Registering the Poor to Vote is Un-American

American Thinker ^ | September 1, 2011 | Matthew Vadum

[Twotone]

Why are left-wing activist groups so keen on registering the poor to vote?

Because they know the poor can be counted on to vote themselves more benefits by electing redistributionist politicians. Welfare recipients are particularly open to demagoguery and bribery.

[Twotone]

I'm very surprised that this article wasn't posted already! But of course, it's stuff we FReepers already know.

[troy McClure]

Only land owners should be allowed to vote.

[Cincinna]

Every American citizen has the right to vote.

[Sacajaweau]

Alzheimer patients get to sign up...Sick....but you know it is happening.

[NoLibZone]

One should only be able to vote where one pays taxes.

If you don’t pay Fed taxes then you should be barred from voting in Federal elections.

If you don’t pay taxes in the state , you must not be allowed to vote in that state.

[lastchance]

Agreed. Even those who don’t own property are affected by the decisions government makes. They also pay taxes in many ways and they contribute to the economy.

[hoagy62]

If the poor can’t vote, then I’m out.
If only land owners can vote, I’m out.

I’m DAMN sure not a Democrat, and I DAMN sure for conservatives. Why take my vote out? Yes, I understand the reason, but c’mon!

[lastchance]

What nonsense. Just what taxes do you mean? Sales tax? Gasoline tax? Tax on alcohol? The money taken from the rent you pay which the land owner uses to pay tax? How about unemployment tax? What about money taken from your wages for FICA?

The idea of a system where by design citizens are shut out from having a voice in our government is repugnant in the extreme. To establish policy that furthers class division is playing right into the hands of radical liberalism.

[Little Ray]

What is repugnant in the extreme is the idea of a system where people can vote money out of your pocket and into theirs.

I’ll take silencing the parasites over that anytime.

[WayneS]

I would say: Only citizens who pay federal income taxes should be allowed to vote; also active duty and retired military personnel, whether or not they earn enough to pay taxes.

There is only a finite amount of land available for ownership, and I would not deny the vote to anyone who works hard and positively contributes to our nation.

[Ohioan]

The time is long since past, to reverse the trend towards always extending the suffrage, to reevaluating the whole question. Under the Constitution, the requirements for suffrage were left to the States--even as to suffrage in Federal elections--with the Federal suffrage being determined in each State, by that State's standards for its most popular House of the State Legislature (Art. I, Sec. 2, United States Constitution.) But the politicians, have long since abandoned that wise provision in favor of jockying for advantage by extending the suffrage, by Constitutional Amendments, that override whatever the social values of the individual States provided.

Yet the clear conflict of interest, over Federal entitlements, makes it mandatory that we reexamine this, before the worst prophesies of our future come home to roost. (See Universal Suffrage--Threat To Freedom.) The present debt crisis is directly attributable to allowing people to elect parasites who will feather their respective nests, rather than serve the intended Constitutional purpose of providing an economic environment that brings out the best, rather than the absolute worst, in the individual citizen.

If you receive an unearned benefit from the Federal Government, there ought to be an appropriate cut-off of voting rights for a period comparable to that in which your conflict of interest is apparent, plus two years--or some such..

William Flax

[dhs12345]

You are probably right. Unfortunately, people will probably do the selfish thing and vote themselves more Obama money versus do the right thing.

It happens at all levels, too — we vote for the politician who brings the most pork to our States. We may have only paid a small fraction in taxes of what is returned to us in pork.

I guess that is the system, however imperfect.

[mamelukesabre]

that’s primitive.

but we really should outlaw motor voter registrations, programs to asssist people to register, and voter registration advertisment campaigns.

[Track9]

If the tax code were revised so everyone payed a flat tax and our ridiculous progressive income tax were abolished, then I think you would agree, getting everyone to have ‘skin in the game’ would not be discriminatory.

[Ohioan]

See my post #11. The fair way to handle this is to restrict the suffrage to those who do not accept unearned benefits from Governments. Obviously those who receive Veterans' benefits have earned them; but there are all sorts of benefits being paid today to those who have not earned them. Those "entitlements" are what are bankrupting the Governments, State & Federal.

William Flax

[Hugin]

Everybody pays taxes, whether they know it or not. Not everybody pays INCOME TAX. But the working poor pay SS and Medicare, and everyone pays sales taxes, utility taxes, gas taxes, etc. plus they pay corporate income tax indirectly in the cost of everything they consume.

[Hugin]

So are Social Security and Medicare “unearned” in your book? I’ve been paying into them for 40 years now.

[troy McClure]

Anyone can be a land owner in the USA.

Everyone can but you have to make the effort.

http://www.cheaplandinamerica.com/

[Ohioan]

The fair & logical way to handle the problem is to "cut to the chase." The problem is people electing representatives who will reward them with unearned entitlements. The remedy is that if you accept an unearned entitlement, you give up your suffrage, effective immediately & for at least two years after the entitlement ends. If you refuse the "bribe," you keep your vote.

See #11.

William Flax

[Hugin]

Renters pay their landlord’s property taxes but get no deduction for it.