Please Vote

**dorispulaski** · 10-31-2004, 06:10 PM

Just to remind you all, please go and vote.

In a few states you can register at the polls.

In CT, if you have just moved in, or just turned 18, you can register even though the date has passed. In CT, if you are disabled or have some other reason you can't vote on Tuesday, you can still go to your town clerk's office on Monday and
cast an absentee ballot.

Sometimes they move your polling place. Before you vote, please check where you need to go to vote at:

Check your polling place

Be Sure to Take Your ID with you. You will be asked for it.

Be prepared to wait in line...voting is popular this year. And if it's going to rain, take an umbrella.

There have been discussions that in some swing states, some voters may be wrongly refused to vote. If you are challenged, you can cast a provisional ballot for president.

If you have any legal problems voting, please call 1 866 MYVOTE1

They will help you.

**show 42** · 10-31-2004, 06:20 PM

Excellent reminders, Doris. Hubby and I sat down this morning and went over our ballots. Read the different propositions for your area or state and vote your conscience, not your party............42

**Doggygirl** · 10-31-2004, 08:19 PM

EVERY vote counts. Voting in our representative government is one of our collective most important rights. Even if you DON'T live in a "Swing State" cast you vote anyway. It's our MOST important voice as Americans.

DG

**Tonichelle** · 10-31-2004, 09:07 PM

I already voted... it doesn't take a lot of time if you know who you're voting for... (ok so it probably does if you don't vote absentee like I did, but still

**STL_Blues_fan** · 10-31-2004, 09:35 PM

Great reminder!

It's vital that everyone should know their voting rights. Take a minute today to make sure that others know their rights, too. Download the guide to voting rights:

http://a9.g.akamai.net/7/9/8082/v001...our_rights.pdf

Yana

**Piel** · 10-31-2004, 10:05 PM

Mathman made some excellent points over in the "Voting Booth". Here they are for those who didn't see them. BTW Mathman I consider it an honor to use my 2000th post to spread your message!

I have voted in 10 U.S. presidential elections. This is the first time that I have been truly concerned about what the outcome will mean in terms of the immediate and long-term future of this country and the world.

Here are some of the questions that I am wrestling with.

1. How is it possible that after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, a nation that had the sympathy and support of most of the world now is looked upon as a "bully?"

2. How can it be that a country that in 2001 had the financial means to eliminate the national debt and adequately fund social security is now running $500-billion-a-year deficits?

3. How is it that we are fighting two wars, one in Afghanistan and one in Iraq, and also fighting a "war on terrorism" at home by expanding "homeland security," yet we have passed four successive tax cuts disproportionately benefiting the wealthiest Americans. Where is the equity of sacrifice, where the fiscal responsibility?

4. Why is it that a nation that possesses the strongest military forces in the history of the world has to activate the National Guard and reserve units, sending them overseas, while at the same time forcing enlistees in the "volunteer" military to extend their service against their will?

5. Do we have a plan in Iraq? How long will our troops be bogged down there? Have we already destabilized the middle east in such a fashion as to provide opportunity and encouragement to bin Laden and the very terrorists that we profess to oppose?

6. Why are we allowing our environmental protections, dating back to the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, to be systematically eroded, not by due process of law, but by executive decree?

7. Why have we abandoned the government's natural regulatory functions in such a way as to allow and encourage harmful criminal activities such as the savings and loans scandal, Enron's overcharging California for electrical power, then "cooking the books" and spiriting away billions of dollars from ordinary investors and pensioners, etc., etc., etc.?

8. With our "borrow, borrow, borrow, charge, charge, charge" economic policy, are we burdening our children and grandchildren with paying off the national debt when the well runs dry?

9. Given the prominent influence of extreme radical conservatives in the present administration, are we headed toward a theocracy featuring a series of holy wars abroad and an increase in religious and racial intolerance at home?

If you love your country, vote. Please.

Mathman

**Tonichelle** · 10-31-2004, 10:56 PM

all I can say to the environmental issue... keep your national pristene parks sacred, that's fine. LEAVE ALASKA ALONE. you start putting more crappy laws up here and we won't get to do ANYTHING here... and while I'm at it OPEN ANWR. it's small and it doesn't hurt the environment...

Alaska is actually getting a lot of support from people wanting to leave the union just because of ANWR, and while I am a very proud American. I am also a very proud ALASKAN and I can understand where they are coming from. Clinton/Kennedy/Gore/Kerry/Edwards ran us into the ground and are still trying to. For that I can not in good conscience even considering voting for people like that.

**Piel** · 10-31-2004, 11:33 PM

Toni, what have they done that you dislike?

**Grgranny** · 10-31-2004, 11:43 PM

I try to always vote. I was so angry at me a few months ago when they were voting to build new schools, etc. here and I completely forgot.

**Tonichelle** · 11-01-2004, 01:58 AM

Originally Posted by Piel

Toni, what have they done that you dislike?

