elwood Posts

My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree

Toward heaven still,

And there's a barrel that I didn't fill

Beside it, and there may be two or three

Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.

But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,

The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.

I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight

I got from looking through a pane of glass

I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough

And held against the world of hoary grass.

It melted, and I let it fa...

Tuesday we will have a new photo ID law that slows down the process for checking in to vote, whether the voter presents an ID or signs an affidavit.  We don't have a lot of additional election workers; the workers we do have are new at this.  There will be longer lines than usual and more confusion than usual.
Here are some suggestions on what each voter may be able to do to help.These are based on my experience working at the polls for the past couple dozen elections.  The process can vary from one town to another - your mileage may vary.
Know where y...

It interferes with the pestilence and death that a truly free market can provide.

Ovide Lamontagne had Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal as a guest speaker at his unity breakfast this morning. Jindal praised Lamontagne's extreme right wing economics and said, that's the key to making states succeed. But hey, he added: "I'm happy to be in a race with New Hampshire!"

Here are the current race statistics, for John Lynch's New Hampshire and Bobby Jindal's Louisiana:

Unemployment rate: NH 5.4% vs LA 7.6%

Household income: NH $65,880 vs. LA $40,658

Completed high school: NH 90.9% vs. LA 81.2%

If we want to race to claim the Louisiana Disadvantage, Ovide is the man to get us there!

Of course, if he succeeds, we'll have a problem. Louisiana manages to avoid sinking still further because it gets a lot of money from the rest of the country: $1.78 back for every dollar they send to Washington, while New Hampshire gets back only 71 cents.  If Ovide brings us down to Bobby's level, who will write the checks?

(The return-on-tax numbers are getting old. The right-wing Tax Foundation hasn't updated their data recently - maybe because it's too embarrassing for their followers.)

The scam began even before the primary votes were counted.

Ovide Lamontagne confirmed his opposition to marriage equality, to even civil unions, to Planned Parenthood. He called for "teaching" creationism in public schools. But then he said, "Wait, wait! My priority is New Hampshire jobs!"

Let's take him at his word for just a moment.* But then let's ask, what New Hampshire Governor has the luxury of focusing on his own supposed priorities? What New Hampshire Governor gets to set the agenda for the state?

Did we spend eight years on civil unions, medical marijuana, Planned Parenthood, and marriage equality because those were John Lynch's priorities? No. The legislature and Executive Council put those issues on the table. Lynch didn't have the option of saying, "Sorry - that isn't my priority. Com back two years from now."

Whatever Lamontagne claims his priorities are, the agenda will be set by the General Court. We have seen over the past two years that the Governor's role is often that of zookeeper: just keeping the most dangerous creatures from doing too much damage. And Ovide likes presiding over that damage.

It doesn't matter what his priorities are - it matters whether he will stop the O'Brien crazies.

And he won't: those are his allies.

* When he's in front of a different crowd, he tells them about his real top priority: ending Obamacare.

are listed here.  (There is also a polling place search on that site, check the menu bar at the top.)

We just went through re-districting; your voting place may have changed.

Please don't cut things too close. If you're in line at the right polling place when the polls close, you'll be able to vote - but if it turns out you've gone to the wrong ward you could be out of luck.

on US coins.

It helps to know somebody in the town offices, capisce?  You don't want to get bogged down in line with the wrong sort of people. (More on this below - it isn't really the main point of the diary, just a pet peeve.)

I'm an election official. I'll be working at the polls Tuesday, probably at the table for same-day registrations. I attended training from the Secretary of State's office on the new voter suppression "identification" laws a couple of weeks ago.

The process of voting has changed in New Hampshire this year. It will be a bit more difficult and take longer to vote - and that makes it all the more important that you exercise that right and responsibility.

YOU WON'T BE TURNED AWAY AND YOUR VOTE WILL BE COUNTED.

Here is a summary of the process, with some notes on what has changed.  Please also look at Susan's recent diaries on voting, and at the comments in those diaries.

