US Elections 2008 - 4

[Guest]

Obama is regestering voters left and right and twice especially students. Students and parents who had registered twice to vote Obama twice should read this.
This was Obama attempt to win Virginia.

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<b>Last week, Virginia’s Montgomery County, home to Virginia Tech, issued a press release regarding proper protocol for college students registering to vote</b>. In interviews with Inside Higher Ed Tuesday, it was described by turns as “unsubstantiated,” “chilling,” and (more generously) as not “incredibly encouraging or friendly.”

<b>It reads, in part: “The Code of Virginia states that a student must declare a legal residence in order to register. A legal residence can be either a student’s permanent address from home or their current college residence. By making Montgomery County your permanent residence, you have declared your independence from your parents and can no longer be claimed as a dependent on their income tax filings — check with your tax professional. If you have a scholarship attached to your former residence, you could lose this funding. And, if you change your registration to Montgomery County, Virginia Code requires you to change your driver’s license and car registration to your present address within 30 days.”</b>

The county registrar of elections said Tuesday that the memo was intended to counteract the absence of cautionary information given to students signed up through the ubiquitous get-out-the-vote registration drives. Generally speaking, however, those interviewed for this article said the warnings are, at worst, farfetched and misleading, or, at best, overstated and not typically supported in reality.

And, in a year in which historic youth voter turnout is anticipated, and the <b>Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has been propelled by college students’ support, this case in the battleground state of Virginia is “not an isolated incident,” </b>said Sujatha Jahagirdar, program director for the Student Public Interest Research Group’s nonpartisan New Voters Project. 
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Montgomery County followed up its first dispatch with a somewhat more neutrally worded news release two days later, on August 27. This one raised similar issues but in the form of questions, which students were prompted to consider in deciding whether to register to vote where their family lives or where their college is.

<b>Among them: “Are you claimed as a dependent on your parents’ income tax return? If you are, then their address is probably your legal residence.... Do you have a scholarship that would be affected if you changed your legal residence?.. Would your health, automobile or other insurance coverage be affected by a change in your legal residence? If you are covered under your parents’ insurance policy, your protection could be affected by a change in your legal residence.”  </b>
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<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->In an interview, E. Randall Wertz, the general registrar of elections for Montgomery County, cited the State Board of Election’s guidance on college student registration as what he relied upon. He explained that, in sending the memo, he was attempting to combat either the misinformation, or lack of information, that college students have to consider when signing up through voter registration drives.

<b>“What’s happening is they’re going out across campus over here and just getting people to sign the registration forms left and right and not telling them issues to consider, or telling them the incorrect information,” said Wertz. “Before they make the decision to register with us, they need to check with the accountant who does the taxes. They need to check if they’re on their parents’ health insurance. By being at a separate permanent address, does that affect their insurance?”

“I was just trying to inform them of things to consider, and then once they’ve made an informed decision and decide to come with us, we welcome them,” Wertz said.</b>

“We don’t want to suppress them from voting and we certainly want them to vote. It’s just, what’s best for them is what they need to consider. Unfortunately, the campaigns, they’re not concerned with what’s best for the student. They’re generally concerned with just getting people signed up.”

<b>From Tuesday through Friday of last week, voter registration drives at Virginia Tech brought more than 2,000 new registrations to the county, Wertz said. He also estimated that about 25 students have called to ask if the county could cancel the processing of their registration.  </b>
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