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[Image courtesy of SFGate.com]

This morning’s headlines are a jolt to anyone who (like me!) was preparing to ease into the holiday season and a potent reminder that the field of elections is about to get even more interesting as we enter a Presidential election year:

  1. Indiana’s Secretary of State was declared ineligible to serve due to questions about his residency and – unless the state Supreme Court disagrees – must surrender his seat to the opponent he beat by more than 300,000 votes in 2010;
  2. South Carolina announced that its DMV had reviewed the list of active and inactive voters without required ID and revised that number downward from 240,000 to about 33,000 – which could have a big impact on the federal government’s decision whether to preclear the state’s new photo ID law; and
  3. The U.S. Election Assistance Commission – left for (un?)dead as a “zombie agency” by some in Congress after the resignation of its remaining Commissioners earlier this month – announced that a ballot scanner in use in Ohio and elsewhere does not meet federal standards, raising questions about such machines in 2012.

These headlines touch on all three of the traditional components of elections – people, process and technology – and come on top of an already eventful year for an “off year”.

A word of advice: enjoy your holidays – looks like 2012 might be even more interesting and eventful than any of us expected!

NOTE: Blogging will be light next week – at the very latest we’ll see you back here on Monday, January 2 … Happy New [Election] Year, all!