Voting in Florida

Upon leaving the polls in Florida, we were each given a sticker
to show that we voted today.

Although small household chores took up part of our morning, we set aside time this morning to exercise our American right to vote.

Floridians, it seems,  are loath to wait until the actual voting day (March 15) to cast their ballots.  Perhaps that has to do with not wanting to stand in long lines in the Florida sunshine, or perhaps people are just so busy that they need the option of choosing when they vote.  For whatever reason,  thousands of Floridians have already cast their ballots.

Voting here in Florida is an easy process.  When we applied for Florida residency, we were counseled to register with a political party so as to avoid the harassment of emails, phone calls, and visits from people of all of the parties to join their particular causes and organizations.  We chose one party, knowing that when we actually had to vote on anything beyond the primaries, we could still mark the ballot in any way that we desired.

That political choice is tied to a person's name, address, driver's license, and tax records.  Today I walked into the courthouse in Clearwater, gave the poll worker my driver's license, watched as it was slid through a machine like I was buying groceries at Wal-Mart, signed my name on an electronic pad, and received a ballot designated by the party I had chosen five years ago.  I walked to a private booth, marked my ballot, and slipped it into the ballot-tally machine.  Five minutes, and we were in and out.

Three things to note.  First, I was rather disturbed to see an announcement on TV last night telling the audience that preliminary count of the early voting showed Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton leading their prospective parties. As Michigan recently showed us, those predictions are not always accurate.  However, I know from studying journalism many years ago that such announcements, although seemingly just "news-worthy," could indeed have the ability to persuade someone to vote one way or another or just to not vote at all.

Secondly, thank God that Florida has revised their voting procedures so that we no longer have to use Votomatic punch cards to punch holes in paper and have "hanging chads" that almost caused a revolution in 2000 until Bush was finally announced the next President of the United States.

Thirdly, with all that has gone on so far with the current political campaigns, I find myself in a familiar place: deciding how to cast my ballot not for a person in whom I passionately believe, but rather for a person who seems the least of all evils.  I took my ballot today into the private booth, glanced down at the names listed, searched vainly for a "None of the Above" box, and filled in the circle next to the name of the person who seems to be the least of all evils.