Election Fraud Blog

On March 31, a certain Air America Radio personality and comedian reportedly related a comment that it was "more likely than not" that 2004 Ohio presidential voting was not "hacked". He cited unspecified MIT professors that did an unspecified amount of work on this issue (perhaps none). In any case, it wasn’t too dang funny.

Leaving aside the issue that only four counties in Ohio had touch screen voting machines and that the bulk of available methods of altering computerized election results illegally would not be fairly described as "hacks", and also leaving aside the various professors and computer experts who would beg to differ with or qualify this MIT statement, there’s a very important realization that gets lost regarding the likely strategy of anyone contemplating election fraud:

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WHEREVER it is more likely than not that something is innocuous or at least not deliberate, that is the VERY BEST place for a hacker or rigger to attack!
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An insider rigger, in particular, has little to no barriers to action (they’re "insiders", right?). Yet, election fraud is among the most intentional and planned of crimes. So the rigger will concentrate their mental efforts on planning defenses and deniability. That’s why they attack particularly in places that look like "glitches", look like human error, that look like "voter error", or look like machine defects of a non-intentional nature.

Touch screen calibration problems are a great example. Miscalibration can happen naturally from vibration, it can happen from a attempted recalibration error, it can happen because of software "glitches", or IT CAN HAPPEN AS AN INTENTIONAL ATTACK, by a user, by an insider official, or by the source code.

But, in the event of such an actual intentional attack, it will be easy to find an expert who in good faith can state it’s "more likely than not" that this is just _________________ (you fill in the non-intentional excuse from the list above). They won’t be "lying", not intentionally.

Many things are MORE LIKELY THAN NOT non-intentional. Yet that very fact makes it the perfect place to attack. Journalists will almost never get beyond a fork in the road like this because they want "proof" not alternative possibilities, and investigators will similarly be either fooled by the seeming innocuousness or deterred from passing by this fork in the road by fears of going out on a limb. One necessarily IS going out on a limb and blowing past the innocent explanations.

But, once way out on the limb, you can pick up more facts that can help distinguish the non-intentional from the intentional. And, a good investigator NEEDS to do that, but few do. Among other things, piecing together facts to put together even a compelling VERY MUCH MORE LIKELY THAN NOT case is to be what we all know and are taught to distrust as "conspiracy theory". Because there’s an alternative innocent explanation. Some also invoke Occam’s Razor, saying the simpler explanation is the better one. But that also means that the slightly more complicated fraud is the BEST one of all, the one that doesn’t get you caught.

I am definitely NOT suggesting that every mis-named "glitch" evasion or every "voter error" allegation is cover for election fraud. I’m saying it’s attractive potential and even likely cover for election fraud. And I freely admit that it is quite possible that there is no actual intentional fraud in most given cases, so long as my opponent acknowledges that fraud can’t be ruled out, either.

In any event, regardless of the presence of intent or not, the damage to democracy from "glitches" is almost identical between when the results are thrown off non-intentionally and when they are thrown off intentionally. In both cases, an inaccurate election result is being published as the gospel truth. Passing off a knockoff tennis shoe as Adidas is itself a form of fraud on the consumer, even if the storekeeper had no idea they were knockoffs and therefore lacks the knowledge and intent necessary for the type of fraud laymen usually assume is the only type of "fraud", the intentional type more precisely called "common law fraud".

So given that in most cases where multiple possibilities exist on the issue of intentional vs. nonintentional, a fair-minded person has to admit that it is at least POSSIBLE that it was non-intentional error, just as a fair-minded person has to admit that it is POSSIBLE that it is fraudulent or intentional error, in the classic sense. MAKING ONE OF THESE TWO POSSIBILITIES THE ONE THAT IS "MORE LIKELY THAN NOT" HARDLY SEEMS TO END THE ISSUE, because the key evidence is still being withheld under trade secrecy claims of the corporate vote counting vendors.

This is why TRANSPARENCY is so VERY important. It is indispenable, and in fact MORE IMPORTANT THAN ACCURACY (if we were forced to choose). This is so because All serious barriers to full election data, information and testing are doomsday devices for democracy that prevent us from knowing which of thousands of glitches and miscalibrations were covers for fraud and which were not. Therefore we can not adjust our course, or make any correction and lies are known as the truth.

There are many serious issues to choose from, global warming, war and peace, human rights, etc. But the reason election transparency is more primary and more important than the rest of these issues is because the only thing scarier and more dangerous than these runaway train issues is having the ability to correct course via legitimate elections taken away.

It’s like putting blindfolds on the train engineer and all the passengers, who know they can’t see well but none of whom are allowed to be fully aware of the nature and extent of the blindfold, limiting their ability to even try to remove it. Then, just like elections, those who’ve placed the blindfolds on say you have no standing to challenge the blindfold or ask a court for its removal because you can’t prove that you’ve been damaged or that damage is otherwise imminent.

