New Details in the Zimmerman-Martin Controversy

Parent Cafe
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<p>I take it everyone’s forgotten how much Americans used to make fun of people with such mentalities*…and the reaction of most Americans…especially those of a libertarian bent to proposals for the US to adopt a National Photo ID for all citizens/permanent residents.</p>

<p>Last I checked…there has been such strong opposition it has long been considered…even as recently as a few years after 9/11 as a political/policy nonstarter. Moreover…the libertarian groups and many others with similar sympathies are still ranting/fighting this as an “anti-American subversive plot” against “liberty”. </p>

<ul>
<li>Check for many postwar Hollywood movies satirizing foreign countries’ officials’ obsession with asking “Papers! Papers, please!” and contrasting that with the US of A.</li>
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I have waited for hours to vote and let me tell you, most people don’t vote the way I do in my area. So don’t presume to think you know anything about me or my situation.</p>

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I’m not seeing much intelligence from some posters. What I am seeing is racism badly disguised by attack rhetoric. You favor disenfranchisement. I favor inclusion. It’s really that simple. ID laws don’t make it difficult to vote in 2012, they just make it harder to steal someone else’s vote. In another era, ID may have been a hindrance, but in the present time it is too necessary to everyday life for anyone to be a fully functioning member of society without it. Heck, the Mexican government knows that and so provides ID cards for its citizens right here in the US. We can and should do the same. I am stunned that you are arguing against providing ID to those who can’t get it for themselves. And you think you’re tolerant and compassionate? Realy?</p>

<p>See the difference is that I work really hard in my life, in money and time, refusing to accept the status quo when I consider it harmful. I do not and will not accept that there is a class of people of whatever race who doesn’t deserve to fully participate in society and whose votes don’t matter. You are fine with the status quo. How nice for you.</p>

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<p>[Trayvon</a> Martin Death Won’t Go To Fla. Grand Jury : NPR](<a href=“http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=150288808]Trayvon”>http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=150288808)</p>

<p>“Let’s give her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe she knows there isn’t enough for first-degree murder but she wants to maintain control and charge him with something else,” Hill said. “What does she need a grand jury for? She cuts out the unpredictability of the grand jury. She goes where she feels she has more evidence.”</p>

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Maybe she is right. Wouldn’t zimmerman have to specifically be targeting Trayvon or otherwise intentionally seeking someone to murder in order to get a conviction on murder one? If that’s not possible, perhaps there are other charges that might bring convictions. It would be wasteful and harmful to bring charges that wouldn’t likely bring a conviction. Although who knows what a jury will do?</p>

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<p>^ there are many here who indeed believe Z had targeted Martin for death</p>

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<p>I think he did in the moment, but I"m not sure about premeditation. Although I don’t know what is required under Florida law.</p>

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<p>Voter fraud, which is what these laws supposedly protect against, is when someone shows up at a polling place and pretends to be someone else and thus casts an illegitimate vote. Documented cases of voter fraud are almost non-existent. In New Mexico, an official who alleged 60,000 cases tore apart the state’s election records, and actually found 19 cases. In fact, the DOJ looked into this and between 2002 and 2006, it got a grand total of 86 convictions out of more than 200 million votes cast – a rate of 0.0000004%. Statistically speaking, it simply doesn’t happen.</p>

<p>The cases you’re talking about are election fraud – misconduct by elections officials or other actors – and yes, this tends to happen in places that are dominated by low-income and/or minority voters. In such places your new-voter registration card is more likely to be destroyed. Your polling place is more likely to open late (or not at all) or close early. It’s more likely that there will be an inadequate numbers of polling places, resulting in an hours-long wait. It’s more likely that there will be a shortage of ballot forms. There are more likely to be an insufficient number of voting machines, or voting machines that don’t work or which don’t accurately record the vote you cast. Voting machines are more likely to have been tampered with, or lack a paper trail. </p>

<p>Voting in middle- and upper-middle-class precincts tends to proceed quickly and smoothly; that’s what many of us are used to, and it’s hard to imagine how difficult it can be to vote in a less-advantaged precinct. But, as with the Voter ID laws, it’s all about suppressing the votes of certain groups. And unlike voter fraud, election fraud happens on a large scale in some places.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.brennancenter.org/content/resource/policy_brief_on_the_truth_about_voter_fraud/[/url]”>http://www.brennancenter.org/content/resource/policy_brief_on_the_truth_about_voter_fraud/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>Zoosermom, What existing problem is preventing people from voting solving? Where are the examples of people who were not entitled to vote actually voting but who would have been prevented from voting by the laws you favor? Go ahead. Cites please. I’ll wait. I’m going to be waiting for a long time, because you will be unable to supply cites of </p>

