'Never Seen Crowds Like This'

[DogPoundPup]

Source: Washington Post

One week before the Nov. 4 election, a courtroom showdown is looming in Virginia over whether the battleground state is prepared to handle what is expected to be a historic voter turnout.

Virginia Gov. Timothy M. Kaine (D) and his top elections officials yesterday launched an impassioned defense of the state's ability to handle the crowds, disputing claims in a lawsuit filed late Monday on behalf of the NAACP that the state has not allocated enough voting machines, poll workers and polling places, particularly in precincts with large minority populations.

Maryland and District officials are also expecting record turnout, which already has spawned long lines for in-person absentee voting, and say they are taking steps to ensure that Election Day goes as smoothly as possible. Still, they concede that long lines could delay results and cause some voters to give up before casting a ballot.

Never have so many people in the region registered to vote, and with the intense interest in the presidential election, officials expect turnout rates as high as 90 percent. Virginia has added 500,000 registered voters to its rolls since the 2004 presidential election and now has more than 5 million. Maryland's list has grown 10 percent, to almost 3.5 million, and the District has almost 427,000.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/28/AR2008102801788.html

[BrklynLiberal]

1. It will be a very long day....therre will be long lines, and polls will not be able to close until

very early Weds AM>

[BadgerKid]

12. Is there such a thing as 'designated end of line'?

On election day several cycles ago, it was my first eligible election. I actually did not vote because I took myself out of line. The reason was that I took the word of the last person in line who said the pollsters had designated her as the 'end of the line' with the idea being the pollsters wanted to close up by a certain time (like 9 PM or something). I have never faced this situation since but have always wondered whether the pollsters were acting legally. I would think that as long as there is someone in line, the polls stay open?!? :shrug:

[Ms. Toad]

14. At least in Ohio,

Anyone standing in line when the polls close is entitled to vote - so the last person in line at that time would be the designated "end of the line," but pollworkers cannot arbitrarily cut the line off before then. People were standing in line in 2004 through most of the night in certain polling places.

I think that is true nationally - but you should do a search for a voter's bill of rights for your state.

[targetpractice]

2. Hopefully, this will be the nail in the coffin...

...for election processes that prohibit anyone from voting if they want to. Federal law should insist that enough resources exist to handle 100% of the registered voters on election day (as well as each day of the early voting period)... Obviously, the only cost-effective method for ensuring that would be paper ballots. The machines are a huge bottleneck in the process.

Hopefully, this election will prove that electronic voting itself is disenfranchising voters.

[stillcool]

3. I hope they are warning people....

that they're going to have to spend the day at the polling place. If they know of this now, there is no excuse for not putting out a public service announcement on the news, radio, etc.,

[gauguin57]

5. But not everyone can take more than an hour or two off work to stand in line all day.

Send all these states/the district good vibes on election day, all you who got to vote early!

[stillcool]

7. they've got a week to get it together..

you'd think that would be enough time to work something out.

[gauguin57]

4. Add Pennsylvania (no early voting) to the long-lines list.

I expect to be folding up my greeters' cardtable around midnight, after "all those in line at 8 p.m." finally vote!

[proud progressive]

6. WHAT IN THE FUCK COUNTRY DO WE LIVE IN?

if one person cannot vote, we as a nation should be ASHAMED of ourselves. there is no fucking excuse for this to be happening. are we so fucking apathetic that we do nothing time after time after time?
you either add more machines or add more time to vote. you do ONE or the OTHER or BOTH!
give the repub florida governor some credit for at least adding more time to vote.

[Zhade]

9. Hear, hear.

NT!

[Joe Chi Minh]

21. I thought maybe some of Obama's campaign money could be used

to purchase more machines for the minority areas where a deliberate lack of sufficient voting-machines is intended to disenfranchise, not help the voting. But there are so many reasons not to, just one of which was sufficient to presuade me it wouldn't be such a good idea. Among those reasons:

They would probably be obliged to purchase them from the Usual Suspects, those manufacturers of Republican-oriented machine. It would lend legitimacy to the use of machines, which all the experts say simply cannot be made absolutely secure. They are designed not to be secure. And so on and so forth.

