I'MMA LET YOU FINISH
i've heard this about MI too, something about internet-based voting?
I guess you better caugh up those Santorum on dog photos sooner rather than later, A.
caugh=cough
Damn public education!
Are they coming from Iraq and marked in favor of Dennis 'let's get the hell out of Iraq fast' Kucinich?
You've never heard of vote early, vote often? Covers all eventualities.
How about extending voting period to say 3-7 days period where all campaigns must stop, all polls muzled?
As a fellow PA resident, is there any way we can get Santorum to go to Sweeden? I'm sure someone there could convince him to give a dog a try.
Oh you guys.. leave poor Rick alone.
He said he loved me.
Here in Chicago, our dead people politely wait until election day to vote.
A.
ĦEl bueno de Ricardo! Tiene mano izquirda con los animales.
I'm sorry, Deaniacs. His meltdown is all my fault. I never should've picked him as my favorite. I should've known he'd meet the same fate as Paul Tsongas and John McCain, after my wild, irresponsbile dalliances with their campaigns.
To redress this harm, I now pledge to support George W. Bush. Go George! (Far away!)
It's wishful thinking.
Anyway, either thousands of people voted for Dean by mail who would have voted for him anyway (which means no impact), or else thousands of people voted for Dean by mail who would not vote for him now, which isn't exactly a good sign for the Governor, either.
My main worry today is that we're going to find Bin Laden a convenient month or so before the election. The talk about going into Pakistan and the assurances coming out of the Defense Department are too loud to ignore. I know I sound like I just put on the tinfoil hat, but at this point I can believe anything.
I'm in favor of absentte ballots, but they should make you postmark or hand deliver them within one week of the election. Making a decision a month out is totally wacky.
Maybe OBL can be GWB's date to the premier of 'Fahrenheit 9-11'!
Then Rick can sit behind and make sure they don't snog through the whole thing and embarrass their parents.
Granholm to endorse Kerry.
It's over...
Truth stranger than fiction.
OSLO (Reuters) - President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair are among nominees for the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize before a Sunday deadline for nominations despite failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
[snip]
``Bush and Blair definitely still deserve it,'' said Jan Simonsen, a right-wing independent member of Norway's parliament who nominated the two for the 2004 prize shortly after the U.S.-led war toppled Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein in April.
``Even though they haven't found those weapons they got rid of a dictator and made the world more safe,'' he told Reuters on Friday, sticking by the choice. ``They got rid of a madman.''
[snip]
Nobel watchers say Bush or Blair's chances of winning are close to nil. The 2002 prize went to ex-U.S. President Jimmy Carter, who argued against war. The head of the Nobel committee called the choice a ``kick in the legs'' to Bush on Iraq.
[snip]
[Geir] Lundestad [director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute] said many people wrongly believed being a ``Nobel prize nominee'' was itself a kind of honor.
Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler and former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic have made it to the list -- every member of all the world's parliaments, university professors from law to theology, ex-winners and committee members can submit names.
This would all be resolved if everyone voted based on policy and history, instead of superficial issues. Year after year, the American people reveal their shallowness to be of unprecedented depth.
Granholm to endorse Kerry.
Endorsements don't matter, remember?
I'm one of those absentee ballot voters in Arizona.
I agree with Atrios insofar as the observation that it is a problem because of the rhythym of the campaign.
OTOH what can we do about it? Get rid of all absentee balloting? If you can't make it to the polling place on the day of the vote, you're screwed?
And so given that we have to have absentee ballots (which has transmogrified into early balloting), are you really going to make voting bureaucrats 'police' absentee ballots to make sure they are really, truly only sent to people who really can't make it to the polls on election day?
I think the effect is more like this:
those who are bent on voting for a certain candidate no matter what, will vote absentee/early and it's unlikely their vote would change between sending in that ballot and election day.
it might also be a way to increase participation - rather than having to remember to make time to vote on Election Day (we all lead busy, busy lives) or, as happened in my neighborhood recently, not being able to find the polling place (they moved it for a city election after YEARS of holding it in the same place, and a number of rather intelligent people here didn't know it had been moved), the convenience of voting early/absentee ensures that those people get the chance to vote.
I don't think there's much we can do beyond wringing our hands over it. And I think the effect on the results is less than might be imagined/worried about.
Oh. I'm voting Clark in case anyone cares. Latest poll here in AZ has Clark slightly ahead of Kerry. Arizona might be the General's first win.
Kerry will falter. By Super Tuesday, he will be struggling. By New York and Calif., he will be history.
Kerry voted for the bush tax cuts, the patriot act, the bush "education" bill and the bush war. How the hell can any self-respecting dem vote for him.
ABBK!
Maybe they are training for the Diebold?
As for the coming offensive in Afghanistan, I think it's getting people more worried about finding hidden significances than necessary. Operations were pretty much bound to shut down over the winter. Their resuming activity in the spring is to be expected. The question is will this be a serious effort or just glorified patrolling?
As for saying they're sure they'll capture OBL this year, what else to you expect them to announce? Of course they're going to tell the press that they're going to get him.
The Bushites will stoop to anything, granted, but I don't see a need to put on the tinfoil hats over this just yet.
I usually prefer to vote early, if possible, but 'round here, our early voting period is only about a week before the election.
Grumpy, if that's the reason you think Dean's dying (which I don't agree with), then it's my fault, too. I was a McCain girl. To this day his face on TV makes me giddy, remembering how great that campaign was.
Never got into Tsongas really.
A.
One thing I've heard in favor of voting via an absentee ballot: it leaves a paper record of your vote. With all the concern about the upcoming Diebold machines, with no paper trail, and the potential for vote manipulation, that's a powerful incentive to resort to absentee ballots to make sure your vote is actually counted.
I forgot to mention I did not mail in my ballot yet, I just got back from 2 weeks across the pond and even though i could have mailed it in on time I thought I would just carry it to the polling place. Partly because of the fun part of showing up there and seeing other folks voting, partly because of the media coverage. Maybe there will be some 'hos there. ("Look Mom! I'm on teevee!")
And as GB points out, I am going to continue voting absentee from now on because of the black box voting thing. We don't have them here yet, we use optical scan and have for some time. But someday AZ will have black-box voting and unless they really make it secure with a paper trail, then I'm not going to use the damn things.
If they felt strongly enough about a candidate to vote by mail so soon, I doubt they've changed their mind. Unless the media hypnotized them into believing their vote no longer matters because their candidate is no longer the frontrunner or "electable".
Assuming nobody tied their hands behind their back and made them vote early, it was their choice to do so, and not ours to second-guess their reasoning.
It doesn't matter if those votes were for Dean or Santorum, people vote the way they vote and it's not our job to tell them they did it wrong or too early or too late or not at all. The right to vote also includes the right not to vote, last I remember. Unless somebody wants to submit a law requiring everyone to vote under penalty of law.
Well, I'm with renato there: if you vote early by mail, you already made your mind before even getting the ballot. And it's been proved that it can tremendously increase the participation - which has been steadily declining since years. In fact in some cases it probably has changed the outcome of votation or election (more people who couldn't be bothered to go outside and vote eventually voted, usually for a moderate position).
But in the case of primaries, where the votes are spread throug months, it can indeed cause trouble. The ultimate question should rather be if it wouldn't be better to make a nationwide primary day after a few months of campaign (but of course that would be as revolutionary as getting rid of the Electoral College or the Senate).
So, overall I'm all for vote-by-mail, but in this precise case (primaries), I understand the inherent problems it can cause.
OT:
Will this help or hurt Gen. Clark?
NATO PORN!
Just asking.
If you do vote early or absentee, don't forget to write in Scooter in '04!
As more touch-screen voting systems are implimented, you are going to embrace something, anything which has a hard copy trail to it.
Holden, on your NYT link - is that for real?? Well, I hope the Nobel-watchers are right, and that more deserving characters actually make it to getting the Peace Prize.
