Voter Records Exposed 77
The
current edition
of Lauren Weinstein's PRIVACY Forum has a cautionary tale about online voter registration in one Texas county. It seems your username is your first and last name, and your password is your year of birth. Not many bits of security there. Guess that information and you can learn any Denton County voter's home address and some trivia -- but at least not their credit card numbers ... yet. michael : A silly privacy overreaction, IMHO. I believe voter records are public in every state and county in the U.S., and they are routinely used by police, journalists, political bulk mailers, etc. If the objection is that they're now "on the Web", that seems like a silly hair-splitting, since for a few dollars you can get the records for an entire county on CD-ROM anyway. Behind the scenes, the voter registration records of the entire country are used by the major political parties to coordinate mailings - this information is not and has never been private.
Republican spam (Score:4)
Maybe the campaign is high-minded (hah!) at the national level, but here in the local trenches, at least in Maryland, it seems like Republicans are using voter lists as a way to irritate everyone they can in the most Gingrichlike way possible.
- Robin
Thank gods I live in North Dakota (Score:1)
Here, in North Dakota, we have no voter registration, so this sort of thing doesn't happen to us.
Technically, however, I suppose this doesn't disprove the idea of the records being public - after all, one can hardly be accused of witholding nonexistant information - but it's still nice...
This is much ado about nothing. (Score:3)
The accessibility of voter records is *ancient* news.
Years ago I ran for School Board.
I purchased voter records including name, mailing address, and voting history for about 6,000 registered voters in the precincts that made up the local school district.
When I bought these, I had perhaps six different companies in metro Seattle to choose from.
I paid about $25.00 for five floppies-full, ASCII, comma-delimited.
If I'd wanted to pay more, I could have had the data set up for various software.
This is no big deal, except this is stupider because you have to know the name and birthdate to get one record.
One at a time.
What a pain in the ass.
Twenty-five bucks got me 6,000.
t_t_b
--
I think not; therefore I ain't®
Re:Why do you have to register? (Score:1)
It's an interesting point, but I wonder if that has a historical basis. For instance, the Ohio Constitution of 1851 required you to register to vote one year before the election. The state Constitution was amended two times, the first time to change that to six months, and the the second time to change that to 30 days, which is what it is currently.
I have to wonder why the state's constitution founders felt that the registration had to be done so far in advance.
In addition, registration requires you to state your political affiliation.
Not in all states, Ohio doesn't require it. You state your political affiliation here by voting in the primary and selecting which party you want to vote in the primary for.
Registration is also used since while most people have some form of photographic identification, it never has been required for voting, like it is in some countries, so a different system to prevent fraud is used. I know that many Americans would be upset if they were asked for photo id in order to vote (I certainly would be furious.)
Re:Why do you have to register? (Score:1)
Ack...perhaps I exaggerated that point. But think about the implications! In the cradle of Democracy you need an ID card to exercise your right to vote...ooo...the state legislature will get burned down for that. God help you if you need to be fingerprinted for said ID card (in those states that do it.)
My point about affiliation is not technical, and it isn't about privacy either, but about the way it makes it easier to use redistricting to preempt the election. Is Ohio special in that respect?
Definitely not. You just have much less data on voting affiliations...but it's enough to indicate general affiliation patterns--enough to draw out districs. So only 20% of voters participate in the primaries..it's plenty.
In Florida (Score:1)
Re:UK voter details are public, but is your vote? (Score:1)
Some sort of data will need to be retained, if only to prevent ballot stuffing. However, I think that any change of constitution that allows for on-line voting MUST ensure that not even the government can access records of who voted for who, and ideally, that these records must be destroyed once the election results have been accepted as valid.
Neither of us live in a police state, atleast not officially. What with the regulation of investagatory powers act, etc., we're getting very close over here, but political freedom is still not against the law, despite my comments above.
If the UK used mechanical voting booths, we'd get far faster results, but the whole process is steeped in so much needless tradition that shows no sign of changing anytime soon, that whatever abuses are possible, they will continue to be possible for some time now.
