;)
The Commentariat -- October 19, 2015
Internal links removed.
Michael Schmidt of the New York Times: "As the [House Benghazi] committee's chairman, Representative Trey Gowdy, Republican of South Carolina, prepared to go on television to provide his latest defense of the investigation, the committee's top Democrat, Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, released information undercutting one of Mr. Gowdy's recent allegations about Mrs. Clinton's use of her private email when she was secretary of state. Mr. Gowdy had claimed this month that messages sent and received by Mrs. Clinton included the name of a Central Intelligence Agency source in Libya. That information was 'some of the most protected information in our intelligence community,' Mr. Gowdy said. The fact that Mrs. Clinton sent and received these materials, he said, debunked her 'claim that she never sent any classified information from her private email address.' But Mr. Cummings said on Sunday that the C.I.A. had informed the committee that information about the source was not classified." ...
... Here's Cummings' letter to Gowdy. Once again, he lets it rip. ...
... Michelle Lee of the Washington Post: "Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) said Sunday on CBS's 'Face the Nation' that he has told Republican colleagues to 'shut up talking about things that you don't know anything about. And unless you're on the committee, you have no idea what we have done, why we have done it and what new facts we have found.'... House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) suggested in a recent Fox News interview that the committee was formed to drive down Clinton's poll numbers. Rep. Richard Hanna (R-N.Y.) and Bradley F. Podliska, a former Republican staffer on the committee, also called the investigation politically motivated. Gowdy said McCarthy, Hanna and Podliska are 'three people who don't have any idea what they're talking about.'" CW: Pretty cheeky to say right there on the teevee that your own majority leader doesn't know what he's talking about.
Nancy Cordes of CNN: "After weeks of insisting he would not run for Speaker, Wisconsin Republican Rep. Paul Ryan - according to those close to him - is now open to leading the fractured Republican conference, and seriously considering launching a bid for speaker of the House. But there's a caveat.... Ryan's confidants tell CBS News he will not horse trade with the House Freedom Caucus, a group of 40 or so deeply conservative members who have been demanding changes to House rules and other very specific promises from candidates for Speaker in exchange for their support. Ryan's confidants say he is not going to negotiate for a job he never sought...."
... Yastreblyansky, writing on Steve M.'s blog, has some thoughts on John Boehner, Ted Cruz, Paul Ryan & Democrats vis-a-vis the speaker's job.
Lauren Gardner of Politico: "Last spring's deaths of eight passengers in an Amtrak derailment in Philadelphia called attention to a glaring hole in the nation's rail safety network: railroads' failure to install an advanced anti-collision technology that Congress had mandated in 2008. But five months later, lawmakers are preparing to give railroads years past this December's deadline to put the systems in place -- heeding the railroads' warnings that they would otherwise have to impose a nationwide freeze on rail traffic that could wreck the economy and threaten national security. More than 100 oil, gas, coal, farming, manufacturing, retail and other business groups are also urging lawmakers to postpone the mandate, as are the U.S. Conference of Mayors, local transit agencies, newspaper editorials, more than 150 House members and nearly half the Senate."
Washington Post Editors: "... improper payments [by federal agencies have] ... totaled $1 trillion since fiscal 2003, the first year in which the GAO produced a government-wide estimate.... Three-quarters of the improper payments come from just three programs -- Medicare, Medicaid and the Earned Income Tax Credit -- all of which are meant to help the elderly and the poor. Nearly 10 percent of Medicare's $603 billion in outlays last year was improperly paid.... Everyone complains about waste, fraud and abuse, but it is remarkable how bureaucrats and special interests can come up with excuses not to carry out the managerial reforms necessary to eliminate them."
Paul Krugman: "... we can learn a lot from Denmark, both its successes and its failures. And let me say that it was both a pleasure and a relief to hear people who might become president talk seriously about how we can learn from the experience of other countries, as opposed to just chanting 'U.S.A.! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!'"
The Sky Is Falling! The Sky Is Falling! Ari Rabin-Havt of the Nation: "All the serious people in Washington know we have a debt problem.... There's just one problem. The numbers relied upon by ... far too many ... inside the Beltway, including the Congressional Budget Office itself, are completely bogus. The methodology used by the CBO to create these projections exaggerates the federal government's long-term debt projection by as much as 440 percent, creating a phony fiscal crisis where none exists.... How can there be such a large discrepancy in the numbers?... The CBO assumes that Social Security and Medicare Part A will draw on the general fund of the US Treasury to cover benefit shortfalls following the depletion of their trust funds, which at the current rate will occur in 2034. That would obviously lead to an exploding debt, but it's a scenario prohibited by law."