While I agree that voting months in advance is a silly thing, there is also a happy medium and voting early isn't inherently wrong. The fact that you care about dynamics of campaigns show that this doesn't have much to do with how I exercise my franchise. In fact, I want to undercut the rhythm of campaigning, because I don't like it one bit.
How much more time do I need to give somebody to convince me somehow they're better than the other guy, all while probably cutting down the other guy, lobbing misleading quotes at me, etc. Everything else that happens in the final weeks is just more of the same stuff, gotcha politics, and other crap.
I've seen enough ads, debates, stump speeches, websites, public records, etc, to inform my vote enough that I could cast my ballot for Dean today with absolute certainty. I wouldn't have been able to say that a year ago, but certainly a month before the Vermont primary I can. For those voters who haven't been convinced yet, good for them: they still have until election day to decide. Me, I'm done.
Atrios is right. If I had gotten the Santorum on Dog pictures before the election I would be too busy wall papering my bedroom with them and then pleasuring myself to vote in any silly election.
MMMMMMMMMMM. Hunky Rick and a Beagle.
I mean, what if, say, Rick Santorum were in a primary race for a senate seat and the Santorum-on-Dog pictures didn't come out until after thousands of people had already cast their votes?
OK Atrios let me take the devil's advocate position.
I think we all know that the dirtiest campaigning happens in the 48 to 72 hours prior to an election - when you can sling mud at an opponent that s/he has no chance to refute before the big day.
Wouldn't it be nice to blunt that awful tactic with more widespread early balloting?
I don't have any comments for or against absentee voting per se, but as per Atrios' remark about optimism on the part of Deanies, I'd like to note, after just checking BFA, that in the past 20 hours they've raised about $170,000 and signed up over 1,000 more people.
According to figures in newspaper reports (AP I think) Dean has raised more money over the past week that Kerry--$1.8 million for Dean to $1.6 million for Kerry--despite Kerry's bounce and all the bad news for Dean.
well, it's not the Santorum pics we all wanted, but check out this cartoon.
oh wait! I just found them!That's some incriminating shiznit.
On the particiaption thing: if absentee ballots increase it, then I say that far outweighs any disruption of the normal campaign flow. Campaigns are exercises in artifice, more theater than anything about educating voters--my casting a vote is the fundamental element of democracy.
One other observation: when I vote absentee, I find I take much more time to consider issues and candidates before I finally make my selections. I literally spend a couple hours voting. That's a luxury you don't have when you're in the voting booth. That's helped me on a number of local things--occassionally I am not aware of some things on the ballot, so voting at home allows me time to go learn more about what's at stake.
I feel I make much more informed votes now than I did years ago, so I always vote absentee now, even if I am in town (as VT law allows).
what amazes me, Pope, is how the Deanies burned through so much money so quickly.
I think it's safe to say this now, but it didn't seem to be before so I held my fire... I don't have much confidence in Dean as a nominee. If he goes ahead and wins I'll support him because of course he's better than Bush. I just don't have confidence in his ability as a nominee. Maybe the next time around.
Polls are like weather reports - one of the few things that keep today's media relevant. Who would watch/listen without them?
If anyone thinks Bush will stop exploiting 9/11 and national security come election time, please tell me you're kidding. Fear and the "war" on terror will figure largely in November.
Just look how Putin shifted the focus several days before the election last year by blowing up that train.
I love vote by mail. Karlie (Rove) tells me it makes it easier to buy votes in an undetectable manner. The problem with walking into a booth and casting an anonymous ballot is that you can't be sure that the nigger voted the way you paid him to vote. But if you get him an absentee ballot, you can look at it before he seals it into the envelope to make sure he's voting the way he was paid to vote, instead of for some DEMON-crat. Yippee, let's all say hurrah for vote-by-mail! (And for vote-by-Internet too!).
Yours in Christ,
John Asscroft, Attorney General, Untied States of America
In Oregon we have ONLY vote by mail. Saves money, increases turnout, and makes the campaign get the word out before the ballots are sent rather than the election day. I don't mind the different rhythm. Besides what if the Santorum on Dog pictures only come out the day after the election?
President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair are among nominees for the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize ...
Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler and former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic have made it to the list
Holden Caulfield
awh, there you go comparing Bush to Hitler again ;}
Voting early is a bad, bad thing. Atrios' example is meant in jest, but the 2002 MN Senate race, where all the absentee votes cast for Paul Wellstone were wasted, is a real-life example of the dangers of absentee voting.
I also strongly believe that an election is meant to be a poll of the people's will AT ONE SPECIFIC TIME, not a rolling sample taken over weeks or months.
Also, and this is a wholly unobjective opinion, I don't approve of catering to people who are too lazy to make it to the polls, like my ex-girlfriend, who voted absentee because she didn't feel like bothering to go to the polling place that was literally only two blocks from her apartment.
There are other ways to encourage voter participation, such as holding Election Day on a Saturday, holding it over a period of two or even three days, or making Election Day a universal holiday, as it should be. But I believe that absentee ballots should only be given for cause--i.e., people who have a reason they can't make it to the polls, like a soldier stationed abroad--and that all absentee ballots mailed within the United States should not be accepted if their postmark is more than seven days before the election.
Go to this link, picture it being this fall and substitute in the names of Bush and the GOP leadership. A little eerie ain't it?
http://www.cnn.com/2003/WORLD/eu...ia.train.blast/
There is a flip side to early voting. It protects against the robo-calling and push polling and asorted dirty tricks that have been going on. And remember the backlash against the LA Times after the Arnold grope story too closr to the election.
Holden sez: "If you do vote early or absentee, don't forget to write in Scooter in '04!"
HELL FUCKIN' SHIT YEAH!
Send this to Granholm:
================
Stealth Negativity? Recording Reveals Kerry Operative Dissing Dean in Campaign Call
By Jake Tapper
ABCNEWS.com
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/
P...lls_040117.html
Excerpts:
...But two nights ago, Cornell College psychology professor Suzette Astley, a Dean volunteer in Lisbon, Iowa, received a phone call from a Kerry's Cedar Rapids headquarters -- in which, she says, a Kerry volunteer had some less than kind things to say about Dean regarding his foreign policy experience, being from a largely
white state, and so-called "environmental racism."
Since a documentary filmmaker was staying with Astley, the exchange, which has been confirmed by the Kerry campaign, was caught on videotape.
"Does your candidate know that you're saying these kinds of things, unsubstantiated claims on the phone representing Sen. Kerry?" Astley asked 19-year-old volunteer, Jacob Thomas, on the
tape, a copy of which was obtained by ABCNEWS.
Soon, she asked to speak with Kerry's regional field supervisor, with whom she launched a complaint.
"I am just really offended by the call I got tonight," she said. "The person who was talking to me was taking things out of context, repeating unsubstantiated reports to me, and I find that really offensive."
"The person who made the call is a young volunteer whose remarks were not authorized or condoned by this campaign," Kerry campaign manager Mary Beth Cahill said in a statement.
But the Dean campaign said it was under the impression that the call did not represent just one over-zealous volunteer speaking extemporaneously. Rather, the campaign said in the last day it had heard of Kerry campaign calls to at least five other Iowans reading from what it said sounded like a very similar script.
Dean campaign spokesman Jay Carson slammed Kerry for claiming to run a positive campaign while letting others do his dirty work.
ABCNEWS has spoken to another Iowa Dean supporter, Susan Alexander, who said she received a phone call on the same night as Astley, which sounded like it came from the same script.
Push Poll?
A third Iowan, Dick Alexander, told ABCNEWS he received a phone call about two weeks ago from an organization claiming to be a polling firm unaffiliated with any candidate, in which pro-Kerry and anti-Dean information was conveyed.
The Alexander call, should it have happened, would meet the definition of a "push poll" -- a call purportedly from an objective polling firm that actually seeks to "push" voters away
from candidates by spreading negative information about them.
---------------------
And from http://www.dailykos.com/story/20...1/30/04918/
5575 (originally from http://us.gq.com/plus/content/?0...127plco_trippi)
Who i
And from http://www.dailykos.com/story/20...1/30/04918/
5575 (originally from http://us.gq.com/plus/content/?0...127plco_trippi)
Who is robo-calling against Dean?
