Wednesday - October 27, 2010
Going Through The Motions
Looks like we are going through our annual noise-fest about scruffy election controls. Poll workers stuffing ballot boxes!! Nevada ballots handed out with Harry Reid’s name already checked! Acorn! Feds strike down Arizona proof-of-citizenship voting law! Racism!! Diebold voting machines are rigged! Glen Beck forecasting riots and blood in the streets!!!!
There they go again. Sound and fury, signifying nothing.
Don’t get me wrong; I believe strongly that many of the election processes around the country “have their thumb on the scales” so to speak. And it is something that people should be aware of, and that needs significant citizen watchdogging. Groups like True The Vote down in Texas, and others, are doing a great job.
The problem is, aside from a few contested recounts, we won’t hear another word about this starting three days after Election Day. But I can guarantee you that when it comes time to vote next year, about a month out we’ll hear all the same crap once again. Voter fraud has become another one of the annual fear topics for the media to trot out seasonally. No different from the “experts predict this will be a terrible year for hurricanes” or the “we’re all going to die from flu this year, and the government/big pharma doesn’t have enough vaccine to go around” tales. Sound and fury. And nothing ever ever gets done.
Ok Tea Party people, I’ve got a job for you. A job that needs doing in every town, city, county, and state across the nation. A job that does not need to be done once, but needs to be done all the time. We are a fractured nation, broken along political lines. We need to close that fracture. We need to have not only a more honest government, we need people to have faith in that government. And that faith starts with people having faith in the election process. Ok, it also starts with people having faith that the candidates running for office are legally qualified to run, such things as showing public proof that they are citizens, natural born ones if necessary, or that the ones running for Mayor of Chicago have followed Chicago’s law and have actually lived day to day in Chicago for the past several years, but that’s not what I want to discuss here. I want to talk about cleaning up the voting process. I’ve done this before, so I’m equally guilty of the seasonal scare story too, but the only reason I’m here talking about it again is that no solutions seem to have been put in place.
If one of these ever-present polling companies were to take a large nationwide poll, perhaps half a million people chosen at random, and asked about their views on the voting process, I could probably guess within a few points what the results would be. You would find that 2/3 to 3/4 of the left to far left leaning folks do not believe that any monkey business is afoot. You would find that 2/3 to 7/8 of the center to right leaning folks believe that not only are the monkeys out there, but they are fed steroid laced bananas and that they all have turbochargers hooked up to their little monkey butts. You would also find that at least 80% of the leftish people say that any kind of effort to clamp down the election process is racist, while fewer than 30% of the rightish types feel that way. Heck, if you asked that question the proper way, 90% or more of the right leaners would say that a rigid election process is patriotic.
Let me posit a solution. Yes, I lean to the right. You may have noticed this once or twice in the past. So much so that sometimes I wonder how I manage to stand up straight. So hold on to your seats, because I’m going to do something radical. I am calling for an increase in government. More government workers. Shocking, I know. But the only reason I am calling for this is that the voter registration process is often left to the lowly county clerk, who has about a billion other jobs to do. And a strict and structured registration process is going to require some staffing. No, you don’t have to pay these people $185,000 a year each. But it’s a $40,000 job for a number of them, and a $65,000 job for 2 or 3 managers. And everyone who gets one of these jobs takes it with the full knowledge that their job is on the line each and every day. Screw it up and you are history.
My solution is radical because it is simple. It does not take rocket science or a Master’s degree in engineering to do. All it takes is cooperation, and the honesty to put aside the willful blindness of PC. Let me get all “post racial” and “bipartisan” like our wonderful president: skin color does not preclude you from making a bit of effort to get yourself registered to vote. Period. No discussion necessary. Physical motile ability does not preclude you either. Nor does advanced age. Nor does sexual orientation ... come on, who gives a damn what you bump uglies with when it comes to voting?
My solution does call for cooperation among the branches of government. In our post-9/11 world, that wall that Jamie Gorelick built has to come down everywhere. Blanket statements from the Social Security folks that they are not going to cooperate is a no-go. It’s cause for instant dismissal. Period. Same goes for the military and the criminal justice people. Be part of the solution, or be gone.
