Oh shut up already

[SeaCat]

This morning the wife and I wandered down to the local precinct office and cast our votes. It didn't take very long even though there were four pages to the ballot. (Two double sided sheets.)

While we were there we had to listen in as the officials kept having to tell people to not talk with other voters. (People were telling others who they should vote for.) In several cases the people had to be escorted out of the voting area, usually under protest.

Because of this the wife and I decided to grab a cup of coffee and hang around to watch the fun. We sat on a bench near the door where we were out of the way but could see and hear everything.

In the next hour we watched more than a dozen people escorted out of the voting area. Several of them ended up being arrested. Of these people eight were voters who insisted they had the right to tell others to vote for their candidates. (These were split evenly between Rep. and Dem.) The others were all Haitians who insisted that even though they weren't U.S. Citizens it was their right to vote here. These were quite vocal in their insistance that they be allowed to vote, even after they were threatened with being arrested.

It was fun and interesting to sit there and listen to people and their comments.

Cat

 

[sr71plt]

I was a voting precinct chief until recently. My most astonishing "toss them out" experience was an airplane crew, all residents of another, distant state, showing up in a taxi from the airport right before the polls closed and insisting that they could vote for president in my precinct (have no idea why they picked mine; we're ten miles from the airport) because "everyone has the right to vote in a presidential election." They became quite violent about it.

Yeah, right, but you have to register first and vote where you're registered--and you are voting for state-based electors anyway, not directly for a president.

 

[fifty5]

Ignorance of electoral law isn't a US prerogative. Some UK electors are just as ignorant. Seemingly like you, we have a law against canvassing in, or near a polling station.

One year, OUR candidate was herself bright, knowledgeable and prepared to follow the law. Unfortunately, that didn't apply to some of her family. They congregated on the 'sidewalk' (as I believe you Americans call it) and harassed those coming to vote. It was largely because our election agent (who carries the legal liability for our party in UK law) had been doing that job for many years, so was known by the election officers (and cooperated willingly with the police) that we didn't get had up for that misbehaviour.


Meanwhile, the EU (generally I'm much in favour) have ruled that convicted criminals should be allowed to vote (otherwise, the European Court says) we are denying them their Human Rights.

Pragmatically, since non-convicts outnumber convicts, that won't make much difference, but our own domestic law, which said that all adults (who could be arsed to register) except Peers of the Realm (who have a seat in our House of Lords), convicts and those certified to be detained due to severe mental health problems - and only those - should have the right to vote in elections.

That seemed right to me.

What's the American take on that? Should any convict retain the right to vote whilst in prison?

 

[voluptuary_manque]

That varies from state to state, along with everything else in this country. In some states a felony conviction bars you from voting for life. In others you can vote once your time is served. But vote from inside the prison? Captain, these civilians is crazy!

 

[Handley_Page]

Personally, I regard debarring from the vote is a just addition to he sentence

 

[fifty5]

Personally, I regard debarring from the vote is a just addition to he sentence

Exactly where I come from - it's justice!

 

[Weird Harold]

In some states a felony conviction bars you from voting for life.

A Felony Conviction -- depending on the class of felony in some states, any felony in others -- deprives the convict of citizenship rights; cannot vote, cannot keep or bear arms, to some extent cannot speak freely or publish without restrictions (cannot profit from their crime by publishing memoirs) and various other restrictions.

Getting citizenship rights restored is a fairly simple proposition; get a court order restoring them after the time served. Simple in concept, at least.

The exact details vary, a bit, from state to state, but it is the effective loss of citizenship that controls voting by felons.

 

[Miss_Pixie]

I used to help my grandma out during Elections in my home town. It was quite interesting. It was mostly alot of giving out "I voted" stickers and cups of coffee and ice water and pop and stuff. But there was once, where my grandma actually threw out a very cocky 20 something, for not having a photo ID and insisting that he should still be allowed to vote. If she hadn't thrown him out, I'd have punched him in the mouth.

You do not under any circumstances drop the F bomb at an 80 year old woman and call her a Bitch. Wether she is my grandmother or not.

 

[harding]

That varies from state to state, along with everything else in this country. In some states a felony conviction bars you from voting for life. In others you can vote once your time is served. But vote from inside the prison? Captain, these civilians is crazy!

Over here in Britain that's exactly what is currently being proposed. All (or mostly all, the rules seem kind of weird) prisoners are to be entitled to vote.

 

[SeaCat]

As an addendum I was out working on the A/C when my neighbor came over. Now this guy is the normal type of loser you find in every neighborhood. He claims a back injury so he doesn't have to work and has an overly helpful doctor who keeps feeding his addiction to pain killers. Translated he's got the American Dream, he scams the system and gets paid for it. (Believe me when I say he doesn't have a bad back. I've seen him tote and carry as well as run around chasing his kid.)

Well he watches me working on the A/C for a bit then he starts complaining about the elections. I finally look up at him and ask him if he voted. When he told me he hadn't I just smirked and told him to shut up.

He just looked at me and asked me why I was being rude and wanted to know why. I just smiled and told him that if he couldn't be bothered to vote then I couldn't be bothered to listen to his complaining.

He got a bit huffy about that and stomped off. I probably won't hear from him for another six months which won't bother me in the least.

Cat