PORTLAND, Maine — Every week, Bollard publisher and BDN columnist Chris Busby will take a humorous look at Maine politics. This week, Chris investigates rumors of voter fraud in Portland.
Previously Chris has attempted to chat with former Gov. Angus King, taken a stroll through Donald Sussman’s neighborhood and explored possible far-reaching consequences of the governor’s controversial decision to remove a mural from the Maine Department of Labor offices.
It may just be me, but what is the joke here? Is he making fun of the thought that voter fraud is a serious crime or is he just mocking the notion that it even occurs? Either way, not particularly funny
I agree. Don’t mock or poke fun at serious issues. We have enough problems in this state to deal with …. in fact their numbers are growing every month. Especially at taxpayers expense!
It’s courageous of you to admit you don’t understand this bit of parody.
Def. Parody (pronounced par-ah-dee) Any humorous satirical imitation of a person or event.
Last year the Maine Republican Party through it’s humorous chairman, Chas. Webster and Secretary of State Chas. Summers launched a ridiculous investigation into silly allegations of voter fraud. Webster provided a list of voters he said were ripe for sleuthing.
A year later, no fraud has been found but the investigation apparently continues. This short film points out the idiocy of these allegations and the foolishness of taking the two Charlies anywhere near seriously.
You’re welcome.
I still don’t get the humor, and it seems I’m not alone.
Basically the joke is Cynthia Dill needs voter fraud and #OWS to win. It’s neither humorous nor is it proper satire. It might however show how dire Maine dem’s are if their hopes rest on #OWS (AKA Occupy wall street) movement. #OWS nither is committed nor loyal to them. Prehaps that is the most satire of all.
Prove it. Prove there is voter fraud and that OWS is engaging in it.
Voter fraud is a very difficult thing to “prove” on paper. Once a person registers with a precinct he/she gets a ballot without any personal information on it. It’s a sterilized document with no identity. The only record of any voter and their participation in the act of voting is the roster the precinct maintains based on the registered voters in that precinct. So if a person registers in more than one precinct and votes more than once by falsifying identity or address, or if you are a non resident college student voting both at your schools town and by absentee in your hometown,the only way to track these problems is for all precincts in the country to compare rosters. This would be logistically impossible. A daunting task to say the least. Without having to prove who you are in states that don’t require it makes it even easier, for illegal aliens can cast a vote without giving up their true identity and address. Again, if all you have to track voter validity is the rosters, it’s near impossible to track fraud hence the false sense of a lack of fraud in the first place. If there isn’t a mechanism in place to prevent it, and easily trace it, it will go unnoticed. This is why the notion of formulating a national I.D. and requiring it for voting falls on deaf ears with the left, and many excuses are made for not requiring it. It would virtually eliminate illegal aliens (12 -15 million) from casting a vote, and by using a national system of tracking voter patterns, it would assure one person, one vote, which is what we all strive for anyway right? An bases on the trillions we are wasting already, why not provide the I.D. free of charge so it would all people could get one that is a U.S. citizen. But somehow the left would consider this proposal as unfair, or potential profiling.
You say you can’t prove it, but then you use it as a basis for attacking a side of the political spectrum. I find that wrong — it’s baseless. I personally find it a disgusting assertion as well. That’s the reason the left is against the right’s “solutions” is because they’re benefitting from criminal activities? That’s a wild claim to be making and you have no proof of it.
You know why the left has an issue with the proposals here? Couple of reasons. You can’t prove there has been significant fraud, enough to sway an election — you can’t even find one example of the fraud! Second, you push solutions that wouldn’t even address the problems you purport to be solving. It’s like with gun control, even if you make it harder to get a gun, someone who wants to commit a crime isn’t going to be deterred, they’ll find a means of doing it. Third, it negatively and disproportionately impacts minorities and the elderly. Have you been reading about what the Department of Justice has had to be doing lately? Stepping in on states with history of discriminatory voting laws doing questionable things. For example, in Florida, removing thousands of “suspected” illegal voters. Suspected! So when these people go to vote in November, they’ll have no idea that they’re not registered anymore. It’s ridiculous.
I question the intentions of the right in terms of this. I don’t think the intentions are good to be honest — but at least I have evidence of that, the same can’t be said of you. You and others like you say that the left is using illegal immigrants and OWS (or whatever) in order to cheat to win, yet all you have are wild theories and no real facts. I think it’s wrong to smear people like that.
You have provided nothing but conjecture and a hateful attitude toward anyone that doesn’t agree with you. No I certainly can’t provide proof as most people with a day job. As I stated earlier, it’s a hard thing to prove. It’s obvious from the tone of your voice you don’t want anyone to prove it, and if they did, you would still discount the results as bunk.
It’s because I know there is no evidence of it, so I know you can’t prove it. What you’re doing is conjecture. You say there is fraud, so the burden of proof is on you.
I don’t care much what you think of my attitude, I find yours to be hateful and disgusting as well. You’re claiming the left doesn’t want to make it harder to vote because voter fraud helps them win. Do you realize what you are saying when you make a claim like that?
If the rubric is “it’s hard to prove so I don’t have to prove it”, then I can come up with quite a few theories and speculations myself! I just don’t think it’s fair for your to say those things and act as though this is a huge problem when you can’t even find one example of it.
