Matt Blunt and Missouri Republicans - Transparently Corrupt, and Attacking the Poor, Elderly and Disabled
Missouri Republicans in the legislature don't want old people, disabled people or poor people to vote, because the Republicans have screwed those groups over at every opportunity. One device they have come up with to deny the vote to portions of those groups is to require that all voters show their drivers' licenses or other voter IDs when they appear at their polling place.
Back when the idea first appeared, Gonemild saw where it was headed:
Republicans are agitating to make Missouri one of the most restrictive states in the nation when it comes to voting. Their current plan is to require photo ID for voters.Well, surprise, surprise - I was right. After railroading the Old Disabled and Poor Voter Suppression Act through a Republican General Assembly, guess what Matt Blunt is outright refusing to do?
At first blush, this requirement seems common-sensible enough. I have to show my driver's license when I want to write a check at the grocery store, unless the clerk recognizes me, and it won't cause me any undue stress to show it on Election Day (unless they look at the weight listed, and give me grief for getting fatter . . .).
But I'm not the target of this proposal. The target is the 170,000 elderly and handicapped people that the republicans have been attacking through health care cuts and decreased services. Those little old ladies and gentlemen, mostly poor, tend to vote with the party that represents the common man, and that is most definitely not the party of Governnor Blunt. So the republicans want to silence them at the ballot box.
When asked about the thousands of voters who would lose their right to vote under his proposal, Republican Michael Gibbons says he "envisions teams of state workers sent out to help photograph voters who are home-bound or in nursing homes." Hey, Mikey, are you envisioning funding provided for that? Are you envisioning poor black people happily opening their homes to camera-wielding government agents?
Or are you really just envisioning Missouri with 170,000 fewer poor and elderly voters?
Matt Blunt is refusing to fund the outreach to give the poor, disabled and elderly voter identification cards.
I've been trying to avoid demonizing those with whom I disagree. I'm kind of stumped here, though. How can you describe what Matt Blunt and his cohorts in the Republican General Assembly are doing to Missouri citizens without using words like "despicable", "corrupt", "slimey" or "outright evil"?
posted by Dan at 6/01/2006 07:02:00 AM
14 Comments:
You are nice to try to keep from demonizing these self-serving Republicans who want nothing more than to screw average citizens. But they make it impossible and this voter id legislation shows (once again) their true motives.
Speak the truth and things will become clear. Keep up the good work.
I'm disgusted and outraged by this rope a dope by Repugnicans. Any citizen who isn't, has been listening to too much Rush. We should really investigate FOX to see if they are using subliminal messages.
And I don't believe for one second that any of these Midwestern Machiavellian tactics are coming from such a political newbie as Biffy Blunt. He is a mouth piece with a hair do for other, more despicably evolved, experienced politicos.....three guesses
I'm sure they're not trying to prevent felons, illegal aliens, unregistered voters and dead people from voting. I'd swear on my great-grandfather's grave that that isn't the case, except that somehow my great-grandfather voted for a lot of fine upstanding Democrats after he was dead even though he voted Republican when he was alive.
Glad to hear that your great-grandfather developed better political sense after he died. It may have been a last-ditch effort to earn his way into heaven.
While your anecdote is fascinating, how does refusing to fund efforts to help the poor, elderly and disabled cast their votes address the issue? Surely, you're not saying that those people who aren't rich, young and physically normal are dead to republicans, are you?
(To be clear, my first paragraph was intended to be humorous - I mean no disrespect to your great=grandfather, who I hope is enjoying paradise.)
To be honest, I don't know that my great grandfather voted Democrat after he was dead, although many dead people in Chicago (Daley) and Texas (LBJ) and other locations did.
My humorous anectdote was simply intended to point out that voter registration and identification is both important and a serious matter.
I have not doubt that both parties (without government help) will expend significant resources to assist in registering the poor and elderly. That has certainly occurred in most elections in recent memory.
Anonymous -
The problem is, now registration will not be enough. The Republicans have inserted a new requirement, and the parties are not able to issue voter IDs. You are correct - prior to this ugly action of the anti-democracy Republicans, voter registration overcame most efforts to suppress poor, elderly and disabled voting.
I've never read anything so phony. You all know democrats want the illegal immigrant vote, the voter who votes multiple times, anything they can do to conjure up as many illegal votes as possible. What a laugh.
Travelingal:
Come on now, think about this. Hoe does what you say (which is bipartisan, anyhow) have to do with denying poor, elderly and disabled people the right to vote? What does it have to do with refusing to fund a program that was promised at the outset?
Anybody who engages in voter fraud should be prosecuted. Anybody who disenfranchises legitimate Missouri voters ought to be voted out of office. Anybody who voted for those Republican slimeballs ought to be ashamed of themselves.
One thing that has generally gone overlooked about the voter ID bill- earlier this year, lobbyist Jay Reichard signed up a new client, BearingPoint, a Texas company that produces photo IDs for identification to comply with the real ID law. Reichard, of course, shares many clients (though not BearingPoint) with first brother Andrew Blunt.
Dan, poor, elderly and disabled people all have a myraid of ID cards ranging from medicaid, to medicare, to social security, on and on. It should not be so difficult to get them a voter ID card to add to the pile and it should be funded by the government, absolutely, whatever the cost. Now, whose budget it comes out of is not my problem. This is what we pay our glorious elected leaders to do...to figure it out. All I want to see is the right for every citizen to vote, once, legally.
Also in the new voting bill is a requirement that anyone REGISTERING voters over the number of 8 has to be LICENSED to do so. They made it harder all around to get anyone out to the polls.
Funny how Andy Blunt is always around the businesses that are in a position to exploit new laws...
In 2008 Blunt will be gone and he will be +wondering why
The Blunts are nothing short of being the biggest crooks in Missouri's history. They make mobsters look like neophytes. They have all been bought and paid for by the tobacco industry. Google some of the Missouri anti-smoking agencies and you will be surprised what you find.
Matt Blunt mis-appropriated 262M dollars, award the state of Missouri from the 2006 tobacco suit against Phillip Morris. This money was slated for ANTI-TOBACCO education. Blunt only allotted 200K for anti-smoking education, and then used the rest to "balance the budget", which he had, of course, FAILED to do himself without , what I consider is the same as out-right "stealing" from the people of MO by the mis-appropriation of these funds. But this was NOT until he made damned sure that the 80 cent per pack tax initiative was dead...even if that was only by the tiniest of margins. Then he added to his crimes/sins by cutting 300,000 low income families/disabled/and elderly of their benefits.
I am disabled and lost my entire food budget, from 120 to 18 dollars per month. But that o.k. because Matt Blunt and his family are set for life. So all is well with the world. The Blunts have no trouble sleeping at night. How nice.
No Matt decides to drop out of the upcoming race (amid rumors of his bi-sexuality). He stated that he had "peace in his heart that he had done all he could". Yeah, he sure did. All that is bad, wrong...and down-right evil. Blunt has a young male son named, Branch. Let's hope that "Branch" takes better root,falls far from that tree, turning over a new leaf in this family's history, when he grows up!
People like our ex-governor-to-be should be in prison life for crimes like his--and even then--that would hardly be justice served. However.... That "justice" will surely come when to him when the Blunts, and those supporting them, meet their maker. You can rest assured of that.
I would like to support Kenny Hulshof, (spl), as he sounds like a good guy, but the fact that he too is a Republican scares me. After the bad taste in my mouth that Blunt has left. the last thing I or anyone else in Missouri need, (if you will pardon the sick and by now over-worked pun) if I'm to be...blunt...is more of the same!
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