Why is everyone shooting for a short sighted fix on voting?

[JAYJDF]

Isn't the bigger picture desirable? That is to get a larger percentage to vote. Current system is overwhelmed with the usual small turnout numbers. Shouldn't the big fix be easier to get more people to vote? Wish I had "the better way" to recommend, but do believe there's enough brainpower on this board that surely someone could come up with something. Is this only this difficult because neither side wants more people to vote? Thought that was just a repub benny.

[rosesaylavee]

1. If the machines can be fixed a few times throughout

the voting day, it doesn't matter how many vote. The machines have to be tossed and paper ballots reinstated IMO.

Getting the numbers out to vote won't be a problem for the DEMs this fall or in 2008.

[msongs]

2. well, we could do both eh? nt

[salvorhardin]

3. The problem with getting more people to vote

Is that you also have to get them educated on the issues. People who hang out on DU are unusual in that we seek out political information. For most people if it doesn't come to them on the radio or the TV news they couldn't care less. So they vote according to the candidate that makes them feel good. Usually that means whoever tells them everything is fine, stay the course, but watch out for those godless liberals that want to steal your way of life. Or, if you can't get them informed on the issues, then you've got to get them properly propagandized to make sure they pull the lever for the candidate you want.

But as to your premise, I don't think get-out-the-vote efforts work very well on a national level. You need the infrastructure in place at the local level to make sure the sick and disabled are able to get to the polls (or make sure they got their absentee ballots), the phone banks, the door-to-door pamphleting. And if that all sounds very old-fashioned, well, it is, but it's also incredibly effective. Part of what you want to do is engage people in politics and make them feel like it's a normal part of their everyday lives, not just some abstract vote process that happens every few years. As such, nothing works better than showing them that their friends and neighbors are involved too.

It's hard work, and it's traditionally been done by the local political parties.

[EST]

4. The biggest reason people don't vote is they don't think it

will make any difference. "The man" has put in the fix and my voter is just a waste of time and effort. Money and power always wins.
Fixing the problems with accurate vote counting is one leg of the stool--an enormously important one.

[valerief]

5. That's right. How many people, especially in black areas, have

waited in line for hours on end to ultimately have their vote switched against their will? Life is too short to waste it that way. We should be machine gunning the stupid machines instead of waiting in line for them.