It’s questionable to me that people like you claim this is a rampant problem, but you still can’t find one example of it. Yet, somehow you still think it would be worth it to burden and disenfranchise millions of voters simply to combat that fraud that you claim exists but that you have no evidence of. There is evidence however that the proposals coming from the right would target and disproportionally impact the eligible elderly and minority voters.
You never answered my question. Would it be unfair to require all U.S. citizens of voting age to apply for a free national I.D. which in turn would be used for situations like accepting receipt of a ballot on election day, and that I.D. card entitles you to one ballot in one precinct?
Neither party would support a national ID in general.
You still didn’t answer my question. Do YOU think it would be acceptable and fair to provide a free national of to every US citizen?
No, not for the purpose of elections. It’s up to states to determine how their elections should function. The only time the federal government should step in is when a state practice violates the Constitution.
I guess I don’t see what is so fundamentally wrong with a national ID system for voting purposes. I also don’t see how it is restrictive. You already have to prove who you are to register, why not just have an ID that would do the same to obtain a ballot? Voting is a fundamental right as is the right to bear arms. Any time a person makes a firearms purchase, they need to prove who they are. I don’t understand why it can’t be the same for voting. Especially if the ID is provided for free. The restriction is fantasy.
It’s only a restriction if not everyone has one, which currently is the case.
I don’t think it is feasible to have a national ID system. It would never find support in either party.
DOJ has approved Florida’s use of the DHS Immigration data base to check their voter rolls. Your entitled to your opinion but those are the facts. Google voter fraud Kentucky because it does happen.
I didn’t say otherwise. If you want to accuse me of something, have it be reality based.
The only thing funny about this gentleman is his picture.
This guy wears the same goodwill clothes every week!
So having seen his attempts at humor before, please just tell me,
did he find any real voter fraud in Portland ?
If so, were there any convictions ?
If not, at best we still only have rumors of alleged voter fraud, that can be traced back to
someone who is known to have hidden the community access vans, so students can’t vote.
Nothing funny there.
not this user
Waste of our time watching this. Voter Fraud is very serious. That aside this “Reporter” seem politically biased. Hire a real reported not a joke. no wonder your readership is in the craper.
Waste of time……. so let’s all watch James O’Keefe or his cohort (not so) Breitbart skew the news that is more enlightening for those that get their “news” from Fox Snooze. There I fixed it for you.
Data please. And cite a non-politically biased “news” source on the conservative side.
It’s been established that there are NO known cases of voter fraud in Pennsylvania, yet the Republicans are hoping to disenfranchise at least 100,000 voters just to make absolutely sure no case of fraud might one day occur.
I don’t think it’s funny, but he does make a point. Those screeching about voter fraud are consistently unable to actually provide evidence of real voter fraud. They use it to demonize and to smear — it’s never about an actual problem.
Check my note on the Doonesbury cartoons this week.
Something I don’t understand: if there’s no vote fraud, and no risk of vote fraud, isn’t the whole business of registering voters a waste of time and money? Shouldn’t we just assume that the people who show up at the polls have a right to be there?
To put that another way, voter registration is predicated on there being some who would otherwise vote fraudulently – so maybe an ID requirement is a logical extension of that?
You’re trying to shift the burden of proof. You want to institute new regulations/restrictions? Fine, but prove why it’s necessary.
Because the old regulations/restrictions are necessary?
But you’re trying to ratchet up the regulations and restrictions. Could I argue that because there is a speed limit the logical extension would be to lower the limit even further? Or since there are currently gun regulations there should be more?
We get to a point where we determine that the cost/benefit is proportional. You have to be able to articulate why additional cost (in this case more restrictions/regulations in terms of voting) is worth the benefits provided. If you can’t point to tangible voter fraud that new regulations would remedy, then I think you’ve failed to prove how the new costs are worth the benefit.
No, but you could argue that because unaided police officers can catch some speeders, there’s no need to use radar guns to enforce the same speed limit on others. Of course, you’d look silly if you did.
Adding more restrictions, guards or whatever you want to call them to voting would adversely impact legitimate voters. So to imply that those new impositions would only impact fraudulent voters and not legitimate ones is what is really silly.
All the new proposals for voting hinder voters, not those facilitating the vote. So your analogy of giving more tools to police officers and putting more restrictions on voters isn’t flush.
Busby’s articles and commentary are of a quality that warrant
being ignored but his writing fits well with the Bangor Daily News.
Ignore at your own peril.
As near as I can figure, this guy has an airtight contract with the BDN.
What other possible reason would there be for inflicting his “humor” on readers on a regular basis?
He’s about as funny as a crutch.
Wonderful series of Doonesbury cartoons this week in BDN print (at the bottom of the Letters column for those of you too “frugal’ to read it). “Jimmy Crow” is touring those states who have or have proposed voter restriction policies, in the face of minuscule stats for voter fraud. Today he comes to Maine citing Maine’s national leading voter turnouts and Charlie Webster’s allegations of Democrats stealing elections. Two cases of voter fraud are cited, “…the same number of confirmed Bigfoot sightings”. Hilarious.