"So Wait...How Do You Say Your Name?"
"Torres"
"Spell that for me."
"T-O-R-R-E-S"
My voting experience at my local polling place can be summed up like this: It took longer for them to find my name than for me to actually vote.
So, ZuZu, Michelle, and I headed a local elementary school that, for today, served as Ground Zero for the Bush-Kerry Sweepstakes. I had woken up earlier this morning to go and vote, only to discover a line out the door of the school. However, when the three of us headed to the school around noon, there was hardly a soul there. Save for these really old people sitting at two tables, arranged in the middle of a basketball gym, with the registered voter rolls for the district. I mean, these people were so old, it's a miracle that they didn't drop dead from an eyeblink. It was a miracle that they were there, in the flesh, waiting to verify the information of whoever dropped on in to vote. Zulay went ahead of me, and the woman who was helping us struggled with her name. A younger gentleman walked over to help her out, but apparently, ZuZu's name was too exotic for them, so a third person came over to help out. I was thinking to myself, "Gee, how many election board members does it take to find a minority's name?"
"How do you say your last name?"
"O-lee-vo"
Three grown ass people, struggling to find a name inside of a book that is listed in alphabetical order. I felt like taking the book and doing the shit myself. It didn't help I saw both my name and her name flipped over in search of the elusive, "Olivo." I never felt like such a townie until that particular moment. When I went with my momma to vote in NYC, we had these snooty ass people who would rush us on into one of 35 election booths. In Cuse, we were struggling to get into one of 2 booths. And the place was so empty. After seeing the crowd earlier that morning, I never would've thought that I would walk into an empty grade school basketball gym and greet Old Woman Time herself.
Eventually, they found our names and we proceded to our booths. There was no doubt in my mind who I was voting for. I walked in there, and flipped switches all the way across the Democratic ticket. I got pissed off when I noticed that the race for House Representative was down to just one candidate, Republican Jim Walsh. Fucking Gerimandering. In protest, I voted for the Socialist Candidate. After flipping the switches, I triple and quadruple-checked my vote, making sure I didn't pull some stupid shit and vote for Bush or something. Satisfied, I pulled the lever which reset the booth and registered my vote. I had just finished voting in my first Presidential Election. :-)
Syracuse University, overall, is a pro-Kerry campus. Bush supporters are certainly present, but definitely, it's no question as to who the people on this campus respect as their future President. Personally, I don't see any reason why an educated person should vote for Bush, conservative or not. I've been waiting for someone to present a good argument to vote Dubya, but I have yet to find someone who didn't provide false information that was promoted by the Bush campaign. I've been dying to find someone to argue with on that point, but alas, no one steps up. I guess everyone is afraid to have a good old fashioned debate nowadays. I don't understand why. People are too scared to step on each other's toes when it comes to this thing. If we discussed these kinds of things amongst ourselves, I think we'd be able to educate one another and get a sense for where a lot of our peers stand on matters. We have a habit of generalizing individuals based on who they're voting for. If we had actually discussed this issue, though, we'd understand where people are coming from, and be able to debate the pros and cons of each candidate on each particular issue.
I'm gonna go run and chill with some peeps...more to come...
"Spell that for me."
"T-O-R-R-E-S"
My voting experience at my local polling place can be summed up like this: It took longer for them to find my name than for me to actually vote.
So, ZuZu, Michelle, and I headed a local elementary school that, for today, served as Ground Zero for the Bush-Kerry Sweepstakes. I had woken up earlier this morning to go and vote, only to discover a line out the door of the school. However, when the three of us headed to the school around noon, there was hardly a soul there. Save for these really old people sitting at two tables, arranged in the middle of a basketball gym, with the registered voter rolls for the district. I mean, these people were so old, it's a miracle that they didn't drop dead from an eyeblink. It was a miracle that they were there, in the flesh, waiting to verify the information of whoever dropped on in to vote. Zulay went ahead of me, and the woman who was helping us struggled with her name. A younger gentleman walked over to help her out, but apparently, ZuZu's name was too exotic for them, so a third person came over to help out. I was thinking to myself, "Gee, how many election board members does it take to find a minority's name?"
"How do you say your last name?"
"O-lee-vo"
Three grown ass people, struggling to find a name inside of a book that is listed in alphabetical order. I felt like taking the book and doing the shit myself. It didn't help I saw both my name and her name flipped over in search of the elusive, "Olivo." I never felt like such a townie until that particular moment. When I went with my momma to vote in NYC, we had these snooty ass people who would rush us on into one of 35 election booths. In Cuse, we were struggling to get into one of 2 booths. And the place was so empty. After seeing the crowd earlier that morning, I never would've thought that I would walk into an empty grade school basketball gym and greet Old Woman Time herself.
Eventually, they found our names and we proceded to our booths. There was no doubt in my mind who I was voting for. I walked in there, and flipped switches all the way across the Democratic ticket. I got pissed off when I noticed that the race for House Representative was down to just one candidate, Republican Jim Walsh. Fucking Gerimandering. In protest, I voted for the Socialist Candidate. After flipping the switches, I triple and quadruple-checked my vote, making sure I didn't pull some stupid shit and vote for Bush or something. Satisfied, I pulled the lever which reset the booth and registered my vote. I had just finished voting in my first Presidential Election. :-)
Syracuse University, overall, is a pro-Kerry campus. Bush supporters are certainly present, but definitely, it's no question as to who the people on this campus respect as their future President. Personally, I don't see any reason why an educated person should vote for Bush, conservative or not. I've been waiting for someone to present a good argument to vote Dubya, but I have yet to find someone who didn't provide false information that was promoted by the Bush campaign. I've been dying to find someone to argue with on that point, but alas, no one steps up. I guess everyone is afraid to have a good old fashioned debate nowadays. I don't understand why. People are too scared to step on each other's toes when it comes to this thing. If we discussed these kinds of things amongst ourselves, I think we'd be able to educate one another and get a sense for where a lot of our peers stand on matters. We have a habit of generalizing individuals based on who they're voting for. If we had actually discussed this issue, though, we'd understand where people are coming from, and be able to debate the pros and cons of each candidate on each particular issue.
I'm gonna go run and chill with some peeps...more to come...
posted by djkibblesnbits at 8:47 PM
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