Screwing military voters - Sam Reed again

Several states are asking/refusing to meet the deadline of mailing military ballots 45 days before the election to allow time them to reach soldiers and sailors at remote overseas locations. And Washington is among them. Washington Secretary of State Sam Reed asked to have our primary moved earlier into mid-August when so many people are on vacation so it would be early enough to prepare for the November general election. On the other hand, he also recommended that every county move to all-mail balloting, which requires added weeks of lead time so ballots for everyone are mailed out weeks in advance, instead of being ready on the first (or second) Tuesday in November. So he can claim to be a victim of his own priorities. He says he doesn't have time to get ballots to military voters. PJ Media ...

Twelve states have applied for waivers from protecting military voters in the 2010 election: New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, Maryland, Delaware, Wisconsin, Colorado, Washington, Hawaii, Alaska, and the District of Columbia. Citizens from these states should be outraged that their state didn’t take steps to protect military voting rights despite having plenty of time to do so. States like Florida, Georgia, and Vermont got the job done and made changes to comply with MOVE. These twelve did nothing. ... Maryland’s failure to comply with MOVE is typical. I have reviewed documents which make it very clear that Maryland knew they were not in compliance with MOVE as far back as January 2010, but did absolutely nothing to fix the problem. This failure to protect military voters now threatens Governor Martin O’Malley’s reelection. Challenger Bob Ehrlich is hammering O’Malley for dropping the ball. Instead of passing legislation to enact MOVE, the Maryland General Assembly was able to pass 810 other pieces of legislation in 2010. Maryland found time for designating September 15 through October 15 as “Hispanic Heritage Month,” a ban on driving with cell phones, mandatory solar energy purchases for state utilities, a law to decrease how far away from shore people can hunt ducks … and saddest of all, a law allowing 16-year-olds to register to vote. Obviously Maryland has other priorities besides men and women serving overseas. In the meantime, the public, particularly military families and veterans groups, have a right to petition their government and voice their opinion about the waivers. Citizens can reach FVAP and tell them to deny all waiver requests at 800-438-8683 or vote@fvap.gov. Citizens can petition the DOJ and tell them both to recommend against granting the waivers and to sue states who submitted them at (202) 307-2767 or rebecca.j.wertz@usdoj.gov.

Sam's side at SOS. I find it hard to spend energy looking at his side, since I have seen that he doesn't even comply with state laws that he requests.