In Ohio and elsewhere, battles over state voting laws head to court

[alp227]

COLUMBUS, OHIO — There were 13 lawyers filling the courtroom of U.S. District Judge Algenon L. Marbley last week, arguing over a sliver of a slice of the millions of votes that Ohio will count in the 2012 presidential election.

Or, more precisely, those that Ohio plans to not count.

The state’s lawyer, Aaron Epstein, told Marbley that “by any metric,” the number of potentially discarded ballots at issue was too small to warrant intervention by the federal courts.

Marbley was skeptical.

“While we might not look for perfection,” he told Epstein, “if your vote is the vote not being counted, it’s a bad election, agreed?”

Such is the state of play in this Midwestern swing state with a reputation for close elections, messy ballot procedures and litigious politicos. “Will Ohio count your vote?” blared a recent headline in the Cincinnati Enquirer.

full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/in-ohio-and-elsewhere-battles-over-state-voting-laws-head-to-court/2012/08/05/a56b8ad6-dc19-11e1-8e43-4a3c4375504a_singlePage.html

[elleng]

1. Sounds like a good judge.

[malthaussen]

2. These stupid laws need to be shot down wherever they rear their heads.

Overall, I am impressed by how often the courts have overturned all or part of the laws the GOP have been passing in many areas. But it is a laborious process, and then there are always the appeals...

If every legislature turned blue tomorrow, we'd still be years in repairing the damage the GOP has done wherever it has the power.

-- Mal