Here's where you and I disagree. The stakes are high everywhere. I don't feel that Kerry will protect this country anymore than Bush has or will.
Apology accepted. Lots of people have stated who they voted for and I have yet, nor will I make a comment about them, so please do me a favor and think before you type. ANYWAYS, back to the topic. No I haven't voted yet, plan on going after I get out of work. We here in NY have the lever machines, much like the one Father Ted described.
Don't know the coffee place in Madam's Organ. K might. When I taunted Bush the Elder in '92, I was working downtown at the AP Broadcast HQ on 18th and K (which is where I realized the "liberal media" is a myth). I could walk to 1600 Pennsylvania in about two minutes from there. Now is a different story, what with all the streets being closed for "security" reasons.
You want to know something? There's a part of me that agrees with you, in that we don't really know if national security under Kerry will be markedly better under Bush. But then I realize that it can't get much worse under Bush, so I'd rather take a chance on the new guy who hasn't screwed things up so badly on protecting us here over the past three years.
I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt that "everything changed on 9/11." But you're right; I probably shouldn't.
I understand where you're coming from, but I still see Kerry as a Senator, a Senator that has done just as much as Bush. Squat. I'm tired of all the political wrangling that's been going on, the mudslinging and threatened lawsuits. I've become so disillusioned with the election that I've been praying for it to be over since February.
I don't suppose it would be asking too much for the removal of two evil tyrants who 1) have damaged their nation's standing in the world; and 2) consistently mangle the English language. Let's just hope Berti and Dubya don't do a job swap.
Other Ohio voters... did your ballots have Nader's name covered with a white label? I'm not sure what my precinct's normal turnout is, but I was #100 at 8AM, which I know is really high. I saw two of my neighbors, and my wife (who is going to vote early afternoon) talked to another neighbor at about 9:30 who said the lines were still really long.
I voted about 10:30 this morning. My job hours are pretty flexible, so I usually vote in the off-peak hours. I waited about 5-10 minutes (first time I've ever waited there, though I voted absentee in the last two presidential elections.) No real problems, though the woman in front of me had just gotten married and they had to search for her in the precinct rolls under her maiden name (which they eventually found). I made sure I had no hanging chads under our punch card system. It looked like there were exit polling people outside. I walked slowly, hoping they would notice me. No such luck. (They did poll someone who came out a little bit after me, so I guess they're polling every fifth voter or something like that.) I did notice afterwards that the Kerry-Edwards people had cookies, which I enjoyed.
I voted this morning around 8:30. Normally, I'm in and out in less than five minutes but it took a little more than 20 minutes this time. We use the optical scanners here which show the total number of votes counted on the front of the machine as each ballot is entered. I regularly vote in the morning and the number is about 600-700. But this morning it was over 1,500 and to speed things up, they were asking people to just place their ballots next to the machine to be inputed later. So, the actual number of voters was higher. With about 6,000 registered voters in our town, that means about 25% of the people had voted in the first 1 1/2 hour of voting. I've never seen it like that. A weird thing happen to me while I was voting. I had planned out my votes for the big national and state elections and planned on splitting my vote between the various parties on the bottom of the ticket. However, as I got to that part of the ballot, I felt anger towards the GOP and voted straight Dem. I completely changed my votes based upon this last-second sweep of emotion. I had never done that before and even felt kind of embarrassed about it. But then after voting, I stopped to grab a bagel with a friend who had also just voted. Since I was embarrassed by my non-pragmatic votes on the bottom of the ballot, I didn't bring it up while we were talking. But then my friend starts talking about how he had voted. It turns out he went through the same experience. He took out his anger towards the GOP on the bottom of the ticket. And it had been a last-second voting booth decision. Did anyone else have this experience? By the way, I tried to go to www.pitchforkmedia.com this morning and got this message: Everybody is getting into the GOTV act.
Nope. Just signs on the door and at the registration table saying a vote for Nader will not be counted as Nader is no long an option on the Ohio Presidential Ballot.
To be honest, I didn't even look. My eyes shot straight to K/E, which was at the bottom of my butterfly ballot. Also: for all the reports of nasty weather, it was sunny and felt like it was in the high 70s around an hour ago here in Athens.
I just voted here in Ohio (Shelby Co.) and I too saw Nader's name was printed on the ballot but covered with a white label. Gotta roll w/ the punches All is running smoothly here ( just wish it would stop pouring rain).
Nonsense. Bush may have behaved as if he had a national mandate after his selection, but if Kerry wins the electoral college and loses the popular vote, he won't be given that kind of leeway from the demagogue element of the right. Kerry needs to win both. Every vote, everywhere is important.
For Ohioans - even though Nader isn't on the ballot officially, you could write in anyone you want, right?
i think that turnout is going to be insane. everywhere. perhaps could be the X factor. i mean, really, how thorough are all the polls that have lead up here? cause voter registration has been through the roof... wonder why that is. just got back from the polls here in dover and it was packed. i guess that is VERY much out of the ordinary.
True, Mike. By the way, thank god I voted last year and didn't need to produce ID this time around, since my ********ing wallet, along with all my cards and license and whatnot, was stolen last night from the swimming pool locker room.
I think you mean Tryst (the same guy owns the 24 hr Diner next door). I think I'm just going to chill out at home tonight so I can cuss at my tv freely should the need arise. K
How else do you do a punch-card ballot? They just put all the choices on the left page, and leave the right page blank. Flip the page, and you move to the next column on the punch card. When I pulled mine out I was very careful to ensure there were no hanging chads, and doubled checked the correct holes were punched for the more important races. My wife actually re-inserted her card and punched Kerry's name again, just to be certain.
Butterfly ballots are when they have candidates for the same race on both the left and right pages. http://shd.ton.tut.fi/pics/florida-voting/link.butterfly.ballot.ap.jpg