MY FATHER, with his endless amounts of wisdom, says that the 2000 election proves one thing - people in Florida are stupid. I do not think I would go so far as that ridiculous statement, but I do believe that it makes two important points.
First, people are aggravated by the fact that two weeks after the election, we still don't have a president, and are displacing this anger on the Florida population. Second, the problem is not the IQ of Florida's residents, but rather the ballot used by some of the state's counties.
This second assertion raises an interesting question: If ballots in Florida were confusing enough to confuse its residents, what is to say there weren't any counting errors in other states? Our whole election process could be considered faulty. As to avoid further ballot confusion, one standard ballot should be developed for all of the United States, and this ballot should be computerized, so as to ensure that there are no counting errors.
As citizens of the United States, we all share common goals - to, as a whole, elect one president, to turn the country into a prosperous and orderly nation. Despite the fact that different states may lean towards supporting a certain party, every single state is attempting to elect the person who can best lead the nation. There is no point in each state having its own unique ballot when every one of them is trying to accomplish the same thing.
Not only does every state have its own ballot, but even different districts and counties within the states differ in the way they elect their politicians. The need for individuality, to show the district's or state's independence from other areas is understandable, but this individuality should stem from the candidate it chose to support, not the physical way in which its inhabitants voted.
While some ballots are easier to understand than others, all of them should be incredibly simple and easy to understand, and the best way to ensure this is to have one standard ballot for every district within the United States. Then, there would be no way to argue that the ballot of any one area is any easier to understand than any other state's ballot.
We live in an age of technology. Every year, companies compete to see who can make the fastest computer, which television has the clearest picture, and whose DVD is of the highest quality. Why then do some of the methods used to fill out ballots seem appropriate for the turn of the century? In addition to the not well-received "hole-punching" method used by Florida, some states use the "lever-pulling" method, Virginia being among them.
This method basically includes entering the voting booth and pulling down the lever for the candidate one supports in each political area (president, representatives, etc.). While this voting method is sufficient, it leaves plenty of room for improvement. What if, say, a voter, in his or her confusion, accidentally pulls down the wrong lever? Hey, it is far-fetched, but the residents of Florida couldn't figure out where to punch a hole. There is no way for a voter to take back his actions if he makes a mistake.
Because of this inability to take back incorrect choices, the United States ballot should be computerized. The computer could ask the voter which candidate he prefers and list all possible choices. The voter would then make his selection, the computer would display the voter's choice, and ask, Regis Philbin-style, "is that your final answer?" This way, there is no way that the voter could not know which candidate he selected.
The computer's memory bank would hold all of the ballots, and count the number of votes each candidate receives. There would be no room for counting errors, because computers are extremely reliable tools for tallying ballots.
The last couple of weeks, newspapers have covered every angle of the debate over the legitimacy of hand-counted ballots. What nobody realizes is that the question being asked should not be "How fair is it to use hand-counted ballots in the election process?" but rather "Why are we being forced to bother with recounting ballots by hand anyway?"
In this computerized age, we should no longer have to worry about human error, by voters or ballot counters. The key to having a smooth, reliable election process lies in the nation's ability to create one voting method, and one method only. Then maybe we can have a president delegated to his office before we sit down to lengthy discussions over Thanksgiving dinner with our families.
(Michelle Drucker's column appears Tuesdays in The Cavalier Daily.)
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