In an age where we can pull $1000 out of any ATM worldwide, it's absurd that we're stuck in an age-old tradition of going to a particular precinct on a particular day to stand in a pretty retro booth to vote.

There's no reason not to have voting places where everyone can vote if we can't just do it via our mobile phones (yes, there are considerations for voting fraud, but as new last minute software for Ohio machines shows, we have this to contend with anyway).

It's 20 years after the internet became popular with WWW, new 4G LTE is on any decent mobile phone, yet here we are, like Mary & Joseph with preggers belly in tow, making our way to our home precinct to make our voting preference known and find a spare manger as well.

2012 years later (give or take 4 or more), we still haven't convinced officials that normal people are mobile, active, on the road and on the go. Bring the ballot to the people. It's not so much that people are lazy - they have a life. Yeah, it sounds heart-thrilling to hear that a mother working 2 jobs will take off to go vote. And it's less than heart-thrilling to find out she had too many orders of chicken or withdrawal slips to process or little Sally caught the flu and she didn't quite make it to the overlong voting queue in time. My father has trouble making it out of his chair to reach the shitter - how's he supposed to vote?

For a nation that celebrates the act of voting so much, we sure do make it a pain in the ass. If they're going to make it long and complicated, why not offer a free MRI at the same time - I hear that's what differentiates us & Canada. Why not put voting booths in emergency rooms? People are used to waiting there, and pulling a lever is easier than pulling a mistaken drill bit out of your arm or pencil out of your eye. Have ballots handy at the driver's license office - it's just like doing 1 more test. For those hit by Sandy, just have the ballots there at the homeless shelters along with food, some warm clothing and a tarp or blanket (yes, they're trying to do this). Hooters? Get your ballot with pigs in blanket and a beer or whatever their specials look like. Sports stadiums? If they can shove 110,000 screaming fans into Michigan Stadium each Saturday, give 'em some forms to do the wave with. Or better yet, run a contest between Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Samsung, Sony, Comcast, CNN, Budweiser, NFL, Starbucks, Warner Brothers & Twitter to see who can pay most & do most with the voter rolls - somehow we'd be able to vote via TV and while sitting in class and on a plane or during a tailgate party or in a theater, while elections would make a profit.

(Don't go all noble on me - they already make a huge profit for the media and special consultants and pollsters, so it's just just an issue of spreading the wealth)

Just somewhere, somehow, let's have the next election look like it's in a real social media, audience-centric age, rather than just an upgraded hijackable screen front end to a 1950's voting booth. Do it for the Beav and June, they'll love you for all time. Maybe we can have a voting drive-in just for them - girls on roller skates and all that modern stuff.

It's strange that we can take a supposedly sanctified Christmas holiday and commercialize the hell out of it, while we can't take an overly commercialized 2 year election process and... commercialize its finale. If Macy's were running elections, they could have everyone in New York voting 10 times on election day. And still run a parade. If it were American Idol, we'd have interactive voting joy-sticks across the land.

Somehow, somewhere, our ingenuity seems to take a holiday in the wrong places. Maybe next time we can get it right.