A 50-state report by national election watchdogs rates Florida in the vast middle in election preparedness. The report by the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU, Common Cause and Verified Voting Foundation focused on emergency procedures for faulty touch screens, availability of paper records, and how states tally and audit election results.

The groups do not like Florida's voter verification law, which requires an exact match of numbers on post-Sept. 8 voter registration forms and driver license or Social Security number. Common Cause estimates that 10,000 to 15,000 new voters in Florida could be affected and would have to cast provisional ballots.

But the group praised Gov. Charlie Crist for leading the switch from paperless electronic machines to paper ballots cast on optical scan units. "It's an enormous, tremendous improvement, and we extend appropriate commendations," said Susannah Goodman, head of election reform at Common Cause. (The only reason the state didn't get higher marks from the report is that it continues to use touch screens until 2012 for voters with disabilities, and those units don't include a paper trail.) Read the report here.

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