Personally, I'd like to see electronic voting in the UK parliament; this business of piling members of parliament through 'Aye' and 'No' lobbies is about 200 years out of date. However, you suggest they should change this, and you get laughed at. This comes from the same group of people who refuse to have toilets labelled appropriately. (Most of the toilets in the houses of parliament at Westminster are labelled 'Members Only' and are for men only). Hopefully, the new speaker of the house will drag the house kicking and screaming into the 20th century.
UK voter details are public, but is your vote? (Score:3)
Anyone can inspect the electoral register, and copies are available (for a fee) for any company wanting it, in machine readable form, so that they can, for instance, check you are not giving them dud details on a credit application. It contains your full name, house address, and also date of birth for persons between 16 and 18 years of age.
As your date of birth is one of the standard security questions asked by credit card companies when calling in to their telephone service lines, that strikes me as a security risk.
Each voter gets a number in the register, such as J 4572. This is printed on your poll card which you take to the polling station to cast your vote (you don't need it, they have printed copies of the register there, and can look up your voter number there).
Most people assume that elections are private matters between the voters and the ballot box. The totals are obviously public information, but can you tell how a particular person voted?
The answer in most cases is no, however the polling station staff write on their register the number of the ballot paper you are given, which means it is, in theory atleast, possible to trace who voted for which candidate.
At this time it isn't a crime to vote for any candidate, and anyone who has sufficient support and pays their election deposit can be a candidate, hence the number of crazy candidates from parties such as The Official Monster Raving Loony Party [virgin.net] and other less than serious candidates.
Kind of makes you wish there was an official monster raving loony running for the US presidency eh? [They are both fully paid up members - Ed]
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
On the other hand, if you happen to give $25 to the DNC, you're also on their mailing list for life. That means christmas cards from Clinton/Gore and other goodies that are neat to have hanging around. Generally we don't get vile spam from the dems, though.
damn (Score:1)
-LW
Re:damn (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Sustaining privacy isn't easy (Score:1)
-jon
Two issues (Score:2)
There is an exception. Under Oregon state law, voters who feel that publishing their addresses would constitute a hazard (for example, those who have been subjected to stalking by acquaintances) can request that their addresses be suppressed in the public file.
The second issue is voter registration data security. Changing one's registration should be simple and easy, but it shouldn't make it easy for fraud to occur. We have well-established routines for fraud checking with paper documents. Weak online security defeats that purpose.
There are still some concerns. I saw a file layout for the voter file data that the state of Florida provides for a fee. It included Social Security number! Now anyone who has tried to get credit recently (for example, starting up a cell phone account) knows that there is no way around the increasing use of the SSN for credit verification. But having a public agency spread these around is a really bad idea and is unnecessary, to boot. Most voter registrars provide their own affidavit ("voter ID") number that us database types recognize as a Primary Key (or at least a "production key in a Slowly Changing Monster Dimension"
So there is no reason to disseminate the SSN even if the state collects it as part of your registration. (See Simson Garfinkel's comments about the dangers of SSN overuse and exposure in his excellent book Database Nation.)
Oregon now has all-vote-by-mail elections. In fact, about 40% of Oregonians have already sent in their ballots for the current election. But we are not moving fast at all toward online voting, for all the good reasons that Bruce Schneier and others have pointed out.
Oregon also has the first and to my knowledge only online interactive voter file system, which my business partner and I designed and implemented (it's a subscription service we provide to progressive organizations). We track ballot returns day by day (not perfectly, given the shortcomings of the "legacy systems" our counties use to manage the voter rolls) to remove voters from the active list so that our cooperating campaigns stop bothering people who have already voted. This reduces the cost of campaigning and provides an incentive for electoral participation.
