> Yes, all of these things ring true. It also occurs to me that I feel like exceptions to rules, such as absentee ballots and handicapped parking spaces, should be reserved for people who actually NEED them. Taking advantage of something just because you CAN is one of the things I dislike in people; ...

This makes sense, but what I can't figure out -- not just from this but from implications in other posts in this thread -- is where the general attitude that using an absentee ballot is "getting out of" something, or taking advantage of something they don't need. If you ask me, voting with an absentee ballot is way more inconvenient than going to the polling place directly.

But maybe that's just me. Our town is small enough that there aren't lines, and I probably have more of an aversion to processing outgoing snail mail than most.