This would have been considerably more convincing had you included any evidence that voter ID laws actually disenfranchise the folks you claim they do. Instead, you engage in the same sort of paranoia you accuse Republicans of conjuring to support their side of the argument. But even if you're right, the appropriate argument is that the IDs should be free and easy to get (as in the new Indiana law) and to have a back-up system for those who lose the ID on election day or don't have an ID for some other reason (again, as in Indiana where you can cast a provisional ballot that will be counted as soon as you can prove you are who you claim you are).

Besides, do you seriously think elderly voters are going to have trouble getting a (free!) ID so they can vote? They are the most reliable voters in the country and most of them have nothing else to do than figure these things out (That's a joke. Sort of.). There is no "But they can't afford it!" argument to make on behalf of the poor because the IDs are free. I suppose it's possible that minorities who do not speak English would have to spend more time than others acquiring IDs but then again the problem is with the issuance of IDs, not the requirement that you have one.

Dahlia, you also play a dirty word-trick by blaming modern vote-supression on "Republicans" and historical vote supression on "conservatives." So it's fair to taint all of today's Republicans with the actions of a slimy few. But the widespread suppression of votes by southern Democrats from the Civil War to, when the 1960s? 70s?, was perpetrated by "conservatives." Nice work.

And for what it's worth, I'm an Obama supporter, not some "conservative" crank.

News flash buddy, southern Democrats often qualify as conservatives particularly pre-civil rights era southern Democrats.

Beaujoe:

News flash buddy, southern Democrats often qualify as conservatives particularly pre-civil rights era southern Democrats.

No kidding. Thanks for that, "Buddy."

From the article in question:

"As former Texas Republican Party political director Royal Masset told the Houston Chronicle last year, while he believed the vote-fraud epidemic to be overblown and opposed Texas' then-pending photo-ID law, the bill "could cause enough of a drop-off in legitimate Democratic voting to add 3 percent to the Republican vote."

Imagine that! An honest Republican!

If he can do it, maybe you can, too....

There is a bigger issue here and one that is being missed. Is our election system fair? Anyone out there a fan of the Electoral College, gerrymandering of congressional districts and our never-ending primary season. Not one of our candidates will touch this issue, like the son of boss who gets the promotion ahead of his peers; they see nothing wrong with the system. Any wonder why people think the systems rigged.

As Heinlein put it, “A managed democracy is a wonderful thing... for the managers... "

The argument that requiring identification will supress voting is absurd. How can someone functioning in American society not have an ID? I am asked to show ID when i go to the bank, when i use a credit card, when i buy alcohol, and i'm supposed to have one on me when i drive my car. Sure, maybe grandma doesn't get carded anymore, but she must have some identification.

Further, "I suppose it's possible that minorities who do not speak English would have to spend more time than others acquiring IDs" is also absurd, because if you can't speak English, you can't pass the citizenship test, and you therefore ARE NOT ELIGIBLE TO VOTE.

I find it troubling that Ms. Lithwick's evidence for the non-existence of democrats voting in multiple locations is the fact that there is no data to support it. The fact that there is no documentation of something does not mean that it doesn't occur. Right now, i could probably vote in three different places (old addresses) if i wanted to. Nevermind that I wouldn't do that, but it should not even be possible. That there is not a system in place to guarantee that one voter has only one vote is a testament to the fact that NEITHER political party truly wishes to have completely honest elections. Anyone who thinks this is a one-party issue is delusional.

First, anyone who thinks that obtaining even a free ID is never a burden has never spent time in a poor neighborhood, either urban or rural. There are constraints of time, transportation, and access that make getting an ID hard for many of our nation's poor. Indeed for hundreds of thousands of blacks born in the South before the mid-1970's, no birth certificates exist.

Second, Ms. Lithwick's piece completely ignores what ought to be the point of any article on voter suppression: the central issue of the 2000 Florida debacle was that 125,000 black voters were purged from the voter rolls, in explicit violation of the Federal voting rights law, and no one was prosecuted. The result was a STOLEN PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION.

If we are seeking to prosecute people for voter fraud, let's start with the Bush family, Jeb and George W., and work our way down from there.