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Re:This is much ado about nothing. (Score:1)
MANY candidates have gotten burned when the opponent does the simple look-up and found that they didn't vote in any school board elections, for exampple, when they claim to be an "education" candidate.
paul
Re:Definitely not news ... (Score:1)
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Definitely not news ... (Score:2)
Note that the actual records of how you vote are not exposed, as they can't be. Ballots have no identifying markings on them (unless we're using paper markings [slashdot.org]) and they go into a locked box with every other anonymous ballot.
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Re:Republican spam (Score:2)
Mr. Gingrich is an individual with a long history of a complete lack of ethics in both his personal and public life.
Re:Republican spam (Score:2)
Mr. Gingrich was fined $300,000 by a republican led House Ethics Committee.
He admitted these violations in a signed statement to the aforesaid committee on December 21, 1996.
In addition, Mr. Gingrich has been involved in a very public divorce case where he acknowledged concealing a 6-year long affair from his wife.
Interesting comparison to Australia (Score:2)
It's interesting to read some people posting that in some US counties you can buy data files of voter details all ready to go into a mail merge package. Earlier this year the Australain people had a Goods and Services Tax (GST) imposed upon them. The Prime Minister intended to send a personalised letter to each adult Australian (in Australia it's compulsory to vote, so every person over 18 should be on the electoral role) using a mass mail merge. The federal privacy comissioner (yes, there is such a person, but most of the time he seems pretty useless) eventually stepped in and stopped the plan, saying that the laws concerning the electoral role prevented it from being used in an electronic fashion. In other words, it would have been alright if someone typed them in all by hand, but importing them into Word (am I the only one who thinks using Word to generate over 10 million documets is a terrifying proposition!?) wasn't allowed.
Of course, this only came to light after someone (can't remember who, the opposition maybe) kicked up a stink and took it to the comissioner.
Re:Now I'm mad (Score:1)
HOLY SHIT PHONE BOOKES ARE ONLIEN!# I HAEV MAED A MAJER PRIVACEY DISCOVARY!!11!!
Privacy (Score:3)
That would never happen.
The converse is worse (Score:4)
Does Chicago under Daley the 1st familiar? How many thousands of voters would come from cemetaries?
At least this, you can look up every voter in a district. IF you start finding registered voters living in a vacant lot, you know you have some voter fraud.
Re:Thank gods I live in North Dakota (Score:1)
--GnrcMan--
Re:And (Score:1)
More opportunity for fraud. (Score:2)
I think a point is being missed. Consider:
Why is there a password? To let you CHANGE your info, right?
So if somebody knows your birthday and age, they can deregister you, or change your address and request an absentee ballot in your name. Maybe that's not too likely for active voters (and likely to be detected). But those who rarely or never vote become a rich source of fraudulent ballots.
As do the recently dead. How many berieved relatives are going even THINK of logging in and killing the registration. Once the mailing address is changed nothing will arrive to show the registration wasn't automatically canceled.
Worse, it automates the creation and administration of phantom voters - a form of fraud that has ballooned since the federal motor-voter law.
What's especially dangerous about voter fraud is that the stability of a republic depends on the perceived accuracy of the elections. The election models a civil war closely enough to convince the loser that they'd lose the war, too - so they don't try to reverse it by violence. Break the faith in the election process and you may "destabilize" the society. And the surest way to break that faith is to destroy the reality behind it, by institutionalizing massive election fraud.
This has happened repeatedly in the history of republics, including the US. Fortunately, in the US the normal response is for a committee of vigilance to run the rascals out of town, maybe lynching a couple kingpins [San Francisco], publicly and repeatedly spank them until they go elsewhere [Portland OR], or capture the ballot box and count the ballots publicly [I forget which town]. Elsewhere in the world it has gotten much bloodier.
Re:You cant change anything (Score:2)
Thanks. It's nice to know that Denton didn't open that security hole.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
Actually the republican's took it one step further in my town. I'm registered as republican and of course I get a lot of mailings from the various republican candidates... but one thing that really got me was this: I vote at every possible opportunity I get, I vote in school board elections, bond issues, and every regular election even if it is off year. So one day I got a letter from the local Republican committee inviting me to their meetings with the line:
We noticed that you voted in a third off year election.
