Exercising the Franchise

Yesterday my first ever absentee ballot came back to me, marked "insufficient postage."  Despair.

But that's not the worst electoral story I have heard in the past twenty-four hours.  Connecticut (where I am absentee-registered) is not a swing state, although if that WWE executive gets elected, I will know it is my fault.

No, this is the worst story I have heard this election day:

I have a friend who just got a job at The Ohio State University.  She registered to vote in her new home state, and when she showed up this morning at the polling place and presented her passport and out-of-state license to prove she was the person who had registered, one of the three poll workers turned her away.  No, you have to provide a pay stub, a credit card statement, or a hunting/fishing license.

"So," she said to the worker, in distressed tones, "If you don't hunt, fish, have a regular salary, or have a credit card, you aren't allowed to vote in this state?"

"Do you watch anything other than PBS?" the poll worker replied, "Because maybe if you did you'd know what you needed to bring."

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