Voting Machines + Moronic Voters

Well, here we go again. It's not even November 7 yet and already there are stories predicting voter fraud and electronic machines that don't work.

Why don't they simply bring back the old-fashioned paper ballot? Nobody could possibly complain about that, except the officials who would have to count them. Or, bring back the pre-electronic model's lever-version, where you simply flipped a lever that pointed to the name of your candidate, or to the name of the party. Writing a name, or checking a box, or moving a lever, shouldn't be that hard -- unless you are a complete idiot. And if that's the case, you shouldn't be voting at all.

But during my entire voting life, I have never heard about voting problems until the 2000 elections, with that insane "hanging chads" controversy. For all my voting years, I have never heard of anyone who couldn't fill out the old paper ballots; never heard anyone complain about the machines with the levers; and don't personally know anyone who has had problems with electronic machines. Let's stop dumbing down everything in our society, even the way we vote.

They always hand out instructions in advance as to how the machines work. If you are too ignorant to read them, that's your own fault, not the fault of the machines or their manufacturers. When you stand in line at your polling place, they usually have huge flyers posted with the instructions, a diagram of the machine, plus a entire ballot.

So, to already be blaming machines for the results IN ADVANCE of the election is outrageous.