Quote:
Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce
Is that negated vote worth disenfranchising thousands?
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Yeah, are 143 cases of voter fraud such a huge big deal that no election results will be valid? I think not.
As an older person on a small fixed income, I know first hand how difficult it can be to get a picture ID - in the state of Colorado, anyhow. Being a complete space case, I seem to loose my purse with driver's license, debit card, etc on a fairly regular basis.
Colorado will only accept a notorized birth certificate or a copy of a divorce decree or a few other such documents to re-issue a picture ID or driver’s license. The birth certificate would seem the easiest route to go unless you happen to be born in the state of Kentucky. The fee is $10.00 – not vast, but a low income person like me still feels the pinch. But there’s another catch. The last time I filled out a request for a birth certificate from Kentucky, they wanted to know which hospital I was born in. Beats me, and I have no one left to ask, so I left that part blank on my application. Kentucky did not like this at all and refused to issue me my certificate (they did keep the 10 bucks though).
So next, I tried getting a copy of my divorce decree. In El Paso County (Colorado Springs) where I got my divorce if you require a copy of something specific from a file, certified copies are $20.00 for the certification and .75 cents per page for the copy. Plus there are additional fees if you need a copy of a record from prior to 1988. My divorce went through in ’87. Total cost $50.00. I didn’t have it.
I knew my ex would have a copy because he is one of the most anal-retentive persons on the face of the earth. I hadn’t been in touch with him for years, but I knew he had a PO box in Manitou Springs. I didn’t know the number though, so I mailed him a letter care of general delivery in Manitou, requesting him to send a copy of our divorce papers. About a month later, he begrudgingly sent me the copy along with the request that I refrain from such communications in the future. Poor man, I hadn’t spoken with him for 10 years, never mind send him a letter. However, I guess the volume of our correspondence overwhelmed him.
Whatever. But my troubles were far from over. I still needed a second document from the official identification list and a document showing proof of address. I managed to come up with those somehow or other.
Then the cost of replacement of a lost license is $14.00. Well, I had 14 bucks, anyhow. But if I hadn’t had such a helpful ex (yeah, right), my total cost to get my picture ID would have been the $10.00 that the state of Kentucky nabbed, plus $50.00 to El Paso County, plus $14.00 to the motor vehicle department for a grand total of $74.00. That’s a big chunk for a low income person, never mind all the time and paperwork involved. If I’d had to present a picture ID to vote, the election would have long been over by time I came up with the required ID.
And there are many, many people in the US in more or less the same situation as mine. Exercising my right to vote is important to me, but someone less dedicated could easily throw up their hands and forget about the whole thing. This is what the Republicans are hoping for.