It's no secret that Dean has faced some nasty robo-calling and push-polling in Iowa and NH, as well as NM and elsewhere. This excerpt from an upcoming GQ article gives a glimpse of what Dean has faced over the last few weeks:
Fast forward to the days before IA: Trippi's "cell phone rings. It's his pollster, Paul Maslin, who not only has bleak news out of Iowa -- but bleak news out of New Hampshire. Trippi hangs up and stares out the window.
His phone rings again. "WHAT? Aw, fuck. I hate this business. This fucking sucks. Okay, thanks." He hangs up. "They're robocalling our ones," he moans. "He has just gotten a report from the field that Dean "ones" are getting bombarded with computer-generated phone calls telling them to make sure to caucus for Dean-then giving them the wrong address."
Who would do such a thing?
"Kerry," Trippi snaps. "They're the only asshole snake campaign that would do it. Every frickin' day now, I'm reminded of why I got out of this in the first place." The Dean campaign keeps fingering the Kerry camp, and it's hard to see who else might be responsible.
The calls were targeted at Dean in Iowa and NH -- the two states that were must-wins for both Dean and Kerry. Gephardt might've been behind a robo-calling effort in Iowa, but he'd have no reason to do the same in NH.
Who else, the Republicans? Problem is that by all reports, these robo calls have specifically targeted Dean's "1s" and "2s". That level of sophistication would require an extent of polling unlikely from the GOP. Only Kerry would have conducted the type of polling identifying levels of support for Dean in both Iowa and NH.
So it's all anecdotal, but the evidence suggests dirty tricks from the Kerry campaign. The thought literally makes me want to puke (some of the calls suggest Dean is not a real Christian because he's married to a Jew). None of the other candidates have faced this type of puke tactics, so there's only one guy engaging in it.
God help Kerry if real evidence emerges.
Bush Boom, we hardly knew ye, Part II
A record-high 375,000 jobless workers will exhaust their unemployment insurance this month and an estimated 2 million workers will find themselves in the same predicament during the first half of the year, according to an analysis of Labor Department statistics by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
All of Amerika should vote by absentee this year because a week before the election Rummie's gonna pull Osama out of Cheney's hidden bunker where he's been for the past three years. An the Bushie's will get a bump in the polls to carry them across the line before anyone can investigate.
I don't think voting early is a bad thing if you allow for certain precautions. First and foremost, the system has to be secure. The U.S. mail system has been. Any internet campaign to do so has not been.
Secondly, yes, voting early does tend to weaken the impact of news. For example, in the CA Recall, those who watched only CNN didn't learn that Arnold had groped a dozen women until well after I had mailed my own votes in.
But there are some advantages to voting absentee that should not be ignored.
First and foremost, there is the biggy; it allows people to vote when they can't be around. I've voted absentee from college before. There was no way I could drive 7 hours to get back to my polling place. I voted early then also. Yes, I probably missed a small portion of the campaign, but it was worth it to be able to vote in the first place.
Secondly, it probably does encourage more people to vote. My father didn't vote for years because he worked about 2 hours drive away from his polling place, and there was no way he'd be able to get back before they closed. He votes absentee now.
Finally, and this is gaining in importance; it leaves a paper trail. If you don't trust the electronic, non-paper trail machines from Diebold, and you want to be fairly certain your vote is counted, Absentee is the way to go. PUnch the card the whole way through and be done with it.
Is there a solution to the absentee voting early/late problem? I'm pretty sure there is; a slight schedule change would probably fix it all. Here's waht you do; don't mail the ballots out until 2 weeks before the election, unless people specifically request them earlier. By the time poeple start sending them back, there will be merely a week until they're all due. Then take one more step; give Absentee ballots some extra time past the actual election to be sent in. A week or so. You'll balance it out on both sides. That way, people aren't forced to vote early, but they're not allowed to vote too early. I think that's about as fair of a system as you can get.
Visit my web page, please
I'm in Arizona. Specifically, I'm in Flagstaff, going to school, but my residence address is in Tempe.
I've had quite a bit of difficulty getting my absentee ballot, and am not the least bit happy about it.
And this conversation says to me, "People like you shouldn't vote."
But what the hell do I know. I was just going to waste it on Kucinich anyway.
I've always felt that "pre-voting" is a bad idea, for just that reason (although ... never had I imagined a Santorum-canine coupling until now; yeccch).
Remember that in the 2000 campaign, late deciders broke heavily for Gore. Part of that may have been based on the late disclosure of W's DUI; regardless of how seriously you take that offense, it is a crime and it was unreported almost until the end of the campaign -- and many voters may have had second thoughts about electing a man whose criminal record had been "overlooked" for so long.
As it turned out, of course, the voters wisely selected the other guy in the race.
I see you point Atrios, but I agree with Balta. As long as my other option is a no trail machine I'm voting absentee
Yeah, it's bad if we choose based on thoughtful consideration at the time millions of people in other states are choosing, and not when millions in our own state are being bombarded with ads and dirty tricks.
I much prefer as a resident of Illinois to not even get a meaningful vote, then to cast a symbolic ballot by mail.
Sheesh. This is nothing but parochialism, mired in tradition. Give it up.
Thad Boyd -
You are not required to agree with everything said here.
Vote, do it anyway you can but go vote.
And now, OT: The BEEB:
Sir David Attenborough, who held a string of BBC management posts in the 1960s and has written, produced and hosted popular natural history TV programs, said he was dismayed by the BBC's apology.
``I found that distressing to hear those words,'' Attenborough, 77, told BBC radio. ``Adjectives like `abject' and `servile' come to mind. It is a sad day when that kind of groveling is required.''
the 2002 MN Senate race, where all the absentee votes cast for Paul Wellstone were wasted, is a real-life example of the dangers of absentee voting.
Answer to this would be adding some form of IRV.
I also strongly believe that an election is meant to be a poll of the people's will AT ONE SPECIFIC TIME, not a rolling sample taken over weeks or months.
Early voting is not a rolling sample. It's a one-person, one-vote affair, and can blunt a lot of the bad things about our current campaign system, including rolling samples in the media which can unduly influence people's choices.
Heck, look at exit polling data from NH. People who supported Kerry voted for him because of the bogus "electability" meme (whore link), and those who voted for Dean did so because they liked his message, ideals, represents them, fought for what he believes in, etc.
So why did this break down this way? At least partly because the media, in need of generating buzz about the campaign months before any voting, keeps throwing polls at us every 30 femtoseconds. No policy discussion altered the voting--it was perception based on media framing.
You want to make elections a better representation of the People's wishes? Get rid of polling, not absentee balloting.
I don't approve of catering to people who are too lazy to make it to the polls
I'm sorry, but that smacks of elitism (and I don't throw that word around lightly). People have every right to have personal failings and still vote. If giving them just a little more incentive to vote caters to their laziness, so be it. At least they are more engaged in the political process. Improving democracy is about removing barriers to participation.
You also ignore the myriad other reasons somebody might vote absentee (see my comment above). Further, I fail to see how making Election Day a holiday or putting it on a Saturday would be any better. We already have the right to vote even on a workday (and I'll note that many people work on Saturdays), and a holiday could actually encourage less participation (hey, I take Monday off and I have a 4 day weekend!).
Your suggestion of having a window of multiple days is a nice idea, but then begs the question: if you are willing to budge on your stance that an election is s'posed to be on a particular day, why not extend that a bit further? Again, I'm not saying months and months, but why not a few weeks, if that encourages more involvement?
Democracy is not about being involved in your country's future on a particular day. It's an ongoing process, and I see absentee ballots as a logical part of expanding democracy.
i got my first campaign call yesterday. Mice voiced pleasent caller who had 3 questions for me.
#1 have made any decision R or D ?
#2 which Dem-DEAN!
# srongly or waivering? STRONG!
and a reminder when the election was.
in the 2000 campaign, late deciders broke heavily for Gore. Part of that may have been based on the late disclosure of W's DUI
I'd say this is symptomatic of a problem with the media, not early voting.