They really know everything... and they openly admitted it.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
Re:when registering (Score:1)
Re:This is much ado about nothing. (Score:1)
evil dot-commers (Score:2)
One piece of mail talks about some evil dot com millionaire who's been living in an apartment since college, and isn't about to give up his $550/month rent control, and his poor, elderly landlord, who wants to move into the apartment.
The other piece of mail I got about it talk about the poor elderly lady and the evil dot com businessman who bought the apartment building and wants to kick her out because he wants to live in the apartment. It doesn't explain why someone who made their money in tech would do something as stupid as buying an apartment house in Berkeley.
You get the feeling Berkeley doesn't like new money?
Denton County? That's nothing. In Harris County... (Score:1)
Also, for two dollars, you can get the full vehicle title information (including owners name and address, purchase price, trade in value, and the names and addresses of any leinholders) from any Texas county tax office, or Department of Transportation office. If you know the vehicle's identification number (VIN) you can get the same information over the phone. (At least this is not online
Of course, these are all public records, so I'm not sure what the big deal is. Even for non-public records, getting personal information on somebody is not difficult.
I don't know about the rest of the United States, but down here in Texas a simple 1-411 call to Southwestern Bell and they will tell you the name and address associated with any listed number you give them. For about thirty bucks a private investigator can get you unlisted numbers and cell phone owners names and addresses. (And there are some PI's who will do this by e-mail over the Internet without asking you for anything more than a credit card.)
Threat or Tool? (Score:3)
Two days ago I realized that I could not find my voter registration card. I needed the precinct information to find out my polling place for the elections on Tuesday. No problem, just go online and do a few searches and voila! I found the Denton County Voter Registration Database [denton.tx.us]. I put in my name and date of birth and quickly got my voter information. I then skipped over and looked up the precinct map and found my polling place. Total elapsed time 5 minutes. Result: happy voter.
This morning I was shocked to read the Slashdot post about Dr. Evil and his diabolical plan to destroy the privacy rights of Denton County residents! After all, I had innocently used that SAME site to find information that I needed to be a responsible citizen, and I didn't even realize how exposed I was! My privacy was shattered! How dare anyone make my home address and gender easily available to ANYONE who knows the year I was born (yet another reason to lie about your age!) Yesterday I felt safe and secure. Today I feel... vulnerable.
After all, someone might use this fiendish web site in combination with the Phone Book (another devilish anti-privacy device) to actually obtain my telephone number! The horror!
In all seriousness, yes I am concerned about my both my online and offline privacy. I fully intend to contact my county officials and talk to them about Denton County's privacy policies, and about the web site in particular. The site could be more secure without limiting legitimate use. As a test, I did a search on "John Smith, 1950" and got instant access to a couple of voters' registration information. Should I have the ability to get that information about someone else? Probably not. Is having that information harmful to them? Probably not.
The bottom line is that we are still in "untamed frontier" days of the information age. People (government people included) are not always aware of the full consequences of their public actions. Vigilence and Courtesy are our best weapons to protect our interests and to keep society healthy.
IV
missed the point, it's not about privacy (Score:1)
Re:Republican spam (Score:2)
I've had something similar happen to me. As a member of my local synagogue, they had my family's name/address. Apparantly, the synagogue shared its mailing list with the local Democrats. I got a letter during our state's Senate campaign which all but called the Republican an enemy of the jewish people. Problem: the Republican was jewish himself.
This is like Amazon's privacy policy, MS's plan not to let you reinstall Windows (effectively), etc. They are clever sounding ideas to score a minor, marginal advantage. People always feel like they can pull off some kind of sneaky deal-- it almost never works.
The problem is that it is difficult to ensure that an election is run fairly. Public voting rolls is one way to verify that the right number of people are voting. It isn't perfect, but there really isn't a corruption-proof voting system.
For instance, there are some precincts which have 'technical difficulties' or other problems which mean that they are kept open past the deadline. Year after year. Reason? They wait until the exit poll results so they know how much to pad their precinct.
