Could I have been wrong about the virtues of requiring ID to vote?
I wanted to briefly revisit the controversy surrounding the requiring of voters to show ID in order to be allowed to participate in the election process. I have been a strong supporter of the idea as expressed in one article with the fairly straightforward title of, “What’s wrong with requiring voter ID?“
In it I had opined that if showing picture ID is required for much more mundane endeavors like buying liquor, cashing a check or picking up tickets to Sesame Street on Ice at the Madison Square Garden Will Call window, why not make sure the person casting a vote for say, president of the United States, is actually who they say that they are?
I felt at the time that stopping voter fraud is neither discriminatory or racist particularly when states will typically provide a picture ID without charge.Also, despite the argument from voter ID naysayers that voter fraud isn’t all that prevalent:
A) If voter ID were to stop even one fraudulent vote from being cast wouldn’t that be worth it? and
B) I’m not sure that voter fraud is not prevalent (i.e. Chicago)!
I felt at the time that unless the dissenters have some ulterior motive for preventing implementation of a voter ID requirement, there is zero downside!Two examples of ulterior motives I can think of would be to foment class warfare in a divide and conquer strategy, or in a more nefarious scenario to actually enable voter fraud to occur.
A simple tale about the trials and tribulations having to show ID!
There I was at a Dick’s Sporting Goods buying wraps for my hands so that I could get back to hitting my heavy bag with a stick-figure face of an anonymous liberal drawn on it.I got to the cash register to make my $15 purchase and, following protocol slid the card through the reader and waited. It was then that the cashier asked me to see picture ID.
I told her that if I don’t need to show it to vote then I sure as hell don’t need to show it to buy $15 hand wraps! She said the hell I do and I can’t buy them until I show my ID. So you know what? I did.
The moral of the tale is that if I need to show a picture ID for something as mundane as a purchase at a Dick’s Sporting Goods, then I have no problem being required to show it to vote in any election from dog catcher on up to president of the United States.
Neither should anybody else! And I suspiciously think that anyone who does has an ulterior motive!
Authored By The Political Commentator
