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DOUG JOHNSON: Welcome to AMERICAN MOSAIC, in VOA Special English.
This is Doug Johnson. On our show this week:
Music from Queen Latifah … and questions from listeners aboutvoting in America.
And, we’ll tell you about a special program next week to mark ananniversary for Special English.
Voting
On November second, Americans willchoose a president and vice president. They will elect members ofCongress and state and local officials. And they will decide localmeasures. Between now and Election Day, we are going to answerlistener questions about voting.
Mister Nguyen from Vietnam wants to know how Americans vote forpresident. And C. Jayakumar of Tamil Nadu, India, and M.S. Haque ofBangladesh, both ask how old Americans must be to vote.
Voters must be at least eighteen. The voting age used to betwenty-one years old, until the Constitution was changed in nineteenseventy-one.
Here is another fact. Until nineteen twenty, the Constitution didnot permit women to vote. Today women vote at higher rates than menin national elections. The Census Bureau says this has been true formore than twenty years.
Still, not all adults have the right to vote. Most of the statesrequire voters not to have been found guilty of a major crime.Voters must also be American citizens. And they must be registeredto vote in the area where they live. Their names must appear on alocal election list.
In many states, a person must register at least two to four weeksbefore an election. Voters do not have to register again unless theymove to a different area or do not vote in several elections.
On Election Day, people usually vote in a school or other publicbuilding near their home. Voting is done by secret ballot. But localelection officials decide what kind of voting equipment is used.
Paper-and-pencil ballots are rare these days. But many systemsstill do use paper. Voters mark their choices on the ballot and acomputer counts the votes. Some places use machines to record voteswhen a person moves a lever next to the name of a candidate. Thesekinds of machines are old and are slowly being replaced.
Other kinds of voting machines use punch cards. Voters use adevice to make holes in the ballot to mark their choices. Then acomputer passes light through the holes to count the votes. Butthese devices are also being replaced.
The problems with vote counting in Florida four years ago ledCongress to pass the Help America Vote Act. Under this two thousandtwo law, states are getting money to buy modern technology. Still,officials say most voters this November will vote on the sameequipment they used four years ago.
The most modern voting machines today use touch screentechnology. Voters press on a computer screen to enter theirchoices. But some people question the security of these machines,especially without a printed record of the votes.
One way to avoid any machine at all is to vote early by absenteeballot. Election officials must receive the ballot on or beforeElection Day. This way of voting is increasingly popular. It avoidsany wait at voting stations. But there are also questions about thesecurity of absentee ballots against the possibility of cheating.
Special English Anniversary
HOST:
Special English will celebrate its forty-fifth anniversary nextweek. Here is Bob Doughty with the story.
BOB DOUGHTY: Special English began on October nineteenth,nineteen-fifty-nine. VOA officials wanted a program to communicatewith English learners. They wanted a way for people to get to knowthe language and, at the same time, learn about the United Statesand world events.
The writing is limited as much as possible to a list of about onethousand five hundred words. Our word book is online atvoaspecialenglish-dot-com. Another way that Special English isdifferent, as you can hear, is the speed. The rate is about onethird slower than standard English as spoken on VOA.
Some language experts thought the programs would be too simple ornot make sense. But listeners proved these experts wrong.
Listeners of this program know that we answer questions on theair about American life. Usually we choose one question per week.But next Tuesday, on the forty-fifth anniversary of Special English,we are going to present a special American Mosaic. We are going toanswer some of the most commonly asked questions that we get. Theanswers will also appear at WWW.51VOA.COM. So be sure tolisten Tuesday at this same time for our special American Mosaic.
Queen Latifah
The newest album from Queen Latifah contains none of the hip-hopmusic that made her famous. Instead, she performs jazz, blues, souland pop songs from the past. The collection is called “The DanaOwens Album.” Faith Lapidus explains.
FAITH LAPIDUS: Queen Latifah became Queen Latifah in college.Before that, she was Dana Owens, the name her parents gave her.Queen Latifah is famous as a rapper. But here she sings “HelloStranger,” a hit by Barbara Lewis in nineteen sixty-three.
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Queen Latifah says she got the idea for her new album afterlooking at her own record collection. She says she wanted to recordsome songs that had influenced her. One of them is “SimplyBeautiful” by Al Green. He joins her on the recording.
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Queen Latifah is also an actress. She stars with comedian JimmyFallon in the new action movie “Taxi.”
A few years ago Queen Latifah sang a famous Billy Strayhorn songin one of her movies. She recorded it again for her new album. Weleave you with Queen Latifah — or Dana Owens — and a song called”Lush Life.”
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HOST:
This is Doug Johnson.
I hope you enjoyed AMERICAN MOSAIC. Join us again next week forVOA’s radio magazine in Special English.
This program was written by Nancy Steinbach and Caty Weaver. PaulThompson was the producer. Our engineer was Jim Sleeman.