The biggest threat to freedom and democracy is communism in all its manifestations.

So did Stalin.

The first thing the communist did after taking over Russia was to kill each other.

What is this supposed to mean

No one mentioned the President so I'm calling TDS. Is he in the room with you now? Does he hide under your bed at night?

You didn't read the comment? Trump is mentioned right there in it.

Don't worry, it's not like a chance to meet Trump slipped right by you.

Lyoll, what does the SAVE America Act do? You don't know, do you? Personally, I think it is just a political stunt and does nothing. Voter ID is just something the two Parties can fight over to distract voters.

I know a lot of students who are leaving for college in the next month: for many of them, the voter ID requirement with birth certificate means that they will be less likely to register, and less likely to vote. Do you want the future of America disenfranchised?

More than that, it operates as an unofficial poll tax, because there IS a financial burden associated with always having those documents up to date, and it grows steeper if you are poorer and more likely to move around. Poll taxes belong to the evils of Jim Crow, which I had hoped were safely behind us.

What a joke. ID is required for so many other things besides voting that everybody in the country should have one by now, not requiring ID to be registered and vote disenfranchise the entire voting system.

Irrelevant of voting, it’s a legal requirement to keep your drivers license address up-to-date. And it’s probably a requirement for your FREE government issued ID also. Your pole tax argument is a farce.

Poll tax: it's a different thing.

Auto spell strikes again

The voter ID thing isn't about registering to vote. You're required to show photo and whatever other ID in order to register to vote.

What these people are demanding is that you bring additional current photo ID every time you go to vote despite having provided us when you initially register to vote. I used to have a driver's license, it expired, I hadn't gotten it renewed in time, so I no longer have a driver's license. As it expired well after I was 18, that means I'm never going to get a driver's license again. Unless I got a government job.

I’m pretty sure every state will give you a free ID card, not a drivers license.

Sure they do, and here in NY all you got to do is go to the DMV, just like getting a driver's license, present them 6 points worth of ID including photo id, just like the driver's license, and you're set to go. Basically stone soup minus the car. In other words, in order to get one you don't really need one already.

They did come out with this Municipal ID card at least for New York City some years ago which is supposed to be easier to get... for foreigners. If you were born here like me, good luck.

Like a lot of city agencies here, the DMV is filled with GED types with a severe God Complex and a big bloody hammer aimed at groin level, and boy do they love to use it. Every time you go, they make it so you have to make a second trip to do what you came for.

Funny when people talk about how supposedly easy it is to get all this stuff here, when if it is, I sure ain't seen it.

From what I hear, it is easier to get this stuff in other states. Also that they're at least more civil about it in Upstate New York or even Westchester County. But what am I going to do, take a 12-hour trip on the Amtrak to go to Buffalo to find out that, sure, maybe they're not such ball breakers, but I still have insufficient ID to get ID?

I have only know two people in my life without an ID. They were both f*ckups who didn't vote anyway.

..who shouldn’t vote…

Fixed it for you

But you need such ID to register to vote anyways.

The whole voter ID thing that these guys are making a ruckus about isn't actually about ID to register to vote, it's that after you are registered to vote you have to bring current photo ID of certain types to prove that's you who's voting in your name at the polling station.

Which translates into unless you have a valid (current) driver's license or government job, you don't get to vote, no matter how long you've been registered to do so. That's where the whole thing about poor people not being able to vote comes in, if you got a car or government job, you're not poor. If you are poor you have neither, and thus won't get to vote. And basically the only way to get a driver's license tends to be by having a parent with a driver's license and doing that prior to the age of 18.