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While you provided an impassioned response at the level of principle, I think you missed the point in responding to Dr. McWhorter's question as to "why now" on state voting laws. He held up 1968 as the gold standard. In that year, everyone went to the polls on the singular election day except for a very few people who could cast write-in absentee ballots with affirmative request and approval by the voting registrar. Today, voting laws have been liberalized to a dramatic extent - which perhaps was justified in the "glory days" of the pandemic but certainly not today.

Early voting (an abomination in my eyes), universal mailing of ballots to everyone (living or dead), motor voter registration, election day registration, etc. in some form is common practice in almost every state. Ballot harvesting, while less regularly practices is also a significant factor in elections. This leads to my three conclusions: First - The state laws being proposed roll this back 10% - 20%. Second - if we are going to make it so much more dramatically easy to vote, at the very least we can insure that those voting are who they purport to be. Third - I have never understood where the presumption comes from that PictureID requirements (required to enter restaurants and participate in civic life in many states) disproportionately impacts people of color.

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I have worked as an election official at my local precinct. I have found that election workers are surprisingly dedicated to getting it right. They take it seriously. However when it comes to elections in general, there are a few problems that seem obvious to me: one, voting is not particularly convenient , being you have to wait in line on a work day, and two, voters often have a pretty vague idea about the candidates and issues they are voting on, and that is confusing and unsettling, and leads a lot of people to just skip it. So if it’s inconvenient and you don’t really know what you are voting or not voting for, it is not surprising that half the citizenry doesn’t vote. Citizens don’t know basic things, like the fact that if you write-in a candidate it will cause your ballot to be invalid or if you are not a registered Democrat you can’t vote in a Democratic Party primary. No clue how it works. And no one is making an effort to educate them, either. From what I’ve seen, it’s hard to claim you are someone else and then vote, but it’s also true that in my state they don’t update voter rolls very often, so dead people and people who have moved are still on the rolls. This doesn’t result in much if any voter fraud but it does illustrate that elections are underfunded and understaffed. It’s a neglected system. Despite these handicaps, the elections are fair and honest, due to very hard work by small numbers of dedicated people. One plus in my state is that we do have good ballot counting machinery with backup paper ballots, which makes it work smoothly. But that is the only up to date feature of the system. It’s something anyway, and I guess some states don’t even have that. So to me all the arguments about voter id and marginal changes to voting hours and mail in ballots are missing the real problems of massive voter alienation, apathy and ignorance, and the zero civic education people get that would help them understand how the government works, and what elected officials actually do. And if we change Election Days from Tuesdays to Saturdays I will know we are serious about improving the system. There is reason for optimism because I really believe that deep down, Americans want to be patriotic, want to be good citizens, want to feel like they are participating in democracy, want to govern themselves. But that is really not happening. Participating in local governments and elections is the logical place to begin, as is civic education in school and throughout life—- money spent on outreach to voters, educating them about how democracy works, and the actual policies and issues they are voting on. We shouldn’t leave our fates to political ads and Facebook memes and conspiracy theories but that’s where we’re at right now. Sadly.

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I can’t tell if this conversation goes on or not. But this is one of the couple things that is incredibly frustrating to me because I can’t get any actual arguments. I love mcwhorter. Freaking love the guy and maybe it was talked about before or after but it no point does he make a statement that shows evidence that it is racist. It’s just taken to be because it is.

We are supposed to believe the pre-opposition that “voter ID laws or however you frame it are racist “and then we start from there with the conversation. Yet I never hear the actual arguments that prove the presupposition. And unfortunately I did not in this conversation either. I have a similar thing with January 6. I have very little opinion on that day other than I have a degree in history and I’ve studied actual insurrections and coups and from what I’ve seen there is absolutely no way I could characterize that day as either of those things.

But the thing is I’ve tried to listen to a couple conversations to have my mind changed yet I still have yet to hear a piece of actual evidence that legally ties things together for me. I am totally open to it I just can never find it.