Awww...everyone knows NM doesn't count, anyway. We're just some stupid third-world nation within the borders of the US, Governor Richardson notwithstanding. I will say that the only ads we saw for the past few weeks were for Clark and Dean, though. So maybe those absentee people only thought two candidates were running....
But I doubt it. We in NM are so used to candidates blowing us off that we figure out things the old-fashioned way: by reading the paper.
Seven days b/f the election. With big bold lettering all over the ballot indicating such. Ballots sent in earlier to be void, if they are mailed from within the United States. I quite realize that there are certain situations where one must be more flexible. I voted absentee in 1998, while I was stationed on a submarine on an overseas deployment. The seven-day rule would have to be written with exceptions for situations such as mine (and the college student above who seems to think we don't want him to vote). But the integrity of elections as samples of the people's will at one specific time, with all the information at hand, and reducing as much as possible the likelihood of a candidate dying or dropping out of the race AFTER you have voted, must be maintained. Systems such as Oregon's and the abuse of unlimited absentee balloting in California undermine the traditional concept of an election. Increasing voter turnout is a worthy goal but not worthy enough to debase the election itself.
"but a campaign has a certain rhythm to it and voting weeks in advance tends to undercut that."
Isn't this a good thing? (since the "media" seems to control this "rhythm"?)
A little off topic but:
I absolutely hate seeing candidates spend time and money in a primary state they will never carry in the general. Why not have the debate in MO or NM. Why not focus on MO, NM and AZ this tuesday. I know Edwards will still go to SC, but it's alot of time and money that could be better spent in toss-up states to set the table for November.
Martha: NM is going to be crucual in November. I hope they don't ignore it.
I see you point Atrios, but I agree with Balta. As long as my other option is a no trail machine I'm voting absentee
Christian
I've heard a number of people who say the same thing. Insist on a paper trail. Canada can do it, are we too dumb to count pieces of paper anymore?
All these responses to a Rick Santorum posting and not one mention of the "frothy mixture of semen and anal lube"? I'm highly, highly disappointed in you people.
www.spreadingsantorum.com
Today's Baltimore Sun runs a story how the chosen Diebold voting machines failed a security test.
http://tinyurl.com/378ms
Security level a smart eighth grader could crack, was the conclusion.
Those who vote absentee are a tiny, motivate minority. Think about it, only a small fraction of Democrats are even going to vote in in the primaries. How many people voted in NH? 200K? How many people live there, 1M, most of whom are old enough to vote I bet. I really think we should be making it as easy to vote as possible, since turn out is so low nationally. Why not let everyone mail in their ballots or do it on the internet? that way, there are no "poll watchers" in black counties asking for 4 forms of ID, or road blocks or any of that crap. Just let people vote.
KevinA - exactly how does multiple days of voting debase elections?
If a state decides that an election is really a window of opportunity for voters to exercise their franchise, what does it matter whether it's a few hours, days, or even weeks? Voting is about registering your wishes for the direction of your government. If you give me a cut off date when all the votes are counted so the process doesn't go on _ad infinitum_, I don't see how this changes the fact that I've expressed my political stance officially, and that it has an impact on the composition of my government.
Again, democracy is a process, not an end. It is hardly abuse for a state to allow its citizens to participate in the process as much as possible. I'd say reducing the concept of an election to an exercise of franchise only during an extremely limited timeframe is debasing.
Again, your problem of candidates dropping out or dying can be easily addressed by IRV, which would also overcome issues like governing by plurality.
Re: Bush Boom.
The end of unemployment insurance is great news for Bush!
If 'less people' are getting it, then 'unemployment' can be portrayed as decreased!
Yay for the Bush Reich!
BTW - looking for a way to kill the afternoon?
Check out the 'Skull & Bones' researcher on the Alex Jones show webcast
(note, not an endorsement of either. may be insightful, may be hilarious, but certainly better than rush rubbernecking)
Also, what do Phoenix Woman others here think about the info at justiceforwoody.org?
Happy Friday.
Renato...
I'm a fellow AZer who also normally votes absentee, but because I just switched from R. to D. to vote for Clark. I'm a lifelong Republican who wonders when the f*** equality, tolerance, fiscal responsibility, and the concept of separation of church and state disappeared from their core beliefs. If I re-register again as an R. after the election, it will only be to keep receiving the entertaining and scary mass-mailings coming.
Kit: how on earth will NM be crucial? We only have three-quarters of an electoral vote. Chump change.
Okay, so I'm exaggerating, but we really don't have much in the way of electoral votes, so we are pretty much swept to the corner. Like a lot of the Mountain West states. Of course, people are finally realizing there is a big Hispanic population (the majority now, I think) and one that is politically active and strong. But still. The entire state has only 2 million people. Not big enough for anyone to care.
But I might remind people now: we have WMD. And WMD-related program activity. Bwahahahahahaha.
Welllll, I have no position on early voting,but I think the easier we make it to vote, the more participation we'll get. But maybe that's wrong.
What ever. Just vote for SCOOTER!!!!!!!!!!!
/Answer to this would be adding some form of IRV./
Perhaps, but since IRV would require an overhaul of our voting laws far more radical than voting by mail, it's really a separate topic that deserves its own thread.
/Early voting is not a rolling sample./
Why do you say this? I think that it is. Whenever I hear people talking about voting by mail, I can't help but think about the tracking polls that are used nowadays, except voting by mail is a tracking poll (or rolling sample) that takes place over weeks or even months. How is that not a less accurate measure of the public will? This is directly contradicting the intentions of the Founding Fathers, who, after all, provided for such things as a postal service and had Postmaster General Benjamin Franklin in attendance at the Constitutional Convention. Elections are supposed to be a sample of all the people at one time. Not a questionare that you fill out whenever you please.
How do we, as people have pointed out upthread, account for such late-breaking incidents as the Bush DUI story?
/I'm sorry, but that smacks of elitism/
I'll grant that there's an element of truth in that charge.
/People have every right to have personal failings and still vote. If giving them just a little more incentive to vote caters to their laziness, so be it./
Which is where I disagree. Laziness should not always be catered to. Like I said upthread, while I agree that increased voter participation is a good thing, it is not an unlimited absolute good thing, and we should not do without question every last thing to increase it. I guess I don't see why it's such a burden to take an hour out of your day once every two years and actually go to a polling place.
/Further, I fail to see how making Election Day a holiday or putting it on a Saturday would be any better./
The more businesses are closed, the easier it is for people to make it to the polls. If we are willing to adopt voting by mail to allow people to vote whenever the heck they want, surely we should be willing to have a holiday so people do not have to go to their boss to ask for a break.
/you are willing to budge on your stance that an election is s'posed to be on a particular day, why not extend that a bit further?/
Fair criticism. It's a matter of striking a rational compromise. I do not see holding an election over a period of two days as undermining the process. Two months, on the other hand, surely does.
As more touch-screen voting systems are implimented, you are going to embrace something, anything which has a hard copy trail to it.
fightingdem
Just ask these guys:
"For a week, the computer whizzes laid abuse - both high- and low-tech - on the six new briefcase-sized electronic voting machines sent over by the state.
One guy picked the locks protecting the internal printers and memory cards. Another figured out how to vote more than once - and get away with it. Still another launched a dial-up attack, using his modem to slither through an electronic hole in the State Board of Elections software. Once inside, he could easily change vote totals that come in on Election Day."
I'm not sure which GOP trump card makes me uneasier: bin Laden in a Han Solo-esque carbon freeze until October, or these Etch-a-Sketch voting machines.
FWIW--I cast my absentee ballot for Dean in OK already, too. 'Course, I would have anyway, but there you go.
I'm recommending vote-by-mail to people who live in locations with touch-screen voting. Vote-by-mail may be the only way to assure that your vote isn't dropped by a Diebold (or other) voting machine. It's not a total assurance that your vote won't be deep-sixed by malevolent forces, but at least you avoid the "badly programmed electronic machine" problem.
