How Not to Run a Sting
In order to prove the need for a voter ID poll tax, and to prove how easy it is for someone to procure and cast a false ballot, the kid who took ACORN down based on fabrications sent some people to New Hampshire to…well, to procure and cast false ballots.
The problem is that it’s a state and federal crime to do just that, and a pretty severe one at that – a felony. And it’s not a sting – it’s the commission of the crime itself; they didn’t catch people falsifying ballots or conspiring to falsify ballots – they actually did it.
“In either case, if they were intentionally going in and trying to fraudulently obtain a ballot, they violated the law,” Schultz said. “So right off the bat, what they did violated the law.”
Election law expert Rick Hasen, who writes the Election Law Blog, joked in an email to TPM that O’Keefe’s team should “next show how easy it is to rob a bank with a plastic gun.”
“Who in their right mind would risk a felony conviction for this? And who would be able to do this in large enough numbers to (1) affect the outcome of the election and (2) remain undetected?” Hasen wrote.
Of course, there was a spate of “Future O’Keefe Stings” on Twitter such as:
[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/TheDarklady/status/157252524464816128″]
[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/buffalopundit/status/157246918513274880″]
[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/MotherJones/status/157244859663654912″]
[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/d_pardee/status/157224694762831872″]
[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/fbihop/status/157223680294928384″]
The Schadenfreude over this kid’s ham-handed efforts to promote conservative causes and embarrass liberals is awesome. I look forward to his next effort to re-create what he did with ACORN, but the problem is it’ll never happen because everyone knows he’s a fraud with zero credibility.
In order to preserve, protect and defend the time-honored Democratic practice of vote fraud, liberals refer to voter ID requirements as a racist “poll tax”. I can understand the need to do so. Vote fraud is a very effective way of helping your side win–in certain heavily Democratic districts in St. Louis and Philadelphia in 2000, the turnout was 110% of the adult population.
You are required to produce a passport (cost $125) or an enhanced driver’s license (cost $50) to get back across the Peace Bridge from Canada. I suppose that’s a racist border tax.
You are required to produce a driver’s license to buy a 40-ouncer of Colt .45 in a bodega. I suppose that’s a racist beer tax.
The problem with the “poll tax” meme is that, for example in South Carolina, a person who doesn’t have a driver’s license can have a non-license photo ID issued by the Dept. of Motor Vehicles.
Free. Of. Charge.
No. Poll. Tax. They will not, however, issue an ID to a dead person.
If you want to investigate genuine vote suppression, try these dudes. http://youtu.be/neGbKHyGuHU
New Black Panthers? Really?
In the fifteen days following Megyn Kelly’s June 30, 2010, interview hyping the unsubstantiated allegations of right-wing activist J. Christian Adams, six Fox News shows devoted 95 segments and more than eight hours of airtime to the phony New Black Panthers scandal. By contrast, those shows have devoted a total of two segments and 88 seconds to the Justice Department’s release of the results of an internal investigation clearing DOJ officials of any wrongdoing or misconduct in that case.
http://mediamatters.org/research/201104130007
It was the parsnips that did it.
Maybe some of the legal folks here can clarify the difference between voter registration fraud and systematic voter suppression.
btw Ward it looks like many of the comments on that youtube vid came from your fellow Fox viewers.
I fear that O’Keefe-ing may become the future of politics (politricks?) — at least for this year — and not just from the right. I’m predicting that once it becomes clear that RMoney has sewn up the Republican nomination, he’ll be O’Keefe-ed early and often. He could be be especially susceptible to it as he’s known to be wooden and prickly in in-person situations. See “Romney” + “airplane”:
http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Politics/The-Vote/2010/0216/Mitt-Romney-attacked-by-irate-passenger-on-airplane
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/in-flight-romney-is-aloof-with-fellow-passengers/
Sadly, more O’Keefe-ing seems almost inevitable with the SuperPACs involved — because they operate in such a new, unregulated, grey area allowing deniability by the candidates themselves. And with an economy down the tubes and class tensions through the roof, there are plenty of young folks who would be eager to try to make a name for themselves or make someone else look bad for a few hundred bucks. Which would be chump change to an organization with $Millions to spend, and nothing to spend it on but taking down the other guy — whichever side they’re on. RMoney might even get O’Keefe-ed from both the left and the right.
Hoping I’m wrong, but fearing I’m not.
You lefties are too much, you need an ID to buy booze, pick up a prescription, open a bank account and cash a check there, it’s canned at the doctor’s office, on and on ad nauseum, and your man Obama is pushing for Internet IDs
http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20054342-281.html
but an ID for voting is ‘racist’.
Just wow.
@ Jim – of all those actions you listed, which are inalienable rights of every U.S. citizen?
Also, why would you support a measure that makes it harder for citizens to vote?