cast my ballot

I mailed in my absentee ballot today for California's Special Election. It went so well I'm thinking about being a permanent absentee voter. I'll have to give up getting lost to my voting location, and I won't stand in line and figure out how the new voting machines work and they'll have to hire people to open my ballot and count it and I won't get that "I voted" sticker after I'm done.

But what was nice about absentee voting was that I could sit here with all my voting materials, I could go onto the internet and read up on various propositions, I could sip some tea, walk away and come back to bubble in my choice, plus know that I have a week to get it done, rather than the several minutes of standing at a voting booth. Yes, yes, I know that I'm supposed to have done all this homework in advance and I should have a list of what I'm going to vote for on hand to make my choices at the voting booth. But voting from home took out the "test" pressure of voting, a metaphor that people have taken to compare to the voting process. "I didn't vote because I haven't done the research. I don't know enough to vote." And don't you feel like you just want to peak over the blinders in the booth to "look for a few answers" from the voter next to you?

In reality too, I think if people want to increase "getting out the vote" then they should encourage absentee voting. Considering that we vote in our local neighborhoods when people's commute times are escalating in such a way that they are gone before the polls open and home well after they close, the convenience in voting is behind the time. When millions upon millions of people vote each week for American Idol, we obviously like giving our opinions on stuff.

Absentee voting means that I won't be completely sure on election day whether they've gotten to my vote yet or not, but it also means that I won't be sent on this emotional rollercoaster that news agencies have put us on as precincts report in, it's up, it's down, and people conceding elections before the last vote is counted.

I dislike the fact we're having a "special election" anyway. And I really wish the state would be spending my tax dollars on improving the voting system, so more people who have a right to vote feel that it's easier to use that vote. If the Governator is "for the people" and he wants the "people" to decide in his special elections, then maybe he shouldn't just stump for his initiatives, maybe he should simply get people to vote at all.