Ohio Papers Determined to Cover Polling Places, Despite Sec. of State's Ban
By Joe Strupp
Published: November 02, 2004 11:25 AM EDT
NEW YORK Despite a directive from the Ohio secretary of state barring reporters and photographers from polling places, some newspaper editors are urging staffers today to ignore the order and seek access to voting sites until they are ordered out.
"We are going to proceed on the assumption we will get in and will until we get thrown out," said Doug Clifton, editor of The Plain Dealer in Cleveland, who estimates that up to 50 of his newsroom staffers would be visiting polling places Tuesday in the hotly contested state. "They were getting in this morning [Tuesday], but not everywhere."
In addition, at least one paper -- The Columbus Dispatch -- has registered newsroom employees as election challengers so they gain access to polling places.
"We filed to be challengers because election officials said they would strictly enforce laws regulating who can be in polling places -- voters, poll workers and challengers only," Dispatch Editor Ben Marrison wrote in a column. "Dispatch staffers are registered as challengers for every precinct in Franklin and Delaware counties."
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000697509
There probably are good explanations for why votes show up on the "odometers" of some machines, but not others. I;ve read that typically, the machines are examined at the opening of the polls, and if they show any votes, the pollwatchers are obligated to "roll them back" to zero.
This COULD have been the proverbial "honest mistake" owing to benign neglect, but it's also something that could be a conscious and very sneaky way of milking several hundred votes in the D column, and claim innocence when discovered
using the above explanation. It's designed for "plausible deniability". On the other hand, if the machine's odometer simply showed raw votes , with no allocation to D or R or Independent, then it IS mere negligence, and wouldn't benefit ANY candidate. The numbers would be as neutral as the number of miles on a car's odometer.
There probably are good explanations for why votes show up on the "odometers" of some machines, but not others. I;ve read that typically, the machines are examined at the opening of the polls, and if they show any votes, the pollwatchers are obligated to "roll them back" to zero.
This COULD have been the proverbial "honest mistake" owing to benign neglect, but it's also something that could be a conscious and very sneaky way of milking several hundred votes in the D column, and claim innocence when discovered
using the above explanation. It's designed for "plausible deniability". On the other hand, if the machine's odometer simply showed raw votes , with no allocation to D or R or Independent, then it IS mere negligence, and wouldn't benefit ANY candidate. The numbers would be as neutral as the number of miles on a car's odometer.