Fox: 102 year old woman had to wait in line 3 hours to vote, "What's the big deal?"

The BBQ Pit
161

I know this is a pit thread but I feel like the discourse in here is fairly interesting. The problem is that the arguments bleed into each other and there is obviously high emotions running through. Personally I think that the under-represented minority in this thread (those who don’t have feverish outrage at the Republican party) can/did raise some rather decent points.

Regarding wait times: What IS a reasonable wait time? I have no idea. Some have said under 1 hour. Others under 3 hours. Does the government (forget political party) HAVE to aim for these times or SHOULD? Is the goal under 1 hour? For everyone? At all times, an average time, median time, etc? These are undefined goals and it seems any time higher than “any time I have ever seen” or “times I think are unreasonable” is not only a wrong answer, it’s an evil answer. I think what Bricker wanted to say is that without rules, much less guidelines, in a country of 201.5 million eligible voters, some old lady somewhere is bound to have a long-ish wait time. All this outrage over a lone outlier.

Regarding fault. The actions of a few select government officials that happen to be of a certain political party now not only reflects on that party, it becomes the base of that party’s idea. Furthermore, it becomes the sole recognizable brand of that party and anyone who votes for that party. To think otherwise is to be hopelessly naive. Furthermore it discounts any positive points that party has on any issue because they clearly hate elderly minority women. I think that’s… a bit of a generalization. I’m not condoning it but it really hurts me to watch Bricker try to be civil and then have lots of other people tag him with partisan [expletive]. I’ve never really noticed his politics shining through his posts. His legal training, yes, but not a disdain for minorities, lgbt, and/or women.

Regarding those reprehensible actions: The degree to which the atrocities are taken out made it seem like they were turning firehoses on anyone darker than a heavily creamed latte who tried to collect an “I voted” sticker. The reduction of “extra” days while inconveniencing seems rather mild as far as active racism goes. Now I concede that it doesn’t help the cause, especially in a swing state like Florida but the sole motivation just isn’t “sheer unadulterated Republican disdain for all things dark, poor, and female”.
Sorry, I just have to address the wait time again. In my 3 presidential elections the wait time went as 30 minutes in a diverse small college town setting, 3 hours in a super white suburban setting, and 0 minutes in a racially diverse urban setting. Time of day dictated the wait times entirely.

Now this isn’t to say that Republicans aren’t racist. Some of them are. It isn’t to say that Floridian leadership may have taken consideration that some voters would be suppressed in them cutting down on extra polling days. They might have. The point is that it’s not such a clear cut issue and that anyone who disagrees, or thinks that all the fervor in here really is overblown is a blithering, idiotic, partisan bitch.

162

Oh, and I forgot the issue of morality. Yes, poll workers SHOULD have tried to get her a fast pass. Maybe handicapped people should automatically get a fastpass. None of that is a REPUBLICAN failing. (pit if you must, but I find the partisan talk very objectionable)

163

Oddly enough getting more people to vote is good for Democrats. You might want to think about why that is. However any of these plans would reduce voting time for Republicans also - unless you think that by some chance only Democratic leaning districts have the problem.

BTW there is quite a bit of math around expected waiting times depending on customer arrival rates and the amount of available servers. I don’t know voting in particular, but you can allocate resources to reduce wait times to a given level with a certain probability. I suspect election officials know this stuff.

But it might cost some money. Might you tell me what is more valuable than ensuring the very cornerstone of our democracy? None of this involves limos driving voters to the polls, btw.

164

You literally made me LOL. There is a reason Bricker-bot is stuck in a loop of “(criticism of republican ugliness) is not bad, but if it was, democrats do it too!”, which would be because he is a team playing hack, as evidenced by this thread and pretty much every other one where politics are mentioned.

165

Sorry, but I’m never going to be David Broder. I argue about stuff that I feel strongly about, and I think it’s a Good Thing when that passion bleeds into my writing.

See post 69 for my response to this.

See Jenaroph, post 160.

This wasn’t the “actions of a few select government officials that happen to be of a certain political party,” it was the actions of officials of that party in swing states across the country. They were pulling the same shit in Ohio that they were in Florida. And it was an effort on several fronts: reducing early/absentee voting, instituting unnecessary voter ID requirements, and one state, Pennsylvania, was seriously considering a bill to split the state’s electoral votes by (gerrymandered) Congressional district, which if implemented would have resulted in Romney’s winning most of the state’s EVs, though Obama got a majority of the votes. And of course a number of Dem-leaning states currently controlled by GOP governors and legislatures tried that gambit since the 2012 election, with their eyes on 2016.

This was not a few fucking bad apples, thankyewverymuch.

When you’re done with this straw man, could you prop it up in a cornfield or something so it can be useful? This wasn’t about firehoses; this was about the talking heads on the Wingnut Network laughing at the idea that it might be hard for a 102 year old woman to wait for a few hours in line to vote. I said that was the action of assholes, not racists.

The code-talking in the past election was a bit less coded than usual, with many Republicans from Romney on down painting “those people” as moochers and takers, and if any mainstream Republicans condemned such talk, they were pretty damned quiet about it.

