So far today I've heard 14,325 (rough estimate) different reasons why Democrats got pummeled last night.
Some have validity, some don't. There's one reason though that sticks out to me more than the others. Voter ID laws.
Oh no, a voter had to show an ID at the polls and this is restrictive to minority voters who tend to vote for our side.
First of all, and I know folks are going to jump on me for this, I'm not entirely sure that I'm even against this. I mean Jesus Christ, you need an ID to buy beer, open a bank account, pick up something you ordered from Home Depot and had shipped to the store and a million other things. You need an ID to be a functioning member of society for god's sake. And in many states, getting a state ID is free so not having the money is not an excuse.
Furthermore, if you are the kind of person that doesn't have an ID, a bank account or a means to go into a bar and order a beer, are you really the kind of person that is keeping up with the issues in an off year election?
That being said, I'm not sure I'm for it either. But unless there's some legal case to be made that can get these laws overturned, these laws aren't going away, especially in states that are dominated by Republicans. That's just reality.
So here's a novel idea; instead of whining about it every election cycle, how about we go about organizing ID drives now instead of acting shocked on election eve two years from now that some people may not be able to vote because they lack the required paperwork. Why can't the Democrats vaunted GOTV operation be used the day after an election as opposed to just the weeks leading up to it?
While we're at it, just stop with the "They're taking away same day voter registration from us. That's not fair!" Seriously? If you've waited until the day of the election to get somebody registered, you're doing it wrong. Again, apparently I need somebody to explain to me why we can't canvass neighborhoods in March instead of just October. Is it too cold in March? Is that the problem? Do we Democratic activists only get fired up just before an election? If that's the case, we might as well give up now.
You know what else would be nice, if we could stop whining about the lack of poll workers at many of the more urban polling stations. Again, this is something that we can actually do something about. Let's not forget that many of these dreadfully disorganized polling places are in heavily Democratic areas and controlled by Democratic election commissions.
Yes, fine, we need to continue to fight these laws in court and in the legislatures around the country but in the meantime, lets fix the things that are easily fixable shall we? Things such as rolling back early voting and the general lack of voting machines in the more urban areas are things that we can't fix without a fight. But getting John an ID or Mary registered to vote are things that things that any single one of us could help get done today, you know, before the next election sneaks up on us without telling us that it was coming.