Supreme Court Voter ID Update

Ed Lasky reports on a New York Times editorial on the voter ID issue, which holds that the Supreme Court should not serve the "electoral purposes of a political party" when it decides whether to uphold an Indiana Voter ID law. The editorial makes clear that, in its view, upholding the law would aid the GOP, since members of communities that disproportionately vote Democratic would most likely be affected (immigrants, African-Americans, the less well-off). Yet if the Court votes against Indiana, it will be supporting the "electoral purposes" of another political party, the Democratic Party. The Times yet again illustrates it is willing to throw logic overboard for political purposes.

In the same online article, Clarice Feldman also reports on a surprising twist:
One of the individuals used by opponents to the law as an example of how the law hurts older Hoosiers is registered to vote in two states.

The irony here couldn't get any better!!!  One of the people that Democrats are holding up as an example of voter disenfranchisement due to requiring photo ID is actually guilty -- and was caught red-handed in a very public moment -- of voter fraud that would likely have been prevented if she had been required to show a photo ID.  I love it!

Finally, Linda Greenhouse reports in the NYT that the Supreme Court is really showing a lot of skepticism:

The justices' questioning indicated that a majority did not accept the challengers' basic argument — that voter-impersonation fraud is not a problem, so requiring voters to produce government-issued photo identification at the polls is an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote.

The tenor of the argument suggested, however, that rather than simply decide the case in favor of the state, a majority of five justices would go further and rule that the challenge to the statute, the strictest voter-identification law in the country, was improperly brought in the first place. Such a ruling could make it much more difficult to challenge any new state election regulations before they go into effect.

Basically, this implication is that the ACLU and Democrats may not only lose, but they may lose so big that future opportunities to challenge photo ID laws will go away, too.

Can we say case closed, anyone?  Let's hope it works out that way.

By the way, if the vote comes out at 5-4, prepare yourself for a lot of whining and bellyaching about how it's a 'bitterly divided court', as if that makes a difference in how binding the decision is.  The reality is that the decision is totally binding whether it's 5-4 or 9-0.  Just keep that in mind.

There's my two cents.