Here in Maricopa County, AZ, we draw lines on our ballots (or at least we did the last time I checked).
Artios thinks that John Kerry's is IT.
I know many disagree with me on this subject, but a campaign has a certain rhythm to it and voting weeks in advance tends to undercut that.
Sort of a Dean's dead, so don't waste your vote please.
If we wait a little bit longer maybe that rhythm will shift to someone else like, heaven forbid, Ralph Nader. One never knows where the rhythm will take you, right Atrios?
Kerry hasn't been test yet. Once Bush opens the campaign war chest it may come down too one of the following.
A) That liar John F. Kerry
B) That liar George W. Bush
C) or that 3rd party outsider Ralph Nader
WHO knows, it could all depend on if that guy, Al From comes out from the shadow of the DLC and tells John Kerry not have a visceral hate for George Bush because that's just not how everybody feels during the campaign debates.
Maybe democracy itself will rest on a guy that isn't even running for president.
New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer.
Everytime I see this guy, Eliot, I have to ask myself "Is that guy REALLY government"? How come people like that never run for president?
New York Attorney General Eliot Spitzer handles himself like a high price corporate lawyer, that guy is such a sharp individual. It's good to be an outsider sometimes.
Eliot Spitzer has talked about the need for the states to sue the federal government because the Bush administration is destroying the regulatory agencies. And the Bush administration also IS NOT providing any real homeland security as Arizona Governor (and AZ ex-AG) Janet Napolitano has often spoken of the need for the federal government to help with this task a national security a whole lot more.
What a depressing 2004 campaign this turning out to be, really.
"how the Deanies burned through so much money so quickly."
No offense, but Dean was being attacked from *every* direction in Iowa. Gephardt was suicide bombing himself, Kerry push polling, the media putting both Gephardt and Kerry to shame, every debate with Dean at the center being attacked by every candidate, including the moderators.
I'm amazed he managed to pull off a third place position, considering the forces that were working against him, and that is the most likely place where all the money went, into advertising to try to fight back, and when that didn't work, to try to present a positive position.
As well, Dean was running ads from the beginning of his campaign, against Bush. Remember the ads that were played in whatever home city that Bush lives in in Texas, as kind of a "we're coming after you, Bush", which were pretty brilliant. Dean has been spending money for about a year, rather than the rest of the candidates who only more recently started spending money, and their money was spent attacking Dean, where early on, Dean's money was spent attacking Bush, or getting out Dean's message to people who don't live on the Internet.
Most of that money was well-spent, early on, because Dean was a total unknown. Conventional Wisdom says that Dean only became visible because of the Internet, but it was the internet that funded Dean's ability to make himself visible off of the internet, out in the real world.
The new anti-Dean meme that he somehow mis-spent 45 million dollars is yet another made up attack on Dean. I haven't done the research on it, but I would bet dollars to donuts if someone did, they would find that the money was all well spent and the charge is completely baseless.
California election was a case in point, with people casting votes for candidates who weren't even in the race any more.
The only REAL solution to getting more people to vote is to give them someone or something to vote FOR (rather than AGAINST, as is about to happen in this election with the "Anybody but Bush" movement). And that means supporting Instant Runoff Voting, Proportional Representation, allowing third parties in debates, and a bunch more which the two-party monopoly (no, that's not an error) has absolutely no intention of supporting. So instead they want to promote bogus solutions like instant registration, non-absent absentee balloting, etc.
If you want to watch what Kerry looks like standing up for what he believes in, watch some of the debates from last year when he wasn't the anointed "front-runner".
He seemed like more of a whiner than a fighter to me.
Everytime I see this guy, Eliot, I have to ask myself "Is that guy REALLY government"? How come people like that never run for president?
The Awesome Destructive Power of the CPM, that's why.
since IRV would require an overhaul of our voting laws far more radical than voting by mail, it's really a separate topic that deserves its own thread.
Agree that IRV deserves its own thread, but I'm not convinced it's any more radical than vote-by-mail. If anything, it seems an easier change: just add additional room to a ballot to register your backup choice(s).
/Early voting is not a rolling sample./
Why do you say this?
Because it isn't. It's an actual count of votes that have been cast, not a sample of how someone is leaning or intends to vote. Once you cast your absentee ballot, it's in the vault, as it were. The window of opportunity is limited (to a few weeks, days, hours, whatever), you cast your vote, done. My intentions have been made clear and officially recognized.
If you want to argue that votes not cast at the same time are rolling samples, then traditional elections are also in that category--we'll need electronic voting in every home and when the buzzer rings, we all push the button at the same time.
Really, all elections in the US are a sample. There's a huge MOE since only about 30% of Americans actually vote, and people change their minds after an election all the time.
If you give people a reasonable timeframe in which to vote, what does it matter exactly when they register their intention?
How do we, as people have pointed out upthread, account for such late-breaking incidents as the Bush DUI story?
We don't, and them's the breaks. I would suggest that part of voting is the recognition that stuff could come out after we cast our votes, and how to handle that is a matter best left up to the people voting. Come on, as it stands now the DUI and AWOL stuff could come out after Election Day. Same effect: the wrong dude's in the WH, and we can't do anything about it until the next election cycle.
Laziness should not always be catered to.
Problem is, what right do you or the state have to say what temperament is required for voting? How do you measure that? How do you know it's laziness and not absolute disengagement because the political process sucks? What if we could reach a few more "lazy" people, show them the power of voting, get them to reconnect, all by giving them a vote-by-mail option? Maybe after a time, they'll start going to the polling place. Or maybe they'll continue to vote absentee, not out of laziness, but because they find it gives them much more time to consider their choices than a few minutes in a voting booth (which is why I always vote absentee)?
You're impugning the motivations of non-voters at the expense of engaging them.
If we are willing to adopt voting by mail to allow people to vote whenever the heck they want, surely we should be willing to have a holiday so people do not have to go to their boss to ask for a break.
I don't see how a holiday follows from vote-by-mail. One has a synchronous
...I don't see how a holiday follows from vote-by-mail. One has a synchronous impact on how businesses and society operate, the other allows for asynchronous participation in the process. That said, I think a holiday is grand--I just don't think it will have the effect you think it does.
I do not see holding an election over a period of two days as undermining the process. Two months, on the other hand, surely does.
Are any of the states allowing a 2 month window? I don't think so. A few weeks for vote-by-mail (and a couple more for actual absentee ballots) perhaps. But if it's a matter of the window size, fine, let's figure out the happy medium.
I'd say there is a certain application of the law of diminishing returns, so 2 months would be excessive relative to the benefit. But a month seems reasonable to me. It seems that the concept of extending the election is not really bad, and what's really at issue is only how long we might actually allow for the voting.
Argh. Sorry. This one works:
The Awesome Destructive Power of the CPM
bogus solutions like instant registration, non-absent absentee balloting, etc.
I wouldn't say these are bogus. They certainly aren't substitutes for total institutional change, but I think they go hand-in-hand with the other approaches you list. I'm all for your suggested changes in addition to the others.
Atrios:
I understand your misgivings, especially in conjunction with the changing nature of the campaign closer to election day. However, my husband and I moved to Oregon from Wyoming and went from the regular voting booth kind of election to a voting system that's done completely by mail and we LOVE it.
For national candidates, we already educate ourselves on their issues to know who we'll vote for; the mail vote is simply convenient. But for local elections and more importantly, ballot measures and initiatives, we have the time to read the voter's pamphlet that accompanies the ballot while we're voting. For that reason, it's profoundly useful. I consider myself an even more informed voter because of it.
The convenience is worth noting, too. My experience is anecdotal, of course, but being able to vote when my schedule allows it rather than trying to fit it into an already hectic day is invaluable. For two people who do almost all their shopping online for precisely this reason, you can imagine why we like it so much and I'm sure we're not alone in that preference. I'd also say voter participation would be higher in an all-mail system like Oregon's, but I don't know if that's actually true so I won't make that argument. 
