In most states, a citizen may register and vote after establishing four critical points: citizenship, age, residency, and, in some cases, felony conviction. However, at least eight states exceed these basic requirements by also requiring voters to present valid photo ID at the polls on Election Day. Now, with the midterm elections approaching, the necessity, efficiency, and even constitutionality of voter ID laws are being questioned once again.
This week, two states--one with an established (though controversial) voter ID law, and another that expects to officially debut its law in November--are met with questions about the laws' impact on voters.
Although the 2008 presidential election showed unprecedented increases in turnout from underrepresented citizens, their rates of voter registration and participation were still well behind the electorate in general. As we approach election season, this pattern may only continue. Instead of taking steps to improve the administration of elections to encourage and facilitate voter participation from eligible citizens, lawmakers and elected officials are back to raising barriers to voting by implementing strict voter ID laws, as illustrated through high profile court battles, ballot initiatives, and fast-moving legislation
An appeal to an Indiana's court's decision to shut down the state's notorious voter ID law as unconstitutional was heard last week in the state Supreme Court.
Drinking Liberally Shot of Truth
by Dan Henry, Drinking Liberally Idaho Falls
We've gotten a bit of national press recently here in the sleepy little town of Idaho Falls.
First, a little background: four boys were arrested last October for vandalizing stop signs. The photo above shows some of their handiwork. Two were minors, and the details of their cases are not public. Alex and Craig, the 18-year-olds, pled guilty and were sentenced harshly - two days in jail, thousands of dollars in fines, and restitution based on the number of stop signs each admitted to stenciling.
This story has been covered a couple of times in the Post Register, our local paper (all its articles are behind a firewall, but some have been posted here.)
After paying restitution, the boys were able to take possession of the stop signs. I know that Alex got 20 signs, but I don't know about Craig. At least one of the minors got a lesser number of signs.
Last week, a local reporter picked up the story of the boys selling their stop signs. Two were sold to the Bonneville County Democrats to auction at their annual Truman Banquet fundraising dinner in May. (I bought one of the signs - we're going to use it on our Drinking Liberally Fourth of July float.)
A local discussion board posted about it. The original poster was outraged that the boys were allowed to sell their signs. I've been posting there as 'idahogie.'
But the big news is that AP picked up the local story, and Fox News ran it! So now I can say that I've been quoted by Fox News. But I still won't go on The Factor.
From the start, the case has spurred some real anti-war activism in our town. Many of us felt ashamed and embarrassed that we weren't doing enough to bring about an end to Bush's War. And it took the civil disobedience of these four boys to wake us up. My friend Debbie Troester-Solbrig said it best in our local editorial page:
"I wish I had painted 'war' on the stop signs. I wish I could say I moved people to think the way those stop signs moved me. How can these young people be criminals when they caused anyone who saw a 'stop war' sign to think about our brave soldiers, our dead, their dead and the world's loss? Every time I came upon a stop sign marked with the word 'war' in my everyday life, that one word brought the war closer to home - where it should be. Those three letters (w-a-r) caused me to stop, realize, think and contemplate: Our country is at war. Yet we go on living our normal daily lives, not thinking of the sacrifices being made each minute, each second, thousands of miles away."
When I took a leave of absence from my job in Washington in 2000 to work in the Montana Senate race, I didn't have much clue what I was in for. Growing up on the East Coast, I thought of the Intermountain West as a huge, far-off, mysterious place of square states and cattle herds - and like many people on the coasts, I didn't know much else.
In the years since that first campaign, I have been working in and reporting on the West, telling people what I say in my new nationally syndicated newspaper column today: That this region is the most politically misunderstood place in America.
As there isn't a U.S. Senate race in Nevada this cycle, about which we could write at My Silver State - Nevada's progressive community blog, and there are no major candidates yet to challenge Republican Congressmen Dean Heller (NV-02) and Jon Porter (NV-02), I'd like to take a look north across the Nevada stateline to Larry LaRocco's run for the U.S. Senate in Idaho.
By looking beyond Larry Craig's resignation announcement, I'd like to make an argument why Larry LaRocco is an ideal candidate to be featured on the Blue Majority fundraising page run by Daily Kos, Open Left, MyDD and the Swing State Project.
Sen. Larry Craig (R-Idaho) was arrested in June at a Minnesota airport by a plainclothes police officer investigating lewd conduct complaints in a men's public restroom, according to an arrest report obtained by Roll Call Monday afternoon.
On July 17, I sat in the U.S. Senate Gallery - watching as Senators stayed up all night and debated whether we should bring our troops home from Iraq.
Idaho Senator Larry Craig sat all alone. As other Senators debated this life-or-death issue of war, Craig looked down and doodled on a small piece of paper the size of a coffee coaster. He did this for at least a half hour, probably more - meticulously drawing some four-sided object and switching pens from time to time.
It seems to me that a Senator from Idaho should have been engaged by the debate - using every waking minute to think about Blake Stephens, Carrie French, Kelly Morris, James Holtom, Emerson Brand, and others among the Idaho residents who have died in Iraq. But Craig doodled away, oblivious to the realities of this war.
Craig then voted against ending the war. Adding insult to injury, Craig voted earlier against a Democratic plan to give troops one year at home for every year in Iraq.
As Craig comes up for re-election in 2008, I'm curious - is someone who doodles against the troops the best person to represent Idaho in the U.S. Senate?
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