<p>People.
Who were not entitled to vote.
Actually voting.
Who would have been prevented from voting by the laws you support.</p>

<p>Names, cites, cases, convictions here. Be specific. </p>

<p>You favor disenfranchising people by preventing them from voting, and preventing them from registering to vote. About ten percent of American adults presently lack the IDs the voting-ID states require for voting. Ten percent. You want those ten percent of adult Americans not to vote. But that’s all right, because you don’t want them to vote, because they wouldn’t vote the way you do. </p>

<p>The Mexican government has a national ID card. The US government does not. Perhaps we should, but the voting ID laws are being passed now, not in some misty future when the US has a national ID.</p>

<p>I can see you work hard, but working hard at preventing people from voting is not something I find admirable.</p>

<p>I functioned in society until I was 33 before I had photo ID. I have no particular opposition to a national photo ID card, but I know perfectly well that plenty of people don’t have a photo ID.</p>

<p>(Random factoid: last year I misplaced my drivers license. I was able to fly on two different flights using a community college ID. But I wouldn’t have been able to vote, if I lived in a photo ID voting state.)</p>

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<p>[Trayvon</a> Martin Case Spotlights Florida Town’s History Of ‘Sloppy’ Police Work](<a href=“HuffPost - Breaking News, U.S. and World News | HuffPost”>Trayvon Martin Case Spotlights Florida Town's History Of 'Sloppy' Police Work | HuffPost Voices)</p>

<p>(the asterisks are mine…I see a pattern)</p>

<p>A string of cases involving police misconduct has also strained relations with the black community. The city fell into the national spotlight in December 2011 after video surfaced of a young white man, the son of a Sanford police supervisor, sucker-punching a homeless black man trying to break up a fight outside a bar. The victim, Sherman Ware, fell, striking his head on a metal pole, and the video shows him lying unconscious while his attacker struts and shouts in full view of dozens of onlookers. He can be heard shouting, ■■■■■■■ what? ■■■■■■ what?”</p>

<p>Police arrived within minutes and obtained video of the assault and sworn statements from witnesses identifying the assailant as Justin Collison, the son of a Sanford police lieutenant. Collison was handcuffed and placed in the back of a police car, but was quickly freed without charges.*******************</p>

<p>Tonetta Foster, Ware’s sister, said the incident reignited racial tensions.</p>

<p>“It’s like a railroad track runs through this place and we’re always on one side and they’re on the other,” Foster said of the town’s racial divide. “And the police, no way we can trust them after all they’ve done to us.”</p>

<p>An investigative report shows that Sgt. Anthony Raimondo, the ranking officer at the scene, placed two phone calls to Collison’s father within minutes of arriving, then overruled a junior officer’s decision to place Collison under arrest.******************</p>

<p>Instead of charging Collison, the officers released him and filed a request for an investigation into the incident with the state attorney’s office.</p>

<p>The next day, Raimondo – the first ranking officer to arrive at the Trayvon Martin shooting – defended his decision to other officers at police headquarters.</p>

<p>“If anybody has any issues with what happened last night, talk to me,” Raimondo said, according to the report. “But here’s my standpoint on it. I’m not in the business of putting cops’ kids in jail unless I absolutely have to.”</p>

<p>Collison was charged with felony assault only after the video of the attack was broadcast on local television nearly a month later. *************** Raimondo and other officers were later cleared of misconduct, although one senior officer told investigators he believed Collison was afforded preferential treatment because of his father.</p>

<p>Wolfinger, the prosecutor, defended the investigation on Good Morning America.</p>

<p>“So I don’t think, at least from what I can tell, there’s no preferential treatment and certainly not at this office,” Wolfinger said. “I don’t see it.” </p>

<p>nope, no preferential treatment at all Wolfinger. That’s why Collison turned himself in only AFTER the video was released, and why his father stepped down.</p>

