Politics > Politics-USA > Democracy will begin at home, without crime-controlledpoker-machine "voting"
| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"Quentin Burward" |
| Date: |
25 Oct 2004 05:07:18 AM |
| Object: |
Democracy will begin at home, without crime-controlledpoker-machine "voting" |
Democracy will begin at home. The USA should trash its lunatic, fraud-prone
medley of dodgy high-tech, and just as dodgy low-tech Heath Robinson or
privatised-criminal, methods of registering (or _not_ registering) voters
and votes in elections at any level of government: federal, state, municipal
and so on.
For voting at polling-stations (and why do they continually _move_?) or by
snailmail it's high time the USA went back to simple, oldfashioned,
countable and recountable penciled marks on bits of paper, thus producing a
bulky and cumbersome paper-trail.
John and Jane Doe and their fellow citizens should by now have been marching
along Main Street to the nation's various legislatures, city halls and town
halls with just that demand brandished on banners and placards and
enunciated from lusty vocal cords.
The chaos and the crime that nowadays characterise elections in the USA
should generally be regarded as a national scandal. It should no longer be
seen as unAmerican to disapprove of official crime in the processes of
politics.
The USA's proud or apathetic dearth of proper processes for elections has
made it the laughing stock of the world, earning such withering comments as
"they couldn't run a turkey raffle, let alone an election". The mightiness
of the USA's military and economic powers means that people in any part of
the world have the right to comment on the fairness or unfairness of the
ways in which the nation chooses (in this breath I can't say "elects") its
politicians.
And it's high time the USA established a single federal-government authority
for the running of _every_ aspect of federal elections, with the aim of
ensuring that a resident of Hawaii can choose among the same simple and
secure paper methods of voting as can a resident of Alaska or Oregon or
California or Nebraska or Maine or (ahem) Florida.
And why the need to declare one's political allegiance at the time of
registering as a voter? In the world of so-called democracy, that's highly
irregular. A nation that can squirt people to the moon can surely do better
than a turkey raffle when the task is a simple election.
Another story is the ridiculous "electoral college". But festinat lente.
--
Quentin Burward
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