VOTE!
I don’t care who you vote for, or who wins if you don’t vote, but you have a personal responsibility to millions of Americans who have been putting up with the two years of hell that has been the 2008 campaign to make the effort.
If you don’t vote, you can’t complain about what they do to you. Voting is a minor inconvenience compared to what a lot of people for a very long time have done to give you the right. At one time only white males with property were allowed to vote, and I think we all understand who benefits from their votes, and it probably isn’t you. Even if you don’t think your candidates or issues have a chance of winning, vote, because it forces the other side to vote or lose. I realistically only expect to be on the winning side with about three of two dozen people and issues on my ballot, but they have to work for their wins.
29 comments
Mind if I snag that graphic (with attribution, of course) and use it for a similar post chez moi?
No problem, Michael, and attribution isn’t necessary as it is just text, so the artistic elements belong to the font designers, not me.
Hear, hear! Even typically partisan voters (like me, for example) need to be reminded that there are many deserving down-ballot candidates… even if you don’t give a damn about the presidential race, you owe it to yourself and your community to vote in those state and local races. It is an obligation, as surely as paying taxes is an obligation. (Personally, I find voting a lot less unpleasant than paying taxes…)
In Florida it is the damn ballot measures that really screw people over. You can get rid of politicians with a simple plurality, but it takes a 60% vote to amend the constitution.
I’m really concerned that people are only going to vote for President and ignore the rest of the ballot. The backers of some of these measures aren’t going to vote for anything but their hate.
I don’t think they will ignore the rest of the ballot, Bryan. As a matter of fact, there are some people so pissed, they want to ignore the top spot, and just vote for the rest….
That could be a problem for McCain in Florida, as a lot of the Christianists may vote for the anti-humans amendment and ignore everything else. Bush’s ground campaign was really the fundamentalists and they aren’t acting like they did in 2000 and 2004. You aren’t seeing the “Christians for McCain” stickers, like the “Christians for the President” stickers that were everywhere in 2004.
We will find out this week, although not as quickly as people think because absentee ballots only have to be post marked tomorrow, they will be coming in for a week, and there are a lot of them.
my parents called earlier to REMIND ME TO VOTE !!!!!!!!!!!!! they did the early voting thing, but their polling place is always crowded, so they were stuck waiting in line no matter what they did.
Even though two precincts use our town hall for voting, we are two of the smallest precincts in the county, so it would be pretty hard to create a line.
Two precincts vote at my polling place as well. If the number of people in there at 7 a.m. this morning was any indication, it’s going to be a long and very busy day for pollworkers across the country.
I voted early — almost two weeks ago — and waited four hours. It was worth every minute.
I voted early this morning. It was busy but there was only a short line and a two minute wait. I was impressed. They had more workers and more voting booths than in past years.
I opted for the paper ballot; everyone was doing that. No printout that we could review on that electronic machine, so I passed. They claim it prints a copy inside the machine of what you voted, but it’s of little value if I can’t review it.
I have high hopes for Florida and they have adopted the ballots and procedures out local Supervisor of Elections, Pat Hollarn, has had in place for two decades – real paper ballots that can be counted by machines or people. The main benefit of the machines is that if you over-vote, it won’t accept the ballot and you get to fill out a new one.
I’m waiting until 2PM so people have easier access on their lunch hour.
I would have the same trust in an internal paper tape, as I have in meetings where the other side takes “the official notes”. I take my own notes… from the recording I make of these meetings.
I make my living fixing problems caused by electronic equipment, no way I trust these machines. The hardware failure rate is minimal, but software?! Hell, I wouldn’t trust them if I wrote the software. It is just too easy to miss something. The software would have to open sourced and submitted to a “hacker challenge” before I would even begin to believe it was secure.
So far it is looking like we’ll get a reasonable turnout, but I’ll wait.
Our voting machines are the ones made by Premier Election Solutions. Never heard of them? Well, they are Diebold using another name! Their secret software that can’t be tested is to be avoided.
Oh, the MS Access script running under Windows developed by the tiny company that Diebold bought out and promptly fired the development team.
The software has been posted in multiple places and just looking at it is to laugh. They didn’t even use the minimal security and auditing offered by Access. VBA is not exactly a “power” language. They keep it “secret” to avoid the ridicule. What a kludge!
