[Ed Note: Threat of violence removed. Violation of BRAD BLOG commenting rules. Knock it off. Thank you. - BF]

I am pretty sure that the GOP lunatics at large are going to try to steal the 2012 election.
All you hear in the media is poll poll polls etc and I fully believe that every last one of them is bias regardless whom does them thus they are worthless.

But that is ALL you hear everyday, every channel, is this poll says, that poll says.
To me what it appears to be is really an inoculation, a precursor, to get people resigned to the "fact" (the poll says) that Obama and which ever lunatic the rethuglicans nominate are neck and neck.
they know that all they have to do is make it appear as though they are very close and it makes it childs play to steal the election.

Oh yes.. this is such a scary and threatening letter... so much worse than say black panthers in front of the voting area with clubs in their hands swearing thd threatening people away from voting... my goodness these republicans with their mighty pen swords... makes a girl swoon with fear... NOT

Trouble with your reference, DKL, is that 1/2 of the black panthers spotted outside that Philly precinct were actually certified as civilian voting observers. In other words, authorized to be there.

The other guy was prosecuted for carrying the club.

2 black guys in front of a 95% black precinct. Not 1 complaint from a voter IN THAT PRECINCT!

Oh, those scary black folk working to protect their constitutionally guaranteed rights..

racism is ugly, DKL. When you wallow in it, that ugliness rubs off on you.

Not only does DKL ignore the actual facts of the incident in PA (no voters who were "intimidated" were ever found), he also ignores the well known saying that far more has been stolen with the point of a pen than the point of a gun.

DKL is 0-2, so who wants to bet he goes for the strike-out on his next post?

"Perhaps the only positive thing one can say about GOP voter suppression is that it is relentless."

That can also be negative Ernie, especially when they use and get their energy from the dark side of the force.

Nunyabiz #1,

Does it really matter any more? Are we so dazed and confused that we think we have a choice any more?

We can't deal with it, but the world is trying to from a distance.

Not good.

oops, sorry Nunyabiz, I should have said #2 ...

The Republican party is quickly teaching young potential voters what they're all about. If I was a student that was restricted from voting, I would remember it forever, and I wouldn't like it. Republicans don't think very long term, do they?

And in Wisconsin, the Republican leaders of the state had a rude awakening when the Government Accountability Board ruled that universities and colleges could attach a sticker to the back of student ID cards to provide any necessary information in order for the students to vote in Wisconsin. Their reaction? See:
http://host.madison.com/...0-941e-001cc4c002e0.html

Maine is having an election in Now. . We can vote on whether to stop same day voting or not. Only problem, the question is so convoluted that many may not vote according to the way they feel is right.

Re Molly @11. The vote in November is on the right to same day registration --- a people's veto of the GOP effort to end that right.

While many may not fully appreciate the significance, citizens must come to understand that the assault on same day registration is but one component of a concerted, billionaire-funded and controlled effort to eliminate the ballot as the great equalizer in a society whose economic disparity is so great as to lean towards a new feudalism.

It is important that grass roots organizations get the word out that what is at stake is nothing less than democracy in Maine.

Sorry, but I don't see the intimidation in this letter.

I suspect that in the course of the voter fraud investigation the SoS discovered that there were out-of-state students who were registered to vote who did not have a Maine driver's license and people who were registered to vote in Maine yet were no longer living there.

Nowhere does he state that the recipient's voter registration is improper or in jeopardy. He neither states nor infers that you must have a Maine driver's license to vote.

Indeed, perhaps all these letters were sent to just two classes of people: Students residing in Maine without a driver's license and students who left Maine yet are still registered to vote there. That would explain the use of the word, "Instead" which implies some sort of linkage, as you note.

I think your "reasonable inference" is not in fact reasonable.

John P. Garry III @ 13:

Sorry, but the folks in Maine --- at least the Sun Journal editorial board --- disagrees with you, and agrees with Ernie. They also ask this salient question in pointing over here in support of Ernie's piece:

Read their coverage to see the numbers that the Sec. of State would be costing the state if he followed through with his intimidation.

As to your specific points, you wrote:

I suspect that in the course of the voter fraud investigation the SoS discovered that there were out-of-state students who were registered to vote who did not have a Maine driver's license and people who were registered to vote in Maine yet were no longer living there.

And, of course, neither of those things is illegal. Having a Maine driver's license has NOTHING to do with voting in Maine. So your point is what again?

Nowhere does he state that the recipient's voter registration is improper or in jeopardy. He neither states nor infers that you must have a Maine driver's license to vote.

So why did he bother to send them that letter? Did he send it to anybody else in the entire state who may have recently moved there?

Indeed, perhaps all these letters were sent to just two classes of people: Students residing in Maine without a driver's license and students who left Maine yet are still registered to vote there. That would explain the use of the word, "Instead" which implies some sort of linkage, as you note.

No. The only "classes" of people who received the letter were the ones who had their life uprooted by the chair of Maine's Republican Party by being identified as a possible criminal, despite having broken no laws.

I think your "reasonable inference" is not in fact reasonable.

Thanks for your thoughts. I think your comment has nothing to do with reasonableness, and everything to do with a partisan interest in intimidating voters from participating in their democracy.

I'm afraid, John P. Garry,III, @13 that you've missed the mark by a country mile.

1. The evidence does not support your speculation that "the SoS discovered that there were out-of-state students who were registered to vote who did not have a Maine driver's license."

a) The letter makes no mention of such a "discovery." It does not inform the recipients of such a "discovery."

b) Since the purpose of the "investigation" was to determine whether any of the noble 206 committed "voter fraud" and since possession of a driver's license has nothing to do with the right to cast a vote in ME, there was no reason why the SoS should even examine the question of whether the 206 had ME driver's licenses.

c) The argument about driver's licenses came from the clueless GOP Chair Charlie Summers during the radio broadcast we covered in Local Radio Hosts School Maine's Hapless GOP Chair on College Students' Right to Vote. The SoS knew full well that Summers was flat-out wrong, yet he addresses a letter to the 206 about the topic?

2) You are correct that the SoS took pains not to "explicitly" make a false statement to the effect that one must possess a ME driver's license to vote. But you willfully choose to ignore the unassailable fact that since there is no link between driver's licenses and the right to vote, there was no reason why the SoS should have singled out the innocent 206 for a letter that discusses driver's licenses, the "investigation" of the 206 for "election fraud" and a withdrawal of their status as registered voters eligible to vote in ME.

3) There is not one word that suggests this letter was addressed to "students no longer residing in Maine." Your effort to suggest as much reveals a desperate grasping for something, anything that would evade the unmistakable intent of the SoS letter --- intimidation!

4) You conveniently ignore the precise effect that the letter had on those recipients interviewed by ThinkProgress. The fact that someone, like yourself, with the luxury of academic distance, does not personally experience intimidation, does not mean that those who are the direct recipients would likely be intimidated --- especially when the letter bears the official seal of the SoS, which itself carries the implicit threat that it is backed by the power of the state.