The Best Way To Vote

I have an early memory of going with my mother to vote at a polling place.  I don't remember exactly what year it was, but it would have been either 1980 (when I would have been four), 1984, or somewhere in between.  I do remember going behind a big curtain and watching her pull big metal levers and thinking that looked like fun.

The first time I ever voted was in 1996.  I registered in Kittitas County and signed up for an absentee ballot, which my mother forwarded to me in Pullman.  I voted for Clinton and a conservative friend of mine scolded me for "voting for a criminal" (he is now one of my more liberal friends).

Since then I have voted in most elections, but never at my designated polling place.  I know a number of people who insist on going to the polls because it holds some sort of romance for them.  However it still seems silly to me, perhaps because I'm all for modern conveniences.

I filled out my ballot last night, and as I did so I looked up what I could about the various candidates and initiatives on the Internet.  Just about every candidate has a website where they list their views on the issues as well as their endorsements.  The Seattle PI and other local papers have dedicated pages where they list their endorsements and links to write-ups where they explain their positions.

So after spending about an hour with my ballot and my Mac, my ballot is almost completely filled in and I am pretty confident in my choices.  To have a similar feeling going to the polls, I'd have to do all of my research ahead of time and take a list with me, which I'm not sure I would do.

I'm happy to see that absentee balloting is on the rise throughout the country.  I believe that this leads to more informed votes instead of just voting a party line or for those names that sound the most familiar, or in the case of initiatives just for whatever sounds best based on the two sentence description.

So take my advice, stay home on election day... just don't forget to vote.