• You will now be asked to provide photo identification each time you vote. You will be asked Tuesday, but it's really a practice run - if you don't have any such ID, you will just be reminded to bring it with you for the general election balloting in November, when it will be required - or more precisely, when you will need to jump through extra hoops if you don't have such ID with you.
• What counts as a valid photo ID? For 2012, there is a fairly long list. A driver's license issued in the past five years, from any US state, counts - so, an expired 2009 Montana driver's license is acceptable. College student photo IDs are acceptable. Passports are acceptable. A photo employee badge from a large local employer is acceptable.  Things get more restrictive in later years, and fewer college IDs will be acceptable. (I haven't tracked the details on that yet, because I'm hoping this vote suppression law will be repealed in early 2013, when sanity returns to Concord.)
• What extra hoops do you need to jump through, come November, if you have no photo ID with you? You will need to fill out and sign an affidavit swearing that you are who you claim to be under penalty of law.  After the election the state of New Hampshire - either the Secretary of State's office or the Attorney General's office, I don't recall which - will send a letter to the address you provided, asking you to confirm by return postal mail that you do live there and did vote without an ID. If you don't respond to the postal mail your name will be stricken from the registered voter list, and a criminal investigation may be launched.
• Does everyone need to jump through these hoops? No. (Hence the diary title.) If the voting precinct moderator personally knows you, his or her word is sufficient and you won't need to fill out an affidavit. (This may change after November - again, I am focused on this year.)  If you have no ID with you but are a well- established local resident - a store owner, a mailman, a car dealer, a restaurant owner - the moderator likely knows you and you can use this Fast Path to voting. If you are a college student, or new in town, or just don't hobnob with the right folks - you will take the Slow Path and the affidavit.  "Equal protection of the law?"  Well isn't that quaint of you.  
• Did they get rid of same-day registration? No, that is still available.  (Eliminating it appears to be part of the Republican agenda, though: attempts to kill it in other states have already occurred.) Photo ID has always been expected for same-day registration, with a similar provision for signing affidavits when you arrive at the polling place without it.  If you register on voting day, it's easiest for you and the poll workers if you bring an ID such as a driver's license. If your current address isn't on the license, it helps to bring postal mail to you at your current address - an electric bill, perhaps. (A NetFlix bill worked nicely for someone last time.) If you weren't born in the US, you will be asked when you became a naturalized citizen - a passport may help in that case.
• If I'm registering in New Hampshire for the first time, is there anything special? Yes. The legislature now includes a warning to new registrants that declaring New Hampshire as your domicile for voting might cause trouble for you in other respects - for example, it might result in losing a scholarship.  I suppose that's possible - if someone got a scholarship from a community group in Salinas, Kansas, to attend college, then declared Durham, New Hampshire, as their residence, the community group might declare that the terms of that particular scholarship had been violated.  But this particular scary language was used by previous Republican legislatures in New Hampshire and I have never heard of that happening.  I can't prove a negative, and I can't guarantee that it would never happen. But in my opinion this scary language is in there for one reason only: to intimidate you.  Let me add different, unofficial language to the new voter registering here: Welcome to New Hampshire!
• Why do you say that voting will take longer? Every voter will be asked to show ID, and every poll worker asking will need to examine the ID.  The lines will move more slowly, even when no problems occur. This by itself will tend to discourage voting - but that is a feature, not a bug, to the legislators who wrote these laws.
• Well, at least this will help prevent fraud, right? Heh. Can you tell a phony 2010 Tennessee driver's license from a real one? I asked the presenter from the Secretary of State's office, "What should I do, if the photo doesn't look like the voter to me?" The other poll workers giggled - I don't believe they expect to be closely scrutinizing these pictures. The presenter seemed a little non-plused, then said, "I suppose you should call the moderator over."  At most this makes voter impersonation about as tough as a 20-year-old buying beer. The people who fund James O'Keefe's voter fraud crimes won't pay him to demonstrate that, though - they like the new law.