A farewell to chads

摘要

Richard smolka smiles as he talks of a ballot he heard of in Oklahoma. Election officials, he claims, reprinted a proposed new town charter in its entirety on the sheet, making it seven feet long and packed with tiny type. Mr Smolka, a retired professor and editor of a newsletter on the election business, is not the only one with a ballot-design horror story at the conference of the International Association of Clerks, Recorders, Election Officials and Treasurers.rnThis year tales circulated of fill-the-bubble ballots that failed to make it clear which bubble corresponded to which candidate, and candidates' names printed in "squashed" text. One ballot in Nebraska seemed to suggest that voters had to write in their preferred candidate, even if he was elsewhere on the ballot. If they did, they spoiled their vote.