The Virginia state Senate today passed a bipartisan bill that would let senior citizens vote absentee without an excuse. As the Washington Post puts it:
Long lines at the polls last Election Day helped convince some Republicans that seniors, who might have trouble standing for hours, should be allowed to vote absentee.
So far, Virginia has not done much to make its lines for voting shorter, but if Republicans in the House agree, maybe the older folks will at least get a break. Of the nine votes against relief for senior citizens, all were from Republicans. (If you're looking for an update on that sneak gerrymandering bill, it looks like the House won't take it up until Thursday. The Republican bill to change the rules for electing a president in Virginia -- commonly known as rigging the election -- moved forward today. Dave Weigel has a good read on this.)
(Image from November in McClean, Virginia, sent by Dave Fullerton, who wrote: "There were young people, people on crutches, old people, all of whom stood in line for almost 2 hours in the cold to vote!" How to send us stuff.)
Leave a Comment:
I'm coming to grips with the fact that my state government is a disgrace.
Yes, Virginia, there is an Anti Claus.
A lot has been said, and I agree, that the Taliban/Teaparty's efforts to disenfranchise US citizens is "unfair". I don't think you'll persuade any of those responsible to change their minds by pointing this out. In some fashion or another they had to have decided that 'the ends justifies the means' before they started.
But while 'fair' was very likely a consideration, I think that many of the much-alluded-to founding fathers thought that one-man-one-vote was more at 'a burden shared is a load lightened, "two heads are better than one'. IM not so HO, Mr. Jefferson and others felt that any form of rule of the many by the few was not only (eventually and inevitably) self destructive, but that representative government, where citizens are not marginalized, where everyone is invited to participate, is more vital, more effective, more productive. for everyone.
How do we get these ...people to see that it is in their own best self interest to include, instead of mindlessly exclude?
Well, OK. If you can't get past the guy's great tan, then I guess dialogue is out of the question.
We have had voting by mail in Colorado now for at least two election cycles. I am glad VA is catching up.
Except that everyone in CO can vote absentee without excuse, not just the elderly. VA still has a way to go.
Only for the elderly who tend to vote Republican, why I cannot fathom. Republicans will do their best to cut social security and medicare.
Welcome to Pennsylvania.
The clowns here are trying to slam through some of the same things.
And privatize the lottery, to boot.
Cheaters NEVER win! That is all! -_-
I've got some House of Representatives Election Results that would like to disagree with you. To say nothing of Florida (and by extension America) in 2000.
wow and they call Obama a communist. Wow just like Russia the GOP is making laws to prevent people from voting
Let's just send ballots to Mexico to save everyone there the trouble of having to sneak across the border to vote.
In the throw-down between Virginia and Maine, it is Virginia hands down, simply by virtue of gerrymandering alone. Changing the rules and manipulating the system to cheat your way to election wins you could not otherwise accomplish, effectively disenfranchising thousands of voters, should be relegated to despots in Third World nations, not a state abutting our nation's capital and home to several of the Founding Fathers.
McLean
Historically, we've never had long lines to vote in Virginia. In 2004, I was in and out within 15 minutes. But this year it was madness. I had to wait nearly 2 hours to vote. I had voted absentee (they allow a lot of reasons to vote absentee), but I went with my mom, who's 78 years old, to help her out in case she needed it. I found out what took so long. Despite that you have to prove that you're eligible to vote just to get registered, the poll workers were required to check each and every single voter registration online before you could vote.
So this is what it looked like waiting to vote.
http://www.imagecoast.com/images/alvagoldbook/longlines.jpg
And out of the 5 electronic voting machines in the building, 3 of them had crashed.
http://www.imagecoast.com/images/alvagoldbook/brokenvotingmachines.jpg
Did I mention that I live in one of the key counties in Northern Virginia who's vote totals is what gave Democrat Jim Webb the victory of George "Mecaca" Allen, the same county that put Obama over the top to turn Virginia blue in '08 and '12?
There are two things I don't believe in. Cloud beings and coincidences.
If it weren't for the way that seniors tend to vote GOP, then I would take this action as a good sign. I am sure some folks think that the reason Mitt lost is only because seniors in a few key states were scared away from the polls by the long lines. That may or may not be true, but the processes put in place to intentionally make it more difficult to vote caused the long lines.
Voters in the United States should have as free and impartial an election system as possible. We have no justification for complaining about election results in other countries if we do not keep our process as clean and impartial as we can. Those folks that want to fix elections should be actively shamed by the rest of the nation and gotten out of office as soon as possible.
