President Obama has lunch with members of the military and barbers in honor of Father's Day - pics

[MADem]

13. The thing is, we're the ones who, like Moses, have to lead those uninformed souls to the Promised

Land...er...voting booths.

I bring a lot of people to the polls. I do it for most local, state, and national elections, ferrying several carloads back and forth, but I work very hard at it in Presidential election years. Last time I hauled over a hundred old souls to the polls. It's funny, they all have reasons for voting how they do, and a lot of 'em are just "straight ticket voters." I hear things like "The Republicans wouldn't give you a crust of bread if you were starving," or "Those Republicans will take away my retirement," and I smile and say "That's why it's great you're coming out today." Some vote Dem simply because they loved Jack Kennedy (yes, really). A few of 'em are "Reagan Democrats" who are embarrassed now at their support of that smarmy coot. If I asked them about some of the more complex issues at play, I suspect they wouldn't have a clue--I've tried a few times and it doesn't help, so I don't do it unless someone asks me first. Koch Brothers? They'd think Coke, too!

They do appreciate the whole voting machine fiasco from Bush v. Gore, but fortunately here we have paper ballots that go into an OCR machine, so there's a double-accountability, and voters have to check in to vote, and check out to leave--after their ballot has been accepted by the machine. Not an issue for my community, thankfully. I know none of my riders like Mitt much--a couple of them had to sell their homes and move into a retirement village because their houses were "overvalued" for Mittsy's "circuit breaker" tax relief for the elderly (which sucks, and was wrong--Deval Patrick fixed that). They couldn't afford to stay in their homes, thanks to Mitt, and they resent him for it.