Ohio Changes Voting Regulations

In principle, election results should not depend on whether the state officials are Democrats or Republicans. But as Yogi Berra so aptly put it: "In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is." In 2004, George Bush won Ohio by 118,000 vote in an election supervised by Republican Secretary of State Ken Blackwell and Republican Gov. Bob Taft. There were many (unproven) allegations of people being denied the right to vote, insufficient voting machines in Democratic areas, fraudulent voting machine software, and other issues. This year is likely to be different because Gov. Ted Strickland and Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner are both Democrats and both are determined to make sure every eligible Ohio voter can cast a ballot and that the election is completely transparent. A new Ohio law allows any eligible voter to vote by mail with no questions asked. In addition, there is a window of a week in early October when a voter can register and then vote immediately. These changes make it much easier to vote. The Obama campaign has a massive effort going to try to get Ohio's 470,000 college students to vote, knowing that students favor Obama by more than 2 to 1. Ohio State University alone has 52,000 students, nearly all of whom can vote if they are Ohio residents over 18. The Republicans are likely to challenge the new law in court, claiming it enables voter fraud.