Re: Dementia victims take voting seriously

[ken hanly <khanly@xxxxxxx>]

Of course the dementia patients vote in higher numbers because they have the
irrational idea that their vote will make a difference. Less of the general
population have this illusion.

Do residents of mental institutions get to vote in the US? At least in
Manitoba they can as can prisoners and we even allow judges to vote! When I
was on the Manitoba Law Reform Commission we recommended amending the law
and it was accepted. Interesting that in studying the experience of other
countries governing parties were sometimes wary of  allowing mental patients
and prisoners to vote since they thought they would vote for opposition
parties. However the distrbution of votes is generally not different from
the overall population in places where prisoner and mental patients votes
are allowed. I imagine judges might vote for the party in power!


Cheers, Ken Hanly
----- Original Message -----
From: "Louis Proyect" <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <PEN-L@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Sunday, September 19, 2004 8:08 AM
Subject: [PEN-L] Dementia victims take voting seriously


> Dementia and the Voter
> Research Raises Ethical, Constitutional Questions
>
> By Shankar Vedantam
> Washington Post Staff Writer
> Tuesday, September 14, 2004; Page A01
>
> Florida neurologist Marc Swerdloff was taken aback when one of his
patients
> with advanced dementia voted in the 2000 presidential election. The man
> thought it was 1942 and Franklin D. Roosevelt was president. The patient's
> wife revealed that she had escorted her husband into the booth.
>
> "I said 'Did he pick?' and she said 'No, I picked for him,' " Swerdloff
> said. "I felt bad. She essentially voted twice" in the Florida election,
> which gave George W. Bush a 537-vote victory and the White House.
>
> As swing states with large elderly populations such as Florida gear up for
> another presidential election, a sleeper issue has been gaining attention
> on medical, legal and political radar screens: Many people with advanced
> dementia appear to be voting in elections -- including through absentee
> ballot. Although there are no national statistics, two studies in
> Pennsylvania and Rhode Island found that patients at dementia clinics
> TURNED OUT IN HIGHER NUMBERS than the general population. [emphasis added]
>
> full: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A18916-2004Sep13.html