They've closed up so much of Alaska as "national parks" that we can't hunt or fish. Now while this may not be so hard for them down in DC to deal with up here it is a matter of life and starvation... without fishing a lot of native villages can't support themselves end up on welfare and still that's not good enough because if they have no way to get to a town/city where they can cash foodstamps what the freakin reason do we send them for??? Granted our Alaskan government found a loophole for the natives but people like my family who, until recently, was just above the poverty line and weren't poor enough for welfare(not that my parents would have ever really gone for that idea anyway) have very little place to go. (what's funny is the same people who want to close it off to people like my dad are the ones who come up and do the big game trophy hunts and the fishing trips... funny how that works... JERKS)

Then there's the ANWR thing, and like I've said on other threads... it's NOT a bad idea. Dan Rather did a whole thing on it making ANWR twice the size of Alaska when really it's so stinking small it wouldn't screw anything up... besides the north slope shows that the oil companies bend over backwards to help the wildlife up there(our Caribou herd has tripled since they really started working up there. They use the pipeline to keep warm and keep their babies warm) where I lived in Kenai we were an oil community and had very few "spills" (and lately we haven't had any) EXXON was and remains the worst... the second would be the nut case who shot holes in the pipline a few days after Sept. 11th... not sure what possessed him to do it... funny thing was he was one of the tree hugger people(they also got busted for having an unsafe vessel in the area where the EXXON spill was and they were screaming about the oil rigs being pollutant when it was there ship polluting the water

I love irony)

I guess my biggest thing was when Bill Clinton signed the bill closing down Alaska to anything (closing many camping sites as they were "Bad" too :rolleyes: ) and everything, even after our senators and congressman said that we didn't want that and our governor(who was a democrat at the time) even sued the administration trying to stop it... but the power of Clinton/Gore was more powerful than little ol' Tony Knowles (he's the only Dem I would have little problem with in DC). To say that Knowles was pissed would be a gross understatement...

With Bush we've gotten another pipeline and if Kerry/Kennedy/Edwards/Clinton/all dems against us in DC weren't so stupid they'd let ANWR go through...

I honestly don't see how those people can make an accurate decision without actually coming up here and viewing the area (Bush came prior to 2000 so he could make a final decision for his campaign, Kerry said something early on in his campaign that Alaska was not an "important issue" and should "never be" so why should I vote for someone who sees me nothing more as a noisy pest?? If I'm not important than screw DC if he's in I'm voting for Alaska to sevre ties with USA

)

Being as how we went from having $$ for college for me prior to Clinton taking office... and basically living off of potatoes and roadkill moose(no joke) and we're just now getting back on our feet I can't imagine what Kerry would do up here... being as how we Alaskan's are TOO STUPID to know what to do(that was another quote of his... we didn't have enough common sense to even try to persuade us[paraphrase, but hey if Dan Rather and the rest of the liberally biased media can do it then so can I

]) I don't know if Tony Knowles is for Kerry but I don't think so... but he needs the campaign $$ from the DNSC so he's not saying who he supports(probably Nader) I do know that he voted for Bush(came out and said it after the election

)

anyway I rambled and if it makes no sense it's because as I type I'm getting more and more frustrated... talking about the 8 years of Clinton's stupidity in Alaska pisses me off more than most can understand.

**Piel** · 11-01-2004, 12:42 PM

Are you saying that there are not adequate hunting and fishing areas open to the citizens and that is their main source of food? What kinds of jobs are there? My next question is why would people choose to live in an area where they cannot provide for their families? I understand your frustration. Lots of West Virginians have had to relocate out of state due to the loss of jobs in the coal and chemistry industry. BUT I would rather relocate than destroy the natural beauty with more strip mines. And I would prefer to lose more jobs in the Kanawha Valley than have the risk of chemical leaks constantly over my head....it is no surprise that Charleston, WV has the highest rate of cancer in the country. You have to look at the overall big picture. Once those resources are gone they are gone forever. While from your viewpoint it may look like there is plenty to go around when you look at the entire world those areas of pristine wilderness are rare.

**serenity** · 11-01-2004, 01:04 PM

www.publius.com to find out if you can vote in Mich

**Mathman** · 11-01-2004, 07:35 PM

Hey, cool, Serenity. I just checked myself out. Yup, duly registered.

Now I can do my duty not to be "suppressed."

(For those not in Michigan, that was a reference to a statement made at a Bush rally by a Republican state senator involved with the Bush campaign, who said that in order for Bush to carry Michigan, the Detroit vote would have to be suppressed.)

Mathman

**Piel** · 11-01-2004, 07:46 PM

Come on Motown show those Republicans that you will NOT be suppressed!

all together now to the tune of "My Girl"......

We want Kerry, on election day.
Roundboi Pete will have to take it from there

.

**heyang** · 11-01-2004, 08:18 PM

Just trying to decide if I should vote after going to the gym or if I should vote 1st and then probably not go to the gym. I'm guessing I'll do the latter since it's supposed to rain, too.