Posted on 10/29/2004 6:35:57 AM PDT by OESY
Residents of Ohio's largest county, Cuyahoga, who are voting by absentee ballot this year have to solve a brainteaser. They were each given a ballot with candidates' names, arrows pointing to the right and small numbers. And they each got a punch card with hundreds of little boxes and a number inside each one. A voter is supposed to ignore the arrows on the ballot - which appear to be there by mistake - and punch out the chad in the box on the punch card whose number corresponds to the candidate selected. If, instead, the voter follows the arrow and punches out the chad in the box it points to - as would someone voting in person, with a machine to align the ballot and punch card - that vote could be counted for the wrong candidate, or no candidate.
Ohio is a critical swing state, with 20 electoral votes and dead-even polls. The more than 75,000 absentee ballots that have been requested in Cuyahoga County, which includes Cleveland, could decide the election. Although the ballots include instructions that theoretically guide people on how to use them properly, the county elections board has been fielding calls from confused voters. There is no way of knowing how many voters are simply punching the wrong holes and mailing their ballots.
One lesson of the 2000 election mess was that badly designed ballots can disenfranchise voters. Palm Beach County's infamous "butterfly ballot" apparently caused many voters to select Pat Buchanan when they really wanted Al Gore. In Duval County, presidential candidates' names were on two pages, and the instructions said "vote on all pages." So thousands of voters chose more than one candidate, voiding their ballots. Nationwide, 2 million of the 100 million presidential ballots cast were not counted because they were unmarked, ambiguous or spoiled, a Caltech/M.I.T. study found. There is no telling how many more recorded choices the voters did not intend.
After 2000, election officials should have committed themselves to using professionally designed ballots that make it easy for voters, including those with limited literacy or poor vision, to make selections quickly and accurately. But there are already reports this year, from places like Orange County, Fla., of poorly designed ballots that may well cause more votes to be thrown out.
There is no great mystery about how to do better. Graphic artists, including the nonprofit Design for Democracy project, know how to make ballots that are simple and intuitive. Unfortunately, our election system leaves ballot design to the whims of local officials, who often make bad choices. There should be national ballot standards, including a requirement for testing before Election Day. Americans have enough to do in deciding on their votes without having to puzzle over how to get their choices to count.
Ed. Note: The above picture was not published by the New York Times.
If you follow the arrow for Bush in Cuyahoga County, a heavily Democratic county, you end up selecting no. 14, a wrong vote.
What is you reaction?
Did the Times' editorial tell the whole story about the design, who was given the advantage and what happened to the election official in charge?
Did the Times again reaffirm its reputation as one of the most untrustworthy news sources in America?
If Bush loses Ohio, this will be the reason.
My reaction is that this is a FRAUD AND HAS BEEN DEBUNKED ON HERE NUMEROUS TIMES ALREADY!!
Why hasn't the repub party not challenged this as they have in other states? Make them reprint them correctly and re-send...Heck throw out all the previously returned ballots...Just throw the whole darn election!!! Sorry, I'm getting mad.
"If Bush loses Ohio, this will be the reason.
"
I wouldn't worry much about this. If Bush loses in Ohio, the lawyers will sue and we'll have a manual recount of these absentee ballots looking for #14...
If that is a correct picture, then this is a huge scandal. Who wrote the ballot? A Democrat?
OHIO BALLOT SCARE FRAUDULENT: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1258074/posts
My blood pressure just went down a bit.
As a Bush voter, who voted absentee in Cuyahoga County all I can say is I punched the whole #4.
"When people go into the polling place, everything will line up."
When you go to the polling place, sure. Just not if you try to line up the absentee ballot with the card. Of course when voting absentee there isn't really a reason to line 'em up.
This is a NYT article; it is the same info I heard on Glen Beck....and the 2 reports are about a week apart.
I have seen nothing that shows this was debunked.
Where was it debunked? Show me the article.
Why is this still carried in this form?
14 is the right vote, the one that will be counted. The "4" is a typo. Nevertheless, it is a serious error. The Republican voters are obviously not smart enough to follow the arrow, and should hire 10,000 lawyers to protest it.
Seriously, if you get a ballot with a typo, you are entitled to ask an election worker how to interpret it.
PC, you know about it too. Jump in.
For the life of me I can't see how it can possibly line up at the polling place either. If the numbers are out of order on one side, but on the ballot the are in order, how can it possibly line up in the machine? It makes absolutely no sense.
I have seen it posted here.
I've seen a lot of discussion of it, but I have seen NO report that it has been debunked....officials saying it is wrong.
Where is the news article saying this ballot is not the ballot being used in Cayuhoga County, Ohio and that this is NOT the facts about the ballot?
This "scare" is a fraud. That's why we don't have hundreds of posts. Everyone else already knows this.
I read the WND article, and you appear to be correct.
Why is the NYT carrying this?
Good idea, I'll email them right now. Maybe then you can stop spreading phony stories.
How about you? While you are at it, why not probe the Times on this?
managing-editor@nytimes.com, retrace@nytimes.com (Dan Okrent)
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