Breaking: Judge halts Pa.'s tough new voter ID requirement.

[Direckshun]

And reason finds a way in Pennsylvania.

http://news.yahoo.com/judge-halts-pa...135928620.html

Judge halts Pa.'s tough new voter ID requirement
By MARC LEVY
10 mins ago..

..HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — A judge on Tuesday blocked Pennsylvania's divisive voter identification requirement from going into effect before Election Day, delivering a hard-fought victory to Democrats who said it was a ploy to defeat President Barack Obama and other opponents who said it would prevent the elderly and minorities from voting.

The decision by Commonwealth Court Judge Robert Simpson on the law requiring each voter to show a valid photo ID could be appealed to the state Supreme Court.

However, Simpson based his decision on guidelines given to him days ago by the high court justices, and it could easily be the final word on the law just five weeks before the Nov. 6 election.

Simpson ordered the state not to enforce the photo ID requirement in this year's presidential election but will allow it to go into full effect next year.

One lawyer for the plaintiffs said it appeared to be a "win." Election workers will still be allowed to ask voters for a valid photo ID, but people without it can vote on a regular voting machine in the polling place and would not have to cast a provisional ballot or prove their identity to election officials after the election.

His ruling came after listening to two days of testimony about the state's eleventh-hour efforts to make it easier to get a valid photo ID. He also heard about long lines and ill-informed clerks at driver's license centers and identification requirements that made it hard for some registered voters to get a state-issued photo ID.

The 6-month-old law — now among the nation's toughest — has sparked a divisive debate over voting rights and become a high-profile political issue in the contest between President Barack Obama, a Democrat, and Republican nominee Mitt Romney, for Pennsylvania's prized 20 electoral votes.

Pennsylvania, traditionally considered one of the most valuable a presidential swing states, is showing a persistent lead for Obama in independent polls. As a result, the state has been virtually empty of presidential TV ads and off the candidates' beaten paths to more contested states in recent weeks.

Pollsters had said Pennsylvania's identification requirement could mean that fewer people ended up voting and, in the past, lower turnouts have benefited Republicans in Pennsylvania.

But Democrats have used their opposition to the law as a rallying cry, turning it into a valuable tool to motivate volunteers and campaign contributions while other opponents of the law, including labor unions, good government groups, the NAACP, AARP and the League of Women Voters, hold voter education drives and protest rallies.

The voter ID law was a signature accomplishment of Pennsylvania's Republican-controlled Legislature and its Republican governor, Tom Corbett. Republicans, long suspicious of ballot-box stuffing in the Democratic bastion of Philadelphia, justified it as a bulwark against any potential election fraud.

Democrats objected furiously, accusing Republicans of using old-fashioned Jim Crow tactics to steal the White House from Obama by making it harder for young adults, the poor, minorities and the disabled to vote.

Protests, warnings of Election Day chaos and voter education drives ensued, as the law's opponents began collecting stories of people who had no valid photo ID and had encountered stiff barriers in their efforts to get one from state driver's license centers.

It was already a political lightning rod when a top state Republican lawmaker boasted to a GOP dinner in June that the ID requirement "is going to allow Gov. Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania."

A wave of new voter identification requirements have been approved in the past couple years, primarily by Republican-controlled Legislatures.

The U.S. Supreme Court upheld Indiana's voter ID law in 2008, and Georgia's top court upheld that state's voter ID law. But a federal court panel struck down Texas' voter ID law, and the state court in Wisconsin has blocked its voter ID laws for now. The Justice Department cleared New Hampshire's voter ID law earlier this year, and a federal court is reviewing South Carolina's law.

The plaintiffs — a group of registered voters, plus the Homeless Advocacy Project, the League of Women Voters of Pennsylvania and the Pennsylvania chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People — had sought to block the law from taking effect in this year's election as part of a wider challenge to its constitutionality.

The constitutionality of the law was not a question before Simpson.

Rather, the state Supreme Court had ordered him to stop the law if he thought anyone eligible would be unable to cast a ballot because of it or if he found the state had not complied with law's promise of providing liberal access to a photo ID that voters were required to carry on Election Day.

Last week, the Corbett administration overhauled the process for getting a voting-only ID card — an admission that the state had not met the Supreme Court's test for the whether the law should stand.

[Garcia Bronco]

Originally Posted by Donger

No, it isn't. Do you agree that requiring photo ID would reduce the possibility of voter fraud?

