Date: Mon, 16 May 2011 09:09:31 -0400
From: Joe Kingley
Subject: Early Voting
To quote Matt, “I believe that the email below is an excellent example of someone “muddying the waters with irrelevancies.”………If I were to bring up poll taxes, literacy tests, intimidation, and the other tools that conservatives have used to keep people from voting, I could be accused of doing the same thing. Maybe we should all make a point of avoiding “muddying the waters.”
Matt then proceeds to lis some ancient things “conservatives’ have done to keep people from voting. Matt, i have news for you – the poll taxes and literacy tests were done in the past – the items I listed are here, now, in the present. Please do not bring up items that are not current. As I said in my post, I abhor intimidation (coercion) just as you do. I inferred in my post that this practice is current (Black Panthers that our so-called Attorney General, Holder, will not address as he has a racist view on his duties). Please let us all know what evidence you have of conservative intimidation. I will gladly condemn that also. If Matt is not able to provide the evidence, then he is muddying the waters again.
I have a different view of voter turn-out. I believe we should encourage turnout as much as possible, but in the final analysis, i would rather qualified voting population vote from an informed position, than from intimidation and undue influence. (Qualified, meaning that they are who they say they are, and are legally qualified to vote). This being so, your last sentence “what’s more important, everyone voting on the same day or more people getting to the polls?”, is not the question we should be asking.. We should be asking – What is more important, informed qualified voters voting on one day, or a larger number of voters voting over a period of days, who are uninformed, or shipped in to vote a party line by undue influence or coercion. I prefer the former, and this should be addressed before we concern ourselves about early voting for people who do not have the commitment to learn the candidates’ positions and know if they are being miss-informed. This is not “creating an emotional reaction”. This is trying to prioritize what is important and relevant, and not putting the cart before the horse.