Sound Politics: Cleaning up the voter rolls

August 22, 2005

Cleaning up the voter rolls

Sam Reed must be on a full-bore P.R. campaign, the Seattle Times and Tacoma News Tribune have nearly identical editorials this morning -- TNT: "Voters need to help clean up voter rolls" Times: "Voters can help make election run smoothly".

The headlines gave me hope, but the content is the same old drivel from lazy-ass government officials and the equally lazy editorial boards [I paraphrase]: "The government has no business protecting innocent citizens from vote fraud, it's up to the citizens to vote properly on the honor system. So leave us alone".

But there are some things that law-abiding citizens can do to ensure a cleaner and more accurate election:

1) Vote at the polls (if your county still allows it), not by mail. Your ballot is more likely to be counted properly. Polling place voting is conducted in public. At least we now understand the problems that have occured in the past and more people can watch to help ensure that there are fewer such problems. Absentee ballots are tabulated by members of the Teamsters union such that the party "observers" can't observe all of their work. It's clear that most of the problems in King County last November were in the absentee ballot processing, yet we have no idea what caused these problems or whether and how they're supposedly being fixed.

2. Work at the polls on election day and volunteer to be a party observer at the elections facilities. Elections should be run mostly by citizens, not exclusively by self-interested political appointees and the Teamsters. In King County, apply here to work at the polls. Contact your county party to volunteer as an observer.

3. Challenge the registrations of improperly registered voters. Don't do this lightly. But if you have overwhelming evidence that a registered voter is deceased, not a citizen, a felon, multiply registered, no longer a resident at their address of registration, etc. -- it's up to you to challenge their improper registration. This form should work in any county until September 14. A new form, described here, goes into effect on September 15.

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at August 22, 2005 11:46 AM | Email This

Comments

1. -----
If the ballot says fill in the bubble next to a candidate's name, fill in the bubble. Other artwork and doodling might result in a vote in a particular race being invalidated.

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Not in King County...if the ballot isn't filled out correctly or you've left certain bubbles blank, friendly KC election staff will fill it out for you "guessing" your intent...

Posted by: FG on August 22, 2005 12:25 PM

2. More inane babbling from Commissar Sam Reed. Wasn't carrying Fraudoire's water on the sham post-election "reform commission" enough of a stage for this old coot?

Somebody has to get that chump outta there...

Posted by: Interested Observer on August 22, 2005 01:08 PM

3. At the risk of sounding repetitive, if you are currently registered as a permanent absentee voter and would like to change your status to a polling place voter, you can use this form.

After filling out this form, you can either mail it to King County at the address shown, or FAX it to the elections office at 206-296-0108.

If you intend to vote at the polling place, please change your status so the county is spared the expense of mailing you ballots, and we avoid the risk of yet more unaccounted for ballots floating around.

Posted by: huckleberry on August 22, 2005 01:40 PM

4. Maybe we could take a note from NWA and ask the teamsters to take a pay cut and layoffs?

I wonder if the unions realize that their abuse of power in the political arena has ordinary folks pulling for big business to squash them?

I really hope NWA and Boeing send them packing with their tails between their legs.

Posted by: Andy on August 22, 2005 01:40 PM

5. I thought it was unbelievable, but last week, Bryan Suits was interviewing the Ostrich Sam Reed. I couldn't believe he doubted that Bryan's vote didn't get counted. He was all into making excuses why the ballot wasn't counted.

But Bryan was all over him (in a nice way, I am afraid) and countered all of the Ostrich's excuses.

For those new, Bryan Suits, as a soldier, voted in the primary, but his general election vote didn't get counted. I believe he was a Rossi voter and was one of the many military ballots that didn't get counted.

Posted by: swatter on August 22, 2005 02:24 PM

6. SoS Reed is in way over his head, a poster child for the Peter Principle.

No election reform is serious reform without a purge of the rolls and re-registration with proof of citizenship and residency.

Till you see a serious look at a complete purge of the rolls, it is all whitewash on male bovine scat.

Posted by: JCM on August 22, 2005 02:31 PM

7. I'd add a step #4:

Pick ten registrations at random and try to determine for yourself if they're valid.

Posted by: Al on August 22, 2005 05:35 PM

8. I think Al has put his finger on the ultimate solution to voter fraud. The county has been broken into precincts with a small enough number of voters so that PCO's (precinct committee officers) could conceivably know every voter in the precinct, and would be the first line of defense against fraud. In practice, the PCO will not know every voter, but the more the PCO walks the precincts, and makes it known he is looking for fraudulent voters in addition to votes for his party's candidates, the less likely people will be to commit fraud. If it is not possible for a PCO to walk the entire precinct, then he should break the precinct up into smaller chunks and delegate to assistants.

Will this help?

Posted by: huckleberry on August 22, 2005 09:28 PM

9. ACK!

That both newspapers came out with this "Blame the Voter" nonsense today - gives me a real bad feeling about what's to come in September and November! *We* (the voters) are already being blamed for the next round of election fraud, error and general corruption?

Posted by: Deborah on August 22, 2005 10:35 PM

10. The sheer, unmitigated hell of it is, on the one hand they say it is up to voters and citizens to assure honest elections, but when you request documents and things necessary to do that, they stonewall you to the point where you have to sue their asses to get what you need to do what they said you had to do. And when you raise some legitimate questions or challenge the validity of a registration, the 'Rat/liberals start smearing you as some kind of kook or troublemaker. IOW, they say we have to be watchdogs of the electoral process, but when you take it upon yourself to do that, they smear and denigrate you.

This is yet another reason (along with the admonition from Bridges that, yes, the system is flawed and broken, but you have to use that same flawed and broken system to fix it up) that makes me think the electoral process, at least in WA state, is flawed beyond redemption. There is no way anyone not in power now is going to get a fair shake. Some outside-the-box solutions are looking more and more attractive.

Posted by: Interested Observer on August 23, 2005 09:48 AM

11. I was listening to Island County auditor Suzanne Sinclair on apublic affairs channel last night. Apparently the big problem in 2004 was with poll workers. Yeah, that's it. Seems even though 2/3 of the votes were cast absentee, the big problem was with the polling places. These people are incredible.

By the way, here are the biographies of the elections task force members. Does anyone know why Suzie and Pattie are denoted Honorable? Why them and not the rest? Curious...

Posted by: huckleberry on August 23, 2005 11:19 AM