I do, I think the real culprit though is the ID aquiring process.

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

No, it isn't. Do you agree that requiring photo ID would reduce the possibility of voter fraud?

It's a circular argument. "Potential voter fraud" is the same thing as "possibility of voter fraud." You just argued that the former produces the latter. It'd be the same as saying, "We should get rid of potential voter fraud because it causes potential voter fraud, and potential voter fraud produces voter fraud." But it doesn't. Something "in potential" does not produce anything. Voter fraud is caused by fraud in the election process, but never [currently non-existing because it is potential] fraud.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

It's a circular argument. "Potential voter fraud" is the same thing as "possibility of voter fraud." You just argued that the former produces the latter. It'd be the same as saying, "We should get rid of potential voter fraud because it causes potential voter fraud, and potential voter fraud produces voter fraud." But it doesn't. Something "in potential" does not produce anything. Voter fraud is caused by fraud in the election process, but never [currently non-existing because it is potential] fraud.

That's the longest "yes" I've ever seen.

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

That's the longest "yes" I've ever seen.

You're wrong in thinking that was a "yes."

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

You're wrong in thinking that was a "yes."

I realize that you believe that.

Requiring photo ID will help prevent people who shouldn't be voting from casting a ballot. I don't care if it's only one ballot cast illegally.

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

I realize that you believe that.

Requiring photo ID will help prevent people who shouldn't be voting from casting a ballot. I don't care if it's only one ballot cast illegally.

That might be what you wanted to say, but that's not what you did say. You did say that Democrats get a benefit from potential voter fraud. If there's a benefit from voter fraud, it's only from actual voter fraud, never from potential voter fraud.

And then you talked about how potential voter fraud leads to the possibility of voter fraud, which is logically nonsense.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

That might be what you wanted to say, but that's not what you did say. You did say that Democrats get a benefit from potential voter fraud. If there's a benefit from voter fraud, it's only from actual voter fraud, never from potential voter fraud.

And then you talked about how potential voter fraud leads to the possibility of voter fraud, which is logically nonsense.

Excellent, so you acknowledge that Democrats are more likely to benefit from voter fraud than Republicans, correct?

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

Excellent, so you acknowledge that Democrats are more likely to benefit from voter fraud than Republicans, correct?

No, I can't verify the truth of that statement. I can verify that that's a question that doesn't contain any logical fallacies. You are making progress.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

No, I can't verify the truth of that statement. I can verify that that's a question that doesn't contain any logical fallacies. You are making progress.

Ah, so you think that Democrats fight these measures purely for altruistic reasons?

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

Ah, so you think that Democrats fight these measures purely for altruistic reasons?

No, I think Democrats fought the measures because they threatened to shut out actual citizens' ability to vote. I also think that's why Republicans introduced these measures: to shut out actual citizens' ability to vote under the pretext of voter fraud prevention.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

No, I think Democrats fought the measures because they threatened to shut out actual citizens' ability to vote most likely for the Democrat candidate. I also think that's why Republicans introduced these measures: to shut out actual citizens' ability to vote under the pretext of voter fraud prevention.

FYP.

To your credit, at least you acknowledge that Democrats care about this issue because it will hurt them.

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

FYP.

To your credit, at least you acknowledge that Democrats care about this issue because it will hurt them.

And to your credit, you realize that Republicans pursued this because it would have helped them.

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

And to your credit, you realize that Republicans pursued this because it would have helped them.

Yes, a nice bonus while preventing illegal voting. It's not the GOP's fault that the Democrats want illegal votes.

I'd rather be on my side, honestly.

[La literatura]

Originally Posted by Donger

Yes, a nice bonus while preventing illegal voting. It's not the GOP's fault that the Democrats want illegal votes.

I'd rather be on my side, honestly.

Republicans should be more honest like this. Maybe there will be another video of Mitt Romney saying something like, "Yes, this is a good way to prevent some undefined illegal voting that doesn't appear to happen much in-person. And preventing blacks, Hispanics, and old people from voting is a nice bonus, too!"

[Donger]

Originally Posted by Literature

Republicans should be more honest like this. Maybe there will be another video of Mitt Romney saying something like, "Yes, this is a good way to prevent some undefined illegal voting that doesn't appear to happen much in-person. And preventing blacks, Hispanics, and old people from voting is a nice bonus, too!"

I don't care what color they are. If they aren't legally-eligible to vote, they shouldn't be voting and they shouldn't be empowered to vote.