DEMENTI3.CBS 09/14/04 7:06 AM-DLR   1:26
Do you know who you're voting for?  This is Dave Ross on the CBS Radio Network.
This was an interesting headline in the Washington Post:
"Dementia and the Voter - Research Raises Ethical and Constitutional Questions."
And the article begins with a comment from a neurologist in Florida who discovered to his shock that one of his patients - who thought it was 1942 and that FDR was President - had voted in the 2000 presidential election.
A couple of studies, in fact, indicate that voters who get treatment at dementia clinics actually have a higher turnout than the general population - which raises the possibility that in close elections, who wins or loses could be determined by people who think it's 1942 - or more likely, by the relatives or caregivers who have access to their ballots.
Or even by party activists who I have no doubt would LOVE to go doorbelling in hospitals and nursing homes and help the patients break through any mental confusion before election day.
This has led to suggestions that perhaps we should test voter competence before elderly people ballots, and some states already have laws that take away the right to vote if your affairs have been turned over to a guardian.
But worrying about whether the four-and-a-half million dementia patients in this country are competent to vote implies that somehow we needn't worry about whether the REST of us are competent to vote.
I mean, a lot of us are going to vote based on a bunch of TV ads which don't have to meet any standard of truth.  I don't see how that's much worse than going to the polls thinking it's 1942.
Especially considering you have POLITICIANS who think it's 1942 - and no one's testing them!  Now this.
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