Voting absentee is a godsend to those of with jobs that make us travel at sometimes inconvienent times. I really beleive in voting and could not once because an emergency at a jobsite halfway around the country from my polling place required my attention. So I vote ahead of time, as a preventative measure. Lots of the people at my jobsites have permenant residences not local to the job, they vote early too.
I like the idea of Election Day being a national holiday, but wouldn't mind some way to get people to provide some evidence of actually voting before they get paid for the holiday. Who wouldn't vote then?
NTodd - great comment. I've been voting early for years because Dallas Co. allows anyone to vote early who wants to and it avoids all the lines. However, unlike voting by mail, it doesn't avoid the Diebold problem. I may not vote early this year unless I know how closely the early voting is being watched to make sure that there isn't another major Diebold "error." Especially since my precinct is overwhelmingly Repug. There were some fierce old time Union Democrats in my old district - I miss it. They watched those polling places with a vengeance.
In this case Atrios, I am sure the absentee ballots are justified. There are tens of thousands of people who are part-time residents of Arizona and New Mexico, and but claim those states as their primary domiciles.
I know, because I am one of them. I spend part of my year in Arizona, and part in California, and/or, traveling. If couldn't vote absentee, I wouldn't get to vote at all.
cassandra,
UH, we don't want the 50-70% of people who can't be bothered to vote to be essentially bribed into voting. It's a recipe for more Gov. Arnolds and Jessies.
Living in Oregon, where Vote By Mail (VBM) is the ONLY way to vote, I have to say - Most of the votes are sent in on the last day to mail or turned in at a drop box on the day of the election.
I like it - it gives people who might otherwise walk into a polling booth totally blind a chance to develop their positions by looking at the voter's pamphlet and reading the actual text of the issue (for ballot measures).
So, please - if you want to start a holy war against early voting, leave VBM out of it.
Kid Zemo
Granholm to endorse Kerry.
It's over...
Simpka
Granholm happens to be a member of the DLC, just like John Kerry - this is not a surprise.
It's a good point, but it's not going to change the outcome on Feb. 3rd. Kerry is going to win Arizona anyway and New Mexico probably too.
It's not over, but one's analysis has to be extremely faith-based (in the Republican fashion) to think that the Clark and Dean campaigns haven't already been fatally torpedoed. Polling says Kerry is taking Michigan from Dean, that's going to be the end of The Doctor. Word is that Kerry's campaign is targetting SC to sink Edwards and Oklahoma to finish off Clark. It took Kerry all of one day to get Missouri in the bag.
Six weeks from last to first, and beating Bush in a preliminary matchup. To hell with Joe Trippi, Mary Beth Cahill is kicking ass- look at the score after six weeks of work: taking it away from the others like candy from a little kid. BTW, I see no one here noticed the moves the Kerry campaign has already done to undercut any Nader or other Green run- the campaign has therefore already lapped the Dean peanut gallery at least twice.
The bad news: the Kerry people are only going to get better. The good news: the Kerry people are only going to get better.
Why is it that Kerry is catching this shit from our side? I expect Repugs to start dissing him now that he is the front runner - that's exactly what I expect. And I expect people pretending to be liberal dissing him on behalf of Repugs. But my goodness, with things going as well as they are for us right now, I fail totally to understand why liberals want to fuck it up.
Bush is in boiling water here up to his neck, like one of Uzbekistan's dissidents. And still the liberals cannot seem to avoid wanting to fuck this election up. *sigh*
From Tapped:
According to the Wall Street Journal, the Dean campaign has blown through all but $5 million of the $40 million it raised last year. With no public funds forthcoming and fundraisers cancelling events after the Iowa loss, keeping the campaign going means keeping the fundraisers on board. Coupled with internal criticisms of Trippi and complaints from members of Congress, a decision was made that additional management of the campaign was needed, says the source. No one in-house had adequate management experience -- the deputy campaign managers have never run anything the size of the Dean campaign --and outside experts were deemed unlikely to take on the task. Roy Neel, Al Gore's former chief of staff and a telecommunications lobbyist, had been brought on board the campaign on Jan. 1 as a senior advisor, following Gore's endorsement. He has been given the title of CEO. Details about what happened next are sketchy, but the net result was that Trippi officially handed in his resignation instead of continuing on in the campaign as the number two guy. At least one of Trippi's young acolytes is expected to depart the campaign as well.
According to Marc Ambinder, the former Dean embed at ABCNews.com, the relationship between Trippi and Dean soured after Iowa, where only around a third of the voters the campaign promised Dean showed up at caucus sites:
Dean was said by several sources who are close to him to have been very upset by what happened in Iowa, and blamed Trippi's staff, in part, for being disorganized and for running poor-quality television advertisements.
Dean and Trippi also had disagreements over spending. Dean is very tight with his budgets and would often veto ideas Trippi proposed.
The relationship between Dean and Trippi has been somewhat strained in the intervening week, according to sources loyal to both Trippi and Dean.
Dean limited Trippi's role in New Hampshire, told him to return to Burlington, stay off television, and the candidate essentially transferred the campaign's executive authority to his New Hampshire state director, Karen Hicks.
Neel's hiring reflects Gore's influence in the campaign. The former vice president has spoken to Dean several times since Iowa and helped to convince him to give Neel a higher profile. Gore has been critical of Trippi in these conversations, according to sources.
No word yet on whether or not Steve McMahon, Trippi's partner at Trippi, McMahon & Squier, and Dean's media advisor, will stay on. But the campaign source said, "There's no one more politically inept I've ever seen than Steve McMahon," and blamed him for the campaign's terrible ads in Iowa.
--Garance Franke-Ruta
Tenal, we ain't voting for the Bush guy Kerry. He supported him on the tax cuts, the war, the patriot act, the leave no rich kid behind.
Some of us have principles that we stick by, unlike the cowardly whore Kerry. We simply cannot vote for the guy any more than we could hit our own mothers.
Besides, if he gets it, he's toast anyway, so it won't matter.
"The bad news: the Kerry people are only going to get better. The good news: the Kerry people are only going to get better."
Proudly attacking other Democrats and campaigning dirty since 2003! Vote Kerry!
He won't stand up to Bush, but he'll happily undermine his fellow Dems. Yeah. That's the guy we want.
Anyone But Bush or Kerry
If my state used Diebold voting machines I would only vote by absentee ballot
With all the stories lately about Diebold, I can't believe there isn't a national push to get rid of the damn things. I'm going to have to check into whether I can vote absentee with a paper ballot by mail, and avoid using Diebold, which is pretty universal all over Dallas Co. now.
If people won't vote for Bush, and won't vote for Kerry, then I guess they won't be voting. Unless, god forbid, Nader gets in the race and blows it for the democrats.
Awesome link, Kibble! Thanks!
Got the absentee ballot a week and 1/2 ago, promptly voted for Dean and took it down to the county recorder's office here in Southern AZ.
Anybody but Bonesmen who VOTED FOR preeminent invasion based on flimsy lies, unfunded school mandates, a tax code that favors the very wealthiest few at the expense of our children's future and the Orwellian liked named PATRIOT Act!
What does it take to get the so called "centist" Dems to take their pink tutus off!
Oh yeah, forgot to mention that we have new Diebold optical scanners down here replacing the "hanging chad" type punchcards. I think the VBM absentee ballot uses the same sheet of paper that gets scanned. Either way there should be a paper trail.
repeal the 22nd amendment...
Forget it. I thought liberals were politically savvy and motivated. And smarter overall than the conservatives who don't seem to question common wisdom.
But I guess I was wrong to think that liberals wouldn't get hung up on something as inane as Skull & Bones. A fucking college society.
*sigh* again.
Forget I brought it up. It's the same old same old, and there's no use rehashing it. My apologies -it's OT anyway.
Dearest Tena,
I think the shit that Kerry is catching is because a lot of us are very concerned at his sudden rise from nowhere to frontrunner in, really, a matter of a week. There seems to be something fishy about that to me. I expect others, too.
There's the whole Skull 'n' Bones thing, but I think that's more of a conspiracy theory.