So yes, it’s a party with a lot of racists, and it’s a party that unquestionably tolerates widespread racism within its ranks.

166

Reductio ad absurdum is a valid reasoning method; it would be more accurate to describe yours as a misapplication of such a reduction. A common name that approximately describes your error is the Slippery Slope Fallacy (or “Camel’s Nose”), for example, “Allowing abortion in the first week of pregnancy would lead to allowing it in the ninth month,” or in your case “Spending an extra $5 per voter on an election might lead to prohibitive spending, say $500 per voter.”

Since your ilk happily spent at least $15,000 per American voter on the Iraq Blunder, I’m not sure what spending you’d consider prohibitive to ensure fair elections, but we don’t need to speculate:

Most voters in white Republican precincts had adequate voting infrastructure to avoid long lines. This constitutes an existence proof that voting machines are affordable. You suggest that they might not be affordable in black, mostly-Democrat precincts.

Should we conclude that voting infrastructure should be paid through local taxation; that poor districts should be less able to vote; that the results of such electoral procedure would be the free market system at its finest?

Or should we instead treat your strange worry about electoral cost as distracting sophistry, unrelated to the real world?

167

I could’ve used one at mine, actually.

Shall the Constitution be amended so as to provide for a reduction in the state’s operating costs by allowing the General Assembly to authorize certain state agencies to enter into multiyear rental agreements?

<blank stare> Duhhhh… yes? I mean no! Definitely no! But… maybe?

168

I want to point out that my reason for being a little heated up about this issue isn’t because of the old lady in the OP. It’s because in 2004, my polling place in Ohio had about a 2.5-hour wait. That’s the first time since I turned 18 and started voting that I’d ever had to wait in a line longer than about 20 minutes in order to vote, in this state or any other state. I wasn’t expecting it and neither were a lot of other people there. It was raining that day, and the line wrapped all the way through the school gymnasium being used as a polling place, and around the building outside a couple of times.

Now, I’m a freelance indexer, which means I work from home and set my own hours, so I had 2.5 hours to spare. I didn’t have a job I had to get back on the clock for, I didn’t have kids I’d left at home while I ran to the polls really quick, etc. During those 2.5 hours, I saw a lot of people drive up, park their cars, look at the long lines, stand there thinking about things for a minute, then get back in their cars and drive away.

That was a hard thing to watch. Those people made time out of their day to come down to the polling place and vote, and the 2.5-hour line turned them away. I don’t know if they were going to vote Democratic or Republican. I have no earthly idea. I hope some of them came back later on (though the line never got much shorter) but I suspect a lot of them didn’t.

People have jobs. People have obligations and responsibilities in their daily lives that they can’t abandon just because the people at their polling places didn’t appropriately plan. The attitude of many in this thread that a multi-hour wait is acceptable or okay is honestly bewildering to me. One of the biggest responsibilities we have in a democracy is to make sure everybody gets a vote, and that means making sure that polling places are staffed appropriately, managed efficiently, and that we get people in and out with a minimum of delay. Now, there are a lot of ways to handle that. Increasing the number of days the polls are open, for example, might be one method, or the number of hours per day. Providing alternate voting methods as a backup, or providing additional machines, or altering the way the machines work to make them easier or quicker to use.

Shrugging and saying, “well, it’s probably too expensive and taxpayers won’t like it” is not an option for us. Absolutely not an option. Am I saying that we must fix this no matter what the expense? Yes. Does that make me an “impractical liberal?” No. It makes me an American. The expense will not break us and this is something we must do. It’s not a welfare benefit, it’s not a health care benefit, it’s not a handout for the greedy takers from the hard-working job creators or whatever stupid narrative our political leaders have constructed for us to believe in. It’s part of the fundamental bedrock of our nation and if we can’t make this work, then this nation has failed.

I really don’t think I can make myself any more clear than that.

169

It is not a big deal that a 102 year old black woman had to wait in line 3 hours to vote. It does not matter that she is old or black or a woman.

What is big deal that anyone has to wait in line 3 hours to vote. Queue theory is a well-understood branch of mathematics. You have a list of eligible voters. You have historical voter turnout figures. Compute the number of machines needed to satisfy a given wait time, with generous padding for higher than average turnout (I say 51 minutes is too long). Write a law that says wait times shall be measured, and if any voter’s wait exceeds the legal limit, that is grounds for impeaching that state’s secretary of state.

Measure outcomes. Hold leaders accountable. This is management 101. Republicans want government to be run more like a business, right? The primary product of government is supposed to be a government run by the people. There is literally no government expenditure that is more important than this.

170

This is hilarious.

You were doing fine until you got to the impeachment part.

What kind of money is necessary is ensure that NO voter’s wait can exceed that limit? That’s crazy – you’d need triple redundancy of resources, or more. In systems availability, look at the costs to go from two 9’s to three 9’s – or from three 9’s to four 9’s.

You’re right that queuing theory is well understood. This is an M/M/1 queue. That’s not the issue. You want to look at Little’s law and hold managers account for the AVERAGE? I could get behind such a system.

