Voter ID debate – over.

For people who aren’t familiar, there is an ongoing debate in the US about presenting ID when voting.

The argument for is pretty straightforward: if you want to vote, you should be able to prove who you are in order to prevent fraud.

The counter-argument is less… calm and rational. Let’s let Idiot give a typical rendition with a local slant.

Which is of course the point. But it’s not just about reducing turnout generally, but about reducing turnout amongst those more likely to support the left. The blunt fact is that the poor are less likely than the rich to have the required forms of ID or be comfortable dealing with bureaucracy, and thus less likely to be able to vote under such a system. Which is exactly what National wants. This isn’t about preventing fraud – which is virtually nonexistent in New Zealand – but about disenfranchising the poor by stealth.

Get that? We shouldn’t do anything to prevent voter fraud because there is no voter fraud. But it’s not because we don’t do anything to prevent it.

The absurdity of this position has been pointed out before. For example, Project Veritas was able to walk into a voting booth and obtain Eric Holder’s voting paper, but the same people were not able to walk into a bar and get a beer without id. (And claims of racism didn’t get them very far towards inebriation.)

But this latest episode seals the deal.

Last week, opponents of voter ID laws — the easiest and most common-sense method to safeguard against identity theft at the ballot box — received a one-two punch in Pennsylvania that should put their crusade against the security measure down for the count.

On August 15, a Pennsylvania judge upheld the Commonwealth’s new law requiring one of a plethora of forms of identification — including a driver’s license, accredited school ID, government employee badge and a new voter-specific ID, among others — be used at a polling place to certify a voter is who they say they are.

The next day, the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit got the ID she needed to vote despite the alleged hurdles her ACLU lawyers said stood in her way.

Viviette Applewhite took two public buses to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation office on her own. In its filing on her behalf, the ACLU insisted the elderly civil rights movement veteran whose purse was stolen years ago and lacks a birth certificate “has been unable to obtain photo identification required by Pennsylvania’s photo ID law” and “will no longer be able to vote.”

Massive. Fail.

This episode should end all arguments that voter ID is voter suppression. Applewhite’s ability to easily get an ID card is a complete repudiation of the vicious campaign of deceit against voter ID that has seen ample plays of the race card (Applewhite is black) and the age card (she is 93 and uses a wheelchair), as well as the amplification of the left’s class-warfare strategy (she is poor).

So getting a photo ID is impossible… but a 93 year old poor black woman in a wheelchair who’s ID was stolen years ago can in fact get one without assistance!

But there’s another aspect to this. A rather odvious one to you and I perhaps, but one seemingly missed by those who have spent so much effort trying to deny common sense.

Viviette Applewhite didn’t need an army of ACLU lawyers to secure her vote — but she could have used a ride. Therein lies the inherent irresponsibility of liberal voter ID complaints.

Liberals appear adept at registering people to vote. The NAACP, for instance, has a website dedicated to helping people register. Groups such as the Voter Participation Center are sending out absentee ballots to seemingly every mailing list they can find with such zeal that family pets are receiving VPC’s partially completed requests for ballots. Similar groups are devoting significant resources to educating potential voters about liberal candidates and issues. And there will undoubtedly be massive get-out-the-vote efforts in November.

Yet there never seems to be a point where potential voters are asked: “Do you know you need proper ID to vote? Can we help you get that ID?”

Apparently it’s easier to launch an expensive lawsuit to claim that someone’s rights are being violated (when clearly they are not) than it is to offer help to people who might find the law less than convenient.

Anyone for a drink?