Re:Public records (Score:2)
Worse indeed. I remember hearing recently about a proposal (nationwide, in one state?) to severly limit that sort of public access to liscense plate information. One of the biggest proponents was a local reproductive rights group, because protesters had taken to writing down liscense plate numbers of women coming to local clinics and launching harrassment campaigns against them.
Have we been so busy focusing on "Internet" privacy and controlling our information in corporate databases that we forgot about all the information in GOVERNMENT databases that's accessible to anyone just for the asking?
I share your concern about "just for the asking" but the two databases mentioned here are IMHO totally legitiamate records for government or law enforcement use. But once I believe that, we run into a catch 22 between privacy and buracracy. If you are doing a legitamate search for information and have to jump through a lot of hoops to prove your worthyness, theres annoyance at "government bloat" and "useless drones being paid out of MY tax dollars". But if you find that someone else has illegitamately accessed your info, you are understandably mad.
Personally I am all in favor of stronger controlls on plate information, which I think in most cases is only the business of law enforcement. Voter registration info on the other hand, in my state only tells you name adress, age, party affiliation and if they voted in the last election. It doesn't do much for a harrasser etc that the phone book wouldn't, but can be invaluable for a candidate for local election, or other political organizers. It does not ever tell anyone how you voted, which is the truely private and protected part of a democracy.
-Kahuna Burger
Public records (Score:4)
In this state I can not only get a CD-ROM with the driver's license and vehicle registration for every licensed driver and vehicle in the state, I can get a subscription with quarterly updates!
Somebody cuts me off on the road, I get their license plate, look it up on my handy CD-ROM, and well, if I weren't such a nice guy, that person might start getting strange phone calls in the night, or have even worse things happen.
The only reason there isn't more of this kind of stuff happening is most people don't realize these things are public record, and so don't bother to go pick up a copy of the records!
Have we been so busy focusing on "Internet" privacy and controlling our information in corporate databases that we forgot about all the information in GOVERNMENT databases that's accessible to anyone just for the asking?
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Re:Public records (Score:1)
Or they might get a rude postcard [dumbassdrivers.com] :) (service no longer available, unfortunately... I dunno why, but I do know the guy was paying for the postcards, postage, etc... out of his own pocket. Might've gotten too expensive and taken too much of his time)
Voting Records are NOT public (Score:1)
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
Yup, I've seen the show many times. Every time I see it, I see a huge flaw in either his interpretation of something, or his logic. One time, he was talking about the "age of discontent" that has existed in America since the Watergate scandal. The fabled discontent that Jon Katz continually talks about, and that really does exist in this country. Well, Gingrich talked about how it was a parabolic curve, and was returning to normal. Things would be right as rain by the year 2000, according to the enlightened Mr. Gingrich. Hehehehe...
Re:This is much ado about nothing. (Score:1)
I agree with all the others that this Denton County story is a nothing story. There is a legitimate public interest in allowing wide scrutiny of the information on the voter registration rolls. Having all sorts of folks looking at the entries helps to discourage intentional errors, and helps to correct unintentional ones.
Besides, there is much more sensitive info out there on the web. Like property ownership records. Like phone book entries. Like what's turned up in a quotationed google search.
Compared to that sort of info, the Denton County thing is trivial. And allowing wider public access allows for more scrutiny of errors in the info.
Ed
Re:Definitely not news ... (Score:1)
You cant change anything (Score:2)
Re:Now I'm mad (Score:1)
Re:Now I'm mad (Score:1)
this comparison lacks quite a bit; I can decline being listed in the phone book but *still* get phone service. With the American voter registration system (I am an F1 student, I can't vote here anyways), if you *want* the "service" (aka the right to vote), you *have* to give up this privacy. Major difference.
Re:Now I'm mad (Score:1)
Granted, I don't know how binding these requests are in the U.S. I know that European countries take such privacy issues more serious.
