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I'm surprised at how easy it was to vote from the fricking South Pole, I thought it would have been an exercise in voter suppression by remoteness because our m

I'm surprised at how easy it was to vote from the fricking South Pole, I thought it would have been an exercise in voter suppression by remoteness because our most distinguished climate scientists down there are only going to vote one way.

bushbaba 4y ago
They voted in SF/California which is very liberal in mail in voting. Would be curious to see a similar experiment with someone living in a more conservative state with strong voter-id laws.
- mikelward 4y ago
  It looks like there's a process for every state. Not sure if fax is always supported. https://www.fvap.gov/ https://www.fvap.gov/
- MandieD 4y ago
  Texas counties theoretically email ballots if you send in your overseas voter request each year, but it’s theoretical, because at least my county doesn’t set up their email domain correctly, and thus doesn’t even make GMail’s Spam folder. Email domain is a subdomain of *.co.texas.us, so it’s probably a state-level issue, but the IP address in the ballot download URL (yes, IP address!) is in the same range as the county’s other websites. Oh, and the county’s main website is geofenced, so the only way I can get contact info for the elections office is using my Hetzner VM in Virginia as a Tailscale exit point. Why do I get the feeling that the State of Texas, or at least my home county, is not interested in my vote?
  - vinay427 4y ago
    San Francisco also allows one to generate their ballot and fill it out using an online accessible voting service, which then generates a PDF with your choices and a QR code that you can mail or fax back in place of the “real” ballot. Considering the number of direct democracy items on the ballot in SF, I’m glad they’ve at least made this part quite usable.
    - terinjokes 4y ago
      Although it's not clear they actually count them. I posted mine in several weeks ago, but my voter status never updated.
  - mariojv 4y ago
    Yeah, voting is such a pain in Texas compared to other states. My brother requested a mail in ballot because of a disability and never received it this year. Him and my parents were also out of state for a medical reason, had to stay longer than expected over the early voting period and Election Day, and as a result couldn't vote. You can also only vote by mail with a particular set of criteria - if you're over 65, disabled, or a few other reasons: https://www.sos.texas.gov/elections/voter/reqabbm.shtml https://www.sos.texas.gov/elections/voter/reqabbm.shtml Election officials are also not always the most informed about rules. When my husband was in college, he was still registered in his home county about an 8 hour drive away. He called an elections office in order to verify that he could still vote for statewide and national candidates. They said it'd be no problem. He was turned away at his closest polling site on Election Day and could only vote at 1 polling site in the county, downtown, where he had to pay for parking with some of the very few dollars he had and wait several hours. Another time, I forgot to update my address for a move within the county and had to drive across the city to go to my old polling place. The poll workers at the first site wouldn't even let me cast a provisional ballot or update my address on the spot. I called the state elections hotline to complain, and they were unsympathetic. I can only imagine how hard it is to vote here for someone who moves around a lot or has to rely on public transportation. It makes me wonder how much of the abysmal 27% voter turnout range for ages 18-29 [0], which is still one of the highest turnouts in 3 decades, is due to voting accessibility issues versus plain apathy. [0] https://www.npr.org/2022/11/10/1135810302/turnout-among-young-voters-was-the-second-highest-for-a-midterm-in-past-30-years https://www.npr.org/2022/11/10/1135810302/turnout-among-youn...
    - dementis 4y ago
      In Texas, anytime you move and update your mailing address it generally takes 7 to 10 business days for the information to fully propagate. So the timing could make it so that you are unable to vote if you miss early voting(in the same county) before you move or are not able to reach your voting location on the day off the election. https://comptroller.texas.gov/help/manage-account/update-address.php https://comptroller.texas.gov/help/manage-account/update-add... Anytime you update your postal address with the US Postal service, they make sure you have the option to also update your voter registration at the same time. Updating your voter registration is just a checkbox away when you are using the website. https://USPS.com/move https://USPS.com/move >I can only imagine how hard it is to vote here for someone who moves around a lot or has to rely on public transportation. It makes me wonder how much of the abysmal 27% voter turnout range for ages 18-29 [0], which is still one of the highest turnouts in 3 decades, is due to voting accessibility issues versus plain apathy. The die in the wool cynic in me would say plain apathy was the most like culprit for low turnout in that age group. Although public transportation in most of the US is an abysmally bad joke. There are some large cities that have decent public transportation but for the most part I feel like if you don't own a vehicle in the US then your are treated as a 3rd class citizen. Even in some cities with public transportation it can be difficult to get even get a job if you don't have your own vehicle(It's a painful catch 22 that a lot of people struggle with).
jcranmer 4y ago
Don't worry, some Republicans in Wisconsin have been trying to prevent military people deployed overseas from voting.
bacon_waffle 4y ago
A nit: this blog is from McMurdo Station, which is on an island just off off the coast of mainland Antarctica. Something like 800 miles away is the geographic South Pole, where there is a US research station too. There's dirt, dramatic scenery, and wildlife at McMurdo but not at Pole. Both of these places are mainly populated by people like the blog author who work for one of several contractors, doing the same sorts of things that are necessary to keep a small community running - relatively few are professional "scientists".
samatman 4y ago
Hey look, the paranoid style in American politics. So rare these days. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paranoid_Style_in_American_Politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paranoid_Style_in_American...
- Cyberdog 4y ago
  Can you blame us, though?
burkaman 4y ago
There are a maximum of a couple thousand Americans in Antarctica, and fewer in November as it's not yet peak summer there, distributing their votes across many different states. Anybody conspiring to suppress votes is not going to waste their time on this tiny population.

