Wisconsin passes highly restrictive voter ID bill

^ Seems like the goal should be to make sure that young people = Republicans in the future, so as to ensure long-term party viability. (It's not impossible to pull off a demographic switch—how many people even remember that blacks used to be primarily Republicans rather than primarily Democrats?)

As Winston Churchill said:

A man who is not a liberal at 20 has no heart, a man who is not a conservative at 40 has no brain.

And a man who believes in labels lets somebody else do his thinking for him.

^^ I found that amusing. I'm closer to 40 than I am to 20.

edited 12th May '11 4:12:55 PM by pvtnum11

Did you have political polarity shift in that time?

Not only young people; poorer people, blacks, and hispanics are more likely to vote Democratic, and they also have more trouble voting than wealthier and white people, between housing issues for poor and ghetto-heavy neighborhoods, having to work longer hours and having less opportunity to go and vote, and other reasons.

No offense to Churchill, but there are no absolutes.

I swear, has anyone ever achieved anything with any variant of the phrase "You'll grow out of thinking that way"? (Granted, I can readily believe that all the aging liberals I know have no brains, but they'd have just as little brains if they'd been raised as conservatives.)

Then again, as someone who's more tolerant than the standard liberal, I suppose I can see how today's liberals could become tomorrow's conservatives against people like me. It's the same principle as how yesterday's rebellious Elvis fans became afraid of the "immorality" of rap fans.

edited 12th May '11 4:13:36 PM by feotakahari

If you change your ways of thinking that easily, then you were never that sure of your beliefs in the first place. There are no rules on how to think properly.

In the morning I will be sober, and you will still be ugly.

It's just a show of demographics. The numbers don't lie. It's generally been the case that the old folks have been the conservatives, and the young folks have been the liberals. What that implies about the human condition doesn't factor into it.

Actually, I had no heart at 20, so yeah.

If the republican party wants to alienate the youths of the country, I can't see how they could do it quicker than this. But if they want to get young voters to side with them, they're screwed. And good grief, why make it so freaking hard to register to vote? I walked into a polling place, told them I lived here rather than the old address, and after a quick phone call to remove me from the old place, I voted. Bam, freaking easy, and this is in Hawaii.

x8

There have been severe shifts in voting demographics, but it's often the same people, just with different labels. Or possibly a change in party composition, especially for the Republicans, who may not have their liberal wing anymore.

It's complicated. The Southern conservative Democrats were anti-Republican because of Lincoln, but then the Civil Rights movement came in, and some prominent Democratic leaders went with it, and that caused the Blue Dogs to switch.

edited 12th May '11 4:17:21 PM by blueharp

I consider myself a conservative. I consider environmental protection to be a conservative value.

Heh.

Conservatism != conservative.

"Dems offer amendment to address absurdity in the law: you need photo ID to get a birth certificate AND you need a birth certificate to get a photo ID; amendment fails."

This doesn't remind me of anything at all, no siree!

That one in particular is the biggest reason I think the Republicans aren't remotely interested in good governance, at least on this particular issue.

The one silver lining here is that, if my understanding of the bill is correct, there's a good argument to be made that its unconstitutional. God, I swear Tea Partiers think being "poor" is like living a cushy middle-class lifestyle but without needing to have a job or something.

The tea party is incredibly stupid. Just to derail for a moment, they preach "Fiscal responsibility," then hold the debt ceiling hostage so they can send gay rights back 2 years and womens rights back 10. Not kidding.

Back on topic, I think that the republicans are setting a series of dangerous precedents for the nation...

The Tea Party is mostly made up of old people who have latched onto conservative fiscal talking points to hide the fact that a large portion of their overall agenda is basically just racism and bigotry-THAT BEING SAID, there are a few people who actually DO follow the talking points, but those individuals are NOT well served by pretending to be tea partiers.

Dems offer amendment to allow voters to vote without photo ID if they object to photos of themselves being taken for religious reasons; amendment fails.

This is not constitutional.

As Winston Churchill said: A man who is not a liberal at 20 has no heart, a man who is not a conservative at 40 has no brain.

This is not true. Churchill himself was a conservative at 20 and a liberal at 40.

It's stuff like this which is why I don't understand the notion that smaller governments are automatically better. State governments are by their very nature smaller than the federal government, yet they either are not up to the task of protecting the people (requiring federal aide in times of disasters) or are horribly more oppressive than the federal government (because for a country like the United States, being that oppressive on the federal level, as has been pointed out, is easier said than done).

So when do we break out the torches and pitchforks and put the Wisconsin state government to death? It only seems fair that if they take away the populace's right to vote, they should lose their right to life.

The Supreme Court is gonna be busy as hell for the next decade or so with all these unconstitutional laws, but I'd at least wait to see what they have to say.

Speaking strictly as a foreigner... this is scary to watch.