Voted Today - First Time Ever Using LOW Tech....Old Folks, Have Your Laugh

[mermaid]

Today, for the first time ever, I felt like a fool, voting.

I actually had to ask for help voting, because the low-tech voting machine was something I had never encountered before, and was as flusteringly complicated to me...as the touch-screens are to elderly folks.

For the first time in my life, I voted with one of the old, ancient, lever-pull voting machines! Previously, I had voted using a paper ballot and pencil twice...and touch-screens all the other times. Never saw one of these lovely dinosaurs...the lever-pull voting machines!!

I imagine there is no way to actually manipulate the vote on one of these machines, which makes it good...but I felt like a hell of a fool!

For starters, trying to close the curtain, I reached up my hand to pull the curtain closed...and it won't go!! So I had to ask how you close the curtain. Well, mercy me, there's a lever in the machine you pull that closes the curtain!!

So, then, here I am, puzzling out how to vote using this old technology, and I finally figured out how to manipulate the levers, to reflect my votes. Now I have all my votes in, and here, I'm looking for a lever or something to submit my vote, and get the levers to all go back in place before opening the curtain, so that no one can see what I voted.

No lever, no button, no NOTHING saying "Submit My Vote." So I had to ask, through the curtain..."how do I make this machine count my vote now, so I can then open the curtain?"

By now, everyone else there to vote is laughing like hell. The volunteer told me that I just pull the lever to open the curtain...that action, in and of itself, resets all the levers, and tabulates my votes.

Well, holy Toledo, Batman!! I never imagined this!! Here I am, looking for a lever or something saying "Submit My Vote" trying to do that before opening the curtain, unaware that the act of opening the curtain is what causes the vote to tabulate!

Did I mention this was my first time voting in a very rural area? I have always voted in more cosmopolitan places, like New Jersey (paper and pencil ballot in 1992) Northampton County PA (paper and pencil ballot in 1996) Louisville, KY (paper and pencil ballot in 1998) Austin, Texas (touch-creen voting in 2000 and 2004.) I voted absentee by paper and pencil ballot in 2002, as I was to be in Bangkok, Thailand, on Election Day.

Anyway, I managed to vote, and I hope I did it right. Damn, these ancient dinosaur voting machines were as confusing and befuddling to ME...used to only high-tech....as the high-tech voting machines are for the elder folk.

So, today, the elder folk...the rural farmers and whatnot around here in Monroe County, Pennsylvania...they got their revenge on the young'uns today...they got to laugh while I was confused about how to work the damn machine!!

Never before have I encountered such a low-tech voting method...I swear on my mother's name I never had...and this was as foriegn to me, as a way to vote...as chop suey would be foreign to a resident of, say Mexico City!

Freaking LOL!!

Okay, old folks (older than 34) here's your laugh for the day, have your fun at my expense...I had no idea how to use the machine trhat is probably very familiar to y'all. LOW technology befuddled ME. Have your laugh!

[Book Lover]

1. That's what we used in NYC

At least it was 10 or so years ago, fwiw.

[electropop]

3. Used those when I was a youngster - they had trained us in school though

so it was fairly easy except for figuring out which levers go with which candidates.

These machines have been cheated with (years ago), but it involved filing down pieces inside, and they got caught. Unlike secret source code, the mechanism can be inspected. Unlike paperless DRE, there is a roll of paper inside (at least some) of these behemoths. Some only have mechanical counters.

[Book Lover]

19. Same here

Our HS basically gathered all us seniors for assembly and handed out voter reg forms. Then someone gave us a demo, and we all went up on stage (assembly was in the auditorium) and we all practiced.

[bkcc]

7. They were still using them as of last year.

I have since moved, but when I voted last November in NYC, those were the machines I voted on.

[BurtWorm]

17. They were still using those in September for the primaries.

And I expect I'll be voting on one of them again today.

[Book Lover]

18. And I see from a local paper

from out on LI that they're using them too. I was reading this article about this gentleman's fight to get instructions on how voters could vote for him as a write-in candidate, and there's a picture of the machine, big as all get-out just like I remember.

[MamaBear]

22. We still use them in NYC.

This year they had even put a fresh coat of paint on the big lever. I've voted on these machines both in upstate and here since 1972.

I was glad to see old faithful again.

[NYFlip]

25. They still do. i just voted on them.

That's all I ever voted on. I live in NYC.

[Book Lover]

26. Hey, welcome to DU!

:hi: I was talking to my father (he's out on the Island) this evening and he said that this year they repainted the machine they use in his small town. I think they have, like, one :-)

[VaYallaDawg]

2. Don't feel lonesome, mermaid!!

I'm 65, and when I moved to a new district in 2001 I had to get someone to show me how to use one of those punch-card things - I had never used one. (Those are the ones that created the hanging chads in Fla.). I had always used the old lever type before that. But today I used a touch screen for the first time.