10 minutes — from the time i walked out my front door to the time i left the parking lot at my polling place, and that included taking a few moments to speak to some of my neighbors after we all fed our ballots into the machine. i didn’t even get to work late, darn it. 😉
i love my precinct, they’re on top of things. normally they have 10-12 voting stations, complete with pens, where you fill out your ballot. today they had at least 30, maybe more, and almost all of them were in use the whole 5 minutes i was there.
I understand it is still a minor mess in the Eastern Time Zone, not as big a mess as 2000, but still not smooth.
i’ve been reading about that off and on during the day, and noticed that palm beach county, home of all those troublesome chads, is just now reporting their results.
It’s rather obvious that a lot of Obama supporters are voting for Amendment 2. It’s rather a sad commentary on the Democratic Party.
most of the democrats i know here are reasonably left of center on everything — except sex. but florida’s also got a sizable independent/third party population, and among my acquaintances in this sector are a lot of the hard-line religionists, so maybe we can blame the final result on them if amendment 2 passes.
Not with an 800k majority, it’s more likely socially conservative AA voters.
Hmmm. They are reporting here that McCain has conceeded! They say his speech is amazing! :O As a couple put it:
Paul Colgan: Where was this guy during the campaign? It’s inspirational stuff.
Lincoln Archer: This is a FANTASTIC speech.
Lincoln Archer: He notes with regret that Obama’s grandmother didn’t live to see this day.
Lincoln Archer: “We’ve come a long way from the old injustices that stained America”
Lincoln Archer: Pledges unity. “I urge all Americans who supported me to join me in not just congratulating him but offering goodwill”
(Yeah… right!! I believe that one!) LOL
There are TWO McCains?? He has a twin? Or, is he just Schizo? Sheesh.
Ahhh! PHew… It’s OK… he’s back! LOL The World tilted for a minute there! 😉
Lincoln Archer: McCain notes that a century ago it was considered an outrage for a black man to be INVITED to the white house, let alone elected to it.
That’s the man we’ve all come to despise and pity. 🙂
Oh God! Well… that didn’t take long *sigh*
Paul Colgan: A quote from Obama on the phone call – he told McCain: “I need your help, you’re a leader on so many important issues.”
Lincoln Archer: Bush called Obama… here’s a quote from his spokeswoman:
“Mr President-elect, congratulations to you. What an awesome night for you, your family and your supporters. Laura and I called to congratulate you and your good bride”
I hope Obama is watching his back. 😉
I don’t imagine the Senator has ever heard of Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln.
Of course, things did go downhill for quite some time between the Civil War and World War II, but black men and women were invited to the White House. He probably forgot that until the Depression most minorities belonged to the Republican Party.
At least he knows when to withdraw, although if he had done it in January the Republican Party might be in better shape.
Hell, I wasn’t 100% sure we would have an election. I assume someone told the Shrubbery to make the call.
i wasn’t 100% we’d have an election either, and furthermore, it’s not january 21, 2009 yet.
Well, thanks for that cheerful, but all too true note.
Well!! I have to admit… I am impressed! 🙂 I just saw Obama’s speech. I saw Obama on my TV… but I heard JFK! I kid you not. He has come a hell of a long way in a year… A year ago, I thought Obama was naive and inexperienced. Tonight, he was a great statesman. 🙂 I hope it’s the real Obama, because the USA and the World needs that Obama. 🙂
Whatever happens from now on… I believe completely that the USA made the right choice, of the two choices you had.
It’s amazing that Obama won all the major electoral states. That speaks volumes. California, New York, Florida, Ohio, Illinois, Pennsylvania. The only real loss (in political terms only) is Texas, which is hardly a surprise. 🙂
His speech was very well delivered, and he seemed sincere (and no notes either!) 🙂
If nothing else… the USA can be proud that you have an intelligent and eloquent statesman as a President! It’s been a long time coming. 🙂 He even got a few subtle jabs in at bush. 😉
It’s a good day. Whether it’s a great day… time will tell. 😉 😀
I glad someone’s happy, because I have nothing to cheer about today. There is no change in Florida and life got worse with the passage of a couple of bad constitutional amendments. The Democrats made no pick-ups and the percentage of voters was down from 4 years ago.
Sorry, but I had hope that something might move.
The economy may have moved national politics, but I expect very little change overall, other than the lies will be told by a better class of speakers than before.