POST ELECTION PRIORITY: ELECTION REFORM
Well, you'd think that would have been the priority after 2000, but things are looking funny this year, too. Amid reports that new registrations are up significantly this year, are reports of suspicious registration related activity and that many new registrations are fraudulent.

Now comes a story that some counties in Ohio have registrations for more people than are actually eligible to vote - according to Census estimates of 2004 population. This could be for several reasons. One, is that rolls have not been purged of people who have moved to, say, Florida (over 40,000 voted in both Florida and New York in 2000 - sorry, I don't have the link handy). Two, Census estimates of current population are wrong (although some would like for these estimates to be used to proportion representation). Three, fraud.

But if these registrations are fraudulent, then the only way to know is to visit the registrant (something you'll get smacked around politically for doing). The best way to verify voters and their registration is through picture ID. You have to have one to rent a video from Blockbuster, but not to vote. Clearly, one is much more important than the other. And there should also be a centralized database linked to a unique identifier - like social security number - to prevent cross-state voting.

But you can't talk about preventing fraud or you'll be harangued for suppressing the vote and disenfranchising people. But this must be addressed - its too difficult to deal with when counting the votes. It's too late this year, maybe someone will get reasonable before 2008.