Instead, it seems to me to be a media-driven thing, and I personally don't trust the media to pick the front-runner for me. They certainly gave him some knocks a long time ago, with his haircut, but that's not anything they didn't do to any of the other candidates.
I am not married to Dean, but I like many of his policies (and I don't think that just because he isn't pro-gun-control that he is automatically non-progressive -- there is a context to his record on guns that has a lot to do with being in a state that is largely rural and contains a large gun sporting community. Gun control was never about removing all guns from everyone, but about assault-weapons bans and anonymous gun-show buys and registry and background checks, things that I don't think Dean has really been tested on), and I am totally freaked out at his complete destruction which has been blamed on him, but like Gore in 2000, really can't be laid at his doorstep so easily -- it is a manufactured destruction, most likely by the media, but also by the other candidates and there is some evidence that Kerry played some dirty tricks in both Iowa and New Hampshire to bring Dean down.
So, that stinks, to me. And Kerry's possible role in it, coupled by the desire for the media to throw its weight around, makes me very suspicious.
I think we owe it to ourselves to be suspicious about that, to check into it, to out the dirty-tricksters when we have evidence of it, so that we can make appropriate decisions.
Personally, I want to change America from the place it has become (and probably has been all along) -- where the dirtiest politicians make it to the top and then have to trade back policy for the favors they received along the way. If Kerry's doing that, I want it known now, so that the pubic, should they decide to do so, can adjust their votes accordingly, while there is still a chance.
If Kerry is a good guy, then great. But if he isn't, and there's a lot of evidence that he isn't, then he needs to be outed and dealt with appropriately, so that we can have an actual liberal, progressive candidate. If anyone can beat Bush, why not pick someone who is going to effect some real positive change?
The vote by mail in AZ is especially significant this time around. Since its a primary the polling stations have been collapsed by 2/3. That means lots of confusion come election day. With a significant number of Dean's vote already cast this confusion hurts Dean less.
The repubs wont start attacking Kerry the way they did to Dean until after the primaries.
You see Karl Rove really wants to run against Dean, thats why they took their best shots at him in the primaries. They are afraid of Kerry that's why they are saving all their dirt on him until August.
Make sense to you?
I vote absentee regularly and have for the past 10 or so years...
this has to do with the fact that generally I am otherwise occupied on election day, getting other people to the polls.
That okay with you, Atrios?
Bravo Ananna! Bravo!
You speak my heart. Please keep talking, spreading your message.
Kerry has done nothing to earn our support. NOTHING. He supported Bush on the war and taxes. He is not one of us.
About voting machines. Shut up and stop being paranoid. They are far more fair and balanced than the old machines, and can ensure security and accuracy. Those who wail over the possibility of hackers and stolen elections are part of another fifth column attempt to delegitimize our duly elected government with fear and lies. Shut up. SHut up.
Aw, shucks. Thank you dear Doggiebreath. 
I really hope that Tena reads it and understands, and doesn't see it as an attack, because we're all on the same side here, aren't we?
Ananana - I am a Dean supporter. But I don't have the kind of commitment that insists on seeing Kerry as having done anything wrong in order to get the votes he's gotten so far. I also am extremely depressed watching the left begin to eat its own. Especially now that the momentum is going with us and we have a real chance to get the country back.
I don't believe that Dean is more progressive or liberal than Kerry, and in fact that is one of the reasons I have liked Dean all along. He is actually less liberal, and so I've thought he would do better in the south and the west. I am a long way from convinced that Dean's candidacy is over. There are so many primaries to go. I think Wes Clark could do well in the west, too. And I like John Edwards - he has come out of the pack and started really turning heads.
As far as I am concerned, all of them are damn good candidates. I just get tired of the nonsense. Especially just when it looks like we really could win this. But we won't if it turns into one big cannibal picnic.
How to steal an election: 1) crooked voting machines. 2) Buy votes -- pay people to vote the way you want them to vote. 3) Dead (or mostly dead) people voting
#1 is the Diebold machines, or the old one-armed bandit mechanical machines such as used in Louisiana, New Mexico, and New York (which can be programmed to skip votes for the person you don't want to win by filing the gear for that person -- thus the phrase "one-armed bandit"). For the next two, it is much easier to do vote buying and to have dead people vote when using vote-by-mail. An operative can work a nursing home and get everybody there registered to vote and request absentee ballots for them. He can then fill out those absentee ballots for the residents of the nursing home, have the residents put their "X" or signatures on them, and then mail them in. A patient with Alzheimer's can easily be tricked into signing a ballot. Patients who do not consent to put their X or signature on a ballot can simply have their ballots torn up and discarded, no big deal.
Doesn't happen? Yeah right. I'm from Louisiana. New Orleans' cemetaries have a better vote turnout than the Garden District.
Phoenix Woman
Thank you!!!
a
Attacking Kerry is not the answer. Dean has to come up on his own, he cannot make it by negative attacks, except as needed, for instance to get Gephardt out of the race.
The support for Dean is natural. It doesn't need being forced by desperation tactics. It needs to keep growing, and keep sowing, the grassroots -- which is by the way what all of us need to do.
Iowa tainted NH, but now that the mainline Dems have their candidate, that can only be good news for Dean, the outsider with his heart on his sleeve. We can defeat Kerry and Clark in the primary; we do not need to attack Kerry to do that.
ABB. At the very least, Kerry will forestall the ecological disaster Bxco is plotting DAILY.
If you don't trust eVoting machines (which I don't), then using an absentee ballot is a good idea. It's a permanent written record that can be inspected by a human and counted by hand.
Until California stops using eVoting machines, I'll encourage everyone to use absentee ballots. Yes, I agree that this is a shame because it doesn't fit smoothly into the campaign rhythm, but at least this way I can be a bit more confident of having an honest count.
Here in Delaware (Delawhere?) you still have to fill out one of those affidavits to vote absentee. Up until recently I would have agreed with Atrios but we also have those electronic voting machines. So I'm comtemplating doing a bad thing - swearing falsely and voting absentee. Promise you won't tell anyone.
Grumpy -
I'm a sucker for honest politicians too. I was telling my 15 year old daughter the other day about how Dean reminds of Tsongas and she just shook her head at my naivete and said "Dad, honesty never works in politics".
This is OT, but did anyone else see Jon Stewart last night? When he ran the video of Kay reporting to Congress - the camera went to Ted Kennedy - I have never seen such raw anger on a face as there was on Kennedy's. He looked to me like he was really struggling to keep from leaping out onto the floor and throttling Kay. It was amazing.
If ever anyone wanted to get rid of BushCo., it is Ted Kennedy.
First off, some of you calm down! Atrios didn't say there's no legit reasons for absentee voting. Just that he had doubts about stretching the reasons too far.
It may be an "incovenience" to go to the polls; I guess it depends on how important voting is to you. How often have we read or seen stories about a new movie or a popular concert or sporting event for which people line up for tickets the night before? If you think it's worth it, you'll spend the time.
As for mail-in balloting giving a person more time to consider their decision, that's a bit silly. My city sends out sample ballots weeks before each election. There's plenty of info available about who's running and what they believe. Voting at the polls on election day isn't supposed to mean that that's the first time you think about it!
I like the holiday idea; we have federal holidays for Columbus and other people; surely voting is at least that important. Expanding the polling time wouldn't be bad, but I wouldn't go more than two days. Remember that it would add a big cost burden to election districts and an incovenience to schools and other places that make themselves available. Perhaps a 24-hr. period would be a good solution; it would give people plenty of time to vote before or after work, and be convenient for people on different work shifts.
Hockey games or other sporting events tend to run 2-1/2 hrs.; movies, plays or concerts 1-1/2 hrs. or longer. Isn't exercising our civic duty and privilege worth a flippin' hour?
Oh yeah, forgot to mention that we have new Diebold optical scanners down here replacing the "hanging chad" type punchcards. I think the VBM absentee ballot uses the same sheet of paper that gets scanned. Either way there should be a paper trail.
I'm with you, Atrios. It bothers me, too, that people can vote too early.
