 |
||||||||
 |
|
|||||||
|
||||||||
|
 |
The eyes of the world watch us vote today
© St. Petersburg Times In the last hours of the campaign, Jeb Bush and Bill McBride were in a battle over who produced the best made-for-TV moment. At lunchtime, McBride stepped out of a white limo (a most un-Democratic form of transportation) in downtown Tampa and addressed a rally of the faithful in Courthouse Square. He was followed up by that celebrated Democratic songster, Jimmy Buffett. Cameras were everywhere. A few hours later, Bush was in the tiny, crowded GOP headquarters in Temple Terrace, peering through his red, white and blue reading glasses at a voter list. He worked his way down the list, urging whoever he got on the phone to vote. Cameras were everywhere. Though the campaigns are staged and the strategists are cynical, the rest of the process, the part the rest of us participate in, is not. On Monday, the line to vote in the Hillsborough County government building stretched from the supervisor of elections office all the way across the hall to the office of the property appraiser. People were cheerful and patient. There was a sense that history was being made. It is. This is the first general election to rely on those touch screen machines that are supposed to avoid 2000's calamity. It is also the first general election in which you could vote as much as two weeks ahead of time (at least in Hillsborough County) without going to the trouble of getting a paper absentee ballot. As many as 10,000 people in Tampa took advantage of this. It helps that this race for governor has been a real contest between two men with real differences in views. You can vote with the knowledge that you're making a choice, and it's not between the lesser of two fools. Sen. Bob Graham , traveling with McBride, said the race was a dead heat. I don't know where he gets his information. Newspaper polls show Bush winning by at least a few points. But when I asked Bush, he wouldn't speculate on what his margin might be. From Temple Terrace and all those cameras, I went to Brandon, and the election supervisor's warehouse, where the unglamorous work of democracy ground on. The Hillsborough County Canvassing Board met to examine some of the 4,000 unopened absentee ballots that came in the mail Monday and discarded several with signatures that did not match the signatures the election supervisor's office had on record. In another room, workers opened absentee ballots and separated them into two stacks, one with the ballots that included all the candidates, the other the ballot for the amendments. All this was done to prepare the ballots for counting. The work was not sexy, just vital. Outside, on one side of the warehouse, a line of voters waited. On the other side, a line of cars was forming as precinct clerks pulled up to get last minute materials they need when the polls open this morning. As elections supervisor Pam Iorio made her last rounds, two people approached her and introduced themselves. One was American, the other Albanian. Yes, Albanian. They are from a group called the Organization for Security and Cooperation on Europe. The Albanian, Ilirjan Celibashi is the chairman of his country's general election commission. After the election, the group he belongs to will issue a report on whether we got this election right. This is a sign of just how much rides on this election. Even though we invented democracy, the rest of the world is no longer sure about us, and whether we can get it right. So please, go show 'em. Go vote. -- You can reach Mary Jo Melone at mjmelone@sptimes.com or (813) 226-3402.
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • Tampa Bay Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 
|
|
Times columns today Ernest Hooper Mary Jo Melone Jan Glidewell John Romano From the Times Metro desk |