So, where do we begin? First up would be proof of citizenship and proof of age. We do not have a de facto National ID card in the United States. And rightfully so. But we have the next best things. We have our Social Security card, our state issued driver’s license, the IRS, the military, and our credit cards. Everything runs on plastic these days. Every one of those knows our age and our current address. And our Social Security number, because 99.987% of all citizens over the age of 18 have one. Oh, but laws say you can’t use your SSN for purposes of identification!! Really? Then why does every single form you fill out anywhere for anything have a space for your SSN? Change the law, or at least put in a caveat for voter registration. And at least one of those groups has a picture of you. So the first step is fairly easy. To register to vote, you need to show up at the clerk’s office well in advance of Election Day - 90 days or more - and prove you are eligible. They have a limited function card reader, just like the one in the grocery store, but with a better screen. Enter your numbers or swipe your plastic, and the result that comes back has your name, your current address, and you SSN. Does that match what you’ve put on the registration form? Good, you’ve just passed Step One. The clerk presses another button, which sends your SSN to the criminal justice databases. And I say databases, because there are lots of them. Hey, I’ve been through the NJ pistol permit process, so I know. And the only data that gets returned to the clerk is a green light or a red light. Green light means proceed, red light means stop.
Should convicts or felons on probation have the right to vote? That’s a side issue, and one that should be solved by state or national referendum every so many years. Personally, I feel that if you have done your time, you are back in. Still doing time, still on probation, no vote for you ... if the crime you were convicted of was serious enough to disable your voting rights. And all the crimes that do take away that right need to be gone over and looked at again with an eye on “cruel and unusual” and “excessive fines and penalties”. But that’s another side issue on this side issue. However if you are convicted of such a crime, then you have to turn in your registration card.
Assuming you get a green light, the clerk takes your picture, and creates a voter registration card for you, with your photograph and its own unique number on it. And that card expires every 7 years, so you have to go through this again and again throughout your life. Too bad. Voting is a right, but it’s a right you have to make a bit of effort to use. Tough titties. But there is no cost, no charge, no fee for getting a registration card. And every county seat or town that does registrations puts the office right on the public transportation routes. Hospitals have a staffer or two on stipend to do the task remotely for long term care patients. And for shut-ins, old folks in nursing homes, etc., the county sends some people around, on appointment by request. So if you can’t come to the office, the office will come to you. But only for those who actually, really, honestly can’t. The lazy and uppity folks who can’t be bothered to go downtown to register and who just make an appointment are hit with a $2500 fine for wasting the government’s time. My plan makes everyone make some effort, so you’re going to get a slap down if you try to play the system.
Hold onto that registration card and keep it in a safe place. Bring it with you when you vote. Just like the “Got your Show Me?” billboards in the alternate universe in the Fringe TV show, public reminders are run several weeks before the elections. Show up to vote with your card AND some sort of current bill or government letter addressed to you as proof of current address. The poll worker checks your face against your card and swipes it. Got the green light? They match the retrieved address against the piece of mail you brought with you. If they match, then go ahead and vote. Got the red light? The clerk will enter your information manually. Still red? No vote for you. Period. It’s your duty to make sure your card works ahead of time, especially since there are only two reasons the red light would come on: false information or recent conviction of a crime that takes that right away. Oh, I forgot my card, I lost my card!!! Fine. See that line over there? Get on it. And that clerk will enter your information manually, and she won’t work all that fast, but if you are legit, then the system will Ok you and you can vote. Oh no, I forgot to register. Can I do it now? Go to hell. Sod off. No, you can not register today, nor can you vote today. Not even provisionally.
People who have moved between one election and the next are responsible for getting their registration cards updated well in advance of Election Day. Those who have not updated their current address can go back to where they live and vote this one time ... and the clerk will then take and destroy (in front of witnesses) the registration card. Can’t I have an absentee ballot? No, because there are no more absentee ballots. They are a thing of the past. And to make sure that duplicate IDs are not issued, any new ID card issued shuts off any existing cards under that SSN and name.
