Election Day!

[OakLeaf]

The implication which I don't think is correct, would be that TE doesn't have many members in Michigan, Florida, Ohio, or any of the superstorm states.

No, not at all (I'm in Ohio, and I know there are several other very active TE'rs here, after all. But I'm not in one of the precincts where people had to wait for so long). I did say "likely" demographics, but I was afraid someone would take that wrong (and went ahead and posted it anyway ). Sigh.

The only assumption I made, which I understand is a big one on the Intertubes, was that most of us are who we represent ourselves to be here, and that most of us originally came to TE to talk about cycling.

We all have enough leisure time and computer access to be hanging out on the internet. We all have an interest in cycling that goes beyond strict economic necessity, which means we have some leisure time and some disposable income.

And most of all - more than once, people here have expressed concerns about merely RIDING through certain neighborhoods. The same kinds of precincts where year after year, elections officials have posted far too few voting machines for the number of voters. While many times people have said that we ride through those neighborhoods at certain hours and with perfect safety, *not once* has anyone responded with the kind of indignation that I personally feel when people express their prejudices about the kinds of people who live in my neighborhood (which is a whole different set of prejudices, but they can be just as deeply held).

And is it too crass to talk about race, when that played such a big part in so many decisions this year? Only the tiniest handful of us have identified ourselves as African-American or Latina. Of all of us who've posted pictures of ourselves, I can't think of anyone who isn't either white or Asian. That matches the racial makeup of women cyclists nationwide - I can't cite anything off the top of my head, but I know that there have been many surveys as well as local observations. De facto segregation is the reality in most of the country, and it's well documented that the people who live in the under-served precincts are overwhelmingly African-American.

All of the above leads me to believe that very few, if any of us, live in those precincts where people were forced to wait for hours.