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And I'm sure there were no Democrats perpetrating evil.
Really Dan, your nightly bull is getting old.
By Donna Britt
Friday, November 12, 2004; Page B01
Is anyone surprised that accusations of voter disenfranchisement and irregularities abound after the most passionately contested presidential campaign in memory? Is anybody stunned that the mainstream media appear largely unconcerned?
To many people's thinking, too few citizens were discouraged from voting to matter. Those people would suggest that not nearly enough votes for John Kerry were missed or siphoned away to overturn President Bush's win. To which I'd respond:
Excuse me -- I thought this was America.
Informed that I was writing about voter disenfranchisement, a Democratic friend admitted, "I'm trying not to care about that." I understand. Less than two weeks after a bruising election in a nation in which it's unfashionable to overtly care about anything, it's annoying of me even to notice.
But citizens who insist, election after election, that each vote is sacred and then shrug at hundreds of credible reports that honest-to-God votes were suppressed and discouraged aren't just being hypocritical.
They're telling the millions who never vote because "it doesn't matter anyway" that they're the smart ones.
Come on. If Republicans had lost the election, this column would be unnecessary because Karl Rove and company would be contesting every vote. I keep hearing from those who wonder whether Democrats are "too nice," and from others who wonder whether efforts by the mainstream media to be "fair and balanced" sometimes render them "neutered and less effective."
Perhaps. But the much-publicized voting-machine error that gave Bush 4,258 votes in an Ohio precinct where only 638 people cast ballots preceded a flood of disturbing reports, ranging from the Florida voting machine that counted backward to the North Carolina computer that eliminated votes. In Ohio's Warren County, election officials citing "homeland security" concerns locked the doors to the county building where votes were being counted, refusing to allow members of the media and bipartisan observers to watch.
Bush won the county overwhelmingly.
Much of the media dismisses anxiety over such irregularities as grousing by poor-loser Democrats, rabid conspiracy theorists and pouters frustrated by Kerry's lightning-quick concession. Some of it surely is.
But more people's concerns are elementary-school basic -- which isn't coincidental since that's where many of us learned about democracy. We feel that Americans mustn't concede the noble intentions upon which our nation was founded to the cynical or the indifferent. We believe in our nation's sacred assurance that every citizen's voice be heard through his or her vote.
The point isn't just which candidate won or lost. It's that we all lose when we ignore that thousands of Americans might have been discouraged or prevented from voting, or not had their votes count.
If it were us, we'd be screaming bloody murder.
Election Protection, the nonpartisan coalition of civil rights organizations that sent 25,000 poll monitors across the nation to ensure that registered voters could cast their ballots, received hundreds of reports of Election Day abuses.
Some were from voters who said they repeatedly pressed the "Kerry" button on their electronic voting screens, only to have "Bush" keep lighting up. Others said that though they pushed "Kerry," they were asked to confirm their "Bush" vote. There were calls about a Broward County, Fla., roadblock that denied voters access to precincts in predominantly black districts, and reports from hundreds who said they'd registered weeks before Florida's October deadline yet weren't on the rolls.
Why aren't more Americans exercised about this issue? Maybe the problem is who's being disenfranchised -- usually poor and minority voters. In a recent poll of black and white adults by Harvard University professor Michael Dawson, 37 percent of white respondents said that widely publicized reports of attempts to prevent blacks from voting in the 2000 election were a Democratic "fabrication." More disturbingly, nearly one-quarter of whites surveyed said that if such attempts were made, they either were "not a problem" (9 percent) or "not so big a problem" (13 percent).
Excuse me?
Electronic, paper-trail-free voting is a danger to democracy that the United States can, and I believe will, address. But not giving a damn about fellow citizens' votes?
Election Protection volunteer Bernestine Singley, a Texas-based writer-lawyer I know, was torn between elation and outrage on Nov. 2 as she monitored polls in three Florida precincts. Inspiring to Singley were hundreds of volunteers, most of them white, who'd traveled hundreds of miles to ensure the inclusion of minority voters. She felt stirred by scores of young, black voters whose at ude, she says, was, "I don't care how long I have to stand in line before I do what I came here to do."
Singley's outrage was sparked by clearly hostile white poll workers, and the police officer who stood -- illegally -- by a polling place door, hand on his revolver.
Did I mention the guy who shoved her?
After watching Singley assist voters for hours, a scowling, white-haired 70-something poll worker patronizingly suggested that she was not a poll monitor. When she replied that he knew exactly what she was doing, he rammed his chest into hers, shoving her backward.
Pushing right back, Singley told the man, "You better get off me." He did. Minutes later, Singley says the man told another poll worker within her hearing: "I don't know why she thinks I know who she is. They all look alike to me."
Excuse me -- is this 2004 or 1954?
Ironically, if all Americans did look alike -- if "black" and "white" and "poor" and "well-to-do" didn't exist -- outrages such as those would happen much less often.
When they did, many more Americans would fight to ensure they never happened again.
Washington Post
And I'm sure there were no Democrats perpetrating evil.
