Wednesday, October 15, 2008

Voter Fraud vs Voter Registration Fraud - Who Cares

As stories come to light on an almost daily basis about thousands and tens of thousands of voter registration fraud incidents predominantly against ACORN, their supporters keep trying to deflect criticism based on the notion that it is voter registration fraud and not voter fraud. While their is a distinction, that should not act as an excuse. Voter registration fraud is a prerequisite to voter fraud. If you are registered once, you can only vote once. If you are registered more that once than you could potentially vote more than once. If ACORN is registering people more than once than they are enabling people to vote more than once. Yes, many have been caught, but how many have slipped through the cracks? I do not know and you do not know, but anyone who remembers the last two presidential elections knows it would not take many to tip the election in favor of one of the candidates. Saying that ACORN or any other group which has/is registering voters fraudulently should be given a pass because it has not yet risen to the level of voter fraud is ridiculous. Let me explain with another example.

A hypothetical group, lets call is B-Corn, is going all over the country planting time bombs. These tiny, acorn size explosives, are set detonate on November 4th. These bombs are easy to disarm if you find them. Thousands of the explosives have been found marked with B-Corn's logo because they were not hidden very well. Some concerned citizens are now trying to stop B-Corn from planting anymore of these bombs. The concern is that some of the obvious explosives may not be found and among the more ignorant bomb setters there may be some who are are experts at hiding these devices. When called in to talk with the media, B-Corn says they should be allowed to continue on their mission and allowed to plant more bombs unhindered because they have not killed anyone yet and given that their explosives are apparently easy to find it is extremely unlikely anyone will be killed on November 4th.

Of course B-Corn has not yet killed anyone because the bombs have not yet gone off. Similarly ACORN has not aided in voter fraud this election cycle because people have not yet voted. Just as B-Corn should not be allowed to plant more explosives regardless of the lack of deaths yet, ACORN should be prevented from registering fraudulent voters despite the lack of current election cycle voter fraud.

Now there is difference between randomly planting tiny bombs and registering people to vote in that registering people to vote is a noble endeavor. Voter registration fraud however is similar to planting explosives in that neither serves any legitimate purpose and both can have strong negative repercussions. On election day nothing less the position as leader of the free world has to be determined. A strong argument could be made that tampering with this process could have even more disastrous consequences then a few small bombs blowing up in random locations.

If you do not believe me allow me to prove the point? For those that opposed the war in Iraq, do you think that war was more disastrous than a few small bombs detonating here at home? For those that supported the war in Iraq, do you think that not fighting the war would have been more disastrous then a few small bombs detonating here at home?

The fear of voter registration fraud is that it enables and will lead to voter registration fraud. The fear is not of those that have been caught, but those that have slipped through the cracks. The fear is of another election were the president is not known until well after the vote because of endless investigations, or worse yet a president elected fraudulently.

Call these people to task and do not give them tens of thousands of chances to slip a through the cracks. The laws should be changed to punish those who commit voter registration fraud to near the same level as those that commit voter fraud. Someone needs to stop this before it is to late.


  1. HI! Thanks for making that more clear. A person commented on my blog about my use of 'voter fraud' and dismissed the whole account of Obama's connection with ACORN based on that. You make some good points about this. They are clearly trying to divert the issue.

    lisa smiley

  2. There is a BIG difference between voter registration fraud, where Acorn is ripped off by some of the people they hire to register folks, and VOTE fraud. Donald Duck has to show up at the polling place, WITH identification, and then risk a prison sentence to change ONE vote in ONE district. Similarly, people registered more than once are checked off by name and address when they vote - they can still only vote once, and risk going to jail for many years the second time they show up to try. That's why there has never been a SINGLE election where this form of vote fraud has been tried - REAL vote fraud is done in BIG NUMBERS by people who control the counting or the machines.

    A good discussion of the details (written by a liberal) can be found at; an overview of REAL vote fraud throughout American history (written by Jack Shafer, a conservative) is at

    Using voter registration fraud and then having people show up and risk jail time for illegal votes one at a time is stupid. Much easier to pay folks to vote your way or to falsify absentee ballots, or (more common still) just rig the counts.

  3. Politico explains how fraudulent registrations can be converted into illegal votes at: . Remember, it would not take many. Just over 500 voters tipped the scales in 2000.


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