Harold Meyerson, WaPo: 'What happens if GOP’s voter suppression works?'

[Newsjock]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/harold-meyerson-gops-voter-id-tactics-could-undermine-a-romney-win/2012/07/24/gJQAKQcZ7W_story.html

Suppose Mitt Romney ekes out a victory in November by a margin smaller than the number of young and minority voters who couldn’t cast ballots because the photo-identification laws enacted by Republican governors and legislators kept them from the polls. What should Democrats do then? What would Republicans do? And how would other nations respond?

... If voter suppression goes forward and Romney narrowly prevails, consider the consequences. An overwhelmingly and increasingly white Republican Party, based in the South, will owe its power to discrimination against black and Latino voters, much like the old segregationist Dixiecrats. It’s not that Republicans haven’t run voter suppression operations before, but they’ve been under-the-table dirty tricks, such as calling minority voters with misinformation about polling-place locations and hours. By contrast, this year’s suppression would be the intended outcome of laws that Republicans publicly supported, just as the denial of the franchise to Southern blacks before 1965 was the intended result of laws such as poll taxes. More ominous still, by further estranging minority voters, even as minorities constitute a steadily larger share of the electorate, Republicans will be putting themselves in a position where they increasingly rely on only white voters and where their only path to victory will be the continued suppression of minority votes. A cycle more vicious is hard to imagine.

... The course on which Republicans have embarked isn’t politics as usual. We don’t rig elections by race in America, not anymore, and anyone who does should not be rewarded with uncontested power.

[southernyankeebelle]

1. Nothing is going to happen. If they took it to the supreme court the court will give

it to Romney. Until dems party start early on this knowing that republicans are rigging the game then maybe we will have a chance. But sooner or later my fellow white americans aren't going to be able to keep it up because the republican party is going the way of the Wig party. Thank god.

[Turbineguy]

2. If Romney wins with those margins

the repubs will merely expand voter suppression to include more whites.

[struggle4progress]

3. Of course, the only answer is that we can work from now to election day to prevent that