I went through the election judge training session in Jackson County, Missouri tonight.
We use the Inkavote system here, where a paper ballot is marked by the other and run through and electronic compiler mounted on the ballot box.
A couple things stood out: the main Election Board speaker had some nasty stuff to say about Acorn, and told us that he and his folks had been on Fox all day and on Greta this evening. His problem seemed to be that it was a lot of extra work weeding out the bad registrations from the good ones. My feeling is that with the election slipping away from them, the GOP is going to do everything they can to cast doubt on the vote itself, and the stooges at Fox are their megaphone.
One good thing, the instructor made sure that everyone in the room understood that in Missouri does NOT require photo-ID. That GOP-suppression move was struck down earlier this year.
Another thing I heard was that the election board is really hard up to find enough Republican judges (we do EVERYTHING in Dem-Rep pairs in Missouri.) That tells me that there is more enthusiasm in our side than theirs, and that our folks want to be right in there to keep things level.
So now I have a thick pack of stuff to read so that I can do the job.
And I voted tonight, Obama, Nixon, and all the other state and local Democrats. Felt great.