It’s just struck me: if, like almost every other liberal democracy [*], the US allowed former criminals to vote [**], then we’d be preparing for President Gore’s second term.
John Kerry wouldn’t have won this time round, in case you were wondering, although the popular vote would have been somewhat closer (Ohio doesn’t disenfranchise felons, and the margin in Florida this time round was too wide for the changes to make a difference).
[*] New Zealand, Belgium and Finland are the only exceptions in the Western world, and their bans all have a 10-year or less time limit.
[**] 13 states impose permanent bans on ex-prisoners, and another 19 impose temporary bans. State-by-state breakdown here.
We might well have had one term of Gore, but I’m not so sure he’d have won a second. I think the fact that the rules that made it easier for Arab terrorists to get on to planes were his doing might have been too difficult to live down.