Apparently lacking the gene that lets the brain identify irony and hypocrisy, the NAACP recently led a march in North Carolina to protest voter ID requirements in the state, which they claim improperly disenfranchises some voters, and disproportionately affects minorities and the poor.

The leader of the march, William Barber II, calls the march the “Moral March” and exhorts followers to engage in a “wave of civil disobedience” against policies and laws passed by the Republican-controlled legislature and a Republican governor. If Barber’s name rings a bell, it’s likely because he was in the news last month for calling Republican Tim Scott, the first black person to serve as a senator from the South since Reconstruction, a “ventriloquist’s dummy”, a derogatory slur hurled at Scott because of his staunch conservative principles (I guess you aren’t a “real” black person, and therefore deserving of respect, unless you are a liberal Democrat).

The irony and hypocrisy comes in the form of a flyer handed out to all of the march participants, which gave them instructions, a set of “Do’s and Don'ts” to abide by during the march. This included instructions such as reporting members of the public that attempt to join the march, reporting any altercations, and the final instruction, “DO bring photo identification (driver’s license, passport, or other photo id) with you and keep it on your person at all times.”

Got that? The NAACP marchers, out protesting photo ID requirements for voting, require participants to have a photo ID on them at all times during the march.

I guess the lesson to be learned here is that it IS racist to require photo ID to vote, but it is NOT racist to require a photo ID to participate in an anti-photo ID march (or to cash a check, buy beer or cigarettes, open a bank account, get a passport, enter into Attorney General Eric Holder’s Justice Department building, apply for food stamps/welfare/ Social Security/unemployment benefits, board an airplane, apply for a marriage license, purchase Sudafed, donate blood, use a credit card, get a job, apply for a business license, buy a gun or ammunition, buy a car, serve on a jury…or any one of a thousand other things that require a photo ID). If those things were racist, then we’d see protests at every airport, Walgreen’s, and blood bank across the country.

And since there were no reports of a protest when the march organizers were required to show a photo ID to get the required permit for the march, I guess that is not racist either.

The simple truth is that photo ID requirements do not pose an undue burden on voters, and most states with photo ID requirements have accommodations for those that claim having a financial difficulty in obtaining the ID. It also begs the question of how these people that are burdened by needing a photo ID to vote manage to make it through the day in our society. Do they not have checking accounts? Do they not drive? If they are so poor that they require food stamps and welfare, did they not need an ID to apply for those programs?

No, opposition to photo ID requirements comes down to one thing; it makes it much harder for people to engage in vote fraud and to steal elections.

For a free people who believe that we are all equal under the law, and deserve to have our vote protected from being cancelled out by someone who is not eligible to vote, that is a very good thing indeed.