Why Tuesday? asks why we have election days on tuesdays. Good question.

There has been an NGO called Why Tuesday? asking the question:  Why is election day on a tuesday?  Among other electoral reforms, they have supported voting on a day more accessible to voters; they advocate a federal holiday for general election day.

Tuesday is in the middle of the work week.  Not as many people have the freedom to vote on Tuesday as on the weekend.

Civic responsibility demands that we encourage as many people as possible to vote.  Having primaries/ caucuses, runoffs and general elections on the weekend is a major step in that direction.

Reform our campaign finance system for all elective offices

The amount of money spent on campaigns for most levels of government has increased greatly recently.  However, the first concern should be the transparency issues of the donors.

There are campaign rules from the Federal Election Commission and from the individual states, depending on what level of government a contested office is in.  The federal (national) offices' campaign regulations are now compromised due to a dis-functional FEC.

A better electoral system for all government office openings is public financing.  By freeing all candidates from campaign fundraising, they can focus on the voting public in their respective races.

For election day, vote and count manually

As noted in an earlier post, the American voter, in this age of technology, has had trouble using their polling stations.

Some waiting lines were too long due to a lack of enough voting machines.  Some have voted for the wrong candidate.  And you haven't known whether their voting calculations were correct.  The lack of full trust from the voter has been of increased concern.

The tried and true paper ballot system had proven to be mostly trustworthy.  Not only had it given the voter control of how they voted, it made the vote counting process more transparent.  Just because the voting technology became more sophisticated hasn't meant it's more accurate.

The trials of voting

Have you ever had a bad experience voting?

People talking politics while you're in line; going to the wrong polling station; avoiding others that are hanging around the ballot box; don't have a photo id; not finding your voter registration card; following vote counts in other states before casting your vote?

It's a matter of consideration and democracy.  One person, one vote.  Sometimes voters and precincts being reformed is a good attitude.

All of the states' elections officials should be politically non-partisan

As this is Labor Day, all of the races for the November, 2016 elections are heating up.

Each states' Secretaries of State should be supporting clean and fair elections.  This demands impartial election administration, from the filing of candidacies through the final ballot counts.

It is all of the voters' interest for all of their Secretaries of State be politically non-partisan. Otherwise, some campaigns can't trust the elections' results.

Let us join Arizona and the other states that have non-partisan election officials, and see that candidates up and down the ballot enjoy non-partisan voting administrations.

Ranked Choice Voting ranks candidates with your vote

How the US conducts its elections varies among its states, municipalities, colleges, etc.  Candidates vary widely among themselves within election season.

Ranked Choice Voting has been used successfully in local contests around the nation as a rank voting for each candidate.

In these days of increasingly complex election seasons, RCV provides a discipline of voting that gives a close look at all of the candidates.  It ranks candidates by level of preference as you vote down the ballot.

The Federal Election Commission is dysfunctional

The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is politically bankrupt; which, oddly enough, boosts the two major parties and their candidates' legal and illegal financial activity.

With no fear the Republican Party hates regulations, even those for elections.  Their constituents, big business, can brazenly contribute an unlimited amount of money in support or against candidates.  And the Democrats can do the same with unions.

Dysfunctional government in the FEC allows candidates to break electoral laws without conscience.  Let us fix the crippled agency and give we, the people clean and clear voting the next election season.