An Internet Vote for President, With or Without an Electoral Vote
This article is a suggestion for an Internet vote for President, which works with the present electoral vote system, or also with its possible future conversion to a popular vote system.
There are a lot of inconveniences involved in voting, and the whole experience can be hindered by the political party in control of a State’s government or a County’s voting station distribution. Whereas Statewide and local elections must be carried out by the separate state and local officials and ballots, the Presidential election need not be.
Such inconveniences are having to vote on workdays, having to have children cared for, standing outside in long lines that may last for hours in urban settings, and in inclement weather, finding parking, etc., only to make a check or press a button. Clearly, suburban and rural voting with adequate booths are a lot easier and faster to access. This discriminates and limits urban representation. We have seen in many state’s results that a few urban districts have as many voters as a vast area of rural districts.
There are also many distribution and breakdown problems that occur to voting places and equipment. This results in requiring paper ballots until they run out, provisional ballots if voter ID equipment fails or is not delivered, etc.
In this modern computer, smart pad, and smartphone age, where everyone is connected and familiar with apps and doing things online, it is ridiculous to suffer the slings and arrows of mechanical, weather prone, and distributed voting, with its built-in disenfranchisement potential.
Yes, computer glitches can occur. But if the internet voting is distributed over a few weeks of voting, all the glitches can be worked out. Remember, that we are only proposing this for Presidential voting, where everybody has the same, simple interface. Yes, Obamacare had a lot of glitches, but it was specialized to each state and area, and had complex forms and levels of care. We also have vastly greater internet traffic and hosting capabilities now.
What about your ID? You can bet that under our new reality of President Trump’s keeping track of everybody’s citizenship status, and whether they have been naughty or nice, everyone will have a unique ID suitable for internet verification. I can’t wait to get a watch chip to replace my wallet of ID cards.
Since the Constitution requires an electoral vote system, that can be applied by assigning your vote to the state in which you are currently registered. This would also allow an easy transition to a popular Presidential vote system, or to local and State internet voting, should political forces ever decide to switch to that option.
I don’t have to convince people to establish Internet Presidential voting, since it is now so obvious. The only opposition would be from states that do not want to give up the present form of voter disenfranchisement.
