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World reaction to long queues of voters in US

bbc.com

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Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#161

Post by jdmichal »

dubcanada wrote: post #55
jdmichal wrote: post #19

So, these lines are not representative of an actual election day. Actual election day is November 3, 2020. Some states are in early voting right now [0]. That typically means that there's a very limited number of polling stations open. For instance, in Pinellas County, FL there's only 5 early voting locations, compared to 301 poll locations during election day. That's a 60x discrepancy! This is for 713,000 registered…

Are you saying that this is fine because everyone knows early voting means limited number of polling stations? You also cherry-picked a specific county with an extreme difference. Are they all 60x difference?

I didn't cherry pick, I picked a county I'm familiar with because I live there. Maybe some other people can chime in with their local areas. But since Georgia was one of the two areas mentioned in the article, let's look at Fulton county, which is where Atlanta, GA is located. It looks like there's about 30 early polling locations [0] vs 380 or so polling locations on election day [1]. So still 12-13x differential.

[0] https://www.fultoncountyga.gov/services/voting-and-elections...

[1] (PDF) https://www.fultoncountyga.gov/-/media/Precinct-LocatorNovem...

EDIT: I forgot the address the first sentence. I believe I made it quite clear that I see missed opportunity here.

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#162

Post by aww_dang »

leetcrew wrote: post #122
0x262d wrote: post #21

This article is an incredibly misleading, fake positive framing of what is in reality a rapidly failing democratic system. An 11-hour wait to vote is absolutely prohibitive to many of the people who most need change, on top of being terrible for everyone else; not that that is anything new for the US. It's basically a poll tax, which is one of the most regressively anti-democratic tools, but applied unevenly by locat…

mandatory voting doesn't sound very good to me for a few reasons. winning with 30% of eligible votes is functionally equivalent to winning with 51% (ie, you still get the office), but looks a lot different. forcing people to pick one seems like a way to make the strongest of several weak candidates appear more legitimate. as misguided as it may be, I think individuals ought to have the option to signal their dissatis…

There should be an option for "none of the above" or "withdraw consent" if voting becomes compulsory.

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#163

Post by jakelazaroff »

12xo wrote: post #152
jakelazaroff wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this relevant? These long lines and the voter suppression that they cause are both very real. Shining a light on that isn't "sensationalism".

Its relevant - albeit a little out of the purview, because without the rise of sensationalist based media creating the distractions, none of this is possible. The lies, the distractions, the propaganda, the amplification of issues that simply-do-not exist, allows the power brokers the opportunity to do these types of things without the oversight and regulation that the Constitution and history used to have in place t…

What in this article, specifically, is a lie, distraction, propaganda or amplification of an issue that doesn't exist?

Voter suppression is real. It alters election results; look at the Georgia governor's race in 2018 for a recent egregious example. The US is continuing a proud tradition of disenfranchisement — from only giving voting rights to white men at the country's inception, to poll taxes, Jim Crow laws, felon disenfranchisement, gerrymandering, voter IDs.

This is an important issue, and I can't fathom dismissing an article about it as "sensationalism".

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#164

Post by bpt3 »

542354234235 wrote: post #148
bpt3 wrote: post #47

I'm not saying this is universally true, but in my area, a large portion of the people standing in these long lines are intentionally doing so to make a political statement (or more skeptically, are virtue signaling). There has been one voting station open in the entire county which adequately supported early voting based on historical trends, while dozens more are opening soon and will reduce (if not entirely elimin…

Isn’t the issue that it isn’t every county, but that it is specific counties that are targeted to suppress specific voter demographics? For a clear cut example, look at Texas. “Abbott in July acted to lengthen the early voting period and allow voters to deliver completed absentee ballots in person for longer than the normal period. But after large Democratic counties including Harris and Travis established several si…

That's unacceptable in my opinion, but it's not the norm at all, even in traditionally democratic-voting areas.

