re: #13 Obdicut

On what grounds are you saying that it’s extremely easy?

I don’t see why it wouldn’t be, except in exceptional circumstances. However, see below for a general question about this.

And why are you overlooking that the easier it is, the easier it’s going to be to defraud?

I’m not overlooking it. I just don’t see how it is true. Then again, maybe our definitions of easy vary. No, you can’t just say “I am such and such” and receive an ID (just as you shouldn’t be able to vote on such a basis). But I don’t see how in general gathering documents identifying yourself is difficult.

Nor should the disenfranchisement of legal voters.

Yes, the key word is “legal”. The point is how to prove you’re legal. It should be proven somehow, no?

No matter how easy you make acquiring an ID,[…]

So those people, who are legitimate citizens with the right to vote, are going to be unable to.

If they can prove that they’re legal voters in any other way, they shouldn’t be prevented from doing so. However if they cannot prove that they’re legal voters, why should they be allowed to vote? On what basis? You’re eligible if you can prove it, not if someone cannot disprove it.

In order to protect the putative voter from someone spite-voting— which would be a felony crime and I know of no recorded case of in history— you are going to inevitably disenfranchise others. Since both courses have the possibility of disenfranchisement, shouldn’t you pick the one that disenfranchises fewer people?

As I see it, disenfranchisement is when you don’t let proven eligible voters vote. A person may “know” he should be eligible to vote. The question is how does the state know this?

If it’s free in terms of money, what’s to prevent people from flooding agencies with requests for the documents? […] And that doesn’t address the question of people flooding the agencies with requests.

This only identifies the problem with how the US does things, identity-wise. Other countries have internal passports, Ausweise and whatnot. So the question of proving eligibility for an ID or voting is a more general question: how does an average American prove that he is who he claims he is in any other situation requiring such proof? Suppose a person who has no ID is arrested. How does the police know who he is? Etc.

That’s nice. And what is that something?

I don’t see it as an issue at all. All countries which require ID to vote have absentee ballots. Somehow they manage. No problem.

To me, this is a classic information problem, and, since it exists in the real world, there is no ideal solution where a negative outcome is impossible. Security and accessibility ore opposed; the more accessible the IDs are, the more insecure they are.

As an example, I have an internal passport which is not insecure at all and always works as an identification. It wasn’t a hassle to get it first when I was 16. I guess I don’t see a problem here because I come from a different background, but I just wonder how it works out in the US, hence my question above.