Endangered Species, Republican Moderate Edition

Interesting but not surprising development from George Voinovich. As the article states, Voinovich will be 74 in 2010, and that is pretty old for someone seeking another six year term. It’s far too early to use this as any sort of indicator of Republican fortunes in the next round of congressional elections, of course. The eight hundred pound bear in the room hasn’t decided exactly what’s going to happen, so it’ll be good to know if we have a wall to hang curtains on before we head down to Penney’s to look at fabric swatches.

Voinovich has long been one of the Senate’s main moderate Republicans. It seems likely from the early maneuverings that the Republican Party is reacting to its electoral drubbings in 2006 and 2008 not by tempering their tone, but by going out of their way to embrace a new Christian, Southern, anti-immigrant, pro-war, pro-torture orthodoxy. A seat like Voinovich’s, in a swing state that wanders all over electorally, could be a real test for the soul of the Republican Party. Who the various factions back, and who comes out the winner will be very telling for what we can expect from the future.

Which begs the question, who will run for Voinovich’s seat? The current Democratic Governor of Ohio, Ted Strickland, will be up for reelection in 2010. Perhaps he could be enticed to run, although he showed a real reticence to be dragged into national politics during the Democratic primary race. On the Republican side, I can’t think of anyone of a similar stature. Any suggestions?

Voting Obstacle Course

The Supreme Court backed up the Ohio secretary of state today, stopping a challenge from Ohio’s Republican Party trying to get some 200,000 voter registrations looked at again. This is, of course, not the first time that we’ve had an instance of voting problems in Ohio. It seems like this is going to be a year where voter fraud is a major post-election story, one way or another. Personally, I’d like to associate myself with Matt Yglesias’ thoughts on voter registration. It’s absurd that it’s so difficult to register to vote in the United States. I can’t think of a single legitimate reason why voting is so difficult – although, of course, I can think of several illegitimate ones. The more people who vote, the more they tend to vote Democratic. That is an obvious problem for the Republican Party.

There are many, many things in the United States that defy logic and exist simply because they’ve been around for so long. Our voting system is due for a major overhaul. After two presidential election cycles in a row where voter fraud (or, in this one, somewhat moronically, voter registration fraud), we really ought to do something about it. If you’re eighteen, you should be registered to vote, period. If we can put a man on the moon, we can create a national election system that isn’t a shambling disgrace.

Participatory Democracy

I received and mailed out my absentee ballot today. I’ve been worried about it arriving in time, but I think it’ll have enough time to get back to the US in time to be counted. As I’m registered to vote in Ohio, I think it’s important that I do send out my ballot – even if the numbers are looking a lot better than they were a month or two ago, every vote is going to count this year. Just like in the last two. At any rate: there’s at least one vote for Obama in Ohio. Now, it’s a waiting game.

Southeast Ohio Hits the Big Time

George Packer has an interesting piece discussing the white working class in Ohio. It was an interesting piece, made more so because it spends a great deal of time in the area surrounding where I went to college, Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. Packer doesn’t dwell at all on the fact that there is a solidly Democratic county in the middle of the area Packer discusses heavily in his piece, extremely conservative Southeastern Ohio. I would have liked for him to discuss the dichotomy a little more, but I guess that’s getting away from his focus on the working class and the working poor.

It’d definitely (in part) an image of Ohio I recognize. One of the things that it really brought home for me was the degree to which people simply parrot back things they hear on television. “Not ready to lead” is this year’s “flip flopper.” It’s not that these people are dumb or can’t think for themselves. They simply don’t consider it. Thinking for yourself is difficult, and if you’re struggling to put food on the table, I can see why coming home and browsing a candidate’s position papers on his website doesn’t seem like an attractive option – assuming, of course, that you even have access to the internet.

Voter Registration

I’m from Ohio and remember all too well Ken Blackwell’s voter suppression shenanigans from the 2004 election. He did a lot of stuff, some of it worse than others and some of it just stupid. His nonsense about trying to ignore voter registration cards because they weren’t printed on 80lbs cardstock was absurd then as what Ohio’s current secretary of state is up to. She’s disqualified about a thousand McCain printed voter registration cards because people didn’t check the box that says, “I would like to register to vote.” That’s just silly. It’s clear they intended to register. This is an awful reason to disenfranchise someone. Not as bad as the foreclosure thing in Michigan, perhaps, but not something I want my state engaging in, either.

We should not be in the business of trying to disqualify legitimate voters. People voting twice or more, dead people voting: fine. But that wasn’t Blackwell was after, and that isn’t what’s going on now. Just because a group of voters is less likely to back your pick doesn’t mean you should try and prevent people who have a legitimate reason to vote from voting.

Beyond that, why do people have to register to vote anyways? It’s always baffled me that there are so many things we could do to encourage and increase voter turnout – moving the day to a weekend instead of Tuesdays, making registering easier. The BMV has a huge list of state residents and they know how old they all are. You have to have a driver’s license in the United States today, or if not, at least a valid state ID (also issued by the BMV). Why don’t we simply register people to vote when they turn eighteen? The only objection I can think of is that people often move and don’t update their driver’s licenses. That seems like a fairly minor objection to me, however.

So: is there any legitimate objection to automatic once-you’re-eighteen voter registration?