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My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

portal.drewdevault.com

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Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#121

Post by zimmern »

sk5t wrote: post #39
dx87 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A "thin blue line" flag also doesn't fit any of the banned criteria. You guys are basically saying that supporting police and military is only done by republicans.

Are you seriously suggesting the "thin blue line" or "back the blue" flags are not political messaging? Lots of folks with different backgrounds and beliefs "support police and military"; however, the bootlick flags are closely tied to just one party.

>>bootlick flags

lol, trump has made lefties lose their damn mind.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#122

Post by [deleted] »

throwaway373438 wrote: post #100
nemosaltat wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you may be referencing the US flag code, which yes, has a handful of explicit and implicit prohibitions against wearing the flag on clothing.

Whenever discussing the US flag code it's important to mention that the statute is unconstitutional as determined in United States v. Eichman. What the flag code says about clothing is as irrelevant as any other hot take on the issue.

[deleted]

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#123

Post by kube-system »

throwaway373438 wrote: post #100
nemosaltat wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you may be referencing the US flag code, which yes, has a handful of explicit and implicit prohibitions against wearing the flag on clothing.

Whenever discussing the US flag code it's important to mention that the statute is unconstitutional as determined in United States v. Eichman. What the flag code says about clothing is as irrelevant as any other hot take on the issue.

I believe United States v. Eichman invalidated 18 U.S.C. § 700 -- which is the Flag Protection Act.

The "Flag Code" normally refers to 4 U.S.C. § 1 -- which I don't think ever had any penalties for violation. It's simply advisory. The purpose is primarily to define the way the flag is used in an official capacity.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#124

Post by knaq »

mindslight wrote: post #98
brandmeyer wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vote and free speech remain powerful tools for meaningful expression. And they do have an impact. Even if it seems like you're being ignored, each voice really does matter, and policy does change in response. But that policy flows from the civilian political realm. Military leadership doesn't decide which missions to take on. Congress and the President do. The military won't decide the fate of this election, no m…

Voting between candidates that all support ongoing military actions is not meaningful. It's similar to the treasonous NSA - discussing it is simply outside of the mainstream Overton window, primary candidates who dare touch it are branded "unelectable" etc. Speech gets swamped by mass propaganda. I don't see how it's possible to look at say the run up to the Iraq war and think that antiwar had a meaningful voice. Whe…

It is "impossible to prevent the military from being used for elective wars" because most people disagree with that goal. (according to observed preference, not stated preference) We just tossed out the only president in many decades to refrain from starting a new war, instead choosing one who voted for the Iraq war. The people have spoken, and they want war.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#125

Post by m0zg »

Biden only gets lucky in PA a full day after that if you look at vote share per batch, well after in-person votes are counted, and the later you go, the luckier he gets.

The pattern is the same in every swing state except Arizona, and in Virginia as well. If you plot out Edison data that has vote count updates, in "normal" states (both Biden and Trump dominant), things are chaotic initially (when in-person votes are counted) and then they settle to a certain GOP/DEM ratio, with a very slow drift towards GOP, presumably because rural votes take longer to show up. In the swing states you observe the same initial chaos, and the same slight initial drift towards GOP, but then Biden starts to get very lucky indeed, and his luck improves as time goes on.

To be fair, this could just be artifact of how votes are counted, in which case I'd like to see what could lead to such a pattern _only_ in the swing states. Or this could be evidence of vote rigging by all means necessary. No matter which side you're on, this should be looked into.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#126

Post by morelisp »

zeveb wrote: post #110
ddevault wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not a universally held belief.

The earth being round is not universally held, either, but it is true. The military is patriotic , yes, as are its members (it is difficult to imagine how they could be effective were they not), but the military tries very, very hard to be apolitical. Yes, individuals in the military have strong political opinions, just like many other individual Americans. It seems to me that any country at a point where the combina…

In many countries other than the US it is uncommon for private citizens in daily life to fly or display flags at all, let alone with some nationalist or political slogan adorning it, except when associated with right-wing activism.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#127

Post by sigstoat »

nemosaltat wrote: post #47
sk5t wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd probably get upset as well if some poll worker tried to tell me I'm not allowed to wear the American flag on my clothes The flag of the United States is not adulterated with text or anything else in place of its stripes, stars, and field.

I think you may be referencing the US flag code, which yes, has a handful of explicit and implicit prohibitions against wearing the flag on clothing.

i don’t think you need to reference much of anything but the flag itself to firmly establish that the flag doesn’t have text on it.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#128

Post by mindslight »

knaq wrote: post #124
mindslight wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Voting between candidates that all support ongoing military actions is not meaningful. It's similar to the treasonous NSA - discussing it is simply outside of the mainstream Overton window, primary candidates who dare touch it are branded "unelectable" etc. Speech gets swamped by mass propaganda. I don't see how it's possible to look at say the run up to the Iraq war and think that antiwar had a meaningful voice. Whe…

It is "impossible to prevent the military from being used for elective wars" because most people disagree with that goal. (according to observed preference, not stated preference) We just tossed out the only president in many decades to refrain from starting a new war, instead choosing one who voted for the Iraq war. The people have spoken, and they want war.

I find the narrative that Trump hasn't started a new war interesting, but not particularly compelling given his actions with Iran and ongoing incitement of civil unrest.

> The people have spoken, and they want war

I see where you're coming from, as usually I vote third party or abstain to avoid thinking I support one candidate that differs only by an epsilon of cultural preferences. But when one of the choices is responsible for the deaths of a quarter million Americans, it's a little different.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#129

Post by tgb »

giantg2 wrote: post #112
dx87 wrote: post #15

This part seems incorrect: > There are strict laws regulating police and poll workers while the polls are open. Police are not allowed within 100 feet of the polling location, unless they're actively voting or there on official business at the request of the election board. Additionally, anyone working at the polls in an official capacity is not allowed to wear any clothing with political messaging. One of the office…

The real question is, what department allows their on-duty officers to wear non-uniform clothing articles for routine public assignments?

I also worked polls in Philadelphia and we were also visited by non-uniform cops at the end of the day to do the (critical!) step of picking up the paper ballots. We got their badge numbers and names of course, but it was a little sketchy. The one who came by midday was uniformed, though.

Re: My experience as a poll worker in Pennsylvania

#130

Post by estebank »

thaeli wrote: post #91
estebank wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My concern here isn't around integrity of the vote but secrecy of the vote for a given person in this event. It might just be that this is so different from what I've seen in other systems that it stood out.

Virginia here, but this should apply anywhere paper ballots are used. The voter is free to mark the ballot they hand back to be spoiled and replaced any way they want, including in a manner that obscures who they voted for. The ideal marking if someone was concerned about this would be to go through and check every box for every candidate before handing it in to be spoiled.

There are systems where the ballot itself isn't special, but the envelope you use is. Because of that there's no need to account for the ballots themselves. Poll workers never interact with your vote, you place the filled envelope in the ballot box, just like dropping off mail-in ballots work here.
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