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#165

Post by acomjean »

komali2 wrote: post #108

The reason for this, as the article aptly points out, is because of the historic technique of the American conservative party (today the American Republican Party or GOP) to restrict the ability of traditionally liberal voters (today the American Democratic party) to vote. Given that the working class, naturalized immigrants, and people of color traditionally vote liberal, the best way to secure a win is simply make…

Voting issues have been happening in the US for a long time (when the US was founded only property owners could vote).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_rights_in_the_United_St...

Its only been 100 years since women were allowed to vote, and that barely squeeked through.

Historically they had "Poll Taxes" (Pay to vote) another form of voter repression (struck down in the 1960s). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poll_taxes_in_the_United_State...

States set their own voting rules, even in national elections. It got so bad in the 1960s the Federal Government passed a "Voting rights act" to try and fix thing. That of course has been dragged through the courts and in the past couple years

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voting_rights_in_the_United_St...

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#166

Post by AaronM »

api wrote: post #103
AaronM wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Texas, where I live, the Republican Governor ordered counties to remove all but one box in each county. In California, the Republican party setup unofficial drop boxes that aren't legal.

> the Republican party setup unofficial drop boxes that aren't legal. How is this not a felony? AFAIK it is a felony to set up a fake mailbox to steal peoples' mail.

Some states have allow for ballot harvesting, where you can legally take someone else's ballot to the drop box. So these boxes are a bit of a grey area, as ballot harvesting is legal in CA. The NYT article from this morning said the CA AG has issued a cease and desist order, so its likely to be challenged in the court.

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#167

Post by bpt3 »

emptyfile wrote: post #62

Shocking. I live in eastern europe and we've had a parliamentary election this July during the pandemic. Two volunteers with disinfectant at the entrance to the local grade school. Political party volunteers to oversee the voting. Paper ballots and temp uni students to count them at the drop off sites. Literally hundreds of countries do the same with no difficulty.

Sounds like this was on election day, which is 3 weeks away in the US and there will be significantly more polling places open then.

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#168

Post by jdmichal »

itsangaris wrote: post #46
jdmichal wrote: post #19

So, these lines are not representative of an actual election day. Actual election day is November 3, 2020. Some states are in early voting right now [0]. That typically means that there's a very limited number of polling stations open. For instance, in Pinellas County, FL there's only 5 early voting locations, compared to 301 poll locations during election day. That's a 60x discrepancy! This is for 713,000 registered…

At the end of the day ordering the new iPhone should not be easier than voting

Clearly you don't remember the lines of people camping out multiple days to pick up an iPhone...

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#169

Post by today20201014 »

eej71 wrote: post #79
manishsharan wrote: post #9

I think the most worrying aspect is an emerging strain of political thought in the US that USA is merely a republic but not a democracy. I find it quite shocking that it has gained a great deal of acceptance. edit : typo

I'm one of those people. I certainly see America as a republic first and foremost. I appreciate the design of America that incorporates democratically electing one's representives in the House of Representives while balancing the downsides of such a process against other forms of voting. It's necessary to capture the passions of the body politic at large - which democratic voting does! - but it's also necessary to in…

The republic-vs-democracy debate distracts from what we should be debating: is our system of representation fair?

Obviously we are a "democracy" (we vote) and a "republic" (for most of history and the rest of the world, this means we don't have a monarch. The US is the exception, where we take it to mean that we have a representative democracy a la Fed. #10.)

Let's say the popular vote (i.e. the mad crowd) votes 45% party X and 55% party Y, but party X get 55% of the representative seats and party Y gets 45%. Why is this fair? Why shouldn't party Y get more seats? Why can't the members of party Y act as a "damping factor" (instead of a "counterweight") to the demands of their own voters?

Re: World reaction to long queues of voters in US

#170

Post by sudeepj »

rightbyte wrote: post #97
sudeepj wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With all her flaws, India's elections and its election commission does a stellar job. Just look at the stats for 2019 elections [1] (copying few of them): 1.035 million: The total number of polling booths across India. 2: The maximum distance in kilometres from any given voter’s house to he nearest polling booth 3.96 million: Number of electronic voting machines (EVMs) in use this election 1.7 million: Paper trail or…

2 km to the nearest pooling booth from every house hold? That doesn't seem to make sense.

Why this does not make sense? Can you elaborate?
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