In the wake of controversy regarding the Department of Justice complacency regarding violation of voting rights by New Black Panther Party members comes news that the DOJ is also freely granting waivers that allow states to ignore the votes of our citizens in the military:

Much of this disaster could have been avoided by the Voting Section of the Justice Department, and without swift action, the Voting Section will cause a similar disaster in 2010 despite congressional efforts to fix the problem.

The primary hurdle, according to most experts, is time. Nearly every military-voting expert agrees that absentee ballots must be sent to overseas military voters at least 45 days before an election to give those voters sufficient time to receive and return their ballots. The Military Postal Service Agency goes one step further and recommends that absentee ballots be sent to war zones 60 days before an election.

Unfortunately, states have been slow to revamp their voting laws to accommodate a 45-day mailing standard. Before the 2008 election, at least 10 states and the District of Columbia provided military voters with just 35 days or fewer to receive and return their ballots. Overall, the Pew Center on the States found that "more than a third of states [did] not provide military voters stationed abroad with enough time to vote or [were] at high risk of not providing enough time."

Yet the primary entity responsible for protecting military voters, the Voting Section, decided not to pursue those states even though federal law (i.e., the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act) gave the section wide latitude to protect military voters.