The barriers to information that are the doomsday devices for democracy are also the instruments of our collective terror, and that deceptively divide us passengers, even as we all act in complete good faith as passengers. This happens when the passengers argue amongst themselves as to what is happening to them on a "more likely than not" basis. The passengers are all themselves most likely acting entirely in good faith, but the arguments are part fact and part Rohrschach test, with no correct answer per se.

But there is one Answer that is clearly wrong. It is the Answer that says "because the data suggesting DANGER AHEAD, while present, is not Proven, and while these fellow passengers of course support transparency and taking the blindfolds off, they nevertheless strongly maintain that there’s NO BASIS to accuse those who placed the blindfolds on us passengers of bad faith."

There most certainly is such a basis. Reckless endangerment to democracy, attempted democracide, and democracide itself, though we won’t find the body of democracy until we realize that the act of blindfolding the passengers was the death of democracy, with the crime completed at that time. What happens after is the "collateral damage" to the passengers. Many passengers, unfortunately, tend to think that having been taught that they were born into a democracy, if they have not personally died or moved out of their country of birth, they must STILL BE in a democracy. And, all jailers have pretty much seen the wisdom of allowing television, so perhaps in this age of miniaturization it is not too far a stretch to imagine that the blindfolds look like shades, and the shades allow the passengers to watch virtual TV. With this TV, they think their field of vision has actually been expanded enormously.

Somebody should find out who placed the blindfolds on, and when that person is found, you will have found a true terrorist against democracy. Meanwhile, others will keep scouring the sands of the Middle East, for a similar purpose of finding terrorists against democracy. Perhaps you should have a little compassion for these rank and file Grand Old Passengers in support of the Middle East democracy threat hypothesis, for at least they understand or intuit that there’s a danger, though they fail to appreciate much danger from within. Those that have a better idea what’s happened to them can also fail to appreciate fully that what they are in fact trying to restore in democracy is a system that will continue to allow freedom, including the freedom to believe the TV, for freedom is meaningless if it doesn’t include the freedom to do or believe unpopular or incorrect things. So, this freedom we are fighting for, includes the freedom and certainly must include the freedom for innocent rank and file to continue to believe as they do.

At the end of my blindfolded runaway train allegory, the passengers win. But they do so for somewhat surprising reasons:

1. They win because they convince a majority of passengers that if they do not admit to the significant possibility that someone would takeover the American Train and blindfold the passengers, then they must not think TrainAmerica is a very good train, because they don’t think any one would truly covet her that badly. Our Grand Old Passengers were forced to admit on that because they loved their country, and thus the danger of election fraud was properly recognized as a serious threat.

2. They win because they agree to disagree with the Grand Old Passengers, acknowledging that both rank and file groups were out of luck if the overall situation continued, and that the condition to be restored retained all the rights of all political beliefs and that the officers of the train that had failed them included representatives of both parties. Our Grand Old Passengers were forced to admit that they didn’t want to be disfranchised either alone or together with the activist passengers, and thus the shared values and interests were recognized.

3. They win because it became clear that it wasn’t "cool" to have these kinds of "shades" on, train or no train. Our Grand Old Passengers were forced to admit that not being able to correct one’s course at all was a most serious recipe for maximum unhappiness of all passengers, and thus the value of transparency in elections was suddenly clear.

The passengers removed the blindfolds and stormed the engine. The terrorists against democracy turned out to be more pathetic than the man behind the curtain in the Wizard of Oz.

It’s just that, in returning to their seats and now enjoying the train ride much more than before, those of both political parties that see themselves as the Masters of Democracy or even the Masters of the Universe were already secretly preparing the next set of blindfolds. But this time, every compartment on the train had regular visual and audio reminders that said:

"Beware those who would deny you information. For in their heart, they see themselves your Master."

—Paul R Lehto
Attorney at Law
lehtolawyer@hotmail.com

Posted by Land Shark on Democratic Underground 

In the next two weeks there will be a final push to get H.R. 550, a bill introduced by Rep. Holt of New Jersey, on the House floor. H.R. 550 would protect the integrity of our elections by requiring a voter verified paper record of every vote, requiring mandatory random hand counted audits to verify the accuracy of electronic tallies, which is the only way to ever conduct an audit we can trust. It will also prohibit the use of secret software and wireless communication devices in voting machines.

The recent change in leadership of the Committee on House Administration has created a new opportunity for passage of this vital election integrity measure. Previous constituent meetings in June and August of 2005 were a huge success, generating 24 new co-sponsors on the bill from both parties. In addition, 27 States have now passed voter-verified paper record requirements.

THERE ARE THREE WAYS YOU CAN HELP — lobby in person in Washington, D.C. or your home district . . . and/or sign the petition:

IF YOU CAN COME TO WASHINGTON DC ON APRIL 6 & 7 TO LOBBY MEMBERS OF CONGRESS TO COSPONSOR HR 550, CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP:
http://www.icountcoalition.org/dclobby.html

IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO ARRANGE TO MEET LOBBY IN YOUR HOME DISTRICT, CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP:
http://www.icountcoalition.org/indistrictsignup.html

IF YOU CAN’T COME TO WASHINGTON DC (OR EVEN IF YOU CAN), CLICK HERE TO SIGN THE PETITION URGING THE HOUSE ADMINISTRATION COMMITTEE TO PASS HR 550 AS WRITTEN ASAP:
http://www.millionphonemarch.com/hr550.php

Please take action NOW, so we can win all victories that are supposed to be ours, and forward this message to everyone else you know.

