November 2, 2012

Voting Firsts

With voting, this was the first time I've ever:

- Voted early--even though it was on the last early voting day.

- Had to wait on any sort of real line to vote--this one was about 30 minutes long!

- Waited outside in the cold on a line snaking around the building--until the election volunteers had a heart and let us all in and out of the cold. 

- Had electioneering occurring right outside at tables and people handing out "information" until maybe 25 feet before the doors of the polling center--in the past, this activity was always kept far away and and they didn't have the nerve to approach you as you were literally going inside the polling stations. 

- Got to sit down at a voting machine--always had to stand up previously, but from the sitting position and the "ergonomics" of the voting machine, you could hardly see them properly. 

- Had virtually no voting privacy--the machine faced the walls with the touch screens facing inward towards everyone else in the auditorium.

Despite all these voting firsts and most of them disappointing, the one voting first that I would have liked to see and didn't was Internet voting, where we would usher voting into the 21st century with ease of voting, convenience, and privacy. 

For some reason we can bank, shop, and pay taxes online, but to vote, we're still stuck in the dark ages and it seemed like overall it was getting darker. 

(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)

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