Post Punk Kitchen Forum

GO VOTE.

And be sure to vote "Tea Party" because it's all Obama's fault ;)

It's so true.

Ha! Aww. Don't ruin tea.

I like voting. I will be voting after work.

I'm so relieved election day is here. I've been getting tons of recorded message phone calls. Now they will finally end.

I was not planning on voting because I have severe depression and apathy this year but last night I made myself look up my voting info and I go soon.

The day to choose between disappointing and disastrous.

Vote, I did it.

I'm very excited to vote for a socialist party canidate for the senate.
I dare a democrat to say something.

I'm going tonight and hoping I can register for NH with what I have. Wish me luck!

Can someone explain to my in layman's terms what the vote is for today? What will the outcome determine? I'm so confused by the American political system.

You mean that isn't what voting democrat implies?

It depends on where the person lives. Some people are voting for senate or congress seats. Some are voting for state governors. Some are voting for mayors, city council, school boards, judges, parish/county officials. Lots of places have state or city propositions to vote for (to raise taxes, to amend the state constitution, to enact bonds, and so on). We call it midterm elections because there's no presidential election. Not as many people end up voting.

You're probably hearing about senate and house of representative races and a few controversial propositions, like California's proposition to legalize marijuana. This election will determine which of our two major parties has a majority over congress, which gives the party the option of stalling things they don't want to pass or passing things that are unpopular with the opposition.

Philadelphia lost my registration and I don't know if I've actually lived in PA long enough to vote here. If I show up at my polling place with something with my name and address on it will they let me vote?

Oh no! I have no idea if you'll be allowed to vote or not... it's worth a shot, though.

Depends on your local voting laws. At the very least, you should be able to get a provisional ballot.

Voted last week. Yay.

Touche.

In Alabama, we're voting for governor, lieutenant governor (we vote separately for these offices here, so that we could conceivably have a Republican governor and a Democratic lieutenant governor or vice versa), senate, congress, and several statewide offices. I will be holding my nose the entire time, like I do every election.

I will have to vote at my old precinct because I keep forgetting to change my registration to my current location. Most of what we're voting for is the same (everyone's voting for governor and I haven't changed US congressional districts) - the state reps and so forth, not so much.

I always vote absentee, so my ballot got mailed off two weeks ago. Thank christ this day is here, I am so sick of getting 75% election-related junk mail in my mail box every day. I have been pretty lucky in that I think I've only received one AutoDial call this election. I just hope we get to hold onto this good World Series feeling a while longer and don't have it immediately spoiled by bad election results.

It's weird because I've worked on proposition campaigns before and the amount of energy and focus that goes into mailers and AutoDial scripts is just ludicrous because in my experience, at least according to the most vocal people, these things are annoying at best and will cause enough irritation to actually change a vote, at worst. I guess it's just part of a larger election system that is deeply flawed.

For those curious non-Americans, my own ballot was three pages long and included national offices such as senate, state offices such as governor and treasurer, state-wide measures such as the marijuana proposition, county- and district-specific offices and measures, and city-specific offices (mayor) and measures (a shiitake ton of new taxes). There are also government positions to be filled on the advisory boards for the local utilities and public transportation authorities. And we also vote on supreme court judges, which I didn't really give any thought to until Jordanpattern said how messed up it was, and I thought, "hey, you're right."

Maybe I'm a horrible person, but I never pay attention to these and just skip them. The only thing I feel strongly about this time around is X and mildly strong about a handful of the state props.

My problem is that I don't know much about them. If there's a party mentioned (so I can just vote party-line) or if I recognize a name from anywhere besides campaign signs, I'll vote accordingly, but otherwise, I dunno. I'm not terribly involved in local politics, unfortunately. That will probably change once I live somewhere I want to stay a while and where I have a stake in, you know, the local school system.

I'm voting after work. Then I'm going home. And drinking.

Perhaps a drink along tonight.

This is precisely why I vote absentee! I have a good long week or two with my ballot to look up what the hell everything is and who endorses/opposes who or what.