[lbo-talk] Votes Count But Organization Decides: Report From The Ohio Front

JBrown72073 at cs.com JBrown72073 at cs.com
Sat Nov 6 12:50:08 PST 2004



>That was how I spent Election Day and the day before
>in the battleground state of Ohio. People in my room
>bitterly reflected that if wanted work that mattered
>and reasonable organization we bet that we could have
>gotten it at Republican Party HQ. So, anyway, maybe my
>experience was atypical. But I doubt it. I think this
>lack of professionalism and seriousness was a factor
>in Kerry's defeat. I agree with my fellow volunteers
>who came to Ohio from NY and California and Kansas and
>Oklahoma -- this was my room -- that the Republicans
>could not have been worse and were probably a lot
>better.
>
>Unhappily,
>
>jks

Damn, that's a long, sad story. I'm happy to say that the officially non-partisan Election Protection in Jacksonville, Florida was well organized, only slightly chaotic, incorporated us in useful things (I worked Sun-Tues.), and managed to negotiate a stand-down from the new supervisor of elections which probably caused the Republicans to not use their voter challenge plan. Greg Palast's BBC story about the 'caging list' also helped us, I think. Additionally, being the South, they fed us every three hours and on Tuesday had three shifts (you could sign up for one, two, or all.) But then, it was organized by the same folks that forced Jacksonville to cough up 5 extra early voting sites through picketing and generally raising hell. And it involved a lot of locals, who were clearly in the leadership.

The lawyers from out of state, it's true, couldn't go into the polls unless invited by a voter, they were officially there as legal volunteers. I sat in on one of their trainings and it seemed to be fairly decent--although news was changing daily on the challenge procedure.

Canvassing, I talked to quite a few people who couldn't vote because of felony convictions--that was striking. The procedure to get your civil rights restored here is onerous and involves going before the governor. Needless to say, there's a huge backlog.

So Justin, next time around, c'mon down to the sunshine state, and stay away from those Democratic Party types and their craven, weak-kneed leadership. At least we'll feed you well.

Jenny Brown



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