Top Ten Ways to Make Sure Your Vote Counts

Bob Hubbard

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Top Ten Ways to Make Sure Your Vote Counts
By Mark Ritchie, AlterNet. Posted November 1, 2004.
http://www.alternet.org/wiretap/20365/

Every vote matters on Nov. 2. Here are a few tips to ensure that your vote is counted.

With the memory of 2000's contested election fresh in our minds, and brand new warnings that this election may also be challenged, every vote matters. With all the recent media coverage of contested votes and challenges to ballots, every voter needs to know a few tips in order to ensure your vote is counted:


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michaeledward

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I would like to encourage everyone of the age of 18, or older, and who is a citizen of the United States to cast a vote today. Please.

And, some of us will be watching the race more closely than others ... but let's get the early numbers out.


Dixville Notch, New Hampshire has traditionally been the first place in the country to vote; voting just after midnight. Harts Location, New Hampshire has also been voting at midnight for the last few election cycles.The polls are allowed to close if all registered voters in the community have cast their vote. Results are in:

Dixville Notch (and you thought they made this up for the West Wing).
19 votes for George W. Bush
7 votes for John F. Kerry

Hart's Location
15 votes for George W. Bush
15 votes for John F. Kerry
1 vote for Ralph Nader


If you ever want to visit Dixville Notch, you are not alone.
http://www.thebalsams.com/
 
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Spud

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Wait - there's an election today?

The guys in my office told me to vote Wednesday. Why I outta.......


The Onion sez:

Note the Onion is parody. I know most of us are aware of that, but....
 

michaeledward

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While the Onion is a great source of humor, tactics such as this are being reported around the country.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/content/shared/news/politics/stories/11/1102_barrier.html
—A bogus flyer with the emblem of McCandless Township, Pa., instructs voters, "Due to the immense voter turnout that is expected on Tuesday, the state of Pennsylvania has requested an extended voting period." The flyer says Republicans should vote Nov. 2 and Democrats on Nov. 3.

—A faked letter using NAACP letterhead in Columbia, S.C., claims that those with an outstanding parking ticket or unpaid child support would be arrested if they vote. (A similar letter from the apparently non-existent "Milwaukee Black Voter League" tells voters that if they have been guilty of even a traffic offense and vote then "you can get ten years in prison and your children will get taken away from you.")

—In Miami, Haitian Americans complained last week that "thugs" had walked along the waiting lines at the Lemon City Library early polling site and demanded to see identification, while telling voters that they could be deported.

—In south Georgia's Atkinson County, almost 100 registered voters with Hispanic names had their eligibility challenged before the local board of registrars tossed out the cases based on concerns that the challenges might violate the 1964 federal Voting Rights Act.
At my polling place, there were what appeared to be, three auditors sitting behind the poll workers. And I gave my name to vote, the poll worker marked off that I had voted (no semi-permanent ink for my thumb), as did the auditor sitting behind me.

What experience did you have at the poll?
 
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Spud

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Haven't voted yet, will do it at lunch. I do know that there are party reps at my polling site checking off names of voters. I'd bet that if I haven't voted by 5:00 I will be getting a call from a campaign staffer offering a ride to the polls.
They have databases showing I had a yard sign for a party candidate and have voted consistently over the last two elections and primaries. Plus last election I was making the evening get out and vote calls....

That's a little unnerving, but it is public information and I have a listed phone number.
 

shesulsa

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*VOTE* *VOTE* *VOTE*
 
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raedyn

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Spud said:
I'd bet that if I haven't voted by 5:00 I will be getting a call from a campaign staffer offering a ride to the polls. They have databases showing I had a yard sign for a party candidate and have voted consistently over the last two elections and primaries. Plus last election I was making the evening get out and vote calls.
Is this a new phenomenon in the US? It's pretty standard in Canada. I've worked as the drive-people-to-the-polls guy, and as the check-off-people's-names-watch-for-voter-fraud guy. It's kinda interesting, acutally. I wonder how big of a difference it makes in voter turnout?
 
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Spud

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I don't think it is new. But better use of electronic databases and phone banks seems to have increased the prevalance of it.

Oh, I got my first call at 10:00 this morning.
 

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