Word: turning
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...saturating our television screens with arguments for and against President Obama's health-care reform effort. They feature the staples of political advertising - fear mongering and comedy, comforting background music and ominous voiceovers. Depending on when you tune in, they promise either to cure your ills or turn America into Great Britain. And though the ad war is just getting started, it's time for a check up on the summer's hottest, and most jarring, health care reform commercials...
...There were some bright spots. Turnout in the northern provinces was extremely high - some districts were reporting 100% turnout by mid-afternoon. Residents of Lashkar Gah, the capital of Helmand province, which is at the center of the Taliban insurgency, defied a Taliban directive not to vote and turned out by the hundreds, according to a voter reached by phone. "Yes, the Taliban has told us that if we vote, they will cut off our fingers, but I don't care," says Assadullah, 24. Fellow voter Golalai Khan, 29, agrees, saying, "We need to vote, as it says...
...government ban on reporting election-day violence only heightened tensions. Nabi Ahmadi, an election volunteer at a station in central Kabul, was receiving regular updates via mobile phone from his brother, who was in turn hearing about violence from his network of friends throughout the city. "No one knows where the attacks are happening, so no one knows where it is safe to go vote," he says, gesturing at his empty polling station. Observers and volunteers outnumbered voters 20 to 1. Early in the day, nearly 100 men and half as many women had voted, he says, but since...
...ballots, a practice that could easily be mistaken as a coercive tactic in favor of the current government. International and independent Afghanistan observers worry that the lack of voters could open the way to fraud: corrupt officials might use the names and registration numbers of voters who didn't turn up with little fear of being caught. And with such a low turnout, even clean-winning candidates are unlikely to have a powerful mandate. (See pictures of the battle against the Taliban...
...universal theme was the low turnout by women. At one station in Kabul, no women had voted, and at another, just dozens turned up, compared with hundreds of men. This raises alarm bells. Women registered to vote in higher numbers than men this year, which many observers had found hard to believe in a traditional society like Afghanistan. Many suspect that men falsely registered fictitious wives and daughters in order to collect extra voting cards that could in turn be used to stuff ballot boxes. Few of the women's stations were monitored, which raises further questions. "I think people...