The pernicious effects of early and absentee voting.

[sailaway21]

An interesting article with what I feel are some irrefutable points on voting access and practices.
A vote for voting on Election Day - The Boston Globe

[hellosailor]

"voters who cast early ballots do so without benefit of all the information, analysis, and discussion "
Huh. Just like the voters who show up on election day, asking what all the other little knobs and buttons are for. Never having read a paper or watched a debate. All the author does, is make a case for banning uneducated voters. (Oh, wait a minute...80% of the country wasn't considered smart enough to vote in the first place, maybe there was something to that after all.)

[sailaway21]

Originally Posted by hellosailor

"voters who cast early ballots do so without benefit of all the information, analysis, and discussion "
Huh. Just like the voters who show up on election day, asking what all the other little knobs and buttons are for. Never having read a paper or watched a debate. All the author does, is make a case for banning uneducated voters. (Oh, wait a minute...80% of the country wasn't considered smart enough to vote in the first place, maybe there was something to that after all.)

I see nothing to argue with in your stated points. Absent any type of poll test for literacy or other civic factors I see no reason to encourage anyone to vote who is not so motivated or informed to do so on their own.

[Rockter]

If you take a single step down that road, you will always win the election, as you will decide who votes.
Why not set the standard to those who have read Manifesto to the Communist Party, and none other.
It would be less controversial to do the counting yourself.
I understand the frustration, but the state would be better educating its people better rather than disenfranchising those it considers ill-educated.
There is a conundrum here.... the state is having trouble educating the people, so it is going to take upon itself to tell us how many there are educated enough to vote, and to what minimum standard. This sounds just like the deep south in the sixties.
I trust when they tell us how many, that the counters have been better at counting than the super-educated at Lehman Brothers or Bear Stearns.

[sailaway21]

Originally Posted by Rockter

If you take a single step down that road, you will always win the election, as you will decide who votes.
Why not set the standard to those who have read Manifesto to the Communist Party, and none other.
It would be less controversial to do the counting yourself.
I understand the frustration, but the state would be better educating its people better rather than disenfranchising those it considers ill-educated.
There is a conundrum here.... the state is having trouble educating the people, so it is going to take upon itself to tell us how many there are educated enough to vote, and to what minimum standard. This sounds just like the deep south in the sixties.
I trust when they tell us how many, that the counters have been better at counting than the super-educated at Lehman Brothers or Bear Stearns.

Actually our Founding Fathers felt that a democratic republic could not survive without an assurance of educated voters. Poll tests were commonplace in America until it was decided that their use was being corrupted by denying black voters the franchise. That everyone is qualified to vote merely by reaching a certain age would have come as a surprise to the Founders.

[Rockter]

But how else would you do it? If ever there is a move away from one man one vote, things get rancid very quickly. It really isn't a call I would wish to make. Women used to be denied the vote in the UK, and no-one ever asked of their education standard. That was about 90 years ago.

[sailaway21]

You had to being women into it, didn't you? (g)

Oh, you could use something like the test that immigrants take for citizenship, perhaps. That shouldn't be too controversial, eh? (Riiiiiight!) (vbg)