It shouldn't be this hard. Really! Voters fill in a little bubble showing who they'd like for president. Elections machines tally them up. And whichever guy gets the most votes wins the state. Everywhere else in America, this simple process works just fine.
But this is Miami, where two days after the election, we still haven't finished counting. And as a result, Florida still hasn't declared a presidential winner.
Update: Miami-Dade has finished counting its ballots! It only took 41 hours after the elections. 883,889 people voted, a new Miami record, according to CBS Miami. Florida still can't finalize a winner, however, because Palm Beach and Broward are still counting absentees.
When will they finally be tallied and a winner declared? Today, maybe. But don't hold your breath.
Statewide, Obama's still holding onto a 45,000-vote lead among 8.3 million votes cast -- a margin that could spark a recount depending on Miami's results.
Miami's elections officials are still blaming the crazy delay on a flood of absentee ballots mailed and delivered before Tuesday's 7 p.m. voting deadline.
The same basic problem that led to voting lines as long as seven hours on Tuesday -- an absurdly long ballot special engineered by Tally's Republican legislature to depress turnout -- is now screwing over absentee ballot counters.
"We have to do signature verification, we have to open those ballots and tabulate them," Christina White, Miami-Dade's deputy supervisor of elections, tells the Miami Herald.
County Mayor Carlos Gimenez sent out a press release hilariously insisting that the long wait for a result is "in no way representative of any issues or delays, but a matter of unprecedented volume."
Hey Carlos: Maybe you're dealing with that "unprecedented volume" because Gov. Rick Scott chopped early voting by a third and YOU refused to extend early voting hours. Gimenez even went so far as to shut down the election office's attempt to take absentee ballots on Sunday in a fit of pique.
So yeah, this is absolutely representative of "issues." Issues purposely caused by our elected officials hoping to score political points by keeping voters away from the polls.
In any just world, those same voters will return -- lines or not -- to kick these clowns out of office next time around.
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