Votes should not be private. If you want to participate in the gov't there are certain freedoms you must give up. I mean would we vote for candidates that want to conduct congress in secrecy?
Did you have any history classes whatsoever? The most recent example of such a system I can think of is the former German Democratic Republic (aka. Eastern Germany before the Reunification). Sure, they called themselves democratic and yes, they even had elections, they even had booths were you could vote secretly. Fact was, if you *used* one of those booths instead of openly and proudly making your "X" for the SED (the socialist party in power since Walter Ulbricht), you were marked as possible threat and enemy of the state and you could count on being taken in for questioning by the StaSi (similar to the Gestapo in this part of Germany then). Now tell me, once you start banning private (aka. secret) voting here, how long will it take to arrive at that point? Or do you even want to go one more step backward from what democracy is all about and have only worthy people vote? After all, they have more land/money/cattle/beer/hoes, so their vote should count more? All that mankind has been thorugh already.
Now I'm mad (Score:4)
You know, this really pisses me off. In fact, I'm so enraged that I think I'll come over to your house and have a word with you in person. What county did you say you lived in again?
Re:Why do you have to register? (Score:1)
And the same concept of privacy exists in most other areas too. When income tax was instituted (to pay for WWI?) that data was made private and only covers workers, not all voters. When Social Security (gov't pension system) was started, that data was kept private, and only covers workers, not all voters. Drivers licenses are semi-public, but don't cover voters. Military draft registration has been sporadic and is treated same as the above.
When you move to a new town here, you can vote in town, county, state and federal elections. The only government record of your existence in that hierarchy is your voter registration. BTW, yes is does seem easy to abuse the system for voting fraud, and in some places it does get abused routinely. On a small scale in local elections a lot, but it has even touched national elections. President Kennedy probably would have been counted a loser without fraud in some key locales.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
you quoted something I wrote, but ignored what it meant. To give an example, Pablo Picasso was a great artist who was also abusive to women. You can talk about one aspect without commenting on the other. I was talking about Gingrich's career as a college professor. What did your statement about ethics have to do with that? (not to mention that your statement that he "was an individual" is just plain silly)
roblimo had used "Gingrichlike" to mean something like "highly partisan to the point of dirty tricks." I gave several examples from the Democrat side which you could have responded to if you were an honest debater (you're not) but you instead swerved off-topic to bring up totally unrelated ethics allegations, but you did it in a McCarthyist way, not actually citing any evidence.
Do you care to back up your claims about his ethics? He signed a book deal for a fair bit of money when he was recently elected Speaker. What made that look unethical was that his predessessor Democrat Jim Wright had actually used phony book royalties as a kickback scheme to actually collect large sums of money without actually selling any books. The difference is that Gingrich's book would likely have sold a large number of copies given the national significance of what he had just accomplished, ousting the Democrats in Congress after 40ish years, but the deal never took place so essentially you are accusing him of potentially being unethical. In his heart was he doing something unethical at that moment? If he was, it was certainly no worse than the popular Tony Coelo (sp? Democrat of CA) who was forced to resign, or the unpopular Clintons and their option trading sleight of hand.
I never tried to make the point that Republicans are more ethical than Democrats. I was making a point that people who would think somthing along those lines are immature and politically naive. roblimo, jamie, and CmdrTaco all fit that bill, as do you. As another example, there were also allegations about Gingrich's divorce and some marital infidelity, both in the realm of his lovelife... Is that what you were thinking of (like I said, Mr. McCarthyist, you were unspecific.) Because if you were, I thought Democrats keep telling us that stuff doesn't matter, stay out of people's bedrooms. Are you being a hypocrite?
Re:Republican spam (Score:3)
I'm constantly astounded by the juvenile level of political sophistication displayed by members of the "government" of Slashdot. Thank God it's a website, and not a country.