What??? Whaddya mean, no more absentee ballots???? Just what I said. They are a thing of the past for those able to make the effort. Yes, for the hospitalized, the disabled and so forth they still exist. But those people are already on a list that lets them use this method. For everyone else, you have to make the effort to exercise your right, and get your lazy ass to the polling station. But we’ll make it easier, and from now on Election Day will be Vote Counting Day. That means the polls are actually open from 8am to 10pm every day of the week for 3 weeks beforehand. Hire a couple of people as temps at a tax free $10/hour to man the voting booth, with the caveat that if they let an improper voter vote then they go to jail for 6 months. Train them and test them, and give them support ( a cop and the town clerk ) if they have to turn anyone down. And woe be unto the person who attempts to vote, gets turned down, raises a fuss, has the support people called in, and is found ineligible to vote. 10 days in jail and a $1000 fine.
Um, I’m dead. Does my vote still count? Um, no. The coroners have to send in the data on the newly dead every single day, once positive and unassailable identification has been made. And fined if they screw up or forget. And the county clerks will process that data every day, deactivating the registration cards of the deceased. Show up to vote while “dead” and you can’t vote ... because the onus is on you to make sure your registration is in order ahead of time. No excuses, not even death.
If you have gained or lost massive amounts of weight, suffered from some horrible accident or illness that has radically changed your appearance, or undergone elective plastic surgery to the extent that the new you doesn’t look a thing like the old you ... then the onus is on you to get your registration card updated with a new photograph. And do it well ahead of time, and don’t forget to bring several forms of ID and proof of current address with you. Those folks just released from the hospital can go back there to do their voting if their release date falls between the registration cut-off date and the polls opening date. Once the hospital’s stipended polling worker verifies that you were a recent patient they will take your vote, as long as you get that good old green light.
And that’s about all there is to it. The military would set up it’s own system, the troops would vote ahead of time, and those votes would be sent in early. Early enough so that any bumps or glitches could be hammered out before Vote Counting Day. Ex-pats living abroad would have to show up at the embassy and vote there. Same process, same visual and electronic verification, same penalties for abusing the system, and the same vote ahead of time schedule that the military uses.
I think I’ve covered all the bases. Voting is a right that we should cherish, but the exercise of that right should not be whimsical. Put some steel in the backbone of the system and sharpen its edges to guard against abuse. Putting a system like I have outlined into place will cost something, but it won’t cost billions and zillions. But it will stop the dead and the false from voting. And that’s a big step. Please feel free to fill in any gaps I’ve missed, or to shoot my plan full of holes if you don’t think it will work. But if you do, I’d really like to read about your alternate plan. Because we need a plan, and if mine won’t do the job then maybe yours will. So pony up.
What about illegals who have fraudulent or stolen SSNs? Once again, this is where the branches of government have to digitally cooperate with each other. Digitally, because this kind of thing is a database to database communication with little or no human input. Social Security knows what numbers are valid, and what names those numbers were issued to. The credit card companies, the banks, and the utility companies - the sources of those letters that prove current address - know where you live. So showing up to vote with a falsely obtained registration card, or even trying to obtain a registration card under false pretenses, sets off an alarm. And alerts the cops and ICE. And earns the registration clerk a $100 bonus for bagging an illegal or a cheater. But that’s another side issue.
So what do we do about them that scream raaaaacism when anyone tries to True The Vote? Throw it right back at them: they are guilty of the prejudice of lowered expectations. They are in support of fraud. Don’t question their patriotism, deny it entirely. We The People are all equal in this. Belonging to any kind of group - ethnic, religious, sexual orientation, whatever - has no bearing at all. And it’s high time we took that stance, took up the fight, and won this little pissing contest once and for all. The first step to recovering national faith in our leaders is making sure that the electing of those leaders is done only by the properly qualified citizens. The next step is making sure that the system used to do that electing is honest and bulletproof. The next step is making sure that the people vying to become elected leaders are qualified to do so. The step after that, once they’ve been elected, is holding their feet to the fire every single day to make sure they do what is right. And that’s what we have to do to get our country back.
