As many as 300,000 military voters will not get the opportunity to vote by absentee ballot because the process of getting ballots into their hands and then back home to be counted is choked in bureaucratic paperwork. Not only is the military under-staffed to handle the issue, the states each impose their voting rules and restrictions.
Something as simple as allowing absentee ballots to be e-mailed to the troops would help cut the number of our soldiers who are dis-enfranchised.
The Pew Center for the States initiative called "Democracy at a Distance" will hold a conference beginning tomorrow in Washington DC intended to focus attention--and perhaps actually get results--to solve this problem.
We send our soliders to fight and sometimes die for our freedom. How can we deny them the right to vote because it's inconvenient to process?
Here's a terrific summary of the problems from Sgt. Patrick Campbell, an Iraq veteran:
You Tube Overview of Military Dis-enfranchisement
And here's more about the conference from Pew:
Democracy at a Distance Conference
Senator John Warner is participating in this conference and as a veteran, former Navy Secretary, and leading Republican on the Armed Services Committee, he seems like a good focal point to voice your opinion that it's time to escalate this issue and get a crisis solution in place in time for the 2008 election.
Here's how to reach him:
John Warner's senate office
And by the way, I know there's a perception that the military vote is mostly Republican. First of all, that's irrelevant. Even if it was all Republican, our soldiers deserve the right to vote on the leaders of the democracy they are fighting for--I'm sure you would all agree.
Second, in fact there's good evidence that's no longer the case--or at least not the case this year, where soliders and their families have had to live day to day with the results of this tragic administration.
Please take 60 seconds and raise another voice to get this wrong righted. Change can happen even in this election cycle if we care enough to try.