As if it weren’t dead enough, bipartisanship stumbled this week when Judge Robert Simpson of the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court refused to block the state’s voter identification law. Such laws may appear benign and reasonable in their wording, but at least in this case the intent was “to allow Governor Romney to win the state of Pennsylvania.” That’s not me speaking; that’s Mike Turzai, the Republican Majority Leader who sponsored the legislation. A recent study found 27 instances of voter impersonation in 197 million votes cast across the country from 2002-5. To swat that gnat, lawmakers are eager to disenfranchise as many as 9 percent of the state’s eligible voters.
Tolerance stumbled again in Tampa when the GOP platform committee added a draconian plank on immigration to go with its call to end abortion with no exceptions. Explained Kris Kobach, Kansas’ Secretary of State, “If you really want to create a job tomorrow, you can remove an illegal alien today,” oblivious to how many more of our jobs are going to Asia than to immigrants. I can’t wait to see the convention’s civil rights plank.
Now that Larry Ellison has bought the Hawaiian island of Lanai, archrival Bill Gates has apparently set his sights on Rhode Island.Asked his opinion on buying a whole state, presumptive GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney, “I am in favor of privatization . . . especially of states whose electoral votes my campaign wrote off months ago.”