The things that John and Glen are talking about here is very similar. Mcwhorter at least at the beginning of the starts by arguing about intent and the implication is that it is without debate that these laws are definitely racist. I very much appreciate Glenn’s pushback on it but I still never got to the place where it is proven that that is true or how they are approving it. Again I am opening to hear it but there was no actual evidence presented in this conversation at least.

But I love hearing you guys talk either way thank you and truthfully maybe if I go to the subscriber link there is more conversation where this is discussed

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To put my political leanings in some perspective, I tend to vote like PJ O’Rourke “for the candidate with the fewest ideas—generally that’s the Republican.” I try mightily not to assign motives since I cannot get into peoples heads or hearts. The exception to that rule is when politicians flaunt overwhelming public opinion—then I start questioning what are they not saying. The polls are pretty clearly in favor of voter identification across party, racial identification, etc. Unlike what was the case in the ‘80’s or ‘90’s, I’m asked for a drivers license to do everything (send a FedEx package, buy prescription drugs or cigarettes, get into government buildings, etc.) so is it racist to ask for ID before we engage in one of our most serious obligations as a citizen? I think not and my opinion has zero to do with trying to prevent black people from voting.

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As someone that spent a career in automation, controls, and systems integration where procedures, standards, and so on are de rigueur, I read the Georgia voter law bill from that perspective. When I finished it my first reaction was “Do you mean to tell me they aren’t doing that ALREADY?!?”

It seemed impossible to believe a Presidential election in the 21st century wouldn’t already have those consistent policies and safeguards in place so the public could have confidence in the end result. The fact that both Democrats and Republicans raised concerns over the validity of recent elections would seem to add additional impetus to making that happen?

While I always enjoy the discourse between John and Glenn, I found this one especially useful, as I’ve really struggled to understand how the bill I read could be construed as racist without absolutely infantilizing the people it is supposedly targeting for voter suppression. With that perspective of being a little dubious I’ll have to review John’s side of the debate again. It still seems a reach to me, but I am trying to be open to being enlightened on the subject.

Thanks for another good one, Gentlemen. I’ve been lurking for a while, but this one actually encouraged me to pony up and subscribe.

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Jan 27, 2022·edited Jan 27, 2022

It's always fascinating to gain a glimpse behind the socioeconomic elite liberal curtain. John's diatribe about racism motivating voter suppression was extraordinary if only for its disconnection with the real world. He's not only taken the propaganda pill but washed it down with some of that Chardonnay he's always drinking. I wonder if we should change the rules in his classroom to allow his students to turn in their assignments whenever they want by whoever they want without the need for any proper identification of who did the work.

I appreciate Glenn's pushback... Glenn was straight up channeling Booker t Washington and his views on voting. Although I should say that Booker t Washington's views are a lot more harsh than Glenn's when it comes to the black vote...

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Glenn is right, and correct, to support reasonable voter ID and voting rules.

John totally avoids saying what, if any, non-racist rules he supports, merely alluding to "prior practices".

But mass mail-in voting fist happened only in 2020.

Zuckerberg $450 million vote harvest effort only in 2020, so far.

5 years of demonization against Trump, from 2015-2020; all false.

But then a big protest against election results when many rules were changed by bureaucrats instead of by elected legislatures - plus a riot. With some, possibly significant, FBI informant activity to illegally trespass in the Capitol -- and this single Jan 6, 2021 protest "proves" that Trump really was as bad as all the lies previously claimed.

And now John is evolving into a partisan Republican-hater, claiming Republicans are racist to want clear election rules and have those rules enforced.

Sounds like John is accepting the NYT Trump Derangement Syndrome, previously used on Palin, Bush, Reagan, and Nixon.

It's actually Democrat Delusion Syndrome, where Dems presume racist, sexist, x-o-phobic motives to whatever policy Reps want that Dems disagree with.