Absentee ballots are OK, but if not postmarked ON election day, there should be some statement, under penalty of perjury, as to why the voter couldn't wait until election day to mail the ballot.
I absolutely do not care that this might postpone having final results for a few days.
Couple of people have favorably mentioned Oregon's Vote by Mail system, but it's a crock. It's incredibly easy to job the system. At least in the old days, if you were going to stuff a ballot box or buy votes or whatever, you actually had to deal with other people. Now, all you have to do is go around after ballot-mailing day (which is well-advertised in the newspaper) and pilfer as many ballots as you want from mailboxes. Most people aren't expecting their ballot to arrive on a particular day, and so would never notice. Mark it, forge a signature on the external envelope and drop it into a mailbox. Untraceable. Unverifiable.
True story: I needed to change my address on my voter registration. I downloaded the form, made a photocopy for my wife, filled in the address on both. We both signed and dated. I walked into the election office and gave them the new form and asked if I could pick up our ballots while I was there. No ID was requested. I had a handwritten note from my wife authorizing the pickup, but NOBODY KNEW who I was. They handed me the two official ballots, and out I walked.
Jeebus.
Tena, since this thread is pretty much finished, I don't think it is worthwhile for us to tussle over something we are both basically in agreement over. Some other time, maybe there will be more information for us to talk about and then we can have another conversation about it, and I will prolly end up feeling really embarassed that I was uninformed (which is my natural state, no matter how much I try to become more informed) but for now, I think there is no love lost over here, and I'll continue to keep an open mind. Be well.
After voting in MI Caucus via internet, I have to say this is a great way to get former non-voters and new voters to participate in the Caucus. I have a lot more faith in this system than in a Diebold machine, hands down, primarily because of the hardcopy I have of my ballot.
If you've been to MI in winter, you know it can get ugly. It was 2 degrees with wind chills of -20F this morning; older folks who are generally the most frequent voters are less likely to vote. If they can vote by mail, more power to them.
It's a big challenge we have right now, trying to reverse the trend of decreasing voter participation. If internet-mail-in ballots increase the rate, so be it.
I have every intention of voting for Kerry if he's the ultimate nominee. NOBODY'S flaws are worth giving Bush another four years, but I think it's rich to worry about insisting on some sort of 11th commandment purity (thou shalt not speak ill of a fellow Democrat) at this stage. It's a little too late. Kerry, Gephardt, Lieberman, Sharpton, less so Edwards and Clark, were only too happy to spend substantial percentages of time during the debates and in their press releases taking as many shots at Dean as they could. Where was the party loyalty then? Lieberman actually had to be prodded once during an interview to shut up about Dean and talk about himself, something most politicians have very little trouble doing. I want to see Kerry get beaten up like that, not for schadenfreude, not because I don't like Kerry, not because I think it's only fair, but because I want to see how he handles it. I don't want to see him hit by a barrage of Rovian arrows and find he can't take it at a time that it's too late. I'd have preferred if the other candidates had confined themselves to criticism that would only hurt each other in the primaries and not give ammunition to Rove, but since NONE of the major candidates adhered to such a convention, tough. Politics isn't a tea party.
Hey I am sorry that I work and go to school all day and my voting precinct isn't anywhere near a bus stop.
Thank you, Atrios, for your skepticism about absentee ballots. What bothers me as much as (maybe even more than) insecure electronic voting machines is the increasing promotion of and shift to remote voting -- voting away from a public polling place via, e.g., absentee ballots or the Internet from home. I think this is dangerous for three principal reasons.
First, I think voting is not only an individual activity, but a communal one as well. I regard the need to go to a public polling place as a "useful inefficiency" that serves as a periodic if subliminal (maybe more than subliminal) reminder that we're all in this together and have responsibilities to each other. If we all see each other and chat a bit as we stand in line to cast our ballots, perhaps we'll think a bit harder about not only the personal consequences of the vote we will presently cast, but the broader societal impacts as well. I believe remote voting increases insularity and helps break communal bonds that allow a healthy, democratic society to thrive. Except for the physically incapacitated and the relatively few voters who have to be far away from their homes for some reasonable purpose (death in the family, etc.), I think voters should be required to vote at a public polling site.
Second, I don't think we should make voting so effortless. I'm a contrarian on this one from most liberals. I don't think we should go ga-ga trying to up the number or percentage of voters simply to up the number or percentage of voters. I want to make voting relatively easy (I like the fact that Wisconsin allows registration at the polling place on the day of an election), but I don't favor reducing barriers merely to let us brag about getting more people to the polls. I think that approach increases the number of ignorant idiots who'll cast ballots, and I don't think that enhances a democratic republic; rather, I think encouraging know-nothings to vote reinforces the dumbing-down tendencies of society. If voting's not important enough to someone for him or her to get off the couch and travel a few blocks (or even a few miles) to a voting booth once every two or four years, I don't think we should encourage that person to vote by making it possible to do so from the couch. I think democracy is -- and should be -- kind of hard to make work, that citizens in a democracy have to take the initiative and time -- if only enough to get off the couch and travel to a polling place to vote -- and periodically commit a significant act of democracy; that kind of affirmative, periodic recommitment is one of the key characteristics that gives a democratic society its staying power.
Third, on a practical level, remote voting significantly increases the opportunities for corruption, including vote buying. When people go to the polls and vote secretly but in a communal setting, the voter can keep third parties out of the booth, and poll watchers can assist in enforcing
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Third, on a practical level, remote voting significantly increases the opportunities for corruption, including vote buying. When people go to the polls and vote secretly but in a communal setting, the voter can keep third parties out of the booth, and poll watchers can assist in enforcing the secret ballot; even if a voter has promised to vote a certain way, the secrecy of the voting booth allows the voter to change his or her mind without an enforcer looking over a shoulder. With absentee ballots and Internet voting, there's no practical way to monitor or prevent corrupt deals or to prevent a corrupt promise from being enforced (at least as a practical matter, if not a legal one). Many of the nastiest and dirtiest election corruption issues have arisen in the context of absentee balloting, as when outsiders "help" the (often elderly) absentee voter fill in the ballot or when the number of absentee ballots suddenly surges in close races. (You don't even need intentional corruption to foment a crisis with absentee ballots. Anyone remember the major dustup over military absentee ballots in Florida in the 2000 Presidential election?) As the restrictions on qualifying for absentee ballots are increasingly lifted, the openings for corruption increase accordingly; Internet voting multiplies the opportunities for this kind of corruption many times over. With absentee ballots and Internet voting, it's much easier to make sure a bought vote stays bought; Mayor Daley the Elder would have loved it.
I tend to think one of the next big, persistent election scandals will more likely arise out of vote-buying involving absentee ballots and Internet voting than out of the security issues making news these days. The security issues are certainly significant and nowhere near a solution, but it's the importation of old forms of corruption into new methods of voting that cause me long-term concern. As remote voting spreads, I wouldn't be surprised to see sub rosa markets develop in absentee and Internet ballots; I wouldn't be surprised if those markets already exist.
I've never liked the idea of absentee balloting for convenience.
I have a picture in my mind of fundy congregation ballot parties.
I also imagine abusive people filling out ballots for their spouses.
I have a big problem with the assumption of many that those who can't/don't vote in person are automatically "lazy" and therefore undesirable voters. Here's a few alternative scenarios that the maybe white, middle-class "good Americans" wouldn't think of:
-boss won't give time off for voting ... or, if he does, won't pay for it
-mother can't afford babysitter and cringes at thought of bringing sick baby (because the HMO won't pay for the baby's care) to the polls
-voter doesn't own a car and our poor public transportation system (poor because white, middle-class voters have CARS and don't give a shit about public transportation) can't take him near enough to the polls
And that's just what I rattled off the top of my head. I'm sure there's a million other reasons that don't involve laziness.
And sniffing at the unwashed masses for their "laziness" reminds me a LOT of Republicans sniffing at the "laziness" of welfare recipients. Just goes to show, a well-off white person is a well-off white person is a well-off white person, regardless of whether they have a little "D" or an "R" next to their name.
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