A free id card for voting is available

https://www.elections.virginia.gov/media/archive/voter-photo...

Also one can vote without an ID

https://www.elections.virginia.gov/registration/voterid/

The free ID application must be presented in person, which will take a lot of time, and time is money.

I have served as an election officer in Fairfax County, Virginia since 2012.

Every. Single. Legal. Voter. Will. Be. Given. A. Ballot.

Your allegations may have merit elsewhere, but the "Virginia is for Lovers". Of elections.

If one actually gives a GIVE about election integrity, then a well-staffed polling place with a secret ballot cast and counted on reliable equipment is PRECISELY what is sought.

These mail ballots and drop boxes are relatively weak, security-wise.

What we DON'T seem to hear is any sort of thorough analysis.

I'm as big a geek as anyone, but simple, low-tech systems seem preferred.

And don't get me started on these Rank-Choice Ballots.

There is zero evidence of any real election fraud. This is a fear tactic of right wing nuts that want to suppress minority and poor voters.

Well, gosh, it's just swell how you whisked vast amounts of genuine concern off to the cornfield.

Nevertheless, let's have hardcopy ballots cast on election day at properly funded and staffed polling places.

Why the simplest, most obvious and fair approach marks me some "right wing nut" is unclear.

However, unlike Tim Walz, I rogered up and actually deployed to Operation Enduring Freedom when called.

https://x.com/smitty_one_each/status/1821337514042347855?s=1...

>However, unlike Tim Walz, I rogered up and actually deployed to Operation Enduring Freedom when called.

What a weird non-sequitur.

Perfectly coherent. The sane, patriotic, adult majority in the country have had about a bellyfull of the nonsense accusations thrown at us.

Speak sober truth and wisdom, and we'll do fine.

Walz, like you, deployed to Operation Enduring Freedom when called.

https://taskandpurpose.com/news/swift-boat-walz/ says that he retired after 20 years of service with the Minnesota National Guard, re-upped after 9/11, then did "a year-long deployment as part of Operation Enduring Freedom in Turkey and Europe."

If there is any interest in ground truth concerning the situation: "Many of you are asking how Tim Walz was able to get away with lying about his service record for so long."

https://x.com/GrageDustin/status/1821908435316691277?s=19

Walz deployed for a year for as part of Operation Enduring Freedom, which is something you claimed he did not do, in your flagged comment.

An X link is a lousy source. I don't care to wallow in that muck heap, and without an account I can't read more than the one posting you linked to.

What is wrong with the Task & Purpose description of the situation?

Walz bagged out.

I realize that the Narrative Alchemists think they can transform any lead into gold, but this is some tough material[1].

It's also a fair point that 20-year old news is less than fresh, but the Narrative Alchemists certainly don't want voters asking any hard questions about policy and direction.

So we get these lousy personality/biography reviews in lieu of serious discussion.

[1] https://hotair.com/ed-morrissey/2024/08/10/walz-former-super...

Yes or no question for you.

Did Walz deploy for a year, in 2003-2004, as part of Operation Enduring Freedom?

No.

"Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) was the official name used by the U.S. government for both the first stage (2001–2014) of the War in Afghanistan (2001–2021) and the larger-scale Global War on Terrorism." [0]

"Walz deployed in August 2003 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. The Minnesota National Guard told CBS News the battalion supported security missions at various locations in Europe and Turkey. Walz was stationed at Vicenza, Italy, at the time and returned to Minnesota in April 2004." [1]

So, as someone who actually deployed to Afghanistan with 270 days of boots on the ground from Dec2010-Sep2011, you and all of the other folks defending Walz can take a long walk off a short pier.

Walz is a classic case of stolen valor. His non-command of integrity is typical of his party.

The knobs bombing my karma on this thread can get stuffed.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Enduring_Freedom

[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/tim-walz-military-record/

Operation Enduring Freedom wasn't strictly limited to Afghanistan. I was there too, before you were, and for longer. Wasn't my first deployment, either. I don't know or care about anything Waltz or whatever his name is.

So he spent less than a year, in Italy.

I don't see the problem.

It takes a lot of people around the world to support such a military operation.

Walz has now been denounced by his replacement, his chaplain, and his Commanding Officer.

You are perfectly within your rights to continue defending this abject piece of work.

Understand that veterans do both understand that life is messy and junk happens...but also that, when it's obvious that the person in question is a total piece of work like Walz, the knives come out.

I'm Australian and from a family with a loooong military association (going back at the very least to the Crimean War (1850s)).

With zero interests in the partisan political aspects of this, from a purely grunt on the ground, cog in the machine PoV, if it was true that he was "deployed in August 2003 in support of Operation Enduring Freedom" then he was part of that Operation even if that service was greasing wheels on vehicles in Italy.

These Operations sprawl larger than the pointy parts faced off across valleys, and those who serve generally STFU and do what they are told.

I get that he didn't have boots on the killing grounds, I have to assume that had he been deployed to a front line position then he would have gone as instructed.

=> "for a year"

And yes, I grasp that military efforts have some sprawl to them.

"...had he been deployed to a front line position then he would have gone as instructed."

It is clear that Walz had knowledge of the schedule, bagged out, and then let his actions be mis-characterized for years.

Even Walz's former boss is critical => https://redstate.com/bonchie/2024/08/09/bombshell-tim-walz-f...

So you are telling me that my wife, in her two year-long non-combat deployments as part of the Reserve, did not actually serve as part of Operation Enduring Freedom?

Fuck off.

My grandpa got enough of that shit as a quartermaster in WWII Italy, when people considered him a lesser solider because he wasn't on the front lines.

Magnificent strawmanning.

I answered your "yes or no question" with specifics, and you ignored the specifics.

This places your arguments on Walz footing.

Can you clarify the claim you're making? The 87 Chicago mayoral election is within living memory for over half of eligible voters in America. Do you think election procedure (which varies significantly as it is under the sole jurisdiction of the governments of states like Virginia) has uniformly improved to the extent that fraud like that, or even just a fraction of that scale, is completely impossible?

While I agree with the gist of what I think you’re saying - that election fraud isn’t anywhere near a deciding factor, especially in Presidential elections - I don’t think it actually matters.

There is a large number of people in the US who believe that fraud is a big enough problem for it to change the outcome. That leads to loss of confidence in the election system, which in turn makes for a far more volatile political climate in the country.

That is in and of itself sufficient justification for us to take a very serious look at the system and consider implementing stricter practices. The actual goal here isn’t to prevent all fraud, it’s to ensure that the political process itself is trusted by the people.

Can there actually be any evidence when the process is designed to not be very transparent or examinable from the outside? Election security and transparency should be a priority for all parties because of how foundational it is. The lack of evidence doesn’t mean much when it isn’t publicly auditable.

I'm openly racist but even I don't think minorities are incapable of maintaining government ID documents.

Could you please stop posting flamebait comments? Your account has already been doing a lot of this and we have to ban such accounts. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html