Do you really think there is some correlation between the political parties and fairness? The very reason you would use a word like "Gingrichlike" is because Gingrich was the victim of a steady stream of negative propaganda from Democrat spin doctors, and you've swallowed it hook line and sinker. Politically vicious and cynical people like Democrats James Carville and Dick Morris exist all across the spectrum. Al Gore's campaign savaged Bill Bradley just last year in the Democratic primary, accusing him of being racist. Anyone with a passing knowledge of Gore's versus Bradley's records as Democratic officeholders would think Bradley would be immune from such a vicious lie... of course, "anyone with passing knowledge" would pretty much rule out anyone who works on Slashdot.
Have you ever read or seen any of Gingrich's educational output? He was a college professor and educator, and is quite knowledgeable, non-partisan, and downright charming when he talks about the history of American democracy. Catch him on CSPAN if you ever get the chance. If he were to post to Slashdot (under a false name) his posts would be +4 Informative every time.
Could the Slashdot editors please grow up.
Re:Democrat spam (Score:1)
What we get in this forum is people like me backing up our claims with specific facts, and people like you trolling with one line, drive-by comments with no substance. No wonder your candidate is losing.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
First, Congressmen, including the seemingly powerful Speaker of the House, run for a single (short) two year term at a time to represent a very small geographic region. Gingrich represented a piece of Georgia, and he needed to play to his constituency as all other Congressmen play to theirs. Second, Newt Gingrich engineered the overthrow of the Democrats who had run the Congress for 40 years. He did it almost singlehandedly, and BTW also overthrew the weak and ineffective Republican leadership at the same time. But, the people it takes to run a revolution are not necessarily the right people to run the new order, and especially when the knives were out for him.
I thought Gingrich played his hand fairly decently and he was a darn sight more intellectual than most who work in Washington. He's the sort of guy that Slashdot should salute if Slashdot had any integrity about politics.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
Clinton's ethical and legal transgressions (perjury, porking young subordinates, and credible & numerous allegations of coerced sex and credible and numerous allegations of phony financial deals) were far worse than Gingrich's (iffy book deal allegation, politicizing a tax-free organization, and an extra-marital affair).
You will never see the above honest list and matter-of-fact laid out in the media for comparison.
I have no idea what your last line means, but I'm certainly more intellectual than 99% of Slashdot, and, as an atheist, I'm not a member of the religious right. But, I think your calling them "bastards" is illustrative of the hypocrisy of the left which purports to be accepting of freedom of thought and diversity but is in actuality viciously intolerant of anyone who holds politically different beliefs.
Re:Republican spam (Score:2)
give up. Gingrich made a career as a college professor, a whole entire career: it was being pointed out that he is a multidimensional person. People like you make a whole career out of being incapable of following a thread: a number of questions are at hand and you seem incapable of grasping them. Gingrich did make it in his political career (after having an entirely separate career as a college professor) by attacking the Democrats leading the Congress on their ethics. They were actually corrupt, and they paid for it. So, we can see there is nothing inherently less corrupt about Democrats than Republicans. That's the thread of this discussion.
As for your point about manipulating people: yes, on both sides of the aisle there are unsophisticated people who can be manipulated, and some Democrats make a career of it as well. That's what prompted Congressman J. C. Watts to call Jesse Jackson a "race-hustling poverty pimp," referring to the point that if Jesse Jackson were to actually do anything to eradicate poverty and racism, there'd be nobody to live on the welfare plantation that he oversees. Other examples of political upperclasses manipulating people in the trenches is the way politicians like Clinton and Packwood develop reputations as being pro-woman, but in their offices use their power and influence to grope and fondle women in positions of weakness, or politicians like the Kennedies or Kerry of Massachusetts who have vast wealth, and speak constantly about the disparity between the rich and the poor and the workingman, but who don't seem to wish to put their own vast wealth to work directly helping the poor and the workingman.
As has been said, fairly a few times: people like you are the problem, people who politicize every issue rather than pointing out that human frailty extends to all humans, not just those of one party.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)
Voting records are public, and that's common fact. Sending you literature and inviting you to meetings on issues that you vote on often isn't exactly that cynical. It is, however, a bit annoying if you can't stop it (which often times you can't, but with the right moves you should be able to).
