It's not secret that Weld County, in Northern Colorado, has always tended to be a Republican and conservative stronghold in the state.
Despite the fact this election turned out to be a referendum about Bush administration (and that from 104584 counted votes, 53.46% went to the McCain-Palin ticket) as a resident I've witness this is a conservative area.
That being said, since early morning hours on election day, started the reports and complaints about supposed glitches with the election process, lead by Weld County Clerk and Recorder Steve Moreno.
First, it was the complain about not having enough interpreters. (Yes, news people out there, they are interpreters because they were rendering a message written in English, orally, into Spanish. The translator is the one that will have to do the written translations of the ballot after the next Census)
Then there were questions about having the ballot in Spanish in phone calls from national newspapers!.
Then were the complaints about law enforcement officers at the polling place supposedly, asking for ID and, the governor getting involved! (Face the State has the email in .pdf)
Since when a current administration gets involved in election procedures that are being overseen by people specially designated to do so?..
The language issue, IMHO, is a non-issue.
I remember almost four years ago, when I met Moreno while working at the paper, he also explained me process to add ballots in different languages.
And he also said that since federal government relies in the Census data to make those decisions, until the next Census his office wouldn't be able to know if they are required to print ballots in languages other than English.
And I say languages other than English because even though the biggest minority in the country are Hispanics, that does not means that there aren't communities with high numbers of other minorities whose first language is not English, but it is not Spanish either).
I don't think that by following the rules, Moreno --being himself Latino-- and his office was disenfranchising voters.
And, again, there is something fundamentally wrong with being a naturalized citizen and not having some level of fluency in English, at least to identify the differences between the candidate's names.
So, what do we have here?
A Democrat and liberal governor (who, by the way, supports those business people flirting with the unmentionable regime in the Caribbean), surrounded by a majority of Democrat and liberal legislators and state officials, worried about voter's intimidation in Weld County?
"I don't know how I could have suppressed the vote with that kind of turnout," Moreno said to Face The State. And I totally agree.
The fact of the matter is that the county had near a 90% of voters turnout, which an extremely outstanding number; a huge work for everybody working in the election process.
On the other hand, law enforcement officers present in a polling place on election day play the same role that officers located in a Rockie's game or even in the DNC in Denver. It's public safety, for Christ's sake!
Despite the fact that I don't see anything wrong with asking for some type of ID at the polling places (how do they know you are who you're saying you are?).
And the fact that no voter has file any complain about election's procedures at the Weld County Clerk and Recorder's office.
And the fact that I haven't heard of any Philadelphia official emailing the New Black Panthers Party regarding the guards they posted at the 1221 Fairmont Ave. polling place on election day.
Can someone, please, explain me, what on earth was Gov. Ritter's office doing intervening in the election process?
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