Please Vote for Ali!
My daughter Ali wants your vote.
She's not running for anything, but she's not going to be able to cast a vote this year. She really, really wanted to cast a vote in this election, but the Kansas City Election Board callously ruined her opportunity to participate in her first Presidential election. She has been excited about Obama since early in the primary season, back when I was backing Dodd and her mother was backing Hillary. And she wants to cast her vote for him.
To her credit, she did everything right. Months ahead of election day, she carefully downloaded and sent in the form for an absentee ballot, and followed up with a phone call. It had been received and would be mailed, they assured her.
It never came.
Finally, after hearing that friends were receiving their ballots, she called again to see what was going on. After much insistent prodding by my daughter, they found her record and saw that they had somehow mailed it to her street address, but the bottom line said "Kansas City, MO" instead of "New Orleans, LA". It was a week before the election - what could she do?
Her determination to vote didn't end there, however. She researched how to get a ballot overnighted to her, and that's why I wound up going to the absentee office on Wednesday. It was crowded, but I waited my turn, explained my mission, and submitted a stamped envelope to accompany my request. The form was to be notarized, and I pointed that out to the lady at the counter, who told me she would fill in the rest. She looked the form over and specifically told me everything was fine. She took my envelope, with its $16.50 stamp, and told me it would go out that evening.
That was the last we ever heard. Ali never received a ballot.
You are Ali's last hope.
Please, on Tuesday, if you see a long line at the poll, or you get busy at work, or you figure that things are going to go okay even without your vote, cast your vote for Ali. Please go the extra mile, wait the extra hour, show the extra determination.
There's an excited young woman who did her utmost to exercise her vote, but the KCEB's incompetence frustrated her purpose.
Please, cast your ballot for Ali.
posted by Dan at 11/03/2008 07:30:00 AM
7 Comments:
I've had problems registering this year, too; seems like the three change-of-address forms I've sent in haven't been received. Maybe I should print my own ballot and take it in tomorrow.
Hey Dan, I am sorry to hear that the powers that be broke your daughters heart.
If I even remotely endorsed voting for another persons choice, I would be glad to help you out. I can;t condone vote BUYING but this is difference. I feel that I, and others, should vote our own conscious.
I suspect however, that more than a couple of your readers were leaning that way anyway, so tell your little girl that you are proud of her trying so hard! Wednesday we'll see what we see.
Hmm. My daughter's voter registration went through, but the office screwed up her absentee application.
She's paying, out of her own hard-earned college money, to fly home tomorrow for a few hours so she can vote in person.
I wonder if this is a wide-spread screw-up? Call me if you want to discuss it... 816-456-9014
Update: I called the registration office and was told that I will be allowed to vote tomorrow if I change my address on site.
This makes me so angry, I can only imagine how you and your daughter feel. If it's happening to someone as persistent as her, i can only imagine how many others chose not to pursue their right to vote because it just didn't seem worth the hassle.
Won't they give her a provisional ballot? It was their screw-up, not hers. With your connections, Dan, can you try to get through to McCaskill or somebody high up to help you out?
Provisional isn't the point; she is out-of-town. If she returned to town, she could probably vote.
There ought to be a way to cure the election board's errors, without elections dragging on for months.
Anyone have an idea for what to do (other than preventing all errors) -- i.e. what to do when errors to occur?
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