Vote by Mail-- a way to save our democracy

[Fast Walker 52]

Great piece:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/januaryfebruary_2016/features/vote_from_home_save_your_count059190.php?page=all


Vote from Home, Save Your Country
Universal vote by mail can revive the franchise and change the political map. So why the resistance?
By Phil Keisling

"Democrats and their progressive allies aren’t bereft of ideas to boost voter participation. Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders are both championing promising reforms, such as automatically registering all American citizens based on driver’s licenses or birth records. But no other solution holds anywhere near the potential to boost actual voter turnout. Evidence from Oregon, Colorado, and Washington suggests that if other states adopted universal vote by mail (UVBM), they could increase their registered voter turnout in midterm elections by 10 to 15 percent. Even more dramatically, they could double or triple their primary election turnout, which would almost certainly reduce the inordinate influence of take-no-prisoners ideologues. (See “Can Vote by Mail Reduce Partisan Extremism?”)

Universal vote by mail has many other virtues, too. Those odious photo ID laws? Rendered moot; you don’t need a voter ID to fill out a ballot at your own kitchen table. Long polling place lines? How about no lines, period—and no way for elected officials to manufacture them by (whoops!) providing too few polling places in certain neighborhoods?

Universal vote by mail has also proven to be at least as secure from fraud—and arguably more so—as traditional voting at polls. Election officials check each voter’s signature on the ballot return envelope, matching it against the voter registration card before the ballot is counted. (Since signatures can change, voters still have time to update their registration cards—and qualify their ballots—before results are officially certified.)

Universal vote by mail has the additional advantage of being less costly to taxpayers than the traditional method. Beginning in 2000, Oregon taxpayers started saving $3 million per election cycle. Or consider California’s San Diego County, where election officials found that in a 2013 special election for mayor the direct cost of operating their polling places—$360,000, for 32 percent of votes cast—far exceeded that of the “mailed out” portion—$84,000, for 68 percent of votes cast. "

[djean111]

1. For me, having lived in Florida since 1987, the problem with mail-in votes is the pictures I

remember of grinning state troopers standing beside crates of mailed-in ballots, destined to be dumped in a canal. I have read of the GOP sending "mail-in ballots" to people registered as Democrats, with the return address being the GOP headquarters. Crooked clerks, changes to spreadsheets with the counts.

I am starting to think the only way to be sure of the counts is to have everyone vote live, on TV, so we can all count the votes.

I am pretty close to having no faith in the system at all. But you have some great ideas!

[Fast Walker 52]

2. wow, that's so incredibly wrong (those actions).

I suppose if people are that crooked, there's not much you can do to stop them if they are in charge of voting. The key would be to get people with the highest integrity involved in elections. But how to do that is a whole other question.

[blondie58]

3. My state of Colorado Has it!

It is so easy. I don't think I can this year as I am going to caucus for Bernie.
It is a great way to get more people to vote.

[Fast Walker 52]

4. yep-- that is what the article is saying

I hope we can get this instituted in other states-- right now only three states have it.