Reuters: "The US approved conditional sanctions waivers for Iran on Sunday, though it cautioned they would not take effect until Tehran had curbed its nuclear programme as required under the historic nuclear deal reached in Vienna in July. President Obama welcomed 'adoption day', saying: 'Today marks an important milestone toward preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon and ensuring its nuclear programme is exclusively peaceful going forward.'" President Obama's statement is here.
Joshua Partlow of the Washington Post: "In a setback for its multibillion-dollar effort to help Mexico fight its drug war, the U.S. State Department has decided that Mexico failed to reach some human rights goals, triggering a cutoff of millions of dollars in aid. The move, which has not been reported previously, affects a small portion of the annual anti-drug funds given to Mexico. But it is a clear sign of U.S. frustration."
Christopher Jensen of the New York Times: "Even as Volkswagen embarks on the task of fixing the emissions systems it disabled on almost 500,000 of its diesel vehicles in the United States, the automaker faces another hurdle: persuading owners to make the repair at all. That's because the software that allowed Volkswagen to fool federal emissions tests also lowered the car's performance and fuel economy while the device was turned on. So for owners, the prospect of having a car's emissions cleaned up, only to have the car perform worse -- whatever the pollution -- is not sitting well."
Alexander Stille of the New Yorker: "The honeymoon for Pope Francis is over -- at least in Rome. The first two weeks of the Synod on the Family have been characterized by open rebellion, corridor intrigue, leaked documents, accusations of lack of transparency, and sharp divisions among the bishops and cardinals. In the first real crisis of his papacy, Francis finds himself in the position of enjoying a rare degree of popularity among the public but facing an unusual degree of dissent within an institution generally so respectful of hierarchy."
Presidential Race
Greg Sargent: "As we continue to wait for Joe Biden to tell us whether he will run for president, a new CNN poll brings us what I believe is the most comprehensive polling yet on which candidate Democrats prefer on the issues -- and Hillary Clinton leads Biden and Bernie Sanders on all of them. The new poll casts doubt on whether there is all that much of a clamor among Democrats for Biden to enter the race."
Matea Gold, et al., of the Washington Post: "As he brags that he is turning down millions of dollars for his presidential campaign, Donald Trump has leveled a steady line of attack against his rivals: that they are too cozy with big-money super PACs and may be breaking the law by coordinating with them. 'You know the nice part about me?' he told reporters in Iowa in August. 'I don't need anybody's money.' What Trump doesn't say is that he and his top campaign aide have connections to a super PAC collecting large checks to support his candidacy -- a group viewed by people familiar with his campaign as the sanctioned outlet for wealthy donors." ...
... Tom McCarthy of the Guardian: "Jeb Bush ... threw a series of punches at Donald Trump on Sunday, saying his rival for the Republican presidential nomination was an 'actor' who was not serious about running for the White House and whose remarks about the 9/11 attacks undercut his 'credibility' as commander-in-chief. True to form, Trump hit back immediately, razzing Bush on Twitter even as the former Florida governor continued to talk on television. In a pre-taped interview with Fox News Sunday, Trump also said that had he been president, 'there's a good chance' the 11 September hijackers 'would not have been in our country'. All but one of the 19 men who hijacked planes and flew them into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and a field in Pennsylvania entered the country legally on business or tourist visas. One entered on a student visa." ...
... Ezra Klein: "I don't know if Donald Trump will win the Republican nomination. But even if he doesn't, it's increasingly clear he's going to destroy Jeb Bush before he loses. Over the past week, Trump and Bush have been in an argument that basically boils down to the question of was George W. Bush president on 9/11/2001?... Jeb Bush ... argues that his brother was only responsible for what happened after 9/11, suggesting, perhaps, that someone else bore the responsibilities of the presidency on 9/11/2001. Or, to be a bit kinder to his position, he argues that the measure of as president isn't whether something like 9/11 happens, but whether it happens again.... The result is this absolutely brutal interview CNN's Jake Tapper conducted with Bush. 'If your brother and his administration bear no responsibility at all,' Tapper asks, 'how do you then make the jump that President Obama and Secretary Clinton are responsible for what happened at Benghazi?' Bush's response is almost physically painful to watch":
... CW: Jeb! is right about one thing: the Obama administration did not provide the security force Ambassador Stevens repeatedly requested in the months prior to his assassination; in fact, the State Department reportedly reduced the security force. This, of course, is analogous to the Bush administration's ignoring the infamous presidential daily briefing memo titled, "Osama bin Laden determined to attack in U.S." Moreover, no one in the Obama administration is claiming that "Obama kept Benghazi safe," but Jeb! repeatedly claims " my brother kept us safe." While it is true that the Libyan government was ultimately responsible for securing the Benghazi facility, no one at State could have thought Libya was up to the task. ...