[Joe Chi Minh]

22. Well, I think the USA, in this matter and in one or two allied, political ones,

stands in relation to the rest of the developed world, as a duck-billed platypus does to the rest of the world's fauna. At the extreme pole of anomaly, eccentricity, bizarreness, irregularity, etc. Then of course, there's the "rogue-elephant" criminality across the globe, and the current, dictatorship aspect, at home. But then, you know all this.

On the other hand, your last two elections have been a bit like a children's Nativity play. A spectacle. Nothing more. 'Cep your parents, or rather, Big Brother, wasn't looking on benignly.

[Proud-D]

8. What we realy need

at the very least is to make Presidential elections a federal holiday. Just like jury duty it should be against the law for an employer to punish an employee for fulfilling his or her civic duty to vote!

[tazkcmo]

18. I agree!

A 3 day event. Bigger than St. Pats, Christmas and Thanksgiving combined.

[badgervan]

10. Classic Ways to Keep the Vote Low

... Kaine will forever be known from now on as one of many elected officials in charge who knowingly tried to keep voters from being able to vote. He will never advance politically after this election. I can't believe a Dem is doing this.

[Dems4me]

11. Gov. Kaine said yesterday that he was confident that

the election officials had everything under control. He said that
there was enough voting machines for each area and that machines were
being sent now to areas that would be more heavily hit. The reporter
did not ask him if there would be an extension to the the closing time or
not. One reporter said that the elections office stated that they would do
what ever was necessary to make this work smoothly when asked about time
changes. I'm in VA and thats all I have heard so far.

This is going to be one close race here.

[adadem]

13. Every state should allow early voting

this is bs that only some states allow it.

[moose65]

15. I agree

In this day and age, there is absolutely no reason to not have early voting. This isn't 1932, for God's sake. The population is larger and more mobile, and people have a lot going on that they need to do. Voting should be an easy process, not jumping through hoops. Election Day should be a holiday, but I also think it should be in a warmer month. In the Northeast and West, it can be bone-chilling cold in November and there can be snow storms. I've always thought Election Day should be on the weekend, if it's not going to be a holiday. How about 2 weeks of early voting, then an Election Weekend where people can vote on Saturday or Sunday? I guess that would be too easy!

[FlaGatorJD]

16. I'm proud of my governor today . . . .re:Florida early voting

Although he was recently seen sucking on John McSame's hind teat, both
before and after the VP decision was made, he made a bold move to change the
early voting to 12 hours.

Some rethugs are saying he gave Florida to the Dems.
Wow, just by allowing people who perhaps are lucky enough to still have a job the
opportunity to vote seems like the right thing to do?

Remember Iraq, where we're still busy spreading democracy, whether they like it or not?
If memomory serves me right, all they needed was a THUMB to vote.
In fact, I'm sure they would have let them use an index finger, if necessary.

Ahhh, "do as we say, not as we do". The Rethuglican motto.

[Le Taz Hot]

17. Could someone knowledgeable please explain

why some states have people waiting for hours to vote and others, like CA (largest population), don't? Or at least I've never heard or seen lines in CA like I'm seeing in Florida. I mean, really, there must be tangible, verifiable processes by which they can eliminate these ungodly lines.

Otoh, after watching years of years of 40% turnout, it does do my heart good to see people out there so determined to vote that they WOULD stand in line for that long.

[Gin]

19. Kaine in VA was an early Obama supporter....he will do all he can to make

it work as smoothly as possible.....I am happy that Virginia is in play and getting some attention..

[FlaGatorJD]

20. We have the wherewithal, but not the will . . .

I can buy a pair sandals in India, have them shipped to my house within a few days and track their every move,
or we can deliver aid to Georgia on the other side of the world overnight, but we can't get gasoline to Atlanta, Georgia, in less than two weeks, or have organized voting. Weird, aint it? Also, I'm still curious why the democracy we're spreading to Iraq only requires a thumb to vote, while we need several forms of identification.