The Pride of the Parties

I'm headed to Milwaukee on Tuesday to act as a poll monitor for the Democratic party. At each poll, there will be a Republican attorney as my counterpart. My job: to ensure that everyone who shows up to the polls gets to vote. His job: to interfere with the operation by challenging voters. See, when you start creating a ruckus by challenging people who are trying to vote, it intimidates other voters and, the Republicans hope, lowers voter turnout. Historically, the less people vote, the better the result for Republicans.

Wisconsin election law is great, though. You can't challenge a voter unless you have good cause and sign an affidavit stating the cause. So, if my GOP buddy starts challenging people randomly, he will be ejected from the polling place.

Of course, they know this. So look at what they've done to try to manufacture some "cause" for challenging folks. Yes, they've come up with 37,000 registrations they claim are defective in some way, i.e. missing apartment numbers from addresses. Now some good Wisconsin who thinks he is all registered and ready is in for a rude interruption when he tries to exercise his right to vote on Tuesday.

Some Republican snotnose is going to put a finger in his face and challenge his right to vote.

This is a transparent effort to frustrate the smooth operation of the voting process. See, in Wisconsin, if you show up to the polls you can vote. It's damn near that simple. You can show up unregistered with no ID and nothing showing your address, and all it takes to vote is a friend next to you to swear that you're a Wisconsin resident. Even if a Republican challenges you, you still get to vote and your vote is counted, but the ballot is marked as challenged.

But the Republicans have seized on missing apartment numbers as a good enough reason to try to screw some citizens out of voting. These people would put the Packers O-Line in front of the poll entrance in minority neighborhoods if they could. It feels damn good to be on the side that is trying to allow people to vote. Damn good.