Wednesday October 27, 2004

Why the GOP Hates Voters

At my day job, I have occasion to see all the get-out-the-vote PSAs as they are released. You don’t have to see many of them to realize that most of them come from the Democratic end of the spectrum. Why? Because, as has now been reported thoroughly, the GOP actively opposes voter turnout, especially among minority voters, who — according to research by a Republican polling firm — could, with a strong turnout, secure a decisive victory for Kerry. Suppressing the vote, challenging voters and fighting attempts to register new voters is official GOP policy. Just today, a spokesman for the state Republican Party of Wisconsin called a public school project that involved registering voters “a disgraceful use of taxpayer money.” We used to call it civics class.

In July, Michigan state rep John Pappageorge espoused the strategy when he remarked, “If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we’re going to have a tough time in this election.”

This month, Doug Haag, chairman of the Milwaukee County Election Commission said, “Why is there this need to get all these people registered? If people want to vote, they will vote. If they want to stay in bed and not vote, they don’t have to bother.”

And in a letter to the editor in Tuesday’s Cincinnati Enquirer, a member of the GOP faithful writes:

Ohio Democrats should be ashamed of themselves. Once again, they pander to the poor and African-American community by claiming that these two segments of our multicultural society require special privileges when it comes to voting.

Voters who really care, regardless of their political beliefs or social status, take the time to find out where they are supposed to vote. Only Democrats, who are constantly pursuing gimmicks to inflate their political following, think it is reasonable to conduct massive registrations among people who don’t really care and then cry foul when their “get-out-the-vote” schemes are legally determined to be unreasonable.

At the GOP, thinly veiled contempt for voters’ rights is the norm. They couch this as an attempt to stop voter fraud, but this is belied by the survey of likely voters above, which shows that the numbers are simply there for Kerry. You can’t poll fictitious voters.

The best reason to vote next Tuesday no matter what? Bush doesn’t want you to.