... Kevin Drum: "Trump has lately moved on to a more defensible criticism of George Bush, asking Jeb, 'why did your brother attack and destabilize the Middle East by attacking Iraq when there were no weapons of mass destruction?' This is ... interesting ... because it gives us another chance to harass Trump for lying about his opposition to the war during the second GOP debate.... 'I'm the only person up here that fought against going into Iraq.'... So far, no one has managed to find even the slightest record of Trump opposing the Iraq War before it started.... It wasn't until November 2004 -- nearly two years after the war started -- that he finally spoke up."
Say What? Tom McCarthy: "... Ben Carson on Sunday upended a widely accepted narrative of the hunt for Osama bin Laden..., suggesting US ally Saudi Arabia cultivated secret ties with the terrorist leader and knew where he was after the attacks.... Pressed by ABC News host George Stephanopoulos on Sunday, Carson [said]..., 'I think [moderate Arab states] would have been concerned, and if we were serious about it ... I think that would have trumped any loyalty they had to Osama bin Laden.' Stephanopoulos said: 'But they didn't have any loyalty to him. The Saudis kicked him out. He was their enemy.' Carson responded: 'Well, you may not think they had any loyalty to him. But I believe otherwise.'"
Beyond the Beltway
Today in Responsible Gun Ownership. Peter Holley of the Washington Post: In Wyoming, a bicyclist shot & killed a combat service dog, who did two tours in Iraq, under conditions that his owner & handler find highly suspicious. CW: I hate stories like this.
Melissa Montoya, et al., of USA Today: "A manhunt was underway Sunday after a shooting rampage at a zombie-themed festival left one person dead, five wounded and pandemonium on downtown streets [of Fort Myers, Florida]. The wounded victims at ZombiCon on Saturday night were hospitalized with non-life threatening injuries, according to police Lt. Victor Medico. The shooting was the second instance of gunfire downtown within a week. ZombiCon, an annual event in its ninth year, was expected to draw more than 20,000 people." The Fort Myers News-Press story is here.
Packing Heat in the City of God. George Hunter of the Detroit News: "Violence marred a church service Sunday when a man with a brick attacked the pastor, who whipped out his Glock handgun and fired several shots, killing the man, Detroit police said. The incident allegedly happened about 15 minutes into the 1:30 p.m. service at the City of God ministries storefront church on Grand River near Lahser, Assistant Chief Steve Dolunt said. 'The pastor had had issues with the man before,' Dolunt said.... The pastor was taken into police custody for questioning, Dolunt said." ...
... Dear Pastor: In a roomful of people, there is more than one way to subdue a brick-wielding attacker. The other ways do not involve deadly force. Love, CW
Your Heartwarming Story of the Day. AP: "After a California couple called off their wedding, the bride-to-be's family decided to turn the $35,000 event into a feast for the homeless. The bride's mother, Kari Duane, said Sunday that rather than cancel the reception, they invited Sacramento's homeless for a once in a lifetime meal on Saturday at the Citizen Hotel, one of the city's finest venues.... She said they had already paid for a reception that would have hosted 120 guests. About 90 homeless single people, grandparents and whole families with newborns showed up and enjoyed a meal that included appetizers, salad, gnocchi, salmon, and tri-tip sirloin."
Way Beyond
Nicky Woolf of the Guardian: "Canadians head into a nail-bitingly close election on Monday in which the incumbent Conservative, Stephen Harper, is struggling to hold on to power in the face of a challenge by Justin Trudeau's Liberal party." ...
News Ledes
New York Times: "The wave of deadly attacks that has roiled Israel this month hit the southern desert city of Beersheba on Sunday, where a Palestinian armed with a pistol and a knife grabbed another weapon from a soldier, fatally shot him and wounded at least nine other people, including several police officers, according to the police. In the confusion as the attack unfolded, a migrant who was apparently mistaken for a second assailant was shot and seriously wounded by an Israeli security guard, then beaten by a mob. He later died of his wounds, according to Israeli news reports. Witnesses who said they knew the man identified him as an Eritrean asylum seeker."
