I got my absentee ballot today. I think it might be the better way to vote, as I can look up the things I’m unfamiliar with.
And to makes this not MPSIMS crap (if not the typical GD-like fare of this forum), have you voted yet? Have you ever voted absentee? What’s your opinion?
And, since we’re in this forum, you can even share who you voted for, if you want, without having to worry about thread being locked.
I’ll post again when I’m done.
I filled my ballot out last Tuesday and turned it in on Wednesday. I have never gone to a polling place. Oregon had a very liberal absentee system and I took advantage when I first started voting. Shortly thereafter, the state went vote-by-mail all the time. I voted against that, as I don’t believe it should be mandatory.
I voted for an old HS teacher for Congress. He was my advisor for Science Club. He has no chance. The incumbent should win easily.
This is the absolutely the worst two candidates for governor I have had to consider. The Dem is a former gov who took a few terms off. I remember being disappointed when I voted for him back in the day. The Pub is a former NBA player(albeit one of the rare Ivy League NBAers) I voted for current Blazer Brandon Roy as a write-in.
I voted absentee yesterday. Maryland apparently changed the law so that anyone can do so for any reason, whether you’re actually out of the state or not (I’m not). This was lucky, as the county board of elections still has me listed at my parents’ address, so my polling place is 30 minutes away.
The only major battle we have is for governor. There is also a county initiative on the ballot to start charging individuals for ambulance service. I realize there are budget shortfalls but I think this is the worst idea I’ve ever heard in my life and voted against it. I see two ways that will end:
People will call 911 less to avoid being charged the fee. It may not even be a matter of not being able to afford the $300 or the resulting health care bills, but just an aversion to paying when “maybe this crushing chest pain will go away and I can see my doc next week.” And then some people will die. Not good. I don’t want any barriers to people who truly need help being able to seek it.
Some people will avoid calling 911 and just drive themselves to save the ambulance charge, which means we’ll have already dangerous roads filled with ill and impaired people who may crash and hurt someone else. I don’t want Kidney Stone Kevin or Ruptured Cerebral Aneurysm Robert behind the wheel of a car anywhere near me.
My county already has a fire tax. It also has one of the highest per capita income levels in the nation. Just increase the fire tax or something if EMS needs more money, people around here will fund far more stupid things.
Okay, would you vote for this guy? Yuck. Negative campaigning at it’s worst, in both respects.
Also, does anyone know whether you are supposed to fill out the blanks on the front of the big envelope (Election ____ and Precinct ____)? And surely a stamp isn’t required, right? The instructions were not sufficient on this. I mean, I can try contacting people in charge to make sure, but it seems weird.
As for the issues on the ballot–two bond issues to be removed, and one to add hunting to the enumerated rights. And one very contentious local matter that I’m not sure I should share and narrow down my location any further.
I voted in late September. Really. My election office stateside is always on the ball.
Been there, done that, absentee ballot mailed last week.
Might not vote this year. Dems disappointed me, I might disappoint them. Maybe what we need is another 8 years of Republicans so people won’t forget what life was like with Republicans in charge.
Having voted absentee these last several elections, it’s hard to think I’ll ever go back. It’s hard to beat the convenience and comfort of sitting down at the kitchen counter and filling out my ballot in the privacy of my own home. Regarding stamps–at least here in Ohio, we have to provide them. I can’t imagine any government picking up the tab for tens or hundreds of thousands of voter mail.
As to the contents of my vote–except for one essentially non-political county administrative position where the incumbent’s been in for ages and displayed no particular lack of competence, I voted what amounted to a straight protest ticket. I’m frustrated with the partisanship, the ideology over pragmatism, the soft corruption of lobbying and campaign money, the two-party stranglehold, the politics of fear, the whole rotten thing from top to bottom. So my votes went to libertarians, socialists, greens–anyone without a real chance of winning. The only reason I sent in my ballot at all, really, was a faint hope that it might possibly spare me a few campaign visits or phone calls. I heard somewhere–NPR or a podcast–that in at least some states, including Ohio, the campaign organizations have access to information regarding who has requested a ballot but failed to return it, and would target such individuals. No thanks, and all the more reason to get the damn thing out early in the future.
