CHAOS AT THE POLLING PLACE THIS MORNING & UPDATE LAWRENCE ALEXANDER

I arrived at 6AM at the local polling place and was held up a while due to some significant chaos caused by three different issues...

First, the woman ahead of me in line to vote was furious and arguing about something that I had never heard of. She had found that when she registered to vote, she had unknowingly registered such that she was ONLY qualified to and allowed to vote in FEDERAL INITIATIVES on the ballot. I heard the explanation -- that people are allowed to register to vote at the drivers license bureau which makes it convenient for some people.
This is what was called the "Motor Voter Law"....and it was intended by Federal officials to force all states to allow voter registration at the drivers license renewal stations. BUT -- not all states went along fully with the forced federal action, and Illinois is one such state and in Illinois if you register when you renew your license, you are only allowed then to vote in federal initiatives.
Go figure, but that is the way the rule was explained..and I looked up this explanation...
http://definitions.uslegal.com/m/motor-voter-act-the-national-voter-registration-act-of-1993-nvra/

So ---- apparently without those people being fully informed, if you have registered there at the drivers license renewal place, then you are only partly registered and unable to vote on any issue except federal issues.

Well, guess what, there are NO federal issues on this current ballot -- only local issues, regional issues, and statewide issues. So this woman's ballot did not allow her to vote on a single thing, and she was furious and arguing vehemently about her fate. But the polling place people couldn't do a thing....this weird and wacky rule that allowed this woman to get herself only partly registered clearly is a bad rule and I have to think others who did the same are going to find themselves a little bit upset.


Then the woman who asked my name pulled the wrong signature slip out of the book for me to sign because she believed she recognized me, but she pulled out the wrong page and initialled it -- she actually had no idea how to correct that error and had to go get a supervisor. So I waited some more, as the upset women who had found she had not fully registered finally left the premises fuming.


Then the big screw-up. This current ballot has a lot of initiatives that people are likely to leave blank -- such as the retention of judges and an amendment. BUT -- the automated machine that takes your ballot will automatically kick it back out if you haven't voted on every single measure on the ballot...which everyone ahead of me had not...and so all were standing, waiting in line for the polling officials to figure out how to fix the problem of the maching NOT accepting anyone's ballot. The purpose of this ridiculous feature is, I guess, if anyone misses an item, then they are alerted in case they want to go back and complete their ballot -- but there was supposed to be an override, and yet it was not working. So there was complete confusion, with nobody being able to turn in their ballot and leave until the officials called down to another place to get instructions on what to do...
Finally the problem was solved by opening a locked compartment on another box and everyone put their ballots in to be counted by hand -- so there'll be a lot of hand counting being done in my district!!

So it took a lot longer to vote this time than ever before, but I hope everyone gets out and exercises their right to vote!



Many people will remember Lawrence Alexander, one of the stars of last season's Peoria Manual Rams. Lawrence was looked at by Bradley but he decided to go to prep school and is at St. John's Northwestern Military Schol in Milwaukee, WI.
Here are some videos...

First, a video of Lawrence's workout and skills...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKQ1IIVsSwU&feature=related

Then a video of his current team scrimmaging this past weekend..
they played a scrimmage against a 2-year junior college..
They don't appear to have uniform numbers, but Lawrence appears to be one of the perimeter players in red jerseys who is wearing the white undershirt...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ckMJO1PO40



University of Kentucky's exhibition game was last night..
Kentucky whalloped tiny Pikeville 97-66 and had a double digit+ lead for most of the last 30 minutes of the game, yet Coach Calipari chose to play their starting five almost all the way..
He subbed very little and 3 starters got 34-37 minutes -- almost NCAA tournament-level playing time..
http://www.ukathletics.com/sports/m-baskbl/stats/2010-2011/uk1101.html

so was he trying to run up the score or showcase his talented freshmen??? Brandon Knight played all but just 3 minutes (37 minutes) in a crummy exhibition game against a D-II team!!

UK definitely did not shoot well, only 9.1% (1-11) from 3-pt

Maybe this is what the 22K fans wanted to see, but it's really bad news for senior Josh Harrellson, who was a one-time Western Illinois commit but backed out and went to play for then coach Billy Gillispie at UK -- and stayed around when Cal came hoping to earn some playing time...
Harrelson has hardly ever played despite being talented..

Recall this story -- during the recent intra-squad game, Harrellson played well with a double digit scoring night and 24 rebounds!
Then Harrellson criticized Calipari via twitter for not giving him more playing time -- only to get a team-imposed ban from twitter..
Now it's too late for Harrellson to transfer -- he's stuck there...
he was a sub and only got 16 minutes tonight.
http://ncaabasketball.fanhouse.com/2010/10/29/josh-harrellson-suspended-from-twitter-by-john-calipari/

Well -- if Calipari is short on talent and having to play kids 35-40 minutes, then Bill Self has the opposite problem -- he has so much talent that he's gonna redshirt kids that he has!!
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2010/nov/01/just-two-jayhawks-royce-woolridge-conner-teahan-me/