Posted on 10/19/2004 7:41:15 PM PDT by Former Military Chick
BAGHDAD, Iraq - U.S. service members based in Iraq and across the globe can't be confident that their votes will be counted in this year's presidential election, analysts and military advocates said this week.
Those warnings came despite a stepped-up Pentagon campaign - developed in response to the 2000 election, when as many as 30 percent of service members stationed overseas were unable to vote - to encourage troops to register and vote early.
Observers praised the military's efforts but said a cumbersome voting process, a confusing patchwork of state laws and likely ballot challenges almost certainly would disenfranchise some military voters.
"They've made three steps forward in terms of their effort and attention to the problem but two steps backward as a practical matter," said Peter Feaver, a political science professor at Duke University in Durham, N.C., who closely follows military voting.
Anecdotal accounts from soldiers stationed in Iraq confirmed that at least some troops here who applied to their local elections boards for absentee ballots months ago still haven't received them.
"I sent my application in June and I never got anything back," said 1st Cavalry Sgt. Jim Villareal from Orange County, Calif.
But unlike past elections in which Villareal and others like him probably would've been disenfranchised, the military has distributed tens of thousands of federal write-in ballots this year. The replacement ballots allow soldiers who haven't received local ballots to vote on candidates for federal office, though they don't permit voting on state and local issues.
"It's a pretty poor substitute for a regular ballot, but it beats nothing," said Sam Wright, who heads the Military Voting Rights Project.
More than the military, states and local jurisdictions are to blame for not getting their ballots to overseas soldiers. Late primary elections and legal challenges - many of them involving Ralph Nader's bid to get on ballots - have delayed printing and mailing absentee ballots in many jurisdictions.
There've been isolated reports of shortages of the federal replacement ballots, but Wright said they appeared to be reaching most soldiers who needed them.
"We have seen some improvement. Just how much is impossible to say. At this point everyone has their fingers crossed," said Derek Stewart, who in 2001 wrote a highly critical assessment of the military's overseas voting program for the Government Accountability Office.
Given the likelihood of a close presidential election, a few thousand more votes from service members stationed overseas could swing the results in battleground states such as Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio. Just 537 votes divided President Bush and Al Gore in Florida in 2000, a spread easily covered by military ballots.
Military voters have tended in past elections to vote Republican, and a recent Annenberg election survey of 655 active-duty soldiers and their family members found that they were likely to back Bush in large numbers again this year.
"The Democrats broke something of a taboo in 2000 when they started to challenge military ballots on technical grounds," Feaver said. "You would expect the Democrats to be just as exacting this time around as Republicans will be about votes coming from perceived Democratic areas."
Overseas military ballots are particularly susceptible to challenge, experts said, because they frequently arrive past deadlines and without postmarks.
The Pentagon had planned to roll out a $22 million electronic solution to the problem this election. But security experts said the votes - which would've been transmitted over the Internet - wouldn't be secure, and the system was scrapped. The hodgepodge of voting and ballot-application methods that took its place is so confusing that the Defense Department issued a 379-page guide to help service members figure out how to vote.
The military has deluged service members with reminders to vote early. Banners and signs seem to fly from every base in Iraq, and "remember to vote" commercials air frequently on the Armed Forces television network.
The Pentagon campaign and the crucial role of the Iraq war in the election have combined to make the election a passionate subject of debate in mess halls and barracks across Iraq.
"We should stay here until the job is done, and I can't trust (Sen. John) Kerry to do that," said Baghdad-based 1st Cavalry Spc. Thuan Tran, from Palmdale, Calif., who said he'd never felt so passionately about an election before.
At Camp Bucca, the American-run prison on the Kuwaiti border 300 miles south of Baghdad, the sand-dusted and sunburned soldiers consider themselves experts on the biggest foreign-policy question shaping the election.
"A lot of soldiers feel President Bush isn't fulfilling what he said he'd do," said Spc. Ricardo Hart, 35, of the 321st Signal Co. out of Reno, Nev. "But I tell them, this is war, this is still a conflict. Nothing is black and white. So, we're all voting - just maybe not for the same person."
It is truly sad that those who defend our right to vote are often overlooked or outright robbed of their right to vote by the left.
**ping**
As beloved just said to me, Nader has successfully disenfranchised the military voter. What a guy, eh? Where is the outrage from the Kerry folks over the military voters?
Old Sarge will not be posting to this thread.
Sarge is currently self-administering stress relief, in the form of gnawing on the table leg, as a result of reading this post.
Sarge will be present for duty, once the Tylenol kicks in and the proper grade sandpaper is found at the hardware store.
Thank You.
Sadly, we are helpless in this. And more sad are the number of military folks who will be disenfranchised by the Rats in November.
I'm mad, what can we do.....
What a shame, you just know the Rats will be blocking every military vote they can again. There is no perfect system, but these guys votes should be counted, always and without fail.
This is ....simply beyond belief.
Maybe military people should be automaticly registered and sent ballots from the time of enlistment. They are the last who should be prevented from voting.
Maybe if you contact Peter Feaver mentioned in the article you could find out who at the Pentagon is in charge of military overseas voting. Whoever this person is, they need to get in front of a camera and let a few more folks know what Mr. Nader has wrought on the people who deserve to have their votes counted most...
"the Defense Department issued a 379-page guide to help service members figure out how to vote. "
Amazing... I think the troops will be sending in the ballots ASAP. They are more aware than anybody about what the stakes are. I know the florida ballots were slow to get out. Hopefully PA and OH were quick to get theirs out.
I'm a little worried about my military absentee ballot.
I refused to put my SSN on the OUTSIDE OF THE ENVELOPE, and instead had another commissioned officer "witness" me putting the whole thing together.
But because I put my SSN on my absentee ballot request form, they might complain that I didn't put it on the OUTSIDE OF THE ENVELOPE which I returned my ballot in.
The worst part is - I'll never know whether my vote was counted or not in my crucial battleground state.
Are you home yet to vote? *ping*
Yet another story that MSM will NOT cover.
This is an outrage. Last time it was the Dems and lawyers and now its ... ??
Something needs to be done NOW!
I don't think it is Nader. Nader has every right to run. I think it is the ridiculous lawsuits thrown up by the Dems in every state to keep him off of the ballot that is outrageous.
If a military person wants to vote for Nader, what right do the dems have to deny that?
Ballots aren't sent out because the legal wranglings over who can be on the ballot are still being fought. Until those are settled, ballots in many states aren't produced. If they aren't sent by now, the soldier has not time to receive it and return it by Nov. 2.
Okay, lemme see if I got this right.
The RATs will move Heaven and Earth to create a political environment that makes it easy for dead people, felons, and illegal aliens to vote, and to make it easy for people to vote in more than one state.
But they will fight tooth and nail to disqualify the votes of the men and women in the American military.
You don't need to be an Einstein to interpret this scenario.
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