Dakota Beacon

More and more, as we approach upcoming elections, we are hearing renewed calls for “real ID” and national databases as a solution to the problem of election fraud.  Most of this is, unfortunately, coming from the right.  It was a mistake to implement this in some areas already - access to domestic flight, access to federal buildings (you know, the ones you paid for).  This is a bad idea and it is an even worse idea to extend this to voting rights.  There are better, more legitimate, better rooted means to have sound elections and end most fraud.  

I submit that this whole voter ID push is the flower of a Cloward-Piven strategy to put every American under a level of surveillance and control that would be impossible without the kind of data base needed for this.  Step one - create the fear and need.  Step two - offer a big-state one-step “fix” that otherwise would not be acceptable to a free people.  Kill privacy and rights with the full approval of the right.  Once the machinery is in place this can expand.  We all know how the IRS got started. Genius.

There are better ways.  If you want free, fair, legitimate elections, here are some of these better ways.  They are not quite as popular as a universal bandaid.   They have less appeal to the endemically lazy (which especially includes the right).  They require more effort and more thought, they are not “new” and they are not glamorous or a one-stroke fix.  Basically they are a form of reverse-engineering of fraud.

1.  One national election day.  Not a week, not a month, not odd hours at City Hall or wherever.  One day for in-person voting.

2.  Paper ballots.  Not “chads” on some sheet, but clearly marked paper ballots.

3.  Hand counting - no machines.  Two officials, judge and clerk, counting in the precinct polling place when the polls close.

4.  No interruption in vote counting, count until finished without stopping and starting.

5.  Vote counting in the open - no walls, no obstruction of the view.  Open to be seen by the public.

6.  Drivers’ licenses required in every state to indicate eligibility to vote - specially marked licenses to denote those who are NOT eligible - whether felons, under age, non-citizen, etc.    This would mean an ID that does not overly impose this federal data base.

7. Strict regulation of absentee ballots.  There was a time when, to receive an absentee ballot, the voter must request an application, fill that out, get it notarized and send it in, get the ballot in the mail, fill that out, send that in and the vote would remain sealed until election day.  Then it would be opened at the end of the vote counting and tabulated in the total vote.  This was a one-off thing, not a blanket absentee vote for numerous people.  My dad had to do this because his work often kept him away from home at election time and he never, ever failed to vote.

8. No more drop boxes.

9. No more gathering of ballots by third parties.  

10. Full investigation of and severe punishment for anyone trying to vote twice or illegally, or for anyone tampering with ballots, etc.

11. No more “calling” of votes by the media until ALL precincts across the US are closed.

While these are all sound practices to ensure fair and free elections - practices to which no party or person has a reasonable objection, there is yet another pragmatic side to this to which casual Republicans and others on the right seem strangely oblivious.  The Real ID as a voting ID mechanism will strongly favor the left.  You might wonder why unless, like myself, you have a veritable lifetime of grassroots political experience.  The truth is, whatever it takes to register Democrat voters, the Democrats will find the money to accomplish.  They always have the funds from somewhere.  There are many financial resources to keep the Democrats and their candidates afloat.  Nothing has ever changed in that aspect.  On the other hand, the most reliable Republican voters will coast, left to their own devices and their own best intentions.  Many would show up at the polls and be turned away if we go the bandaid route.  But Democrats will have a year-long drive to get everyone and his German Shepard registered and on the books well in advance.  They might be terrible at policy making but they are experts when it comes to getting out their vote.  

So when you hear another supposed Republican demanding some quick fix to ensure fair elections (and we all know something has to be done after the Biden “victory”), tell them to stuff it and go back to the drawing board.  A solution can be simple - such as the common sense operation described above - but take some effort or you can just throw your freedom and your privacy out the window with the bath water and do the lazy thing, which is exactly what the leftist thinkers are licking their chops over.  Cloward-Piven works and we see it more and more and more.  It relies on human laziness, which is an abundant commodity.  And that means an intellectual laziness.  The SAVE Act will address some issues but not all.  We need to do something, but we don’t need to be reckless with our hard-won and hard-kept rights in order to restore legitimacy to our elections.