@OCCOM BILL,
Quote: That's the rub, Bernie. The systems most States use to block and/or detect the fraud have been blocked in Wisconsin... so evidence is hard to come by. However, the absurdity of the excuses offered for the blocks do serve as evidence of intent on a common sense level, though obviously inadequate for a legal basis. Why would any politician oppose reasonable safeguards against voter fraud? Like, a picture ID for instance? Or at least some documentation for he who is being vouched for? It is beyond naive to pretend there isn't a motive for blocking reasonable safeguards against voter fraud; because politicians do take flack for doing so. They must have a reason.
You're a reasonable guy, bill. I'd like you to think about this in a different way.
First, even outside of Wisconsin, indictments/prosecutions for voter fraud can be, as I said, counted on a hand or two. Here's a prior news item on the Justice Department's investigation of voter fraud...some stuff on Wis. there too...
Quote: In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud
By ERIC LIPTON and IAN URBINA
Published: April 12, 2007
Correction Appended
WASHINGTON, April 11 " Five years after the Bush administration began a crackdown on voter fraud, the Justice Department has turned up virtually no evidence of any organized effort to skew federal elections, according to court records and interviews.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/12/washington/12fraud.html?ei=5088&en=277feccfa099c7d0&ex=1334030400&pagewanted=all Let's note too that academic studies reflect the JD's findings that there's little to no evidence of actual voter fraud.
Second, penalties for voter fraud are severe. You can do a google check and get some examples, but serious jail time with fines and loss of future right to vote seems pretty standard. You understand that your single vote won't likely make much difference in an election, nor would a second if you could somehow sneak it in. So there's little motivation for any individual to engage in the act, let alone many individuals. And if one imagines an organized project to get thousands of (rather stupid) people to risk the above for $25 or some such, what do you think the chances would be of keeping that secret?
But let's imagine anyway that in some manner which the JD and academic studies and our appreciation of motivation all miss, that one or two hundred instances happen in some electoral districts in the US each election. We've NO reason to think this, but we'll just imagine it. What difference would it make?
So maybe there's something else going on here as regards the
claims of voter fraud and the implementation of checks/roadblocks to stop it ("it" being something that doesn't really exist, remember).
What if you might set up a roadblock which will make it far less likely that people, perhaps many people, will not arrive at the polling booths, or will be hassled long enough so that they decide to return to work, or will have their votes or eligibility discounted? Given this strategy, you could (instead of adding the 100 votes we just imagined for your fav candidate) cancel
thousands of votes for your opponent.
That's the rub, Bernie. The systems most States use to block and/or detect the fraud have been blocked in Wisconsin... so evidence is hard to come by. However, the absurdity of the excuses offered for the blocks do serve as evidence of intent on a common sense level, though obviously inadequate for a legal basis. Why would any politician oppose reasonable safeguards against voter fraud? Like, a picture ID for instance? Or at least some documentation for he who is being vouched for? It is beyond naive to pretend there isn't a motive for blocking reasonable safeguards against voter fraud; because politicians do take flack for doing so. They must have a reason.