Take heart, people.

Nov 03, 2004 15:57

I see a *lot* of the people on my flist despairing at people's fuckheadedness, to which I just want to say: Dude! People here (not the press, to my disappointment and horror!) are shaking their heads and saying stuff like 'what? is it some kind of third world country or something? what do you mean not enough ballots, software errors, voter ( Read more... )

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stellamira November 3 2004, 14:06:03 UTC
People here (not the press, to my disappointment and horror!) are shaking their heads

Over here, too. My dad and I were discussing the 2000 election a while ago, and we agreed that the American system of how to collect and count the votes is just strange. All those punchcards that had to be looked over twice where the hole actually was, and now the computers that didn't even print something out, so you had no control that your vote actually was counted (or counted for the right person). When we're electing our parliament, we get a long ballot with all the parties on it and a big fat circle in front of each one where we make our cross. I haven't heard of anybody complaining about that yet. And, what the fuck, standing in line for three hours to go vote? No wonder that their turnout is so low. The longest I've ever waited to vote was half a minute!

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halimede November 3 2004, 14:23:00 UTC
Same here, except no cross but filling it in with a big red pencil on a chain. When we did vote by computer & it gets printed on a big roll of paper right there. But anyone can request to read the source code for the computer programs used. Another thing that puzzles me about the US way of holding elections is why people have to 'register' to vote. Here you get a call-up letter in the mail if you're elligible, you bring that and some ID and that's it, you get to vote.

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stellamira November 5 2004, 12:48:54 UTC
We get a call-up postcard, but still the same. I do sort of get the registering thing, though, because it probably means much less effort and cost. Why send everybody a card or letter if only 60 % are gonna use it and go vote anyway (although, I admit, I don't know if Americans get a letter at all). But what I heard is that upon registering you give your basic political tendency (Republican or Democratic), and I'd feel very uncomfortable with that.

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