Update: I voted last night in-person/absentee/early voting.  And with my non-campaign shirt on. This satellite polling place seemed ready for heavy turnout - several pollworkers, a large room with seating, take-a-number system (you have to wait to have absentee application checked by phone).  They said the room was filled most of the day.  Too bad about the mystery voting machines and the ID requirement in Virginia.  Read more about some problems with voting in Virginia and other states in our report.

You would think the VA Board of Elections has better things to do.  After all, there are lots of paperless electronic voting machines in the state.  No recounts!  They require ID to vote - my 86-year-old mother spent half a day in DMV to get hers.  The state essentially asks you to lie to vote early.

But, according to the WaPo:

What if I show up in a campaign t-shirt just as the polls are set to close?  Will they send me back for another shirt, effectively banning me from voting?  Or, will I be able to vote shirtless?

Watch it live online!

Today and tomorrow St. John's University School of Law in NYC is hosting a symposium titled MAKING HISTORY: Race, Gender and the Media in the 2008 Elections.

This symposium will investigate the subject of race, gender and the media in the 2008 elections. Many democracies, such as the United Kingdom, Argentina, India, Israel, the Philippines, Pakistan, Liberia and other countries have or have had women heads of state, and other countries, like Peru and Bolivia, have elected presidents who are members of racial minority groups. However, the United States has never elected a woman or a person of color as president and has traditionally discriminated against both women and minority voters and candidates. In 2008, we stand poised  to witness the historic event of a black male or a white woman heading the presidential ballot on behalf of a major political party.

WATCH LIVE
All sessions of the MAKING HISTORY Symposia will be broadcast live via the St. John's University Web site. Viewers are also encouraged to submit questions to panelists for any session.

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) had its people call our people to set up a meeting for June 18th.  They asked to learn about our campaign on election reform.  More specifically they asked, "What are the most pressing issues facing the American electoral process in 2008 This past Wednesday, we got the full biography on who their people are, exactly.

The OSCE is  "is a very  large regional security organization which includes 56 member countries, hailing from a range of six geographical regions: Eastern Europe, South-Eastern Europe, Western Europe, South Caucus, Central Asia, and North America.  The OSCE's operation, which has headquarters in Vienna, projects three primary pillars of objectives: the politico-military, the economic and environmental, and the human dimension.  Institutional structure parallels can easily be drawn from the OSCE to the European Union.

Colorado's Secretary of State, Mike Coffman, announced yesterday that most of the voting machines used in the state have been decertified. In a highly anticipated decision, the Secretary said that the machines are unreliable and unsecure and therefore cannot be used for the 2008 elections. At Common Cause, we fight to ensure that our votes are counted accurately and with integrity. If that means decertifying our electronic voting machines because they are unreliable, then the decision was a necessary one. However, we also believe that we cannot take away options for voters. Encouraging participation in our elections should be a top priority for our election administrators.

The issue of requiring proof of citizenship to register to vote is rearing it's ugly head in Colorado once again. Each year in the legislature, a bill of this sort comes up at least once. And each year, we at Common Cause work hard to defeat the bill because we believe in removing barriers to our voting process, not adding them. But this year, El Paso County Clerk and Recorder Bob Balink is taking a different approach. Balink belives that if the legislature won't pass a bill requiring proof of citizenship, a lawsuit would force the issue. Those who believe that we should require proof of citizenship claim it's not that difficult to obtain the proof, and you would only have to do it once. An editorial in this week's Denver Post says: To say that proving citizenship is not onerous is wrong. It is expensive and time-cosuming, not to mention infringing on our basic voting rights. The citizenship requirement is aimed at illegal immigrants and discouraging them from voting. But, there is little to no evidence of voter fraud in Colorado. This is a solution in search of a problem. The possibility of having to bring even more identification to the polls is going to discourage people from voting. In a democracy where voting is a fundamental right, we should be passing laws that make it easier to vote, not harder.

Republican Jason Perillo has won the special election for the 113th House district in Shelton, Conn. - the first election in Connecticut that offered Citizens' Election grants to candidates.

Perillo, who won with 64 percent of the vote, earned the distinction of being the first candidate to qualify for the state's election grants and will now be the first Citizens' Election Program participant to be sworn into office. His opponent, Democrat James Orazietti, also participated in the Citizens' Election Program.

Although it will still be several days before the State Elections Enforcement Commission issues a final determination how well the new Citizens' Election Program worked in the special election, SEEC officials have said no major problems have occurred.

Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer spoke to the audience at the National Conference On Citizenship last Thursday in the National Archives.  He focused on the central role of democracy in the US Constitution, saying he felt all of his colleagues in the Supreme Court would probably agree even as they differ on interpreting its parts.  This may seem fair enough.  Indeed, he made a point of stating the obviousness of his argument.  Democracy is the fundamental principle our Constitution guards.

The problem is, like Justice Breyer, 600,000 citizens in the District of Columbia are denied democratic representation in the House of Representatives.  I asked him what he thought of that.  Unfortunately, he couldn't answer the question, despite the First Amendment, as he said Supreme Court Justices have to remain publicly impartial.

For now, he has to wait for the Senate, and the recalcitrant minority therein, to let DC Voting Rights pass so that he can exercize his Constitutional duty to give his opinion (should someone be so undemocratic as to challenge it).  For his, my and all our sakes, I hope to see that day soon.

In scores of campuses across the country this month students celebrate the U.S. Constitution. Through educating their peers on the importance of understanding it and how they can live as active citizens these student leaders are building a movement towards greater civic participation in their generation.  Common Cause and Democracy Matters are working together to give young people the tools and support they need to make an impact in how politics will affect their lives.  Organizing speaking events with faculty and guest speakers on the importance of what they're doing, a few students have been the headline acts on campuses I have been visiting this week.  At Bloomsburg University and St. Francis University, both in rural and small town PA hundreds of other students have stopped by to talk about politics and to register to vote.  To learn more or to get involved yourself email istorrar@commoncause.org.