General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLet's all be calm now.............
There area few posts tonight/morning bemoaning the fact that the power on the east coast may be out until after November 6. Many others wonder if polling places have no electricity, how will people be able to vote. Let's not get ahead of ourselves and begin the hand wringing and obsessing over what may happen.
Have faith that electricity will be available to the machines via generators. The Federal Election must take place on November 6, this would be for President, Senators and Congressional Representatives. Any others on the ballots would be State Senators, State House of Representatives, State referendums & possible local elections.
If electricity is not available for the machines to operate, then paper ballots would probably be available, with people only voting for President, their Senatorial and House of Representatives choices. All other elections probably in my opinion.could be mandated by Governors of States to be held at a later date. All that would be needed is for paper ballot voting to occur is for each polling place
to visibly post the names of all candidates (Federal) and hand voters paper and pen, then it would be deposited in a locked box & at end of the night the poll workers would do a hand count. For those who need assistance to vote, they can be assisted by someone they bring to the poll or by a poll worker who would note they have done so. The poll I work, we have a ledger where we note that we have assisted a voter.
Again, let's not get ahead of ourselves, just remain calm. Have faith that those men and women working to restore power will do their best to get the power restored ASAP. I believe that they understand what needs to be done.
Floyd_Gondolli
(1,277 posts)Emulate the fine Democratic governors and mayors who have been calm and collected tonight.
mrmpa
(4,033 posts)Journeyman
(15,001 posts)that the older we get the more we can appreciate that most of the troubles we've known never happened.
In other words, don't let the unknown cares of tomorrow live in your head rent free today.
mrmpa
(4,033 posts)I think I know an 82 year old parent who needs to hear that. I will tell her tomorrow. Thank you.
Journeyman
(15,001 posts)Tx4obama
(36,974 posts)they have to buy generators for the elections.
Saw it here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021664791#post12
JB126
(165 posts)our power companies have their shit together. I'm keeping the faith!
mrmpa
(4,033 posts)and I agree with you about our power companies. Just as an aside, I was heading west into Ohio on Saturday and in a 45 minute drive on the interstate I counted 16 power company trucks headed east.
Yul A
(94 posts)maybe Sandy is god's way of neutralizing any compromised electronic voting machines!
jeff47
(26,549 posts)We don't need to design a new "top-of-the-ticket" ballot. Print up copies of the absentee ballots for the polling stations without power. Already has all of the races on it, and it's already in convenient ready-for-the-printer's electronic format.
And that's assuming the polling places are using direct electronic voting. If they use scanners, then they already have paper ballots. They just won't be able to scan them at the polling place.
Getting a few million of those printed quickly is pretty much a matter of cash, which the feds have said they will supply.