But – typical for a liberal here on the SDMB, it seems – you have no idea what this means. You don’t understand the cost differential between average and maximum. To guarantee the average wait time is a worthy goal. To guarantee the MAXIMUM wait time is a hugely different proposition.

Liberals have well-meaning hearts. If only they stayed awake in math and business classes.

171

An empty-headed liberal American, genus impracticalis.

“I don’t know what the cost is, I don’t care what the cost is, we have to fix it!”

I support fixing it, if the price is reasonable. I don’t support fixing it at any price.

This is why liberals like you are children – you’re like kids in a Toys R Us, wanting the things you see with no conception or care about cost.

Seriously – read over what you just wrote: “Am I saying that we must fix this no matter what the expense? Yes.”

Think about it. Where does this money come from? And before you answer – YOU DON’T EVEN KNOW HOW MUCH MONEY IT IS, so how the hell are you going to answer that question? Should we raise taxes by 50%? That will kill the economy – if it turns out that’s what’s needed, should we do it?

THINK, for crying out loud. Please – the people of this country have handed the White House and half of Congress to the party that identifies as liberal. Thank God those leaders are as woolly-headed as this sentiment is. No responsible leader on either side of the ideological divide would say, as anything other than aspirational hyperbole, we have to do ANYTHING “no matter what it costs.” That’s utter irresponsible nonsense.

172

You can repeat that question another million times, but it’s not going to make it any less asinine.

173

No precinct in the country – not even the ones in the richest, toniest of white Anglo-Saxon Protestant neighborhoods – can guarantee a wait time of less than 51 minutes. Even those places are a couple of unfortunately-timed mechanical or personnel failures away from trouble.

Sure, MOST voters in richer neighborhoods have wait times lower than many voters in poorer neighborhoods. I’m all for addressing that.

No responsible scheme I’m aware of can GUARANTEE vote times. Average vote times? Sure. Stick with that goal.

174

Ok. Lay it out for me.

What are the SPECIFICS of the scheme you propose to guarantee wait times for no voter, not one, will be under three hours, or 51 minutes, or whatever in-between number you care to name.

My objection is asinine – that must mean you have a clear solution you’ve chosen not to share. What is it? Let’s hear it.

Or… are you just a “big picture” kinda gal? You wave your hands and say, “Make it happen - I don’t care how?”

175

And here, finally, is your true argument. You don’t care a whit about democratic ideals or the functioning of our nation. You just don’t like liberals. You think they are whiny children. And so when you see a liberal making an argument, you don’t address that argument on its merits. You entrench yourself into a series of increasingly ridiculous positions (“reducing voting queues might raise taxes by 50%!” Come on, now; we are adults here, are we not?) because doing so pets and strokes what is apparently your most cherished belief: “Liberals are idiots.”

I don’t think conservatives are idiots, as a rule. I think that you are behaving as one in this thread, though.

176

Let’s see…

Why don’t we use the exact same amount of money that you people were so enthusiastic about spending to prevent non-existent voting fraud to target areas that experienced Very Long Waits. We can be scientific and shit and define Very Long Waits as anything longer than two hours.

We wouldn’t be able to guarantee anything–this is your retarded straw man. What we WOULD be able to do is reduce the average wait time and inter-precinct variability.

177

How am I not addressing your argument squarely on its merits??

Is that your argument?

I think it is. You typed it.

Am I addressing it squarely? I think I am. I don’t agree with it. I believe the proper statement is: We should fix this, assuming the cost is reasonable as compared to the benefit.

Which one of us is making the better policy statement here?

178

This! I wonder if fiend Bricker can make a case without falling back on pettifoggery: "But you said “guarantee”!

179

We’re talking about voting rights. If your honestly-held position is that it’s important to ensure adequate access to the polls only as long as it’s not too expensive to do so, then I don’t know what else to say. Do you also believe that we should only protect First Amendment rights as long as it doesn’t cost a whole lot of money to do so?

You seem to be hung up on some kind of nitpicky adherence to the hypothetical chance that ensuring adequate access to the polls would cost billions of dollars and bankrupt our nation. This will not happen. How do I know this? Because every year at election time, thousands of polling places around the country manage this fairly simple task without bankrupting themselves.

Perhaps you are operating under the mistaken impression that I think we should set things up so that it is literally impossible for anyone to ever experience a long wait. That would be a stupid thing to say, and I suppose that if you think all liberals are stupid, it would be reasonable for you to assume that I meant such a thing. However, that is not what I said. I said that it is unacceptable for such a thing to happen, meaning that if it does, we need to analyze the situation and make changes to our procedures so that it doesn’t continue to happen in the future. I don’t expect the NTSB to make it literally impossible for a plane to fall out of the sky, but I do expect them to analyze the aftermath of plane crashes so that we can determine what happened and stop it from happening again. (They do this quite well and without bankrupting the nation, FYI.)

180

What do you argue with that asshole for? This is the same douche that argues for voter ID laws that cure a problem that does not exist, costs money to implement, and disenfranchises Democratic voters. Spending money to cure a problem that does not exist is fine when it makes Republicans more likely to win, spending money to address a problem that does exist so that Democrats might find it easier to vote is a waste of taxpayer money.