The Ideal and the Reality ...

posted by The Vidiot @ 10:34 PM Permalink

The Ideal (hat tip to a devoted (sic) reader):

I love to vote

I love Election Day.

I think it should be a national holiday with fireworks and picnics and patriotic speeches. I think we should stand outside polling places and cheer.

I think voting is one of the very coolest things in the whole world.

I'm off to cast my ballot. It's not much of a walk to the school where I vote. On the way I'll be thinking of Alice Paul who was imprisoned, and force fed during a hunger strike, in support of women's suffrage.

I'll be thinking of James Cheney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner who were killed while working in Mississippi for the rights of black men and women to vote.

I'll be thinking of nameless, unknown, men and women who fought in the American Revolution because they wanted to govern themselves.

I'll be grateful to the people who made it possible to vote without owning 'real property', paying a poll tax or passing a literacy test.

It's pretty easy to vote these days cause people devoted their lives to the idea that voting is important.

All you have to do to honor their vision and sacrifice is show up and pull a lever.

I agree with the sentiment (tho it's a bit hard to take seriously from a blog called Miss Snark;-)

The Reality:

A perfect storm of voting problems, from machine malfunctions and violence at the polls to dirty tricks and hoaxes, cast a pall over Election Day.

In a number of states, including California, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and Utah, voters reported that electronic voting machines were not working properly.