Liberals' unsettling distrust of honest elections
By Tom Quiner
Comedian Al Franken won his Senatorial race by 312 votes out of over 2.8 million votes cast.
That 2008 election proved that every single vote counts.
The 2000 presidential election came down to the state of Florida. Whoever won the Sunshine State’s 25 electoral votes would become president.
Out of nearly six million votes cast, George W. Bush won by only 537 hotly-contested votes. The vote was so tight, and the recounts so inconclusive, that legal challenges were filed by the Gore campaign. It went all the way to the Supreme Court who decided on the slim tally that favored Bush.
More than any election, the 2000 presidential election proved that every single vote counts.
In a country that is pretty evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, the power of a single vote looms large. That is why a vast majority of Americans support voter ID laws. In a country with millions of illegal aliens living in our neighborhoods, they understand the devastating impact voter fraud could have on our communities, our states, and our nation.
Republicans offer a simple solution: simply request that voters present a driver’s license or a government-issued photo ID when they vote.
Democrats charge that such laws will result in voter suppression of minority voters. They accuse Republicans of being racist for asking for the same thing that airports ask before boarding a plane. Heck, I was asked to show my ID in Alaska last summer just to order a beer, since they have mandatory carding, even if you’re a tottering old geezer (which I’m not, for the record!).
The NAACP is one of the groups screaming loudest against voter ID laws. I don’t know if they think that blacks and Hispanics are too dumb to secure a photo ID if they don’t have a driver’s license. I guess conservatives like me hold minorities in much higher regard than these liberal groups.
I ran into Iowa’s Secretary of State, Matt Schultz, at a pro life event in Des Moines a few weeks ago. Secretary Schultz has been a leader in screening voter rolls to ensure that there is no vote fraud in our elections. He is a leading advocate for voter ID laws.
His opponents scream that he wants to suppress the votes of minorities. I asked him about it. “How would your plan suppress minority voters?” He shrugged his shoulder and said it won’t, it absolutely WILL NOT. If someone has a driver’s license, that’s all they need. If they don’t, they can simply go and apply for a photo ID at specified government offices. If they can’t go to the government, the government will come to them, right to their house or apartment and sign them up.
It’s interesting: the NAACP scheduled a “moral march” in North Carolina to “defeat discriminatory proposals to mandate photo ID for all people exercising their right to vote.” Guess what ? Their explicit instructions to their marchers demanded that they supply ID before they would be permitted to march:
“DO bring photo identification (driver’s license, passport, or other valid photo id [sic]) with you and keep it on your person at all times.”
Other liberal opponents to voter ID laws include labor unions. Baltimore educators had a vote last Thursday on a new union contract. Guess what they needed before they were allowed to vote? You guessed it: an ID. Said union boss, Marietta English:
“And all you need is your picture ID. And you must be a member of the Baltimore Teachers Union.”
They demanded IDs to avoid fraudulent votes.
Same thing for the International Association of Machinists in their last vote to determine if they’d accept a contract with Boeing: a picture ID was required to vote.
Seventy percent of voters support the voter ID laws. Unions demand it in their own votes. The NAACP demands an ID just to march in their “moral marches.”
If one had a suspicious mind, one couldn’t help but wonder why they’re so afraid of honest elections for the rest of us.
