It is no secret that Republicans have been trying desperately to prevent Democratic voters from being able to cast a ballot through Voter ID laws and other vote suppression measures. The Republicans efforts to restrict the vote in Minnesota have not been successful so far and they have grown desperate, so desperate in fact that they are willing to literally throw away the entire military vote in order to prevent a law that would make it easier for the people of this state to cast a ballot.
Republicans tried to push a Voter ID law on Minnesota last November through a Constitutional Amendment, unfortunately for Republicans most voters in this state are not as stupid as they wish we were and we rejected their amendment at the ballot box.
Now Minnesota Democrats have taken up a new voting measure, but unlike the Republicans proposal the Democrats want to expand people's opportunities to vote rather than limit them. A bill has been introduced to our state legislature that would bring early voting to the state of Minnesota.
As you can probably guess Republicans don't want to make it any easier for people to vote so they are determined to stop the early voting bill from going through. Their argument is that the state Constitution specifies the date of the election so therefore they claim it is unconstitutional to cast votes before election day. There is one problem with their argument however, people already have been casting votes before election day in Minnesota for years. While Minnesota does not have early voting it does provide absentee ballots to people who are going to be out of town or are for any other reason unable to make it the polls on election day. If it is unconstitutional to vote before election day through early voting then it would also mean that absentee ballots are unconstitutional as well, but no one would be stupid enough to try to ban absentee voting in the state would they?
Well it turns out that State Senator Warren Limmer is that stupid...
State Sen. Warren Limmer, R-Maple Grove, another sponsor of voter ID, raised doubts about the legality of absentee voting. Minnesotans can vote absentee before an election if they are disabled or sick or if they expect to be traveling during an election.
Sen. Ann Rest, DFL-New Hope, warned Limmer and other legislators against edging toward a constitutional showdown over absentee voting.
“Senator Limmer, you are disenfranchising the vote of every singe member of the military,” Rest said. “I don’t think you want to go there.”
Limmer shot back: “I am not going to sit here and be questioned about my motive and be warned not to go somewhere.”
http://www.startribune.com/...
Limmer is standing his ground, he may be disenfranchising all active duty military personnel along with many thousands of other ordinary Minnesotans, but he is telling us that he is going to go there and we better not warn him to stop.
Well Senator Limmer does not have to worry about me warning him not to go there, instead I will politely tell him to "please proceed".