Really Dan, your nightly bull is getting old.
Its not a Spurstalk requirement to read his posts (or is it?? I havent fully read the Terms of Service)
This is a big story and growing everyday, and I have been on top of it since the beginning. Why are you so worried if everything was on the up and up in the election?
I have no problems, I read your posts, some I agree with some I dont. Some interest me, some dont, I was telling AHF that he doesnt need to read your posts if he is getting tired of them.
Sorry Drachen, I was addressing AHF.
no problem, it wasnt clear to me...
Thought I would launch a pre-emptive strike, before I knew for sure who you were addressing.
Do like me and put him on ignore.
Dan....I predict that this whole thing is going to blow up in your face. In the end, this is a can of worms that you'll wish you'd never opened. Yes...there will probably be some fraud shown but more so to the Democratic side. Some people don't know well enough to leave things alone.
Look Dan, it's not apathy. It's about believing that there is no way Kerry had a 5 million vote swing because of voter fraud. I believe that there should be an investigation into every situation of voter fraud, but I'm not going to act as though thats what swung the election to Bush.
It's about time you started thinknig of ways to reform the party and ways to appeal to voters rather than grasping at straws which are hopeless.
Good reasoning Manny but you know as well as I do that Dan has only one agenda. He thrives on conspiricies that cause turmoil and that likens him to the efforts of the terrorists. He does not care for a united America. Only his America.
The impetus behind all of this rumormongering is driven by a partisan desire to delegitimize Bush's decisive election victory as much as it is to push for real reforms.
Dan, anytime asshole lawyers who lie and distort the truth get involved, I worry.
Look I dont know if I believe in massive fraud on either side, yet I do agree with the le of the thread. Lets say, for instance, that there was a just a little fraud (I dont care which side) and this is not looked into, it basically becomes a blank check for more fraud to be commited.
Oh and AHF the same can be said of politicians.
Last I checked it was the electoral college that decided the election and not the popular vote, and W only won Ohio by 135,000 votes before any of the provisional, absentee or oversea ballots have been counted. W only won New Mexico by less than 8,000 votes and Iowa by less than 17,600 votes before any of those ballots have been counted either. We are not talking about the manipulation of millions of votes here, just enough in the right places, namely Florida, Ohio, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada to get W over the hump.Look Dan, it's not apathy. It's about believing that there is no way Kerry had a 5 million vote swing because of voter fraud. I believe that there should be an investigation into every situation of voter fraud, but I'm not going to act as though thats what swung the election to Bush.
It's about time you started thinknig of ways to reform the party and ways to appeal to voters rather than grasping at straws which are hopeless.
Yes Hookdem, My America is one in which there is true bi-partisanship and not one which Republicans try and change the rules if they don't like them. In my America, reporters are willing and able to do investigative reporting - the real checks and balances to our otherwise corrupt form of government. In my America, our leaders do everything possible to prevent wars, and only ask our protectors to put their lives on the line when our sovereignty, our homeland, our financial and economic interests are in deep dire straits. In my America, our political leaders do what they can to draw us all closer together, not tear us fundamentally apart. In my America, religion isn't used as the sole critieria to distinguish between Progressives from Traditionalist. Real Issues matter as much as moral values.Good reasoning Manny but you know as well as I do that Dan has only one agenda. He thrives on conspiricies that cause turmoil and that likens him to the efforts of the terrorists. He does not care for a united America. Only his America.
In my America, if we easily give up rights guaranteed to us in the cons ution and the bill of rights, that which our founding fathers fought and died for, then Osama Bin Laden has already won.
Yes, hookdem, that is my dream of America. I would hope that in your nationalistic furor, your single-mindedness to avenge 911 against anyone and everyone, we could find some common ground along the way.
Last edited by Nbadan; 11-13-2004 at 03:21 AM.
The real impedus is Americans who care about the loss of democracy and the lack of transparency in our election system, at a time when our nation is trying to rationalize spending billions of dollars to foster democracy in the Middle East. If we can't get it right here, do we have any right to even be over there?The impetus behind all of this rumormongering is driven by a partisan desire to delegitimize Bush's decisive election victory as much as it is to push for real reforms.
Provisional ballots first have to pass the hurdle of being allowed. Also, at a state level they will probably break close to the way the rest of the state went in the election.Last I checked it was the electoral college that decided the election and not the popular vote, and W only won Ohio by 135,000 votes before any of the provisional, absentee or oversea ballots have been counted.
Absentee ballots tend to favor the GOP.
Oversea ballots? That includes the military.
With the slight problem that one would need to know the outcome of the election before that manipulation could occur. Also you seem to ignore the possibility of Demo voter fraud. Go figure.W only won New Mexico by less than 8,000 votes and Iowa by less than 17,600 votes before any of those ballots have been counted either. We are not talking about the manipulation of millions of votes here, just enough in the right places, namely Florida, Ohio, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada to get W over the hump.
"In my America, our political leaders do what they can to draw us all closer together, not tear us fundamentally apart." .............................As demonstrated by the Democrats in the most current election?
Dan these days
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