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Election Day

Today’s Election Day, the day we’ve all been looking forward to. I think these mid-term elections are pretty interesting, probably because I’ve never really been aware of their existence before. The balance of power in the Senate and the House of Representatives could shift tonight, and 36 states are electing governors. It’s almost important as a presidential election. Well, maybe not, but still.

Election Day is very important, I think. We even had today off from school, presumably so that the teachers would have time to vote (and probably because the school might have been used as a polling place). In fact, while I was pondering that yesterday, I came to the realization that Election Day should be a national holiday celebrating democracy (and giving everyone a chance to go and vote without making excuses like “It was too crowded at five o’clock”). Apparently, though, I’ve been beaten to the punch. It turns out that Election Day is a holiday in some states, and a bill making it a national holiday has been introduced in the House.

Anyway, on Saturday I had the opportunity to see former President Bill Clinton at a political rally at my school. He was campaigning for Ron Klein, who’s running for a House seat. I was taking pictures and video for the school paper, the Pompano Pulse, while my friend Luke recorded the audio of the entire rally. Luke has posted his audio and my video at the Internet Archive, where it lives safely in the public domain. But since he hasn’t posted the photos yet (no hurry, Luke), I thought I’d post some of them here. Enjoy!

	Former President Bill Clinton greets Student Government Association President Sherrelle Thorpe as State Senator Ron Klein looks on. (Sherrelle later denied allegations that Clinton kissed her.)
	Klein makes a brief speech, proudly introducing Bill Clinton.
	The school band, some other students who were somehow allowed onstage, and Bill Clinton look on as Klein addresses the crowd.
	Klein beams as Clinton wags his finger.
	Clinton’s all, “You know I’m right,” and Klein’s like, “Come on and applaud, everyone, the man’s right.”
	Check out Lucas Boyd’s green-and-white-striped shirt. It’s crazy. I was looking for news coverage of the rally the following day, and I saw a shot of Clinton and Klein, but it was very tight, so I couldn’t tell if they were at my school or somewhere else. Then I saw Lucas Boyd’s shirt in the background, and I knew.
	Clinton wags his finger yet again in this action shot (actually, it’s probably just me being unsteady with the camera). Now I’m trying to remember if there was a reason I wanted to provide captions for all of these photos.
	After making his speech, Clinton salutes the crowd, and the band starts playing. I can’t believe I was close enough to get a shot like this. I love it.
	Clinton meets with senior citizens from local retirement community John Knox Village as the rally ends.
	The Pompano Pulse‘s very own M. Luke Myers (right) asks Ron Klein the hard-hitting questions about the Darfur conflict. “The United States Government should be much more involved than they are right now,” said Klein. “The United States should absolutely be providing much stronger leadership.”

Here’s a simple demonstration (YouTube) of how electronic voting machines can be hacked ‘n’ cracked without leaving any evidence of tampering. Whoops!

McSweeney’s reports on an election held at the most local level: The Race for Junior-Class Vice President Goes Negative.

Listen to an NPR interview with two voice-over guys who do negative political ads. Don’t miss them reading nursery rhymes.

Three years ago: “It appears that a bunch of people came here within the same few hours and poked around quite a bit.”