Thank you for saying this. In Virginia we call them election officers, I would lllllllllluuuuuuuuuuuuvvvvvvvvvvv to see netroots make a concerted effort to recruit election officers.

 I'm in Frederick County. I arrived, I voted, I departed. No delays. No glitches. The polling place was open, well-equipped, and efficient.

 Amazingly coincidentally, I live in a red part of a red county.

 (Whether my vote was recorded as I cast it, of course, is a completely different question.)

 This kind of crap is happening TOO OFTEN for it to be a coincidence.

This is going to help Wynn. Montgomery is going to go heavily for Edwards.

Pollworkers in Broward get paid, so being a pollworker is a win win situation.

Just voted in Beltsville.  Was the only person voting (before lunch rush).  No problems with Diebold machine - like others have said, that one could see.  New procedure, now have to fill out and sign card with name and DOB and sign and give to worker who takes you to machine.  This may have been done in '04, but I voted absentee to make sure my vote was counted for President, not that this isn't important, I'm just not as well organized this time.

You can also sign up to do it in NY and like Florida you get paid.  Unfortunately you have to complete a paper application and send it in.  We are not very technologically proficent here as we also still use lever voting machines.  NY is almost always short people so if you sign up you will probably get to be one.  Below is the link to the pdf.

http://vote.nyc.ny.us/pdf/forms/boe/poll workers/pollworkerapplication.pdf

First, let me say thank you for raising concerns about voting integrity. On the most pragmatically politically oriented websites, MyDD and DailyKos, it is my perception that this issue generally is viewed as arising from conspiracy theory land.  I believe there is far too much evidence of outright vote theft and suppression from 2000-2004 to ignore and I am very concerned about this election when the repubs look ripe for the picking.

What concerns me is what you say about volunteering to monitor the vote.  That is what it comes down to--no national coordination, just cheerleading for vote count volunteers, when, on the other side, there is almost certainly national coordination on voter suppression and vote theft. I happen to live in the Bay Area where there is no serious concern about this (apart from possibly Alameda county), and constraints of family and profession prevent me from travelling elsewhere on election day be a watchdog.  It has to come to local volunteerism.   But apart from encouragement like yours, what is there in the way of a coordinated effort?

Mark Crispin Miller on KPFA in Berkeley this AM opined that the whole point of Bush's blitz of fascism and terror speeches is to provide a plausible cover story for the media for when the repubs steal another election.  The confidence with which Cheney and Bush assert that the republicans will retain the majority in both houses does concern me, although that is not necessarily different from the boasting before a big game by a sports team.

I have been in general frustrated by the lack of   a coherent national effort to go after this concern about voting integrity.  Dean has given it lip service.  Blackwell was pushed back at least on this ridiculous criminalization of voter registration.  However, there is no concerted public effort by the dems, and Rush Holt remains something of a voice in the wilderness on this issue in congress.  

Can we keep this dialogue alive at least on MyDD and brainstorm on how to generate a more coherent watchdog effort nationally?  

I was a pollworker in the Florida primary, a touch screen tech. I can attest that the number of votes sent to election central equalled the number of votes cast, but that's all I can attest to.

What surprised me was the number of young voters who voted on Republican ballots. Also surprising was that the turnout for Republicans was 26% and turnout for Democrats was only 16%. Something definitely wrong with the Democratic GOTV operation.

Some have asked on DKos for "Kos" or some national figure to help fight what's going on in Maryland with the FUBAR balloting in multiple counties, most notably Montgomery County this morning.

But I think we Marylanders and specifically Maryland bloggers need to step up for ourselves - for us by us, as it were.  No disrespect to national luminaries like Markos or the fine people here at MyDD who cover these races - they/you have been awesome - but we Maryland progressives have to take responsibility for our own direct democracy too, just like Connecticut.

My name is Bruce Godfrey; I run Crablaw Maryland Weekly and practice law in Maryland and DC.  I don't mean to "blog-pimp" but the blogroll at my site has a decent number of Maryland and county-level sites of liberal/progressive/Democratic activists, including a lot of Montgomery County activists and others.  I hope that those interested in the Maryland races and, now, infamous debacles will check in on the Maryland blogosphere as well and support us as we exert what pressure we can in the face of a reasonably likely electoral bloodbath.  Thanks very much!

I voted in Montgomery County about 4 PM today.  I asked one of the volunteers if they had any problems earlier in the day.  She said they did, and were asking people to fill out provisional ballots.

What was more interesting was that she was surprised to hear there were issues throughout the county.  Isn't there any county-wide communication to the polling precincts?  

How could a person be working the polls since 7 AM, and know that their polling location had some problems, not be clued into the fact that this was going on all over?

Amazing.