Hello. My name is Karen. This is my first Diary.
I live in North Carolina, in a city that is about one-third black. I am white. Over the last week (but especially on election day) I had the "So did you vote?" conversation with numerous friends, coworkers and acquaintances.
After a while a pattern began to emerge in the conversations. (I honestly wasn't looking for it, it just emerged on its own.) While I waited an hour to vote, and other whites reported similar waits, the blacks I spoke to reported waiting two to five hours.
I was accepted at my polling place even though this is my first election in the state. One black coworker reported being sent to three polling places before she arrived at the right one. "My grandmother would've just given up," she said. "She's ninety."
This is in a county where there have been no allegations of fraud or voter intimidation. It just comes down to a pattern of errors, a pattern of slow lines, a pattern of little problems.
It's sensible, of course, on the Republicans' part. Blacks are, after all, visible, and they are the most polarized voting bloc in the nation (88% Democrat this time around).
But it's also kind of evil, if true.
Has anybody else seen this pattern?