Attytood

"By the way we have to fix that"

62 comments

"By the way we have to fix that"

POSTED: Wednesday, November 7, 2012, 5:31 PM

I guess President Obama's victory was the headline coming out of yesterday (barely beating out this story) but the most interesting comment was this off-hand remark by the current and future leader of the free world:

As he spoke in Chicago, he thanked everyone who cast a ballot "whether you voted for the first time, or waited in line for a very long time" -- then he quickly added, in an evident ad lib, "by the way we have to fix that."

By "that," the president was referring to long lines, confusion over early voting and other issues, thousands of voters who should have been on the books but weren't (full disclosure: including my 18-year-old son casting his first ballot, although he was able to vote eventually), and a slew of recent laws aimed at making it harder for people to vote instead of easier. The resulting chaos made a mockery of American exceptionalism, unless "exceptionalism" is now synonymous with "what you might find in a faraway banana republic."

Now, three things about the president's comment:

1) "By the way", you've been president for the last almost four years -- this is just occurring to you now? Amazing. It's almost like that Ragu commercial..."I wonder what other bad decisions I've made.."

2) If he's serious, Step 1 is to roll back all the voter suppression laws -- like Pennsylvania's outrageous voter ID measure -- that have passed in the last couple of years.

3) More importantly, I hope America can think outside the box for real solutions to encourage as close to universal voting as we can get. That means things like day-of-voting registration, early voting in every state (including, gasp, Pennsylvania), and moving the final Election Day from Tuesday to Saturday. I heard on the radio yesterday that Tuesday elections were to coordinate with farmers' trips to market. I don't think we'd be crushing too many succotash growers by moving the vote to the weekend.

Will Bunch @ 5:31 PM Permalink | 62 comments

62 comments

Previous Story: Sooo, about that post-election riot....

Next Story: Do the grump

Comments (62)

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 3:38 PM, 11/08/2012

hey wok for a guy who doesn't know who pat caddell is and doesn't know that dick morris got clinton reelected in 96 i would be careful about what you talk about

— rysagr

0 like this / 0 don't • Posted 9:01 PM, 11/09/2012

"By the way", you've been president for the last almost four years -- this is just occurring to you now? Amazing. It's almost like that Ragu commercial..."I wonder what other bad decisions I've made.."

Erm, America doesn't have a uniform federally-administered electoral system. It's not like he can just get out his pen and get rid of the lines. I reckon this is ridiculous, incidentally - how can the world's most powerful nation leave the voting system almost entirely to the local level, filled with so much incompetence and lack of uniformity?

— Peter07

| View All Comments | View All By Latest

View comments: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

'Corbett Hood' takes from the poor ... again
Nutter's awful, terrible, not good appearance on national TV
It's past time for fast food workers to get a living wage
From Istanbul to Rio to Philly, this democracy thing is broken
UPDATED: One man against the world
Bad to the bone
Al Gore wants you to meet this author tomorrow (Wed.)
This 1 factoid will demolish your faith in Chris Christie
"Do something now"
"Tell me what is being done in my name"

About this blog

Will Bunch, a senior writer at the Philadelphia Daily News, blogs about his obsessions, including national and local politics and world affairs, the media, pop music, the Philadelphia Phillies, soccer and other sports, not necessarily in that order.

PLEASE COMMENT WITH PASSION...

...but not with racial slurs, potentially libelous allegations, obscenities or other juvenile noise. Such comments will, at our discretion, be deleted in their entirety, and repeat offenders will be blocked from commenting. ALSO: Any commenter advocating killing any government official will be immediately banned.

Reach Will at bunchw@phillynews.com.

Will Bunch

Get our top stories