This campaign has made me wonder what the "do not call" registry really means. I am pretty sure I'm on it. And I've been getting an average of 6 messages a day over the past week from politicians asking for my vote. I wouldn't be as annoyed if half of them were coming from people I'd actually vote for. At least there'd be equal coverage that way. Instead, I'm being phone-spammed by one of the two major parties. And they're talking to the wrong answering machine. I've already voted and their phone calls wouldn't have swayed me one bit. The reason I have an unlisted number, which I pay for monthly, is to avoid calls like this. It's enough to make me get rid of my land line altogether. But I've found out that the regular "do not call" registry pretty much only covers for-profit telemarketing calls. If you want to stop receiving campaign calls, you can add your phone number to the Stop Political Phone Calls Now registry. There's no guarantee that it'll work, but it's worth a shot.
I read another great, timely, article about how citizens are using social media to monitor the elections tomorrow. Written by Simon Owens for PBS, it covers the background of the "Video Your Vote" movement and provides further insight into the Twitter Your Vote movement. It also talks about the Voter Suppression Wiki, a site that is dedicated to educating the public about voter suppression and providing a space for voters to tell their stories. The Incident Tracker page conveniently lists problems encountered by state so you can see what's happening near you. So now, everyone can tweet, video, blog, and wikify their voting experience. This is documentation on a scale that has never been seen before in an American election.
I don't know how anyone is going to be able to work tomorrow. Which is why it makes even more sense for the United States, in my opinion, to follow all the other countries who vote on the weekends or holidays. The entire nation is distracted by what's going on; we might as well just take the day off and focus on what is most important.
Rachel Maddow calls these long lines the new poll tax:
Check out Why Tuesday?'s candidate challenge to see what they have to say about about current voting practices and whether they need to be updated. And stop by Current to find out about all the free stuff you can get tomorrow just for voting.
According to the Arizona Republic, the votes in Maricopa County may take days to count up because of all the early ballots that will be walked in on election day.
And the first report is in for this election, from New Hampshire- in favor of Obama.
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