bushbaba 4y ago

They voted in SF/California which is very liberal in mail in voting. Would be curious to see a similar experiment with someone living in a more conservative state with strong voter-id laws.

mikelward 4y ago
It looks like there's a process for every state. Not sure if fax is always supported. https://www.fvap.gov/ https://www.fvap.gov/
MandieD 4y ago
Texas counties theoretically email ballots if you send in your overseas voter request each year, but it’s theoretical, because at least my county doesn’t set up their email domain correctly, and thus doesn’t even make GMail’s Spam folder. Email domain is a subdomain of *.co.texas.us, so it’s probably a state-level issue, but the IP address in the ballot download URL (yes, IP address!) is in the same range as the county’s other websites. Oh, and the county’s main website is geofenced, so the only way I can get contact info for the elections office is using my Hetzner VM in Virginia as a Tailscale exit point. Why do I get the feeling that the State of Texas, or at least my home county, is not interested in my vote?
- vinay427 4y ago
  San Francisco also allows one to generate their ballot and fill it out using an online accessible voting service, which then generates a PDF with your choices and a QR code that you can mail or fax back in place of the “real” ballot. Considering the number of direct democracy items on the ballot in SF, I’m glad they’ve at least made this part quite usable.
  - terinjokes 4y ago
    Although it's not clear they actually count them. I posted mine in several weeks ago, but my voter status never updated.
- mariojv 4y ago
  Yeah, voting is such a pain in Texas compared to other states. My brother requested a mail in ballot because of a disability and never received it this year. Him and my parents were also out of state for a medical reason, had to stay longer than expected over the early voting period and Election Day, and as a result couldn't vote. You can also only vote by mail with a particular set of criteria - if you're over 65, disabled, or a few other reasons: https://www.sos.texas.gov/elections/voter/reqabbm.shtml https://www.sos.texas.gov/elections/voter/reqabbm.shtml Election officials are also not always the most informed about rules. When my husband was in college, he was still registered in his home county about an 8 hour drive away. He called an elections office in order to verify that he could still vote for statewide and national candidates. They said it'd be no problem. He was turned away at his closest polling site on Election Day and could only vote at 1 polling site in the county, downtown, where he had to pay for parking with some of the very few dollars he had and wait several hours. Another time, I forgot to update my address for a move within the county and had to drive across the city to go to my old polling place. The poll workers at the first site wouldn't even let me cast a provisional ballot or update my address on the spot. I called the state elections hotline to complain, and they were unsympathetic. I can only imagine how hard it is to vote here for someone who moves around a lot or has to rely on public transportation. It makes me wonder how much of the abysmal 27% voter turnout range for ages 18-29 [0], which is still one of the highest turnouts in 3 decades, is due to voting accessibility issues versus plain apathy. [0] https://www.npr.org/2022/11/10/1135810302/turnout-among-young-voters-was-the-second-highest-for-a-midterm-in-past-30-years https://www.npr.org/2022/11/10/1135810302/turnout-among-youn...
  - dementis 4y ago
    In Texas, anytime you move and update your mailing address it generally takes 7 to 10 business days for the information to fully propagate. So the timing could make it so that you are unable to vote if you miss early voting(in the same county) before you move or are not able to reach your voting location on the day off the election. https://comptroller.texas.gov/help/manage-account/update-address.php https://comptroller.texas.gov/help/manage-account/update-add... Anytime you update your postal address with the US Postal service, they make sure you have the option to also update your voter registration at the same time. Updating your voter registration is just a checkbox away when you are using the website. https://USPS.com/move https://USPS.com/move >I can only imagine how hard it is to vote here for someone who moves around a lot or has to rely on public transportation. It makes me wonder how much of the abysmal 27% voter turnout range for ages 18-29 [0], which is still one of the highest turnouts in 3 decades, is due to voting accessibility issues versus plain apathy. The die in the wool cynic in me would say plain apathy was the most like culprit for low turnout in that age group. Although public transportation in most of the US is an abysmally bad joke. There are some large cities that have decent public transportation but for the most part I feel like if you don't own a vehicle in the US then your are treated as a 3rd class citizen. Even in some cities with public transportation it can be difficult to get even get a job if you don't have your own vehicle(It's a painful catch 22 that a lot of people struggle with).

jcranmer 4y ago

Don't worry, some Republicans in Wisconsin have been trying to prevent military people deployed overseas from voting.

bacon_waffle 4y ago

A nit: this blog is from McMurdo Station, which is on an island just off off the coast of mainland Antarctica. Something like 800 miles away is the geographic South Pole, where there is a US research station too. There's dirt, dramatic scenery, and wildlife at McMurdo but not at Pole. Both of these places are mainly populated by people like the blog author who work for one of several contractors, doing the same sorts of things that are necessary to keep a small community running - relatively few are professional "scientists".

samatman 4y ago

Hey look, the paranoid style in American politics. So rare these days. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paranoid_Style_in_American_Politics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Paranoid_Style_in_American...

Cyberdog 4y ago
Can you blame us, though?

burkaman 4y ago

There are a maximum of a couple thousand Americans in Antarctica, and fewer in November as it's not yet peak summer there, distributing their votes across many different states. Anybody conspiring to suppress votes is not going to waste their time on this tiny population.