There’s been a little mistake in some of the sample ballots prepared in Hillsborough County, Florida — Rudy Giuliani’s name was misspelled, in a fashion suggesting that he is female (as opposed to merely appearing in drag once in a while as a joke). Oops. There’s time to fix it, but is it worth an extra $40,000 taxpayer dollars?
The responsible official (who is a Republican, and who admits he just plain screwed up) doesn’t know whether he should spend the money and time to do that. I think he should, but then again, I would. Hillsborough County includes the major city of Tampa and its very large suburb Brandon; the error affects a little bit more than 200,000 sample ballots; it’s a significant jurisdiction in Florida, which in turn is a critical state for both parties. No word on whether this will affect the actual ballots, although as I understand it plenty of voters use the sample ballots to prepare their punch-card votes before actually voting. (And if you do vote on a punchcard, please be sure to clear out any hanging chad. No one wants a repeat of Florida 2000.)
I’d be interested in what non-Giuliani supporters have to say about that decision.