Re:Why do you have to register? (Score:1)
It's not a huge commitment of time or effort, anyone of age can do it, it's not like it's a real discrimination unless you say poor people are poor because they're lazy
the facts are, rich and old people are much more likely to vote than young and poor peaple. Do you believe it is because poor people are generally happy and carefree and humming 'summertimes' all day long and young folk just instinctively trust their elders to do the right thing?
If the young and the poor can't take 30 minutes out of some saturday to register to vote then they don't deserve to
Indeed, if they can't work, and get rich, and buy a dinnerplate at a fundraiser, they should all be in jail anyway, there they'll have 'time' aplenty. Suits them well, these parasites.
Of course, if you can afford to read this, time is not your problem;-)
Re:Why do you have to register? (Score:1)
My point about affiliation is not technical, and it isn't about privacy either, but about the way it makes it easier to use redistricting to preempt the election. Is Ohio special in that respect?
Re:Why do you have to register? (Score:2)
In addition, registration requires you to state your political affiliation. This is extremely important because it allows the two parties to draw the boundaries between districts in a way that protects their incumbents, making most congressional elections pretty meaningless and further depressing voters turnout.
Low voters turnout benefits the two parties because it makes politics easier to manipulate and undermines challengers, and it particularly benefits Republicans because it deppresses voters that are less likely to vote for them.
All in all, it is a beautiful and ingenious system.
Michael, (Score:1)
I just wish more editors did some research before posting.
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Re:This is much ado about nothing. (Score:1)
Re:UK voter details are public, but is your vote? (Score:2)
Online voting will change all that...
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when registering (Score:1)
Re:Now I'm mad (Score:1)
Sustaining privacy isn't easy (Score:2)
Risks of Accessible,Public Voter Registration Info (Score:1)
Yes, voter registration records are public information. And this poses a great risk for:
- people who are fleeing abusive relationships
- people who work in occupations where privacy is important (e.g., therapist, police officer, journalist)
- victims whose perpetrators are out for revenge
Should voter reigistration information be public information? Or should it require a subpoena or some other request? It's important in democracy to verify that the people who voted are the residents they claim to be. But should voting be a right allowed only to those who are willing to give up a lot of privacy? And how much information needs to be displayed? Why date of birth and address, but not proof of citizenship or proof of no felony convictions?
Furthermore, should driving be a privilege only to those who are willing to give up some privacy? In TX, like other states, you're automatically registered to vote if you're eligible when you get a driver's license because of the "Motor Voter" law. I'm not even sure if you can opt-out of motor votor. So, if you get a license, your address is publicly available.
When I went for my driver's license this year, I think there was a checkbox for motor votor, but there was nothing about the privacy implications or that my address would be available on the web.
The problem with having registration records on the web is that it makes it so much easier for someone to gather your information. And I'm not talking about the annoying aluminum siding company or local church. I'm talking about the kinds of people who hold a grudge against you.
Whoever put the website together (I can't get through to them on the phone), certainly didn't think about these privacy considerations. The county just put up a lame disclaimer that they're not responsible for the accuracy of the info or how it's used.
Re:Now I'm mad (Score:1)
BAN PHONE BOOKS!
This is actually good. (Score:1)
So what? (Score:2)
Increased data for the governers makes for better government. How are they supposed to govern without information about those they are governing, after all?
KTB:Lover, Poet, Artiste, Aesthete, Programmer.
Re:Sustaining privacy isn't easy (Score:1)
Re:damn (Score:1)
But, this is exactly why voter registration information is and should be public. Making it public is a major anti-fraud mechanism.
Denton county (Score:1)
Re:And (Score:1)
Re:And (Score:1)
Re:And (Score:1)
Linus is not USian. Linus is Eruopish.
And I'm sure whatever you're doing at 9:30 on a Saturday morning is just as pathetic.
Re:when registering (Score:1)
But then how would AOL users be able to vote online.
Re:Republican spam (Score:1)