After work, I went over to Stuarts Draft Rescue Squad, and voted. And as a result, I got this:
As you probably expected, I voted for John Kerry for President.
As you probably did not expect, however, I voted for a Republican for Congress. I voted for Bob Goodlatte, who was running unopposed for the House of Representatives. This was the off-year for the Senate, and as such no vote for or against George Allen or John Warner.
Otherwise, there were two propositions for amendments to the state constitution on the ballot, ones which were what I consider to be why-hasn’t-this-always-been-the-case amendments. One was an amendment basically codifying what should be the case anyway – after redistricting is completed following the Census, those people elected from the old districts will continue to represent their old districts until the end of their term. And if a vacancy opens up after redistricting happens but before the end of the existing term, the replacement will be selected out of the old district.
The other amendment sets the order of succession for the Governor’s office in the event that the Governor is unable to fulfill his duties for whatever reason.
I consider both of these amendments to be no-brainers, and everyone expects them to pass. You know what they say… an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.
I was fortunate to have breezed right in and back out. Based on what I heard at work, Waynesboro polling places were lined up out the door, out to the road, even, in a few places. Me, I think I was in and out in less than five minutes. Meanwhile, a lot of customers and coworkers asked me if I had voted yet and if I was going to, and the answer was “not yet” and “yes”. One older lady tried to convince me to vote for George W. Bush. Not swayed.
And Ralph Nader, as we knew back in August or so, was not on the ballot in Virginia.
So I’ve done my part. Now the election officials across the country must do theirs and find a President somewhere in all those votes. It’s like I said in 2000 during the whole Florida recount process: “We have a President in there somewhere. We just have to find it.” I just wonder if we’ll find out tonight who the President is, or if we’ll have to wait for months again for a recount. It will probably also determine the topic of my next trip to Washington DC on Thursday. I figure if we know who the President is, it will be a “leisure” trip, with my doing some railfanning and some photography in Northwest DC and Arlington. If we don’t know who the President is, and it lasts through November 4 when I go to Washington, it will probably be a “political” trip, where I cover political activism, like I did for the A12 ANSWER march, the J5 ANSWER march, the World Bank vigil, the procession, and the Million Worker March.
I’m rooting for a leisure trip.
Meanwhile, you can tell that the news networks are kind of killing time until the polls close. CNN is talking about just about anything they can think of to fill in the time. I think that Lou Dobbs could probably go on right now and talk about his mother, and it would have the same effect. We’re all just killing time until 7 PM when the polls close in seven states (Virginia included).
So anyway, I voted.