As stated before, GorT loves pulling themes for posts from his liberal friends and relatives Facebook posts.  Why?  Because they usually are bereft with logical flaws.

Today, we’ll focus on the recent video that is making the rounds of 12-year old Madison Kimrey who is speaking to a rally against the new North Carolina voter laws in Burlington, NC.  Let me be clear: I’m all in favor of young Americans, heck, all Americans getting more involved in the voting process in the United States.  I’d even like them all to be more educated about it – what component of the government really controls the purse strings?  How to laws get passed?  What do department mandates do?  What are Executive Orders?

I’m impressed with Ms. Kimrey’s speech.  It shows a ton of courage and public speaking confidence.  She also demonstrates a passion and drive that I wish more of the youth of the country had…or show.  However, that’s about where my support for he position ends.  I have no dog in this fight – I don’t live or work in North Carolina and I already live in a state with very loose voting regulations.  I don’t have to show any identification at all.  As long as I knew a name and address of someone in the voting precinct last election, I could have voted.

Let’s focus on two aspects of Ms. Kimrey speech:

1.  She claims that eliminating the ability for 16 and 17-year olds to pre-register to vote – that’s 1 to 2 years before being eligible – an effort to dimish the participation of young people to vote.  She continues by comparing herself and other youth in North Carolina as the new “suffragettes”.

Cutting to the core: Suffragettes were fighting for the right to vote.  She is fighting for the ability — NOT the right — to pre-register to vote.  While mocking a state representative for calling pre-registration confusing, couldn’t one mock her for, in essence, calling the process for registering to vote when you’re 18 too hard?  I’m all for making it easy to register to vote.  Have the DMV/MVA in each state mail all 18 year olds a reminder to register to vote.  Maybe even include the form or link.  Maybe upon license renewal do the same.  But this comparison is silly.  And I’m not sure there exists any data to support that with or without this provision the youth participation in voting changes.  I would wonder whether the program is savvy enough to know that upon graduating high school, a NC student moves to another state in order to gain in-state tuition for college and is therefore, no longer eligible to vote in the state?  What if the family moves?  What if, heaven forbid, a tragic event claims the life of that student?

2.  Ms. Kimrey advocates allowing 16 and 17-year olds to pre-register to vote via a process when getting their driver’s license or through schools but yet the thrust of the voter id law that she is rallying against is to require a valid, government-issued identification.

In fact, if you do a little research, the organization whose quote she references at the end of her speech is emphatically against requiring such an identification.  It could actually be construed as a “liberal” group and while Ms. Kimrey isn’t a “mouthpiece” for them, she is supporting their position.  But more core to the argument, both cases that she cites requires some sort of identification.  To enter North Carolina public schools and register as a student, some proof of age is required.  To get a North Carolina driver’s license you must present identification.  And you are getting a GOVERNMENT-ISSUED Identification. 

So what is the position that Ms. Kimrey is advocating?  I think to put it simply: An easy button.  Make it easy (or easier) for the youth of the state to be registered to vote.  Arguably, she is advocating either a lazy position or a simplification/streamlining depending on your point of view.  I’m all for simplifying processes and cutting red tape.  Heck, I think having a process where an 18-year old American gets a driver’s license, registers to vote, registers for the selective service and gets a social security number (if they don’t have one already) all in one step would be great.  You’ll get no argument from me on that. 

Simply put: voting in this country is core to how this country was formed and how it operates.  Our election processes and systems were and are the model for the free world.  Whatever we do we need to ensure that this process is preserved and kept whole.  By that I mean that eligible Americans should have the ability – should they choose to exercise this right – to vote in elections for those that represent them.  At the local, state, and federal levels.  The key there is “eligible” – it makes no sense to allow dead people, foreign nationals, or computer “bots”* to vote.  As I pointed out yesterday, if getting a government issued ID is so hard then how come getting federally-mandated and managed health care insurance coverage thought of as easy?

* GorT, while computer-based, is no simple “bot”. 

GorT

GorT is an eight-foot-tall robot from the 51ˢᵗ Century who routinely time-travels to steal expensive technology from the future and return it to the past for retroinvention. The profits from this pay all the Gormogons’ bills, including subsidizing this website. Some of the products he has introduced from the future include oven mitts, the Guinness widget, Oxy-Clean, and Dr. Pepper. Due to his immense cybernetic brain, GorT is able to produce a post in 0.023 seconds and research it in even less time. Only ’Puter spends less time on research. GorT speaks entirely in zeros and ones, but occasionally throws in a ڭ to annoy the Volgi. He is a massive proponent of science, technology, and energy development, and enjoys nothing more than taking the Czar’s more interesting scientific theories, going into the past, publishing them as his own, and then returning to take credit for them. He is the only Gormogon who is capable of doing math. Possessed of incredible strength, he understands the awesome responsibility that follows and only uses it to hurt people.