that is a good thing I guess.
Good discussion.
I guess the biggest worry about voter fraud now comes from the black-box Deibold voting machine situation:
while polls = open do;
votecount = votecount + 1
repeat until candidate.victorious = true.
You got it dmarks. The Pentagon can't figure out how to stop hackers some of the time. Can you imagin if some nefarious entity decided to mess with our elections? I hesitate to even contemplate it.
Have a great Mother's day
A
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