Sunday, September 24, 2006
SHOCK SPREADS
The New York Sun’s Alicia Colon observes assumed voting:
A funny thing happened when I went to vote in the primary election. I signed in at my district’s desk and a poll worker printed my information on a green card. She gave the card to another worker, who adjusted some mechanism on the side of the voting booth. I entered the booth and soon discovered I could not push down the lever for my candidate. When I asked for assistance, the poll worker checked the lever and said with a shocked tone: “You’re a Republican?”
The shock spread to all the women at the table, who apologized profusely for their supposition. Unfortunately, they said, I would have to fill out a paper ballot or wait for a Democrat to come in and use the booth, as it was already primed for Democrat voters. I wasn’t in a rush and so elected to wait, but voting was very, very light. Eventually, a black woman in a wheelchair entered the area and the poll workers breathed a sigh of relief. The woman signed her name, the poll worker filled out a green card, and — oh, no. The woman was a Republican, too.
Via NY State Assembly candidate Yvette Velázquez Bennett, who notes that Colon is “echoing something I’ve learned about in my district. I am finding more and more conservative minded minority Democrats.” In other US election developments, Texan gubernatorial musician Kinky Friedman rejects racism claims:
Gary L. Bledsoe, president of the Texas State Conference of NAACP Branches, asked Friedman to apologize in a Friday letter. Friedman said he would “absolutely never” apologize.
“The NAACP, I don’t even want to talk about them. They’re offended about just about everything,” Friedman said.
I’ve met Kinky a couple of times. He isn’t racist at all. Certainly not anywhere near as racist as New York City poll workers who assume all black women vote Democrat.