Tweet the Vote!
You've probably heard a lot about possible voter fraud on Tuesday, as there as been a lot of potential for voter fraud. But few (including the Rs, who are MORE CONCERNED THAN EVER) seem inclined to tell voters how, exactly, to do something about it. It is, unfortunately, a little more complicated than yelling and pointing. Stepping up to the plate this year to make reporting concerns as easy and as public as possible are two organizations: the grass roots group Twitter Vote Report and the more corporate-y (they have consultants!) Election Protection, who is also partnered with a ton of other organizations, including NBC. Both groups are encouraging voters to use Twitter as a kind of panopticon of the polling process. I assume you're following all the right people already, but interested parties should also follow 866ourvote to for real-time poll watching. After the jump, a memo from the group, noting the specific conventions for how to report your own observations and how it works.
- People can follow our Twitter account and tweet us with any questions or voting problem reports.
- On Election Day, if a voter experiences any problems (i.e. long lines, machine malfunction, suspicious behavior at the polls, voter intimidation, etc.), they can report the problem to @866ourvote.
- The report should be hashtagged #EP + state abbreviation (i.e. If the voter is voting in VA, the tweet should be tagged “#EPva”). The tweet should include at a minimum, a description of the problem and a hashtag of the voter's zip code (i.e. #22205). Precinct numbers would be helpful but are not required.The tweet-report will be monitored by Election Protection's state captain, who will confirm the reports and work to resolve any issues.
- We are also partnering with Twitter Vote Report, which will be aggregating all tweets tagged with #votereport.
- The site will also instruct anyone who is experiencing voting problems to add the #EP + state abbreviation tag
- The zip codes from the #votereport tweets will be tracked on Twitter Vote Report map, giving a quick visual of the voting report hot-spots across the nation.
- Election Protection will be re-tweeting reports and giving updates throughout the day from the @866ourvote account
- The #votereport tag is basically for anyone who voted to tell about their voting experience. The #EP(statecode) tag is to report any problems at the polls. They will monitoring the tweets as they are come in on Election Day and will also be alerting us to any problem “hotspots” they see developing.
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1
Why does the MSM talk about vote "fraud" but not vote suppression?
What's the ratio of fraudulent votes versus votes that have been purged, discarded, etc.? Can you give me any statistics on how many nonexistent people have had their votes count? I can tell you how many citizens have been disenfranchised in one form or the other.
You can't report fraud, but you can report efforts to keep people from voting.
If people vote, Democrats win.
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2
"You've probably not heard a lot about likely voter suppression on Tuesday, even though there has been a lot of history of voter suppression"
Fixed.
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3
I'll be manning the phones on Tuesday in California. So if anyone has any trouble in LA, be sure to call me (well, maybe you'll get me - if you're lucky).
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4
Thanks for the heads up, AMC.
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5
In DC, fraud is when people try to vote.
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6
In DC, there's too much money in politics if individuals start to contribute to campaigns.
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7
Early voting exit polls show an advantage for McCain in Florida and Nevada...even though Democrats outweight Republicans in early voting by 2 to 1 in both states.
http://www.poligazette.com/2008/10/30/early-voting-mccain-the-advantage/
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[...] accounts that voting activists groups have set up as well as Time’s own Twitter account: Swampland - TIME.com » Blog Archive Tweet the Vote! «: “Stepping up to the plate this year to make reporting concerns as easy and as public as [...]
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Don't forget that people can also add incidents and information about voter suppression to the Voter Suppression wiki: http://www.votersuppression.net
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10
Sorry, Libby:
"Seventeen percent now say they've already voted, favoring Obama over John McCain by 59-40 percent. "
http://blogs.abcnews.com/thenumbers/2008/10/new-direction-v.html
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11
I think AMC is mostly guilty of confusing the terminology. Twitter Vote Report and Election Protection do deal with voter suppression.
Although, if AMC has any evidence that "there as been a lot of potential for voter fraud", as opposed to voter suppression, I would love to hear it.
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FWIW, I'm also jayackroyd on twitter
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13
It's more than confusing terminology. It's an example of another unquestioning acceptance of a rightwing frame in direct opposition to reality.
The GOP likes "fraud", because it says too many minorities are voting, and it must be illegal. Dems like "suppression" because if people vote, they win. So, the MSM ought to pick the one that best represents reality. Fraud is stuffing vote boxes. Suppression is purging voter rolls.
How many non-existent voters are there?
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14
Tweeting the vote is great. It is also great to participate in a direct petition to both God and man to stop the political hackery, and pledge to reward only honest debate points.
C'mon.. it takes just 3 minutes to join the parade.
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15
AMC, you are a disgusting human being.
What a sick quote: "Little baby Trig must be so glad he wasn't aborted for this, his first Halloween, because his parents dressed him up like a political party symbol to be carried around at snarling political events. Aww. Isn't life just grand?"
http://wonkette.com/404013/hey-kids-check-out-lil-trigger-in-his-elephant-costume
The reference to abortion here is repulsive, you sick twisted harpie.
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16
Great article-- the variety of Twitter-based applications available in this election is just incredible.
This morning as the polls opened on the East Coast, my colleagues and I at New Media Strategies got to roll out a new site from Tropicana called Fresh Squeezed Election Tweets-- it pulls Twitter messages in real time, crunches the numbers and displays pretty graphics to demonstrate connections from Tweet to Tweet.
It's here: http://anorangeamerica.com/
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