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I haven't read all of the various voting rights bills in circulation, but I'd love to know exactly which parts of the bills aim at restricting the rights of any person, regardless of race. Rather, this one: https://www.legis.ga.gov/api/legislation/document/20212022/201498 for Georgia aims at strengthening the integrity of one's vote. I would feel more secure that no one else is voting on my behalf, for example, by showing a picture ID when I vote. The ID issue is one of many that are touted as being racially disadvantaging, but I don't see any connection to race on that issue.

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I'm more with John on the possible racial motives for voter ID laws, I recall there actually have been court cases where emails came out showing an explicit racial motivation, at least that's what the judges decided regarding voter ID laws in NC. I don't believe that's what inspires most people's support for voter ID laws though. Most people just see it as common sense. And I don't think the power players have a racist motivation as much as a power motivation. But the people downstream accept the power player explanation. It's not an uncommon pattern in politics.

People who frame the recent pushes for more stringent voting regulations as having a racial motivation are ignoring the obvious though: the wide numbers of people who believe the election was stolen or at least fishy.

One thing that exemplified the foolishness of the left in voting regulation debates was recently Bernie complained about disenfranchisement over Texan voters being denied mail in ballots, when the reason was they gave wrong SSN/license numbers. That's how dumb you get when you assume every regulation is meant to disenfranchise.

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I felt that the recap of the Amy Wax controversy left out a lot of the nuance and context in the original discussion. She made several qualifications. I saw the discussion about Asian immigration in the context of possible theoretical implications of cultural sensitive immigration standards, with Asians as an example, more than absolute statements on Asian immigrants.

The thing that I always think about whenever the taboo of discussing cultural characteristics comes up is the carte blanche given to critiquing white culture, and how much white people are expected to swallow. I accept why people feel the need, but the permissiveness is getting to the point where demonization creeps in. I don't think it's a coincidence that anti-white hate crimes spiked and became the second most common bias motivation in 2016 and 2020 (not that you'd know from mainstream news). And the borderline demonization is what's fueling the anti-CRT backlash. And it's very interesting to see white people adopting civil rights jargon and media critiques, and also the identitarianism.

I'm not the only one to remember that the earlier anti-racist rhetoric was around prejudice, and there were discussions over the dangers of blanket statements, while there was an admittance that generalities can be needed for honest discussions.

Now the status quo is generalization of non-whites is automatically racist, but any generalization of whites is permissible. I have to think if John's standard for who can teach introductory courses were evenly applied, all white people would be exempt from courses with any professor that teaches black studies, given the number of generalizations about white people that come with that subject matter.

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Jan 27, 2022·edited Jan 27, 2022

The "long" history may be tangled, but the last 2 years is not. The Democratic Party, with election law operatives led by Mark Elias (then of Perkins Coie, the same folks who were the Clinton campaign's cutout with the Steele Dossier) starting from the Stacey Abrams claims about the 2018 Goerrgia election but esp. taking advatage of the COVID pandemic, cajoled, threatened, and strong-armed about 2 dozen states to forget everything we ever knew about elections and approve massive absentee balloting with no controls--no chain of custody, no meaningful signature or other verification, ballot harvesting, drop-boxes with no controls or sewcurity, etc.. Things that before 2020 the US would criticize when other nations were so lax. And now some states are trying to restore reasonable requirements that were thrown out in 2020, and cleanm up some longer-standing problems. THAT is what this is all about.

Goergia's new election law is in important ways more liberal than states such as New York and Delaware, but that did not stop the Democrats and the media from declaring it racist and really declaring political war. And THAT should tell any fair observer all they need to know.

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As John notes, voter ID does not, in fact, suppress the vote. I am inclined to think that the people promoting this idea are well aware of this, also, which makes the case against their motives harder to support.

It is perhaps also worth noting that implementing a voter ID system was one of the recommendations of the bipartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform, chaired by James Baker and Jimmy Carter, in 2005.

That it is also very strongly supported across partisan and racial lines suggests that perhaps voter ID is not at all a controversial idea.