[CatBoreal]

4. I still don't understand the need for voting machines...

...In Canada we use a pencil and paper. The candidates are printed on the ballot with a circle beside their name, you check or put an X in the circle, hand the ballot to the poll worker who folds it in three, then you put it in the box. No fuss. No muss.

What's the rational behind the punch machines???

[electropop]

5. Supposedly cheaper/faster to count.

I guess that's why we get our results in days, weeks, or months, and Canada gets theirs in hours. :sarcasm:

[htuttle]

10. And you know why that even matters?

...Television. The only real reason anyone needs to know who won "right away" is for exciting television coverage.

You know, the same thing happened to major league sports -- they changed the games to suit television coverage. It's a damn shame we're doing the same thing with our elections...

[melody]

8. US has 9x the population of Canada

That's the difference. One tallies faster, the other doesn't.

Well, that was the difference under the democratic system. Why it is now that Der Bushler is in office, is any body's guess.

[CatBoreal]

11. Well, why not just hire more poll workers and have more polling stations?

Oh, wait a minute......:crazy:

[electropop]

12. That's just too obvious.

We don't work that way.

[melody]

15. And spend money on government? Nope, not done that way here.

[LSdemocrat]

9. We vote for like 20+ different races/ballot issues at the same time

[VaYallaDawg]

14. If we didn't have the machines how on earth would the elections get rigged

[m_welby]

6. ha ha !!

They never seemed confusing to me, but I was using them right up until the state replaced all ours in '98.

I loved those old machines, we have paper ballots with magic marker/scan machines now. It just isn't the same.

Doesn't it just feel more like you voted when you pull that old lever? That whoosh as the curtain opens, the clakity-clack as the levers record the vote.

[JanusAscending]

16. I'M WITH YOU!

Just voted on one in Ct., maybe for the last time! I have good news for everyone though........in a small town of 7500 people (the # of people who are still missing in LA)......God , just think of it! The equivalency of our ENTIRE town !!! anyhow, getting back to the news; I believe about half of the population are reg. voters,we have ONE polling place (town hall) and when I arrived at the polls, they were already out of "I Voted" stickers!! This was around 2 P.M. The exciting part is, this town has been controlled by Repubs for the past 20 yrs.!!! Most all of the Ind. voters that we spoke to at our phone bank night, said they were voting the Dem. ticket!! I'm going to headquarters at 8 PM when the polls close, and if we have a celebration party, I'll get back to you all when I get home!! I think the Repubs in town have "had it" with their party too !!!!:bounce: :toast:

[firefox]

13. At least you had a real voting machine

If it does not have a paper trail it is not a voting machine. And that is all I have to say about that.

[ComerPerro]

20. Good thing you posted this thread before 4 o'clock

Otherwise, the people who would truly appreciate this thread, the senior citizens over 34, would already be out eating dinner. Then, back in time to catch Lawrence Welk reruns, watch Wheel of Fortune, and fall asleep in front of TV Land or Nick at Night by 8pm

[Deb]

21. I'm glad you had a chance to use one

On the really old machines we did need to reach up for the handle to open/close the curtain. The yes/no levers made distinctly different click or clack sounds too.

Those workers will not forget you, I bet you made their day!

BTW, did they have lots of crock pots and baked goodies? My polling place always smells like Grandma's Sunday dinners. :9

[mermaid]

23. It Was Definitely A New Experience For Me, Voting On LOW TECH...

I'm sure the workers and everyone in my town won't forget this one! The workers were probably laughing their heads off telling the story to every Farmer John in our town after I left.

By tomorrow it'll be all over town, I'm sure, considering our town population is, at best, about 5000. I'm gonna see if I can look it up somewhere...hang on a sec...OK, I was close...Google had this to say about us...

Ross Township (2000 population - 5435)

Anyways...only one polling place, too...The Township Building. No crock pots or baked goods, either. That all happens at the post office, just up the street.

[JanusAscending]

24. Geesh!! I thought my town was small!

BUT HEY GUYS, WE WON !!!!!!!!:party: :toast: :bounce: :bounce: :party: :woohoo: :applause: First time in 20 yrs. Thomaston Ct. has a Democratic First Selectwoman and we won across the board! We beat a Repub State Rep. who has been in office in the Statehouse for 17 yrs!! What a wonderful day for Grassroots Democrats!!!! Alllllllll over America!! Big Smile!!

[The_Casual_Observer]

27. I pulled the levers for Kennedy in 1960

I was 5, my dad let me do it.