Ya Voté!

Did you vote this morning? If you haven’t, do it, please. Think your vote doesn’t make a difference? Well, it probably doesn’t, but at least you get a cool sticker on your way out. Seriously, though, I’m not so sure my vote did count this morning. As I handed my ballot to the administrator at the local Mr. Rooter, where I do all my important governmental tasks, the machine which reads and processes the ballots had a minor malfunction.

“Is this how you meant to vote?” the man appointed with the extremely grueling job of sliding paper into a machine asked me.

“Come again?” I mean, is it really appropriate to ask that question at a poling booth? I don’t think so.

After standing there for 5 minutes, watching three people try to override the error, pushing buttons on the angry machine, I’d had it.

“Well, so much for being a good citizen!” I turned to my husband and said.

I thought, This is great. If anyone asks me if I voted, I’ll just say:

I think so.
Uh, maybe.
The jury’s still out on that one.
It’s anyone’s guess.
Could be.
You tell me.

Finally, my ballot received the validating “BEEP” as it slid through, and I was graciously dismissed.

Now, I’ve never been one to push my political beliefs, but if I could urge anyone to vote a certain way, it would be to vote yes on Prop 83. There have been a lot of arguments against the Proposition, mainly stating that it would cost taxpayers 500 million dollars, but would not ensure children’s safety against sex offenders. However, this is how I look at it: Any initiative that aims to protect children and anyone else against sex offenders by increasing jail time, restricting them from living in areas where children play and requiring them to wear tracking devices, is an initiative I support. Maybe it won’t do a damn thing, but maybe it will, and if by passing this Proposition we save ONE child, that one child is worth the 500 million dollars.

Proposition 83, also known as Jessica’s Law, was created after 9-year-old Jessica Lunsford was kidnapped, raped and buried alive by a convicted sex offender who had failed to register his address. Prop 83 would keep track of an offender’s every move so that the whereabouts of criminals like John Couey wouldn’t slip under the radar.

So, that’s it. There’s my beef. Do with it what you may. In any case, find out how many registered sex offenders are in your area by visiting this link. The bastards’ names, photos, addresses and nature of crimes are available free of charge to anyone and everyone interested. Do it for your kids.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 7th, 2006 at 12:13 pm and is filed under Parenting/Family. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.