Beayooooootifully handled!!!

Just a wee correction there re UK Voting. I have never been required to present an ID, photo or or otherwise when I vote since I started voting decades ago. A voting reminder is posted to every eligible voter at their registered address but it is not needed to actually vote. The presenting voter vocally or with a pointer confirms name and address on the voter list for that voting station and is then given the ballot. As for now all votes are on anonymised private paper ballots and are actually counted by real humans in person under witness. I am required to periodically verify my registration but that requires no photo ID just my National insurance number. There are dark suggestions that "Computer voting may yet come about but there is no point and no need . Voting is about people not machines or digits and so it must remain.

Steve Lane @ 2:

Thanks for clarifying that point. As you can tell, I was trying to not go too far into the specific weeds with him, so I simply allowed for the stipulation that those countries required Photo ID to vote, in order to point out that, unlike this country, they all have national ID systems (which Republicans in this country have fought against for decades.)

Sounds like your National insurance number is somewhat akin to our Social Security number, and while that does not include a Photo ID card, the card is allowed for use when registering to vote in all 50 states, as I recall, under the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), and in those states which require ID to actually vote --- except for those Republican states where they've now severely limited allowable ID to very specific, state-issued ID that they know many (Dem-leaning) voters don't have. In those states, your social security may be good enough for registering to vote, just not good enough to actually cast a vote.

And, yes, glad to see your nation is still civilized enough to continue on with far more reliable and verifiable hand-marked and hand-counted paper ballots too!

Thanks, Steve Lane @2.

It's hard enough to keep up with bogus right wing propaganda (aka "talking points") that pertain to U.S. elections, let alone generalizations that American right spews about foreign elections. Refreshing when someone who has participated in a foreign election (in your case, the UK) chimes in to set the record straight.

There are instances in which the U.S. would do well to follow the examples provided by other nations, such as:

Following the lead of the German high court by applying Democracy’s Gold Standard by mandating hand-marked, paper ballots that must be publically hand-counted at each precinct on Election Night before the ballots and the tally is communicated to a central tabulation headquarters.

Instead of buying into the GOP’s coordinated, oligarchic efforts to make it harder to register to vote, harder to cast a vote and harder to count votes, we should follow the lead of nations like Australia, that treat voting as a civic duty, as opposed to simply a right, by way of compulsory voting.

Finally, if dupes like Geraint, are really interested in a viable democracy, they would insist on elections that are fully publicly funded, eliminating the appalling circumstance in which a tiny class of billionaires and their corporations can deceive and drown out the voices and aspirations of ordinary citizens by way of unlimited private and corporate funding of elections.

And, of course, while we're at it, given that, as James Madison aptly observed that "knowledge will forever govern ignorance," we should include, in those changes, media reform that, at a minimum, brings back the Fairness Doctrine so that the commercial message is no longer the only message we receive over our public airwaves.

Democracy is predicated upon the consent of the government. Consent is meaningless if it is not "informed."

Brad: The photo causes me to wonder. We see where dupes like Geraint have placed their heads, but are their eyes open or shut?

How can photo IDs prevent voter fraud, when you can buy machines that create photo IDs? Try googling "buy color photo id card printer."

In the interest of preventing voter fraud, Republicans should start acting to make those printers illegal.

Disappointed there was no mention last month of the Scottish independence referendum – hand marked, hand counted paper ballots - delivered to 32 Council centers which announced their results (including postal ballots) ASAP through the night.

Ballot boxes in the Western Isles
Posted at 23:34
The plane has landed in Benbecula. If the skies stay clear, the boxes should be collected from Uist and Barra and loaded aboard by midnight - ballots should arrive in Stornoway by 00.30.

If the fog closes in again, Plan B is to take them across the Sound of Harris by fishing boat.

If the plane can fly, the count will be done by 02:30. If not, the count would be done by 05:00 or 06:00.

Scroll down for the Clackmannanshire clip to hear how all 32 results were reported, including rejected ballots!
http://www.bbc.com/news/...otland-politics-29263022

Rick H. @7 wrote:

Disappointed there was no mention last month of the Scottish independence referendum

It is virtually impossible to cover every example of election integrity in any single article.

But that's the value of a comment section.

Thanks for your informative comment on Scotland.

Despite my fear of sounding like a clickbait headline from one of the mainstream sites...

EPIC TAKEDOWN, Brad.

Republicans: If you give them books, they'll just eat the covers.

Yet another false equivalency to disspell:

Conservatives don't read, and when they do, they certainly don't read anything that disagrees with them.

And when they do *that* (usually by accident), the computer runs the algorithm for "DEFEND PRECONCEIVED NOTIONS AND IGNORE NEW INFORMATION".

How do I know all this? Come to Thanksgiving at my house in about 6 weeks.

