I have fond memories of being allowed to stay up past bedtime in 1992 and 1996 to watch Bill Clinton's glorious victories. My mom had plastered a "Clinton-Gore" sticker on my pink lunchbox. I was excited for the leadership of a man whom my parents hailed as the best Democrat since Kennedy (Bobby or Jack, take your pick).
The first time I was ever really aware that the public has the privelege and obligation to hold a sitting president accountable was in the 1992 presidential debates. I was amazed at how people could raise their hand, stand up, and say "Things aren't going so well in my hometown right now. Can you fix it, or should I vote for the other guy?" I was too young to understand primaries, but I somehow felt that an overwhelming number of people had decided that if someone were to beat George H.W. Bush, it should be William Jefferson Clinton.
Staying up to watch the returns was an educational and fun experience, sort of like a slumber party on a school night, and it's an experience I'm afraid I won't be able to share with my own children.
In 2000, I was a freshman in college and I practically had to plaster my eyes open with duct tape to wait for the Florida returns... the returns that never really came. A news network declared victory for Bush, government officials declared victory for Gore, Nader declared victory for no one, and I passed out around 4:30am with tears in my eyes, fearing that I'd wake up to find another Bush president.
It took weeks. Recounts, hearings, hours of Congress' floor time. Then we had a president that we didn't elect.
And four years later, I watched the returns from my desk at the Kerry-Edwards headquarters in Washington, D.C. When all but Iowa and Ohio were in, and it was nearing 2 a.m., my boss told us to head to a hotel she'd gotten some rooms in and get some sleep so we could prepare ourselves for an arduous recount process. Lawyers left our office and boarded planes to Florida, Iowa, and Ohio. My coworkers chugged the last of their Red Bulls and left for the hotel. I found an empty cubicle in the "Fire Fighters for Kerry" area and cried for an hour. I didnt' want to work myself sick for two more months to find myself stuck with another four years of a President I couldn't respect. It was with bittersweet relief that we learned the next morning their would be no recounts.
PR Newswire released this today:
League of Women Voters President Mary G. Wilson today testified before the Senate Rules Committee, expressing the League's strong support for key elements of S. 1487, the "Ballot Integrity Act of 2007," introduced by Senator Dianne Feinstein (D CA). The League strongly applauded the following elements of the legislation:
- Protections for voter registration drives (Section 302)
- Equitable allocation of polling place resources (Section 304)
- Protections against erroneous purges of voters (Section 306)
- Requirements to count provisional ballots of eligible voters (Section 309)
In this day and age, the fact that voters' rights are still infringed upon based on class, race, age, or criminal history is ridiculous. Our crooked justice system, and the crooked influencers hanging out at polling places, make the kind of election nights I remember so fondly impossible for our future.
There's so much red tape, making sure the "right" people vote, that only people who registered on time get to vote, only people who've never committed a crime or served jail time, only people who understand ballot booths or absentee cards. I don't know if my vote has ever been counted, and that scares me. I know I voted correctly, but so much could've gone wrong.
Now that I no longer work in politics, I find myself not wanting the primary stages to end because the finish line scares me. I'm scared that America WILL elect a great president and that person will never get to serve due to corrupt election proceedings.
Tampering with ballot boxes, tampering with our justice system... it insults me that the people who do this think they are so much more intelligent than the rest of America that they should be the ones to decide who leads us. If they aren't underestimating our intelligence, they are selfish and self-serving, ensuring that the State Attorneys, congresspeople, and even President are people who will do them favors or guarantee their special interests.
I wish I could find the 10 year old girl inside me whose eyes lit up as the electoral map changed from red to blue in 1992. I'm just trying not to lose hope that we will have an election in this country during my lifetime that restores my faith in the democratic process.