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It did not feature much in the way of butterfly ballots, hanging chads or protracted Supreme Court fights. But the first hearing yesterday of the Commission on Federal Election Reform made it clear that the 2004 election was not without problems. Former president Jimmy Carter and ex-secretary of state James A. Baker III, who co-chair the commission, invited a dozen experts to American University to recommend ways to improve the nation's voting system. The commission will consider those suggestions, along with others expected at a second hearing in June, and submit its own recommendations to Congress. Those recommendations are not expected until September, which is a good thing because the academics, advocacy group leaders and politicians invited to testify yesterday provided a dizzying list of electoral problems that might make some wonder how any ballots were counted in November. They told of absentee ballots that were never delivered. Of voters who were arbitrarily struck from the rolls. Of confusing and poorly designed ballots. Of long lines at the polls. Of inadequate funds to train poll workers. Some complained that polls are frequently inaccessible to wheelchairs. That bilingual assistance is lacking. That there are too few voting machines, especially in minority communities. Others asked whether partisan officials ought to be in charge of elections. Whether the country needs a voting holiday to improve turnout. Whether the nation should adopt uniform poll closing times so elections called in the East do not depress turnout in the West. Whether photo identifications ought to be required to vote. And whether to create a "paper trail" for electronic voting machines. [more]

Where is John Conyers? "Why the heck wasn't Congressman Conyers testifying at this meeting?" The short answer is that the commission would not allow him to do so. This letter that Conyers sent to Carter on April 11 should shed some light on why. [here] In this letter, Conyers does two things that were not done by any speakers on Monday. He questions the inclusion of Baker on the commission, and he questions the validity of the official results in the Bush-Kerry election. That's right. An election reform commission has been created in the wake of massive public outrage over an election, and following the historic challenge in Congress of the Ohio results, and not a single speaker at Monday's meeting raised the question of whether the election system functioned adequately to conclude that Bush won the 2004 election. [more]