[RonF]

It's the law in Illinois that your employer must give you time off to vote on any statewide election day.

Making election day a national holiday would be a fitting celebration of democracy and our Republic. Failing that, scheduling elections on Saturday would make a lot of sense.

I seen nothing wrong with a city government, or any government, giving it's employees time to vote. Certainly in Boston you're going to get a lot of Democrats, but that does not negate the overall idea.

If you really want to get out the vote, put up a State/Federal lottery. Vote to enter. Every voting booth stub has a number already (at least in Illiniois). Figure out a way to include absentee ballots, and there's an incentive.

Of course, I'm not all that big on get-out-the-vote campaigns. Even with the current low turnout, there's too many people who vote based on 30-second sound bites. Voting really isn't that onerous a logistical problem (I reserve those with physical limitations). If you're not interested enough in the franchise to take the trouble to vote, I rather imagine that you probably haven't put too much effort into how/why you'd vote one way or another, anyway.

[husky ed]

Making election day a national holiday would be a fitting celebration of democracy and our Republic. Failing that, scheduling elections on Saturday would make a lot of sense.

Aren't the polls open from 8am til 8pm now? It would seem that if Joe Six-Pack would put down the remaining 2 cans, he would have plenty of time to vote during the day.
But now we need another paid day off for government workers and teachers? That's what was missing all along. Getting paid to vote.
Of course, the people on welfare will need to be reimburse for missing Oprah.</sarcsam off>