Maybe The UN Had A Point

A few weeks backs I posted something about 2012 election shenanigans. In that post I also ridiculed the notion that we needed United Nations observers to oversee our electoral process.

I stand corrected.

After widespread allegations of voting fraud -- or at least, voting 'irregularities' -- perhaps it's time to consider wholesale revision of the way Americans elect their (so-called) leaders.

Imagine a country on election day where you know the results the instant the polls close. The votes are counted electronically, every district and state has the same rules and the same organized voting procedure. It is managed by a non-partisan independent body. Sounds like the greatest democracy in the world, right? Try Mexico. Or France, Germany, Brazil. Certainly not the United States of America.

America has one of the world’s most antique, politicized and dysfunctional procedures for its elections. A crazy quilt patchwork of state and local laws with partisan officials making key decisions and ancient technology that often breaks down. There are no national standards. American voters in more than a dozen states, for example, don’t need ID. But even India, with a GDP just 12 percent that of ours, is implementing a national biometric database for 1.2 billion voters. The nascent democracy in Iraq famously dipped voters’ fingers in purple to ensure they didn't vote again. Why are we so behind the curve?

My God. Places like France, Mexico, and even Brazil do a better job than we do. Why are we so behind the curve? Good question. Here's one explanation.

...here's what doesn't happen in other democracies:

Politicians of one party do not set voting schedules to favor their side and harm the other. Politicians do not move around voting places to gain advantages for themselves or to disadvantage their opponents. In fact, in almost no other country do politicians have any say in the administration of elections at all.

Get the politicians out of the process. Makes sense to me.

Last week, international election observers were banned from nine states. Some of these men and women were threatened with arrest. Maybe we should start learning from election officials from abroad, not try to throw them into jail.

At this point I'm eating my earlier words. But at least I'm washing them down with some cold Shiners...