Rick H. said @ 7:

Disappointed there was no mention last month of the Scottish independence referendum...

The sad truth is that when things go well, they rarely get nearly enough coverage in the media! The same is true here, unfortunately, and perhaps even more so here since our resources are so few. And even more so right now, as we're dealing with any number of messes in the run-up to our own November mid-terms.

That said, I should also add that I actually was keeping my eye on the counting in Scotland, due to some concerns that folks were noting. As far as I could tell, however, those concerns weren't particularly well founded, particularly given the details you cite of just how public the entire affair was. And, even with those concerns, unless I can substantiate them in some way, I am loathe to shout "FRAUD!" as so many often do. That's a very serious charge, so I am actually quite careful when/if I make such charges.

Finally, I'll note that the public counting of hand-marked paper ballots was fantastic, though there was room for improvement. Counting publicly at the precincts, versus the central headquarters at each Council center, would have been preferred and much more difficult to game. Moreover, observers weren't allowed particularly close to the counting in those huge counting areas they were using. There were one or two other improvements that I'd have recommended (not that anyone asked me.) But, overall, it was certainly head and shoulders over the 100% invisible "counting" we do in most U.S. elections!

The congratulations from Brad's fan club are a little misplaced, cheering the take down by a professional activist/journalist of an average 'dude' with a day job and family, watching the Left destroy civil society.

The UK (my native homeland), by the way, does not have National ID, contrary to statements above.

I will admit, I was surprised to learn that the real issue for the left is the desire for a National ID, and that, apparently, the furor would die down if only states would issue such a document. Then, it would seem, the left would have no problem with being required to produce their ID to vote.

Hmm.

Last point: why is Brad placing my name in inverted commas? "Geraint Roberts" and "the guy calls himself Geraint Roberts"? That's too funny!

Do liars assume everyone else is lying?

Geraint Roberts kept embarrassing himself @ 12 with...

watching the Left destroy civil society.

You. Are. Darling, Geraint! Desperate, sad, confused, misinformed. But darling!

The UK (my native homeland), by the way, does not have National ID, contrary to statements made by Brad and Co.

As you know, since I told you in a previous comment on Facebook, and since a BRAD BLOG commenter noted it as well, that issue has already been discussed. While, unlike yourself, clearly, I have no prob admitting an error, this one was actually a stipulation for purposes of shortening the conversation with you, given the amazing number of errors and inaccuracies you managed to pack into your initial comments (as well as the ones you later deleted, out of embarrassment, presumably?)

I will admit, I was surprised to learn that the real issue for the left is the desire for a National/State ID

Wow. Are there no words you aren't willing to purposely misinterpret just to justify your errant positions? I don't recall discussing a "desire" from "the left" or anybody else for National ID. Rather, as is well documented, the Republican Party has long fought against National ID whenever it has been presented, under the Rightwing extremist notion that it would be used somehow to round up wingnuts, or whatever nonsense they are frightened of. If you are unfamiliar with those facts, I'm sorry.

The bigger point, however, was that if there WAS a National ID, akin to most of countries you cited where big government state-issued Photo ID is required to vote, nobody would have a problem with presenting it. It is *only* because some 20+ million legally registered voters don't have the TYPE of ID now required by Republicans for voting in many places that folks object to the disenfranchising restriction.

Yes, some of us don't like it when rights are stolen from us, particularly when it is for nothing more than the need for one political party to retain and/or obtain and/or abuse power. Sorry to hear you support the idea of a fascistic big government stealing rights from the people. I don't.

apparently, the furor would die down if only states would issue such a document. Then, it would seem, the left would have no problem with being required to produce that ID to vote.

Again, I don't know who this "left" is that you keep speaking of. But, you are correct (finally), if everyone was ABLE to produce such a document, if the requirement didn't result in disenfranchising voters in our representative democracy, then nobody would have a problem with it. That's correct.

You never noticed that Republicans love purple ink on the finger in Iraq, but never call for it here? Never noticed that they don't call for reasonable protections such as affidavits signed by voters without ID? That they never suggest that those w/o Photo ID have their photo taken at the polls or some such, so if they were found to be guilty, rather than presumed innocent, they could be rounded up and arrested? Never noticed that Republicans don't call for solutions to their pretend problem that *wouldn't* keep largely Dem-leaning voters from voting? Never noticed, chief?

Don't think about that too hard though! You may miss a few crucial minutes of Fox "News"! Better get back there right away! (So sad.)

Last point: why is Brad placing my name in inverted commas? "Geraint Roberts" and "the guy calls himself Geraint Roberts"? That's too funny!

Because I have no idea who you are. Yes, I actually confirm stuff before I write it or speak it. Try it sometimes. It's fun to actually know what the hell you're talking about.

Do liars assume everyone else is lying?

I wouldn't know.