Don't you have to be a registered voter to submit an absentee ballot?

[Oilwellian]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought you had to be a registered voter before you could submit an absentee ballot. According to Keith Olberman, absentee ballots are the reason why there were an additional 93,000 votes than number of registered voters in the greater Cleveland area.

The punch, of course, is the explanation that the 29 more-votes-than-voters precincts in greater Cleveland appear to have been caused by the addition of Absentee Ballots. The total difference between registered voters and votes (93,000) might be explained by that process, but it does little for one’s confidence in the whole result from Ohio.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6210240/

[noiretextatique]

1. yes you do, at least in california

you have to registered to vote...period.

[OrwellwasRight]

2. Of course you have to be registered

is Olberman smoking crack? :smoke:

[bullimiami]

3. right you are. that is just stupid.

there should never be more votes than voters.

actually since the typical turnout nationwide was in the 65% range there are a lot more votes there than there should be.

[AllyCat]

7. Actually, it can happen...

...looking at the counties I'm working on for BBV, there are a number of precincts in WI where the number of reg voters is less than votes cast. Since we can register at the polls in WI, it is possible the new voters were not yet added. So my SO called the counties in question as a "confused citizen" just wanting to know if election-day registered voters were added to the total counts reported on their websites.

The Clerks in all three counties replied they do not add that number of people. Now it's possible they were "on" to him as he was put on hold for a long time awaiting an answer and they may have heard about this campaign. But they might also be reporting the truth and were busy.

What other states have same-day registration?

[noiretextatique]

11. if you can register at the polls...

wouldn't it make sense to add those people to the total number of registered voters? :shrug:
i'm an accountant (and not the enron type)...perhaps these election clerks should be replaced with some folks like me.
basic accounting...count everything, and make sure you can account for everything. an election official in florida said she "threw out a ton" of spoiled provisional ballots...without even bothering to count them. which is against florida law, btw.
it is ming-boggling that we have such a piss-poor, rag-tag voting system but of course that benefits some folks.

[OrwellwasRight]

14. I think WI is it or at most one of a very few

Same day registration would encourage too many people to vote and we can't have that.

And by all means, let's stop any effort to have automatic voter registration for all citizens. That would be simply outrageous! Can you imagine the number of working class, Democratic types would vote? It's got to be stopped. :hippie:

[AllyCat]

4. Wondering the same thing Oaf!

Unless Ohio allows you to send in your voter registration application with your absentee ballot, this argument is just not holding water.

[Oilwellian]

6. Even then...

wouldn't the registration application be counted as part of the registered voter numbers? Particularly if they accepted and counted their absentee ballot. I hope more DU'ers write Keith and ask the same question. :D

[OrwellwasRight]

13. But how would you get an absentee ballot if you weren't registered? nt

[Oilwellian]

5. I just emailed Olberman the same question

I knew the excuse didn't sound right and thought it was odd that Olberman didn't question it as well.

[WestHoustonDem]

8. The "explanation" was

that all of the absentee ballots for one county were credited to one precinct instead of being spread out. Still sets off my BS alarm

[AllyCat]

9. Oh yeah, that's right...

...but don't these people have to be checked off the voter rolls even with absentee ballots? Otherwise, how do they stop people from voting twice?

While pollwatching, any lulls in turnout would involve taking the envelopes of absentee votes and checking them off the same books used to check off those there to vote in person.

Talk about inaccuracy of just assigning them to one precinct. This sounds fishy to me still.

[Oilwellian]

12. Interesting

It still doesn't explain why all of the precincts combined didn't have enough registered voters to equal the number of votes in the county. There should be 93,000 more registered voters than what the county is officially reporting.

Am I missing something here? :shrug:

[mytribe]

10. actually...

what I gathered from KO's segment was that the reason OH has the inflated numbers is indeed absentee ballots, but the reasons the numbers are off is because on some of those ballots are votes for state reps whose districts cross county lines or something like that.
so the way they distribute the absentee ballots is off, but according to them...right and no reason for alarm?