Dead Goldfish Offered The Vote In Illinois

Election officials in northern Chicago want to know why voter registration material was sent to Princess, a dead goldfish. "I am just stunned at the level of people compromising the integrity of the voting process," said Lake County Clerk Willard Helander, a Republican, who said she has spotted problems with nearly 1,000 voter registrations this year. Beth Nudelman, who owned Princess, said the fish may have got on a mailing list because the family once filled in her name when they got a second phone line for a computer. When will we recognize a goldfish's right to vote?

Comments

Registration Materials

[MyLongNickName]

Oh no, it got sent registration materials. It did not get registered. The paperwork was sent out based on a request. It is the end of Democracy as we know it!

Re:Registration Materials

[stinerman]

And if Princess registers, she will show up to the polling place and cast a ballot.

You think anyone would notice Princess isn't a qualified elector?

Re:Registration Materials

[Straif]

Two words for this line of thinking: Absentee ballot.

Registration fraud is not just about making it possible to walk in and vote illegally in person, it also about just getting on the rolls so that a ballot can be requested by mail. And with the minimal validations being enforced in most states, it's not all that hard to do. There have already been reported cases of dead people having already voted, both federally and in the primaries.

Then of course there is the drive by voting trend that seems to be becoming more popular where people just enter a state long enough to register vote and leave (in direct violation of state voting laws). At least 14 cases have already been well documented (one an official Obama campaign worker and 13 others in an Obama associated 'get out the vote' group).

But to be fair in this stories case, this was more about a voter registration group just bulk mailing forms.

Re:Registration Materials

[samkass]

It gets even WORSE! Can you believe that some people are distributing BLANK registration forms that let you enter ANY NAME YOU WANT in the "Name" field??1!one! Let's throw out the entire democratic system because it can't possibly be perfect!

To clarify the summary-- the registration forms (not the actual registration) were sent to the goldfish because the owner had lied about a name on phone records previously, entering the goldfish's name. The goldfish was not registered, and probably could not have come up with the ID (the form required a driver's license # or last-four SSN that matched the name) if it tried.

Why am I not worried?

Re:Registration Materials

[tverbeek]

This is getting out of hand, to be sure. In some states it's possible to register to vote even if your grandfather wasn't registered! Clearly voter registration requirements have become overly lax since the 19th century.

I'd be more concerned...

[orthancstone]

if election officials actually provided the pet with the ABILITY (aka some form of proof that is acceptable at a voting location) to vote.

Re:I'd be more concerned...

[XxtraLarGe]

The point is that someone would be ABLE to vote on princess's behalf at the voting location. Not all polls care about a voter's ID.

Re:I'd be more concerned...

[jgtg32a]

because requiring ID is racist

Re:I'd be more concerned...

[Agent__Smith]

It also, in a state like mine, Arizona, helps weed out those who are here illegally, but who ACORN not only helped to get mortgages by the hundreds of thousands, but also helped find ways to register to vote. As these illegals tend to vote DEMOCRAT in disproportionate numbers, I guess you could call that partisan... I don't buy the "are poor and don't own vehicles" crap, as even many of the illegals purchase and own automobiles, and also, as an adult in this country, you can get a state ID that is not a driver license, and I would imagine that most do as you could not do anything from buy liquor and cigarettes to trying to open a checking account or apply for a job of any kind without one. So your point is garbage.

Voter suppresion at work

[yareckon]

This is the humorous media end of a much more sinister campaign designed to convince people that lots of scary voter fraud is taking place and that we need to crack down at the polling places to stop it.

The republicans are scared stiff, and want everyone to put aside the rights of new voters in a cloud of suspicion and red tape that will clog voting places, keep folks standing in line and frustrated them into not voting in minority and heavily Democratic areas. Casting suspicion on the lists used to target voters for persuasive ads is one thing - many of these are commercial advertising lists. Saying that the actual voter list has bad names on it, which evil people put there, who intend to risk their liberty to vote more than once, is harder to believe.

Re:Voter suppresion at work

[PixelScuba]

Voting is a right, driving is a privilege.

Re:Bad registration doesn't matter

[Anonymous Coward]

Bull.

I'd like to point out that I understand that this was just a case of the family getting a registration packet for a fish that was pining for the fjords.

However, the large influx of fraudulent/comical/garbage registrations that ARE being submitted is using up resources that should be used to remove the following entries:
1. non-citizens who have driver's licenses, and so (in some states) are automatically registered to vote
2. felons whose voting rights have been stripped as part of being found guilty, but are still (or are being actively) registered
3. people who have mistakes on the registry form, and need those fixed in order for their vote to be counted

The first two dilute the legitimate voters' rights (I don't fly to Germany and vote in their elections!) and the third case disenfranchises legitimate people whose votes deserve to be counted. There are documented cases where known felons' votes are being tallied, specifically because the election boards are overwhelmed, and don't want to wrongfully exclude those whose rights have been restored. (It's fine with me that a felon whose right has been restored gets to vote.)

I'd also like to point out that in some states (Ohio) registration and voting happened the same day, and once the votes are accepted, there is no way to remove them from the process. So in those cases, registration fraud and voter fraud can happen simultaneously.

Everyone talks about a fair election, how about being fair to those of us who maintain our citizenship and stay out of trouble?

Re:The Obama Campaign

[El Royo]

Which is odd, since she has more executive experience than the other three folks involved in the race -- combined.

Re:Bad registration doesn't matter

[Straif]

The problem with that thinking is that people are stuck on the concept of physically showing up to vote. As most states have some form of absentee voting system many of these fraudulent registrations can lead to actual votes.

There have already been reported cases of dead people voting through absentee ballots both federally and in the primaries.

Re:The Obama Campaign

[Weasel Boy]

Perhaps this is why we tend to elect governors as president, not senators.

Re:The Obama Campaign

[bonch]

It gets worse. ACORN has been registering dead people, homeless people, Mickey Mouse, you name it. What was even more sickening is that Democrats on Huffington Post claimed Republicans were trying to "steal the election" by shutting down the "legitimate operations" of ACORN.

I can't trust either one of these fucking political parties.

Re:The Obama Campaign

[gd2shoe]

This isn't the first time this has happened "to" ACORN. Drawing the connection to the Democrat party isn't a stretch. At a minimum, Obama used to work for them. I'm not going to blame ACORN, yet. Let there be an investigation. Yes, I know that phrase is overused, but here it's warranted. Something about their policies or practices is allowing a tendency of fraud.