{"id":9454,"date":"2012-08-16T14:38:25","date_gmt":"2012-08-16T14:38:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2012\/08\/16\/the-voter-id-controversy-continues\/"},"modified":"2012-08-16T14:38:25","modified_gmt":"2012-08-16T14:38:25","slug":"the-voter-id-controversy-continues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2012\/08\/16\/the-voter-id-controversy-continues\/","title":{"rendered":"The Voter ID Controversy Continues"},"content":{"rendered":"

It amazes me that new articles and columns in high-class venues appear almost daily concerning what really ought to be a non-issue.  Of course, I blame the Left for this.  By maintaining preternaturally absurd positions, they force sensible writers to waste time and energy opposing their nonsense.  Here<\/a> is how a 15 August NY Times editorial begins:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Judge Robert Simpson of the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania seems to assume that legislators have a high-minded public purpose for the laws they pass. That\u2019s why, on Wednesday morning, he refused to grant an injunction<\/a> to halt a Republican-backed voter ID law that could disenfranchise hundreds of thousands of poor and minority state residents in November.       <\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

One thing you have to understand about leftists is that they regularly engage in semantic distortion: they will take a word that has an established meaning and misuse it for their ideological ends.  'Disenfranchise' is a case in point.<\/span><\/p>\n

To disenfranchise is to deprive of a right, in particular, the right to vote.  But only some people in a given geographical area  have the right to vote.  Felons and children do not have the right to vote, nor do non-citizens.  You do not have the right to vote in a certain geographical area simply because you are a sentient being residing in that area.  Otherwise, cats and dogs and children and felons and illegal aliens would have the right to vote. Now a requirement that one prove that one has the right to vote is not to be confused with a denial of the right to vote.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

My right to vote is one thing, my ability to prove that I have the right another.  If I cannot prove that I am who I claim to be on a given occasion, then I won't be able to exercise my right to vote on that occasion; but that is not to say that I have been disenfranchised.  For I haven't be deprived of my right to vote; I have merely been prevented from exercising my right due to my inability to prove<\/span>
my identity.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

That's one point.  The author of the NYT editorial begins by egregiously misusing 'disenfranchise.'  But note also the cynicism betrayed in the opening sentence.  Third, we are asked to believe the unbelievable, that "hundreds of thousands of poor and minority state residents" will be 'disenfranchised' come November.  Hundreds of thousands? Prove it!  In Pennsylvania, photo ID is free.  So even the 'poor' can afford it.  Our editorial writer continues:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

He wrote in his ruling<\/a> that requiring a government-issued photo ID card to vote \u201cis a reasonable, nondiscriminatory, nonsevere burden when viewed in the broader context of the widespread use of photo ID in daily life,\u201d as if voting were equivalent to buying a six-pack of beer or driving a car.       <\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

At this point I stopped reading.  The writer is committing a grotesque straw man fallacy.  No one claims that voting is "equivalent" — whatever that is supposed to mean – " to buying a six-pack of beer or driving a car."  The point is that the photo ID requirement is a minimal one in that photo ID is necessary for all sorts of transactions in everyday life that ordinary people engage in.  And again, in PA you can acquire this ID for free<\/em>. Our idiot editorialist also seems not to realize this issue has nothing to do with driving a car.  A photo ID is not the same as a driver's license.  The latter is a species of the former as genus.  You don't need to own a car, and you don't even need to have a driver's license.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now if you want to read something intelligent on this issue, besides what I have written, I recommend this WSJ piece<\/a>, and this article from Commentary<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It amazes me that new articles and columns in high-class venues appear almost daily concerning what really ought to be a non-issue.  Of course, I blame the Left for this.  By maintaining preternaturally absurd positions, they force sensible writers to waste time and energy opposing their nonsense.  Here is how a 15 August NY Times editorial begins: … Continue reading “The Voter ID Controversy Continues”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9454\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}