NYT editorial, In Defense of Voting Rights: DOJ idealogues' aim is denying ballot to Democrats

[DeepModem Mom]

In Defense of Voting Rights
Published: November 5, 2007

....The Justice Department has a long history of protecting the voting rights of minorities. In the Bush administration, the department’s voting rights section has been taken over by ideologues most interested in denying the ballot to minorities, poor people and other groups likely to vote Democratic.

The Justice Department endorsed a Georgia law that would have required many voters to pay for voter IDs, a requirement that a federal judge rightly likened to a poll tax. (John Tanner, who heads of the Justice Department’s voting section) said publicly that blacks are not hurt by ID requirements as much as whites because “they die first.” He was assuming that ID laws disadvantage elderly voters, because they are less likely to have driver’s licenses. And in Mr. Tanner’s world, blacks are likely to die before they become elderly....

***

There have been calls for Mr. Tanner to be removed, and he should be, but that is not enough. The Senate must refuse to confirm (Hans) von Spakovsky, an anti-voting-rights advocate cut from the same cloth as Mr. Tanner, to the F.E.C. Based on his record, Mr. von Spakovsky would use the job to undermine the right to vote.

Congress should also pass the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act, sponsored by Senator Barack Obama, which would criminalize misleading and intimidating actions used to prevent voters, particularly minority voters, from casting ballots.

This administration seems to believe that the right to vote is something only Democrats should care about. It is too important to be reduced to a partisan issue.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/05/opinion/05mon2.html?_r=1&oref=login

[peacetalksforall]

1. Every day we see proof of a plan enacted years ago - very clever

people - the plan called for getting their people in at all levels of civic, county, state, and federal levels and to school boards and similar ancillary associations. From the Supreme Court all the way down to the lowest levels of decision making.

The question from me is - when are Dems going to acknowledge this and expose it when it comes up.

Dems have a trait they share - tolerance. That tolerance should not extend to the takeover of this country by selfish greedy war mongersing religion and world domination obesessed people who fool us and make fools of us - including their own.