http://townhall.com/columnists/MichelleMalkin/2010/10/27/the_lefts_voter_fraud_whitewash
http://www.slate.com/id/2272405/
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/10/26/court-strikes-ariz-law-requiring-voters-prove-citizens/
Posted by Drew458
on 10/27/2010 at 08:29 AM
Filed Under: • Crime • Government • High Tech • Politics •
• Comments (1)
•
Trackbacks(0)
Permalink • Five Most Recent Trackbacks:
Once Again, The One And Only Post
(4 total trackbacks)
Tracked at iHaan.org
Thｅ advantage to having a guide with you is thɑt an expert will haѵe very first hand experience dealing and navigating the river with гegional wildlife. Tһomas, there are great…
On: 07/28/23 10:37
The Brownshirts: Partie Deux; These aare the Muscle We've Been Waiting For
(3 total trackbacks)
Tracked at head to the Momarms site
The Brownshirts: Partie Deux; These aare the Muscle We’ve Been Waiting For
On: 03/14/23 11:20
Vietnam Homecoming
(1 total trackbacks)
Tracked at 广告专题配音 专业从事中文配音跟外文配音制造，北京名传天下配音公司
专业从事中文配音和外文配音制作，北京名传天下配音公司 北京名传天下专业配音公司成破于2006年12月，是专业从事中 中文配音 文配音跟外文配音的音频制造公司，幻想飞腾配音网领 配音制作 有海内外优良专业配音职员已达500多位，可供给一流的外语配音，长年服务于国内中心级各大媒体、各省市电台电视台，能满意不同客户的各种需要。电话：010-83265555 北京名传天下专业配音公司…
On: 03/20/21 07:00
meaningless marching orders for a thousand travellers ... strife ahead ..
(1 total trackbacks)
Tracked at Casual Blog
[...] RTS. IF ANYTHING ON THIS WEBSITE IS CONSTRUED AS BEING CONTRARY TO THE LAWS APPL [...]
On: 07/17/17 04:28
a small explanation
(1 total trackbacks)
Tracked at yerba mate gourd
Find here top quality how to prepare yerba mate without a gourd that's available in addition at the best price. Get it now!
On: 07/09/17 03:07
DISCLAIMER
THE SERVICES AND MATERIALS ON THIS WEBSITE ARE PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE HOSTS OF THIS SITE EXPRESSLY DISCLAIMS ANY AND ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY LAW INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF SATISFACTORY QUALITY, MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, WITH RESPECT TO THE SERVICE OR ANY MATERIALS.
Not that very many people ever read this far down, but this blog was the creation of Allan Kelly and his friend Vilmar. Vilmar moved on to his own blog some time ago, and Allan ran this place alone until his sudden and unexpected death partway through 2006. We all miss him. A lot. Even though he is gone this site will always still be more than a little bit his. We who are left to carry on the BMEWS tradition owe him a great debt of gratitude, and we hope to be able to pay that back by following his last advice to us all:
It's been a long strange trip without you Skipper, but thanks for pointing us in the right direction and giving us a swift kick in the behind to get us going. Keep lookin' down on us, will ya? Thanks.
- Keep a firm grasp of Right and Wrong
- Stay involved with government on every level and don't let those bastards get away with a thing
- Use every legal means to defend yourself in the event of real internal trouble, and, most importantly:
- Keep talking to each other, whether here or elsewhere
THE INFORMATION AND OTHER CONTENTS OF THIS WEBSITE ARE DESIGNED TO COMPLY WITH THE LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. THIS WEBSITE SHALL BE GOVERNED BY AND CONSTRUED IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LAWS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA AND ALL PARTIES IRREVOCABLY SUBMIT TO THE JURISDICTION OF THE AMERICAN COURTS. IF ANYTHING ON THIS WEBSITE IS CONSTRUED AS BEING CONTRARY TO THE LAWS APPLICABLE IN ANY OTHER COUNTRY, THEN THIS WEBSITE IS NOT INTENDED TO BE ACCESSED BY PERSONS FROM THAT COUNTRY AND ANY PERSONS WHO ARE SUBJECT TO SUCH LAWS SHALL NOT BE ENTITLED TO USE OUR SERVICES UNLESS THEY CAN SATISFY US THAT SUCH USE WOULD BE LAWFUL.
Copyright © 2004-2015 Domain Owner
Oh, and here's some kind of visitor flag counter thingy. Hey, all the cool blogs have one, so I should too. The Visitors Online thingy up at the top doesn't count anything, but it looks neat. It had better, since I paid actual money for it.
RSS 2.0 
Atom 
