Sunday afternoon roundup

I've seen a lot of people encouraging the "vote early" option, and have thought that's probably a good idea. But I also have wondered what happens to those ballots, and how we can be reassured that boxes of those ballots aren't "disappeared" somehow. There's an article in today's Columbus Dispatch addressing that very issue:

Absentee ballots under 2 locks, 2 keys

Security cameras are pointed at doors to rooms housing blank ballots, ballots addressed to voters and ballots that have been returned. Two cameras watch elections employees as they fill voters’ absentee-ballot requests.

There’s a partisan division in keys to the double-locked door of the returned-ballot room. Damschroder holds the Republican key, and Deputy Director Dennis L. White holds the Democratic one.

One privatization plan we could all support by modernesquire

From Buckeye State Blog, outlining all of the things Ken Blackwell plans to privatize, and ends with the suggestions that it is Mr. Blackwell himself who needs to be "privatized".

If you haven't seen the ad Michael J. Fox did for Claire McCaskill, you can see it here, along with the reaction of Huffington Post blogger James Boyce. The article is entitled "What would Jesus do, a**hole?" Only without the asterisks.

Also, I highly recommend reading After Pat’s Birthday, an open letter from Pat Tillman's brother, Kevin.

It is Pat’s birthday on November 6, and elections are the day after. It gets me thinking about a conversation I had with Pat before we joined the military. He spoke about the risks with signing the papers. How once we committed, we were at the mercy of the American leadership and the American people. How we could be thrown in a direction not of our volition. How fighting as a soldier would leave us without a voice… until we got out.

Much has happened since we handed over our voice:

(Click to read the rest.)

And since I'm never going to get Demetrius in the habit of plugging new designs he's made at Cafe Press, I just want to add a link to our store. Go have a look-see. There's an e-mail address on that page, so if you don't see what you're looking for, you can make a request.

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