I did my civic duty and voted today. I'm not going to really say who I voted for, because that undermines the general purpose and ruins some of the surprize. I will mention how I voted, though.

The ballot at my polling place was a single long sheet of paper, with three (if I recall correctly) columns of things to vote for on both sides. Here's a sample from somewhere near me, but not my ballot.. The bulk of the first column was for president,with the rest of the column and first side divided among some state stuff, the amendments, and some local stuff. Turning the sheet over revealed a slew of judges, most running unopposed.

I will say that I don't always vote for president. There, that cat's out of the bag. In the rest of the elections I believe my vote counts, but in the case of the vote for president, Minnesota does not mandate how the electoral college votes, so I'm pretty sure their minds are made up without my vote, and since they've voted for the democratic candiate every time since 1976 (when it went Nixon), and primarily voting democrat since 1932.

That said, I did vote for president this year. I've also done it in the past, but in the handful of presidential elections that have been had since I've been able to vote, I've often skipped that bracket. I'm not going to say who I voted for, but just that I voted this time, even though I'm pretty sure it won't matter.

I also voted for the state-level stuff.  Honestly, it's about the only thing on the ballot in which I felt I was even partially informed in a manner befitting the description "informed." Sadly, much of the informing was sound-bite attack-ad stuff, but at least there's some record of activity one can seek on the incumbents and other career politicians seeking different jobs. I'm comfortable that my (limited) research and awareness gave me confidence to vote in these few cases. Probably the only cases on the ballot that my votes matter, anyway.

For the senate and such, I voted with who I knew to be doing a good job, or against who I thought was doing a bad job.

Of primary concern were the two big amendment votes: marriage and voter ID. In both cases I voted against the amendments. I'm going to leave my position on either of the underlying topics for the amendments for your interpretation (although you can probably guess both), but I don't think either should be an amendment. I believe both of these things can be, and are, better controlled by laws and rules.

It's currently the case that Minnesota doesn't recognize same-sex marriage, and the amendment didn't change that. The amendment further goes against what I think of as "freedom," by adding a restriction instead of defining a defense of a liberty. I'm thinking more of prohibition than the more often bandied segregation laws; there are laws governing alcohol, in some cases banning its sale and use, and that's fine, but prohibiting it at the constitutional level just didn't work. Whatever the sways of public thinking may be in the future to change the current laws, having this amendment pass adds unnecessary burden to future lawmakers as they'd first have to overturn the amendment in order to even begin discussing changing any laws.

It's currently the case that Minnesotans don't have to present ID in order to vote. You do have to provide proof of residency at some point to register to vote (an ID or even piece of mail generally suffices). When I voted today, I was asked for my name and address twice in order to get a ballot, but I did not have to present an ID. While he amendment would have imposed an ID requirement to vote. Further, it would have required the state to provide this ID for free if the person didn't have other ID. I'm ambivalent about presenting ID at the polling place; really it would have saved time as I wouldn't have had to spell my name or street (neither of which is difficult, even with my mumbling speech). There are few people of voting age without recognized identification, so adding the burden of providing them for free, and having them be of some value (and not a type-written name on an old library card...) adds what I believe is unnecessary cost. Again, I believe this is better suited for a law or rule than an amendment.

Loads of other amendments have passed that probably shouldn't have. Other things that should simply have been laws or rules, but are now "forever" in our governance. The whole Minnesota constitution is available from The Office of the Revisor of Statutes (who knew we had such a thing?). "Forever" we're now mandated how to spend highway funding and preserve parks. Well, "forever" means until 2034, in the case of "outdoor heritage" (Article 11, Section 15...look it up); that it has an end-date smacks of "should be a law."

So I voted to smack down some amendments that shouldn't be amendments. We'll see how that goes as the news stations were reporting that both were tightly polling in the 48% range, with a 5% margin of error...so "maybe" is the way to interpret that, right?

Also on the ballot were a number of more local positions. I hadn't heard of the positions much less the people running, so they didn't get votes. Likewise there were a number of judges on the ballot, most running unopposed, as I'd mentioned before. None of these got votes from me. I mean, who am I to randomly pick people?

So there you have it. I did vote for president even though I don't believe my vote counts. I voted against both amendments, hoping to leave those open for other laws and rules. I voted for other people I liked and against those I didn't, but only where I knew something about it. I didn't vote for anyone or anything I didn't know about, or who ran unopposed.