Reuters: "More than 10,000 migrants are currently in Serbia, stranded by limits imposed further west in Europe, the UN refugee agency said on Monday, and warned of shortages in aid. Thousands of people clamoured to enter Croatia from Serbia on Monday after a night spent in the cold and mud, their passage west slowed by a Slovenian effort to limit the flow of refugees into western Europe."
Share Article
Reader Comments (16)
Pistol Packin' Pastor,
Who would Jesus shoot?
My understanding re: the lack of additional security in the Benghazi situation was that the Republicans had cut the budget for more embassy protections. Yes, the clip of Jeb! trying to rationalize his stance is uncomfortable to watch. But I think this is a man who is not that comfortable in his own skin to begin with.
Yesterday Marie linked a piece by Elizabeth Drew about the Iran deal. Here's a taste:
"A group of senators has just written new legislation––widely referred to on Capitol Hill as a CYA (for cover your ass) action––that would give additional military equipment and other protection to Israel."
We appear to be that country's nanny, bull dog, and big spender. And why do we not speak of the fact that they themselves have a nuclear bomb? Why is that so hush, hush.
P.S. A few days ago Marie's made-up Mortimer Fleegan fooled me.Today I read another one of Ben Carson's "made up shit" stuff. No wonder I'd believe Fleegan's bad performance––wees gots so many of these cuckoos one ceases to be amazed.
Hi PD,
The Right's position on the Israeli bomb is that Israel has not threatened to exterminate it's neighbors. Therefore, in their hands, it's a defensive weapon and a stabilizing factor.
My several friends in the U.S. Foreign Service have for 40+ years been telling me that embassy security is woefully inadequate. It's never been a priority for any administration. And there's a view, even inside the Service, that strong security measures look bad -- signaling fear of and/or hostility toward the host country.
I'm not advocating any of the above -- just saying...
@PD Pepe wrote, "My understanding re: the lack of additional security in the Benghazi situation was that the Republicans had cut the budget for more embassy protections."
Yeah, I thought so, too. For some while Democrats were pushing that story & I'm pretty sure I bought it. However, it's been pretty much debunked since. Here's one dive into the matter by Glenn Kessler, but it's not the only one.
Marie
A few days ago the Washington Post published a surprisingly uncritical profile of David Daleiden, the "investigative reporter" behind the undercover (and in some cases illicit) Planned Parenthood tapes. Well, it is critical at times - of Planned Parenthood. The piece is entitled: "Meet the Millenial who Infiltrated the Guarded World of Abortion Providers." It apparently never occurred to the geniuses who wrote the headline that abortion providers and facilities are literally guarded and for good reason: providers have been assaulted and killed, facilities bombed and burned down. Actually, that headline reads like a sick joke.
@Marie: thanks so much for the Kessler link. The last paragraph sums it up neatly:
"State Department officials repeatedly told Congress that a lack of funds was not an issue. Instead, security was hampered because of bureaucratic issues and management failures. In other words, given the internal failures, no amount of money for the State Department likely would have made a difference in this tragedy."
Now we can put that baby to rest.
"Oh, ah wish ah was in de land 'a cotton..."
Unless I was in Mississippi awaiting trial. Because although in most states you have the right to a defense attorney if you cannot afford one, in Mississippi, you may not get one until a day or so before your trial. And a judge there thinks there's nothing wrong this or with defense attorneys who don't have enough time to do any background investigation into criminal cases. Not only that, he thinks it's perfectly okay if, because of all this, you're innocent but go to prison.
A reporter from Al Jazeera America, Anjali Kamat, spoke with Judge Marcus Gordon about his approach to the law. Here's what he had to say:
"Lady, people charged with crimes, they are criminals. And they say what meets their purpose. Now they told you they had requested an attorney. They had not requested an attorney in 98 percent of the cases. You never hear of that. I never hear of that.
I don’t know whether they have requested an attorney or not. They would not be entitled to an attorney until indictment, as a policy of this district by myself and the other circuit judge. It would be an additional burden on trial attorneys to go out there and investigate every single case."
(Let's also stipulate that people charged with crimes back in some semblance of the old America, don't have to specifically request an attorney; the judge will tell them that if they cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to their case. But not in Judge Gordon's court.)