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<p>Zoosermom, I wouldn’t be half so troubled by the voter ID laws if they hadn’t been passed by Republican legislators without any proof that voter fraud has been a real issue in any federal election, and if the statutes included some methodology to make it convenient to obtain a photo id, such as a mobile unit that would travel to voters’ homes at their request. Any law that burdens the exercise of a fundamental Constitutional right should be subject to the highest level of scrutiny to determine if there is adequate justification for that burden. Simply put these laws don’t pass the smell test.</p>

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<p>Yes. That’s exactly it.</p>

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<p>In the wake of the Florida legislature passing laws that make it more difficult to register to vote, the League of Women Voters says they can no longer do voter registration drives in Florida. Is there some reason to prevent the League of Women Voters from helping new voters to register to vote? Is that preventing voter fraud, or is it just preventing new voters from registering to vote?</p>

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<p>CardinalFang, this is my position as I’ve repeated several times " It’s far, far, far better to ensure that those in need can get that ID so they can fully participate in our national life than it is to continue to hold them apart, segregated from that full participation."
And you disagree. I think that says much more about you than it does about me.&lt;/p>

<p>Your decision to lie about my posts says even more about you.

I work to help people get ID, as well as to teach illegal immigrants to read in English. It is through my work with illegals that I became involved in the issue of ID and it has everything and nothing to do with voting. I live and work in the minority community. I know how hard it is to not have picture ID because here a person can’t even utilize a check cashing facility without it, never mind open a bank account. My position has been clear that I support providing government -issued ID for those who don’t have it. You twisted and lied to come up with the quote I put here. You should be ashamed, but you are undoubtedly shameless.</p>

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MommaJ, please read my posts, not what has dishonestly been attributed to me. I have and do work toward exactly what you suggested. If you read my posts you will see that I support and advocate for providing government-issued ID to those in need. The voter fraud issue is only something mentitoned in passing in the context of opposition to helping people get ID. I feel very strongly that citizens can’tt fully participate in society without it and I put my time and money where my mouth is. Another poster has chosen to twist and misrepresent my words. Please read mine before passing judgment. If you still disagree, that’s fine. But do so with me directly. Thank you.</p>

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<p>I’m generally seen as liberal, though I don’t think I’m quite as left as some of you, and I think Zoosermom is making a really excellent proposal of government sponsored ID for the impoverished. I applaud the out of the box thinking on that one.</p>

<p>I also can see no downside at all to that!</p>

<p>Also, as someone from Chicago, I can tell you I completely support photo ID for voting rights. The lack of necessary ID has led to extensive abuse in this area, for decades, if not over a century. “Vote early and vote often,” was coined here. Only half-jokingly.</p>

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<p>Zoosermom, the fact is that the voter ID laws as passed don’t include this type of facilitation, so we have to react to them as they are written—let’s not kid ourselves by implying that the proponents of this legislation had any interest in getting more voters to the polls–quite the opposite. It’s pretty clear that the specter of voter fraud was just window dressing. I put these laws in the same category as gerrymandering (which both parties have engaged in): base political shenanigans.</p>

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<p>Zoosermom, you said, “ID laws don’t make it difficult to vote in 2012.” And yet, you acknowledge that some people don’t have the kind of photo ID that’s required to vote. To your credit, you try to help people get photo ID. Fine. But how can you then claim that the people you haven’t gotten to yet aren’t prevented from voting?</p>

<p>Let’s see where we agree. We agree that not having some kind of photo ID can keep people from doing some things. We agree that if people want a photo ID, they should be able to get one without difficulty.</p>

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<p>MommaJ, I don’t disagree that the motives of those who are advocating for the voter ID law are probably not pure, but heck, I just wish more people would think of it as an opportunity, as in, “Okay, absolutely, let’s make that law, and while we are at it, since we KNOW you have no ill intentions, let’s put in a measure so that anyone eligible for WIC or Medicaid gets a state issued ID to go along with it.”</p>

<p>Just, I wish there was more creativity around that kind of thing, these days.</p>

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<p>MommaJ, I agree. The bills passed in many states do NOT include a requirement for conveniently located facilities and both strategic and timely notification to encourage voters to get the the ID. The objective is to have low turn out which benefits republicans.</p>

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<p>How could anyone think that Texas’s law, which allows a gun permit, but not a college photo ID, as a voting ID, would be discriminatory in any way, or would be favoring voters who might be more conservative over those who might be less conservative? I can’t imagine how anyone would get the impression that Texas wants to prevent less conservative people from voting.</p>