Even as the occupier of the White House is continuing to act exactly as dictators in history have acted just prior to extinguishing democratic governments, including baldly telegraphing that he will declare himself the winner on election night before all mail-in votes are counted, Democrats without medical or age-related vulnerabilities plan to mail their ballots in, when early in-person or drop-off voting is now almost universally available.
A Vietnam vet friend who had the nerve to suggest on social media that those who can safely vote early should do that in order to make room for the ballots of those who must vote by mail, was pilloried in literally every comment by his liberal and progressive friends.
We do not have to be lemmings following one another into an obvious trap.
We still have time to win this election by using the sensible strategy of voting early and in-person, in no small part to ensure that the ballots of those who must vote by mail are not delayed.
Those who must vote by mail need to know that their vote will not be delayed by a totally unnecessary crush of mail (that Trump may be counting on) but will instead arrive on time and be counted.
There is just too much at stake this year to stubbornly refuse to adjust strategy. We can still educate our voters while we have time.
I understand the concern, but voting by mail is just not a logistical problem for the Post Office. The great majority of ballots will be mailed in or near the municipality they will be counted in. Ballots are preprinted, machinable mail that can be sorted very efficiently and delivered to the local office of the town. Once it reaches the local post office–that means it is delivered. Nearly every town and city picks up their mail at the local post office, meaning it is not handled by mail carriers.
The only disadvantage of voting by mail is the chance that the ballot will be disqualified–something that I don’t have any knowledge about. But there is no reason think that mailed votes will overwhelm the mail system and be delayed.
In Massachusetts, mail ballots are treated the same way as early voting ballots. Voters sign the inner envelope. The city or town clerk checks the registration and signature of the voters. Once the ballot is accepted, it is put aside until election day, when the inner envelope is opened and the ballot is run through the scanner. Thanks to our decentralized voting system, there is little risk of uncounted mail ballots.
Sadly, the other 49 states are not in such good shape.
I have no doubt that the MA results will be handled efficiently and quickly. I also have no doubt that the MA vote will be overwhelmingly Democratic for every national office on every ballot.
It is the other states that are in much worse shape — in particular, WI, PA, NC, GA, and others.
I don’t understand why we don’t have standard procedures across all states for exactly how and when ballots are counted. The Constitution expressly grants to Congress the authority to determine the time, place, and manner of elections and to judge the validity thereof. They would be well within their rights to legislate deadlines, mail-in eligibility, registration procedures, method and time of recording votes, and ratio of polling places to eligible voters. IOW, they could make every state do things the MA way if they chose.
Based on what you’ve seen from the GOP for the past ten — never mind thirty — years, why would you think these states WANT their elections to be fair and honest?
There is no escape from the reality that the GOP has been brazenly and flagrantly dishonest and corrupt for at least the last fifty years. Virtually every piece of whatever dogma it has claimed over that period is both self-serving and subject to whatever the current leadership decides is politically advantageous at the moment.
It wasn’t that long ago that a centerpiece of GOP dogma was “Taking responsibility for your own actions”. When was that last time THAT was invoked? Paul Krugman has enumerated the fiscal and economic lies of the GOP multiple times. Deficits are “BAD” except when a GOP president wants to pass a tax cut. “Big government” is “BAD” except when a GOP candidate wants to tell women what to do with their bodies.
The entire GOP culture is a house of cards built on a foundation of sand.
The GOP doesn’t want fair and honest elections because it knows that the result would be the annihilation of the GOP itself.