Oh yeah, the nice judge also had this to say about the kind of hit or miss justice he oversees: "I do know that there are innocent people, who are charged and go through the system who are not guilty, in the penitentiary. But there is nothing I can do about that."
Got that? If you're arrested, you're a criminal. And you're lucky to see any lawyer at all until a day or so before you come up before Judge Hang-em-high, and if by some "miscarriage of justice" (wink, wink), you're innocent and get sent to prison, tough shit.
Life in Confederate America. Especially if you're poor and most especially if you're poor and black.
But to listen to Sean Inshannity or Loofah Boy, such things don't happen in post-racial America. It's a lie invented by bleeding heart lib'ruls who hate America.
Read the interview. I'll bet my George W. Bush Secret Al Qeaeda Decoder Ring that this is not the only court in America where justice is taken out back and beaten with clubs.
And from The Civil War is Still Being Fought Department...
Court houses and the Confederacy. Such a natural pairing in Right Wing World. A Mississippi judge has his own "policies" about justice down in the deep south and meanwhile in a county in Tennessee that was pro-Union during the early days of the Civil War (1861-1865), current residents are voting tonight on whether or not they should fly the Confederate flag from their courthouse.
County commissioner Buddy Randolph, in response to those who feel hoisting the flag of secession and slavery over a government building might be in poor taste, says to fuck off. "That's their problem". Don't all these assholes say that?
But according to local historian Richard Hood, “Greene County was profoundly anti-Confederate...Commissioner Randolph may not like this history, but it has the virtue of being factual. He should be celebrating Greene County’s heritage of resistance to the Confederacy, not propping up a grotesque distortion of ‘history’ that debases our true past and offends many, many of our own neighbors.”
Ah...sorry Mr. Hood. "Virtue of being factual..."? Never a winner with Confederates.
So a county that stayed on the side of anti-slavery will now be flying the flag of their mortal (and moral) enemies.
But in Kentucky, something similar has happened. Kentucky, which never joined the Confederacy (at least not then), celebrates slavery by its prominent display of a marble statue of Jefferson Davis in its State House, of all freakin' places. Davis didn't even come from Kentucky! Abraham Lincoln, who was born there, gets only a bronze statue and his likeness is looked down upon by the Davis statue.
So even areas of the south that were affiliated with the Union cause are now firmly in the bosom of slaveowners and the current haters and racists of the New Confederacy.
Ol' Buddy Randolph, back in Greene Co., TN (98.4% white) says it's not about race.
Because it never is. Right?
So who's right? Trump sticks it to The Decider for fucking up the middle east, Jeb(!) says "I know you are but what am I?" Jake Tapper puts Jeb(!) on the hot seat, because if his brother wasn't responsible for 9/11, then who was?
Stop right there!
Fox (as they always do) has the answer. It most certainly wasn't The Decider. It wasn't Cheney. It wasn't any Republican. It wasn't even anyone who was in office on 9/11.
So who was to blame for the debacle at the World Trade Center?
BILL CLINTON! Natch!
Brian Kilmeade, the imbecile who floated this idea and says that Clinton should have seen the warning signs and gone after Osama Bin Laden back in the 90's, sees no apparent hole in his argument when it came to Bush ignoring an actual report about what Bin Laden intended to do just weeks before it happened.
Facts, they never intrude into wingnut fantasies.
Now if only they could "prove" that Hillary was also to blame...
@CW Today Charlie Pierce has a good piece why a Constitutional Convention isn't a good idea. Meshes with how you promptly set me straight about two years or so ago as to why it would be a stoopid thing to do. But, seems as though many progressives are once again getting behind the idea. You reformed me! Hope the others get the message.
"Liberals Calling for a Constitutional Convention Are Delusional—Nothing good will come of it in the era of Citizens United." http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a38963/liberals-calling-for-constitutional-convention/
*sigh*
I hate to do this but I have to bring up a column I read over the weekend. I didn't mean to, but the title "What Bernie Sanders Doesn't Understand About Economic Equality" written by one of the all-time greats at false equivalences and willful misunderstanding (complete with cites of obscure bullshit and casuistry of the most embarrassing sort) of just about anything that doesn't fit his wingnut world view, George Fucking Will (that actually IS his real name), made it impossible to look away.
