It’s not surprising that the parties and the voters have adapted themselves to the absentee ballot possibilities. What is equally, if not more interesting, is why the absentee ballots make such sense in the circumstances. The campaigns are too long. Most people are not political junkies like us, and they want them to be over (if they don’t wish that the campaigns wouldn’t start as early as they do). There is no logical connection between long campaigns and heavy use of absentee ballots, but there is a pyschological connection in that it affords relief for millions of people from what they wish would go away. What’s next! Computer voting whenever anyone feels like it? (By the way, I’ve voted absentee myself for the usual old-fashioned reasons, like not being home on election day.)