One of the more bizarre aspects of an American Election, from the point of view of a European, is the fact the there isn't a standard set of rules. So Obama's dead grandmother would have had her early-ballot pulled if she lived Iowa, but it's counted because she lives in Hawaii. And if she lived in Pennsylvania, she probably wouldn't have been allowed to vote early.

The same goes for the argument above about whether a "straight party ticket" vote includes the Presidential race - it does in some places, and not in others, apparently.

Of course, for European wide elections, each European country uses it's own rules, but then there aren't European-wide elections for a single office, just country-wide elections for local representation in a EU-wide parliament.

"And there is still vote rigging on a massive scale in the largest democracy."

Although it's probably very interesting, I can't see what relevance the situation in India has to this article...

In Hawaii, as long as the dead person's name has not yet shown up on the dead people list by election day, the absentee vote will count. In Obama's grandmother's case, she died on Sunday evening and by Tuesday morning her name was not yet included on the dead people list, so her absentee vote counts. The dead people list is pulled from a database maintained by the state coroner's office. It could easily have gone either way, but, for you conspiracy theorists who enjoy kicking around ridiculously irrelevant notions, it is entirely possible that the state coroner's office decided to withhold publication of Obama's grandmother's demise in the list until after the election so that her absentee ballot would count, to honor her wishes. It certainly made no difference to the outcome, and there is no regulation requiring publication to the list within any particular timeframe.

Great article, Pete.

Thanks for the well written reply. It makes a lots of sense that the dead people list can be slightly out of date.