California permanent mail-in voter here; our laws let us do that. Every election, I get my stuff in the mail like everybody else, and some weeks before the election, I get an envelope with several ballot cards and a return envelope. I mark the ballot, pull off the stubs, seal them in the envelope, and sign my name. Off into the mail it goes!
I have to say, the idea of being able to vote sitting at my computer where I can look everything up and refresh my memory about everything would be great. I really hate getting to the polls, standing in line and being in pain, and frazzled and trying to remember everything I have read over the past few months.
I wonder if Connecticut would let me do the mail in ballot on the grounds of physical handicap? I think I’ll hit their website and see.
They send us a paper copy of the exact ballot we will see in the voting booth. I can work out all my votes at home, then just take that with me when I vote.
We have early voting, so there is plenty of time for me to get in and vote without lines.
Yeah, since I’ll be across on Tue, I’m voting absentee for the first time. Didn’t apply until really late in the game but it all arrived in time just fine.
Oregon voter proud of our long time vote by mail system, voted days ago. All the scare stories offered when other states talk about vote by mail are just that, scare stories.
Sit in your own home and take the time to really think about and research the people and the issues if your mind isn’t already made, and then put the ballot inside the security envelope, place that anonymous security envelope inside the return envelope, sign and stamp the thing and you have voted. Your signature is verified on the outside envelope and the security envelope is removed and placed with the others to be counted. There is no connection between the envelope you signed and the secure envelope with the ballot in it.
Simple, cheap, effective. And still people can’t be bothered to actually open the thing and vote!
I’ve never voted at home before, but in 2008 I did vote early, which the state treats as an absentee ballot. My regular polling place would have been convenient, too, but I happened to be running errands downtown that day, and so stopped by the courthouse (where the early voting was being done) and got it out of the way.
Well, let me amend that. Every so often there’s a purely local issue that comes up (authorizing sale of bonds for the public library, things like that) where all of the voting is by mail. But I’ve never voted for a candidate by mail.
I voted in 2008 by absentee ballot (early) but went down to the local Board of Elections office and filled in my application and ballot right there. It took a few minutes because, well, this is New York City – everything takes a few minutes, but it was fine.
I actually prefer voting at the polls. They open here at 6:00am and close at 9:00pm and the polling station is only 3.5 blocks from my house, so I can leave about 20 minutes earlier and vote on my way to work (20 minutes only because it’s in the opposite direction from my subway station). There’s never a line at that time (usually never a line in my district, unfortunately) not because there’s extra effort to provide voting machines, but because of apathy. The busiest times of course are evenings, right after work.
I’m actually working for the BoE on election day, my first time. New York just upgraded (as of the primary) to electronic voting machines so it should be fairly chaotic. Mayor Bloomberg just fired the head of the BoE for fuckups during the primary, so we’ll see if that has an impact good or bad on how things go on November 2.
Sorry, LawMonkey, about those calls. I’ve also been volunteering and they’re now just a part of the political process. I now have a better understanding, based on the things people say and do when I call, of my how unnecessarily rude I’ve been to telemarketers; I still don’t want to talk to them, but I’m more polite in getting rid of them.
I, too, enjoy the polling-station experience and would prefer to go that route. It gives me a strong sense of having done my duty as a citizen. But that’s not really practical for me these days.
I used to feel the same way. Actually, still do; it does add something to the whole “Election Day” ambience. But when early voting started in Colorado, and I found that my new polling place was an old folk’s home where 100 old folks had their chairs in line three hours before the polls even opened, well . . . I got over it. 
It was useful training; my job here in Missouri has random travel, and after unexpectedly missing a municipal election, I’ve voted absentee in all elections, just in case.
But yeah, there’s a lot to be said for the whole experience: vote, walk around all day with an “I voted!” sticker on your lapel, stop and pick up some celebration or sorrow-drowning (as the case may be) beverage on the way home, and settle down watching the returns. It’s a special day, a meaningful day, and a day to be thankfull.