I read an article today describing how churches in Florida, once reliable spots for voting, are now declining to allow voting at their facility. I have a lot of reaction to that, primarily…you already get to avoid paying taxes, so you owe us. Host the polls. Another reaction is to wonder if their leadership has done the math and realizes that women’s rights (abortion) is likely to be a big issue this time around and they don’t want to facilitate women coming out to vote.

Combine this with some video I saw of long voter lines in Georgia and Mississippi from previous elections, and my reaction is…huh? I haven’t stood in a line to vote in at least a decade. Voting by mail is simple, easy, and convenient. What’s going on in those states that leads to gigantic voting lines?

I suppose that when you have energetic Rethuglican state and local leadership removing polling places, not allowing vote by mail, reducing the dates and times for voting, challenging the ID of voters, you get those long lines. But if those folks saw how easy it is to vote in CA, they’d be pissed. Long lines is probably all they know, and that’s a tragedy. It doesn’t have to be that way.

From Digby:

They report several other states are having the same problem. Meanwhile, the Republicans are trying to end vote by mail, drop boxes, drive up drop-off and any other way to make voting easier. And now they are threatening the polling places and election workers. Basically, they are trying to make voting extremely difficult. But I have to wonder — do they assume that their own voters won’t be affected by this?

And finally, the stock market took another big dive today, with the DJIA dropping below 30K for the first time in two years. Sigh. There goes two years of on-paper gains…