Elderly lady in North Charleston casts her absentee vote, then dies. Absentee ballots are counted after the polls close. Does her vote count? I hope this lady's vote count. She sounds like one cool chick. If they don't count it, Voter Office is going to be damn busy checking the status of ALL the absentee voters.Anyway, I was wondering where I'd see this lady before. Ah, now I remember: she's the forgotten member of Devo.
Should you count on this lady's vote counting? Don't know, but you can count on Jefferson Starship:
8 comments:
Wow, that is a wild question, and what do you do about early voting? here and in Florida, folks started voting at elections centers last week, so there's no paper trail to tell you which ballot is from the dead person ... and with as many people as there are in Florida, there's bound to be at least one person who votes early, then dies, it's just odds.
There's apparently precedent in other states. I know that absentee ballots can be challenged individually, as I have defended two pretty sorry elections when I was Jasper County County Attorney. A Harvard study evidently found that one of the elections (1998, I think) was the worst in the Country that year. Anyway, a party challenges each ballot it suspects was tainted (most frequent reason: an unauthorized person- usually someone affiliated with a campaign- picked up the paper ballot). The County Election Commission either keeps or throws out each allegedly tainted vote. Appeals go to State election commission, then on to the Courts. If the State vote is not close, then the results are usually not appealed (unless the election is a total cluster- er, manuever). If the gal's relatives hadn't bragged about their momma/sister/friend voting right before she died, noone would probably challenge the vote and it would count. Since someone let the cat out of the bag, I'd imagine the vote will be challenged and may or may not stand. I'd guess it won't, but we'll see. In either event, the Charleston County Election Commission's decision- whatever it is- will probably only be challenged if the election is close.
She is in a sense truly "absent" now, isn't she?
I voted on Friday and had to wait in an hour-long line with dead people. Or *nearly* dead people, anyway. And we DO have a paper trail here...we had the old fashioned fill-in-the-bubble with a No. 2 pencil ballot. What? You techno-geeks in CO have actual computers???
We get paper if we do it at home, but vote on a computer if it's at the Board building.
...and with all those tourist dollars, Star, Florida will always be the land of the hanging chad to me.
Ah, crap, Jessica Fletcher died? Well, about time I guess, after she kilt all those people in Maine. "Now look here sheriff, when I found the body, there was no weapon, just this wound and a puddle of water..."
Take you medicine Jess, take your medicine.
Wait. Was that a Stephen King story, Ange?
I kilt lotsa people and use their thumbs to vote ...
- Dean Karnazes
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