And the dirty elections continue

[unixronin]

Seems the Macomb County, Michigan Republican Party is gathering a list of foreclosed homes prior to the November election.

Why?

Apparently so that they can deny the foreclosed-upon their votes, since some of them are no longer technically residents of the precinct.  "Mean-spirited" is putting it mildly.

I've said it before, I'll say it again:  The people running the political machines are scum of the worst kind.

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Update:

It's been pointed out to me that this is far from an objective source.  I don't know anything about ACORN, which features prominently.  Biased source or not, I'm still disgusted by the dirty tricks that both [arties pull to either disqualify voters for the other party or invalidate their ballots by any means possible.  I clearly remember the 2000 campaign, and the Gore campaign lawyers distributing an inch-thick book to Democratic counting-room staff in Florida detailing all the possible ways to invalidate military absentee ballots on minor technicalities, because military absentee voters were expected to vote for Bush.

What the fuck happened to democracy and everyone being entitled to vote?  How do you get from that to "Use every dirty trick in the book to disenfranchise as many opposing voters as you possibly can"?

I personally won't be surprised if I wake up one day to find Congress has passed a new election law that, without actually saying so in so many words, makes it illegal to vote for any candidate who isn't either Democratic or Republican.  Call me cynical, but I suspect a major reason why it hasn't happened already is simply that they haven't figured out a way to get away with it.

Comments

[cipherpunk.livejournal.com]

If you live in a precinct and you lose your home, then you become a legal resident somewhere else, even if it's "underneath the bridge near what used to be my home". Anyone whose home has been foreclosed needs to update their voting registration information and poof, they're safe.

Wait, you say, but they're required to do that anyway, any time they change addresses?

My God. What a conspiracy.

It may be mean-spirited, yes. But it has precisely zero ability to affect people's right to vote. All you have to do is make sure that your address is correctly listed with your precinct. If someone challenges you at the polls by saying "that home is in foreclosure", you get to say "yeah, and I'm still living there. Do you have any evidence I'm not?" The burden is on them, y'see.

So yeah, while I agree the political elites who run things are the worst kind of scum, it's hard for me to see this as anything more than amateur-night villainy, and the reporting of it as fearmongering.