Now they just need to make it easier for old white men to vote and they will have achieved the objective.
Here is a really stupid question:
"Why make it hard for anyone to vote?"
I wonder if the GOTP look in the mirror, do they see the faces of the dictators such as the Shah of Iran, Saddam Hussain, Hosni Mubarak, Hitler et. al., because they should! These people have shown that they are power hungry and will do whatever it takes - even disenfranchising other Americans to hold onto the reins of power.
They don't want or respect democracy, they want an authoritarian state with themselves at the helm! They shouldn't be rewarded with votes from the people, they should be charged with treason! They have wedded themselves to a failed, mean-spirited and morally bereft ideology and WE the PEOPLE are paying the price of their arrogance and quest for more power & control! Wake UP Americans, vote these people into oblivion at least until they prove that they are no longer a threat to our democracy!
As a Virginia resident it's stifling to know that we need an excuse to vote early, when so many more progressive and modern states have opened the window to fresh air and democracy way wider than us. Early absentee ballots should be given out to anyone that's committed to keeping our democratically-elected officials in check.
so virginia thinks that i am an ''old person" who needs help so that i can vote. listen, i am going to be 65 in 4 months. i ride my bicycle with a pack on my back to get groceries and well as to yoga classes. i carry my camping gear up mountain paths to set up my tent. i am healthy and strong and i do not need any special privileges. you know who needs to be able to vote by absentee ballot? the 25 year old parent of young children who has to choose between being a good parent or being a good citizen when he/she has waited in line to vote for hours and now needs to pick up the children from day care. the 35 year old who works 3 jobs to put food on the table and has to take unpaid time off from work. the 45 year old who who has a full time job and also takes care of an ill relative. so many people have needs that make waiting in line to vote a real hardship. so stop this divide and conquer crap that allows me to have special rights that i neither want or need and fix the system for everyone. thanks but no thanks for special favors.
Not much of a silver lining in that cloud, but consider this - if you use an absentee ballot, the line is one person less, and everyone votes that much sooner.
This isn't meant to be snarky, and as far as I'm concerned, they should allow everyone to vote by absentee ballot, they should make it easier to vote, they should make it harder to challenge voters, etc. But if every senior citizen who can vote absentee does, it will make at least some bit of difference in the length of the lines, right?
True, but the Repubes know that old people are their base. Young people, not so much.
The best thing we can do for Virginians is stop Cucci and elect Terry...it would be nice if we had early voting in Va.
Well, yeah, of course the Republicans in Virginia want seniors to vote en masse in person, or absentee. The group of Virginain seniors is probanly 95% conservative.
Have a little faith - right now, across America, Conservatives are gathered in small secret groups trying to devise new bolder strategies for alienating ever larger segments of the voting population. I have faith - I know they can do it.
Virginia is becoming one of those crazy Southern states that looks more like 1950 or 1850 than 2013. Too bad. It coulda been a contender.
Le Page (Le Rage) is an embarrasement to our state and the sane people of Maine. Can't wait until the next election. At least we took the control of our state legislature back from his crowd. - Belfast, Maine
As a Virginia resident and poll official in the last election, let me first mention that there is no McClean Virginia -- it is McLean, Virginia. Also, the lines varied considerably by precinct. Where I worked, we had lines in the morning but no lines after about noon. In fact the evening was rather dead. As a senior citizen, I do agree with those that suggest absentee ballots ought to be available to all but maybe this is at least a first step. While I believe the Electoral College ought to be ended, I do agree with the proposal to at least cast electoral votes by Congressional Districts vs. the present "winner take all" format. Two states (NE and Maine) already use this system. For example, in the 2008 election in Nebraska (where I grew up) Bush won the overall vote but Obama received an electoral vote because he carried the Omaha District. To suggest this process is less Democratic than the current system is simply nonsense.
There always seems to be a motive to their madness,because they know the older votes count for their party more, they get the absentee ballad.I have never been so ashamed of how some states can talk so much about our constitution,and yet try in every way they can to go against it, in the most horrible way .Freedom and voting is for all the people.We are all equal maybe not in your eyes Republicans, but in the eyes of God,and in some good people that still walk this earth today from both party's.
Washington state votes by mail.
Yep, the whole state.
It might help save the USPS.
I think the GOP has rigged the game for the USPS to be privatized, taken over and raided after they go bankrupt from trying to meet the pension terms that GOP required by law. Then we won't be able to trust the mail, either. Maybe.......