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John, when you posit that 'it is absolutely repulsive to see so many Republicans committed to having as few black people vote as possible', do you have the numbers to back that up? For example, going back a couple of decades, has the black vote been suppressed or is voter turnout for the African American community stable or even increasing? Secondly, I find it belittling to this community that a voter ID will suppress their vote but not the white community? How does that work? There's a leap of faith (possibly racism) to assume that placing a speed bump in front of voting (e..g. driver's license) discourages black people but not white people...

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John, I am surprised and almost don’t believe you. Are you just offering the opposing opinion to Glenn’s, to make it more interesting? The progressive commentators and politicians promote this narrative that voter laws suppress “minority” vote. It seems to me that more “minority”, I despise this classification, voted for Trump in 2020.

I tend to agree with Glenn, that once Trump realized that the election was stolen fair and square, he should have stepped aside, but that is in hindside. Not only shenanigans in front of our eyes, but intimidation into silence by woke and corporate media, where even Rush Limbaugh could not mention election fraud in fear of being cancelled by corporate overlords. He made plenty of jokes on his situation, while he was alive, which is beyond sad.

This is true voter suppression, when you intimidate people into silence and people lose faith in fairness of the election process. There is nothing wrong in asking for ID from any voter. The infantilization of so called “minority” voters, I despise this classification, is really appalling and truly despicable.

Vote harvesting, now with mail to all, ballot harvesting, dubious voter rolls, where people can vote in multiple locations and states, the rolls that are not allowed to be maintained in any meaningful way, dead people voting, election official receiving ballots before they were mailed, progressive oligarchs buying whole voting districts in tune of $400 Million dollars, I can go on and on, and you are saying that we cannot possibly normalize this through common sense legislation?

Two democrat senators, by preserving filibuster rule in the Senate, prevented the Federal takeover of election process, just two Senators – wow!

Like I said John, I don’t believe you.

Cheers!

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I am actually going to go against the group and defend John. Is it just simply requiring an ID in examples such as Georgia? Or, are there additional limits? If so, why?

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/02/us/politics/georgia-voting-law-annotated.html

Do I have a problem with ensuring integrity, no.

Is this recent concern about passing laws to ensure integrity in states like Georgia solely about ensuring integrity and nothing else? I don't know, but I am skeptical.

My concern is that the laws could be designed to create a disparate impact, which is a form of discrimination. I'm not suggesting they are being targeted just for the sake of being black, but more for the fact that are more than likely to vote Democrat in an election. Furthermore, the 2020 election had historically high turnout.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/how-we-rise/2020/11/24/how-black-americans-saved-biden-and-american-democracy/

I'm just saying that I cannot completely discount what John is saying. I'm still on the fence on this one.

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I think you are both right, and thank you for having an honest discussion about it. In right wing circles there is a belief that there is rampant voter fraud and on the left a belief that there is rampant voter disenfranchisement. I don’t think either are actually true. I don’t think anyone has really done a good job of identifying the issues in our election system and trying to fix those.

For example, in more densely populated areas wait times can be far too long. Whether you can give out water isn’t the issue. Making it a national holiday doesn’t help if you work in a retail or service that still works on national holidays. Unfortunately, since elections are run locally, I’m not sure how much can be done about this problem federally. Personally, I think in person early voting is a great solution to this problem.

When it comes to IDs the issue is which IDs are accepted. Drivers license or passport, obviously. But accepting, for an already registered voter, a voter registration card or gun license with no photo but not a photo ID from a state University? That starts to undermine the argument about what the intention of the requirement is.

And few are talking about voter nullification. No one should support the will of the people being able to be overturned because a legislature of a different party can. That is deeply anti democratic.

I believe our politics would be more sensible and moderate if more people voted. Unfortunately, that isn’t really in the interest of most partisans. For that matter having an issue to divide people over seems be more important than actually solving those problems. From what I can tell, both sides are using “the other side is trying to cheat” argument to get their side more likely to vote. This supports John’s point about there really not being anything significantly new to justify all these changes but also Glenn’s point about it not being a big deal to try to have reasonable requirements.

Thanks again, guys.

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