All election campaigns are filled with rhetoric designed by each side to demonize the other. Nothing new there. What does seem to be new, particularly with what comes from the left, is the assumption that the voting public has somehow lost its ability to think at all. The assertion that certain segments of the American electorate will somehow be “disenfranchised” if required to identify themselves prior to voting is an example.
The only Americans who are disenfranchised are those who, through laziness or some other reason known only to them, haven’t bothered to register. Most of us of voting age have driver’s licenses, the standard of identification in all pursuits. Those who don’t drive but wish to vote may get a photo ID like the one my non-driving mother carried. This is common knowledge. It appears, then, that the obvious purpose for the almost laughable charge of disenfranchisement is to allow non-citizens to vote in our elections. I can’t force myself to believe that any citizen of this country, whether from the left or the right, would want our election process polluted by those with no right to participate. The implications of allowing such an invasion should be obvious. But the choice to use non-existent disenfranchisement as a talking point by one side in this election tells me they don’t think obvious things make even the slightest dent in our collective skulls. In other, more inflammatory words, they’re calling us stupid. It’s time the voting public proved them wrong.
Dennis Fishel
Lake Forest Park
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