So what doesn't Bernie get? First, poor people are just envious slobs and they're never gonna be rich so just go away and whine. In Will's view, the people Sanders is "pandering" to, want to be as rich as Croesus because they're jealous of people like Bill Gates. In Will's eyes, they're all perfectly comfortable just as they are (meaning dirt poor)but now they all want luxury vacation homes with elevators in the garage (eat your hearts out, Caddy driving welfare queens!) and private jets. You see, the opposite of economic inequality, to GFW is economic equality, which means all those nasty poors want to live in doorman buildings and subscribe to Forbes and play polo at the Myopia Club. (If I were a philosophy professor and a student submitted this paper, I'd give them an F for the entire semester for willful stupidity.)
No George. They want a decent place to live, healthy food, health care for their kids, and a job that pays more than what you have deemed is perfectly fine for slave labor.
Also. Freedom. That's why rich people. Freedom. Get it? No? Neither did I.
You just have to have the right "aptitude and attitude" (the penile tissue must have had a recall moment when he came up with that one--'aptitude and attitude', has such a nice winger ring to it) and you're all set.
What about all those legacy millionaire and billionaires? And what about billionaires like the Kochs (who are also legacy rich kids) who benefit from corporate welfare? Is that what GFW means by "Freedom" and "aptitude and attitude"?)
Of course, if all you want is for the government to hand you millions then you're what's wrong with this country.
And so is Bernie.
The wonder is that the earth doesn't crack open and swallow people like this whole. Probably spit them out right quick. Too nasty even for pits of swill and filth.
@Akhilleus: David Corn at Mother Jones has an interesting take on why Parrot's (my code word) delusions about his brother's safety record persist.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/09/george-w-bush-speech-sap-ns2-summit. @Marie: My thanks if I got this reference from you or one of your readers. My aging brain cannot remember.
"As one regular attendee of the SAP NS2 conferences, who for professional reasons wishes not to be identified, observes, 'The obvious irony is inviting George W. Bush to lecture us on how to keep the US safe, after presiding over the 9/11 failure and launching an unjustified war which has destroyed the lives of thousands of Americans and Iraqis, brought Al Qaeda to Iraq, created the situation for ISIS to be created, destroyed a country, cost the US [almost] $2 trillion and counting, and has made our country and the world less safe.' "
Islander,
Thanks for the take on the delusional Jeb(!).
My thinking was that he was just a lying sack of shit, but my thinking is often fairly unsophisticated.
The claim that The Decider "kept us safe" is all of a piece with Dana Perino and Darth Cheney loudly declaring that there were no terrorist attacks on their watch.
9/11 was all Bill Clinton's fault.
The House suit against ACA advances.
http://jonathanturley.org/2015/10/19/federal-court-denies-administration-motion-and-sets-aca-case-for-final-ruling/#comment-1499987
Just home from voting in our Federal election. 15 minutes from out of car to back in again. Quicker than in some American states. I am fortunate to possess a drivers licence picture ID so no hassels. Unlike an Alabama resident, failing that I would have been required to provide 2 of the following:
a health card
a Canadian psssport
birth certificate
certificate of Canadian citizenship
citizenship card
socialinsurance number card
indian status card
indian band membership card
Metis card
card issued by Inuit local authority
Canadian Forces Identity card
Veterans affairs health card
old age security card
hospital card
medical clinic card
label on a prescription container
hospital identity bracelet
blood donor card
Canadian national institute of the blind card
credit card
debit card
employee card
student idnetity card
public transportation card
library card
liquor identity card
parolee card (inmates are already ID'd and eligible to vote)
firearms licence
hunting, fishing, or trapping licence
utility bill
bank statement
credit union statement
personal cheque
govern statement of benefits
government cheque or cheque stub
pension plan statement
residential lease
mortgage contract or statement
income tax assessment
property tax assessment or evaluation
vehicle ownership
insurance certificate, policy, or statement
correspondence from a school, college, or university
letter from a public curator,guardian or trustee
letter of confirmation of residence from a 1st nations band or reserve or Inuit local authority.
letter of confirmation of residence, of stay,admission form or statement of benefits from a student residence,
a senior's residence,
a long term care facility,
a shelter or soup kitchen.
Personally I can provide 18 of these secondary proofs. Perhaps this is just the result of prioritizing getting everyone to vote rather than restricting the vote.
I understand the desire to broaden the voting method to mail or internet but I would miss the feeling of walking to the voting station with my fellow citizens, the feeling of community and purpose.