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March 7, 2005

By Ernest Partridge, The Crisis Papers

The accumulated weight of evidence of election fraud – statistical, circumstantial, and anecdotal – has failed to move the mainstream media to report or investigate this evidence, or the Democratic party to acknowledge and protest the apparent Republican control of our elections.

This essay is not yet another account of that evidence, which I have spelled out extensively and which I firmly believe to be compelling.

Instead, I wish to deal with another indicator that our national elections no longer represent the will of the voters, but rather are manipulated to produce the outcome desired by the "winning" candidates and party. This indicator is the behavior of those who manufacture, program, and operate the paperless, unauditable machines (direct recording electronic: "DRE"), and those who benefit from this technology.

Perhaps this new electronic voting technology is as honest and reliable as the private election industry and the winning candidates tell us it is. However, they simply do not behave as if this were the case.

My contention might be illustrated by this parable:

Suppose that a drug-sniffing dog at an airport identifies a suspicious piece of luggage. The customs officer then locates the individual whose name is on the tag, and orders him to open it. Now suppose further that this person then proceeds to do one or more of the following:

a) He denies that the luggage is his.

b) He calls his lawyer who presents an injunction against further inspection of the luggage.

c) He claims that he is a diplomat, and thus not subject to luggage inspection.

d) He offers a bribe to the inspector if he will "forget the whole thing."

Might one not suspect that the traveler was trying to hide something?

The dog then gets back to work, and soon identifies another bag, and the owner of this parcel is identified and ordered to open the luggage for inspection. He does so willingly and without qualm, having packed the bag himself and thus knowing that there is no contraband therein. He is also aware that the dog has a record of 30% false positives.

Which of these two responses more closely resembles the behavior of the DRE manufacturers (Diebold, ES&S and Sequoia), of the Republican Congress, and of the Republican National Committee? Are the DRE manufacturers and the Republicans acting in a manner consistent with their claims that "e-voting" is both honest and accurate? Or are they behaving as if they have something to hide?

Here are a few indicators. Because there are so many, I will be brief. For details and documentation, follow the links:

• First and foremost: DRE machines use secret software and produce no separate record of the voting to allow auditing and validation of the votes. Thus, by design, it is impossible either to prove or disprove directly the accuracy of the vote totals of a DRE machine or the neutrality of the software. (However, there is abundant indirect evidence of e-voting fraud: statistical, anecdotal and circumstantial evidence. But that’s another topic).
• The manufacturers and programmers of DREs (all of whom have close ties with the Republican Party) insist that their software ("source codes") must be kept secret – for no apparent and defensible reason. (They claim to be concerned about copyright infringement. But music, essays, fiction, drama, etc., all are public by nature, and yet all are protected by copyright).
• The e-voting manufacturers also make ATM machines and automated gas pumps, both of which produce paper receipts. Yet they steadfastly resist demands that their "touch screen" voting machines produce printouts, which might then serve to validate the accuracy of the votes.
• DRE manufacturers will not allow "test hacks" of randomly selected machines. (Unauthorized hacks have proven DREs to be extremely vulnerable to fraudulent manipulation. So too a recent report by the non-partisan Government Accountability Office: a report that has been virtually ignored by the mainstream press).
• A bill by Rep. Rush Holt (D-NJ) that would require validated printed paper receipts of the votes and random inspection of the DRE machines has been locked up in committee by the Congressional Republicans. A discharge petition, which would allow a vote on the bill, is unavailing, due to insufficient support by the Republicans.
• In 2000, computer programmer Clinton Curtis was asked by a GOP congressional candidate, Tom Feeney, to create a software program that would alter vote counts in favor of the Republicans. Curtis testified to this under oath, signed an affidavit, and took a polygraph test. Of course, Feeney, now a congressman, denies Curtis’ allegations, but unlike Curtis, Feeney refuses to state his denial under oath or to submit to a polygraph.
• In California, Stephen Heller, a temporary employee of Diebold Election Systems, obtained copies of memos indicating that Diebold may have used uncertified voting systems in the 2004 primary and suggesting that thousands of voters might be disenfranchised in subsequent elections. Heller’s "reward" for blowing this whistle? He was charged with three felony counts and, if convicted, could serve more than three years in state prison.
• In 2004, California Secretary of State Kevin Shelley decertified Diebold DRE machines. In a special recall election, Republican Arnold Schwarznegger replaced Democrat Gray Davis. Kevin Shelley was then harassed and forced out of office and replaced by Republican Bruce McPherson, who "conditionally" recertified the Diebold machines. (These are two types of machines: Optical scan with paper ballots, and "TSX" with touch-screens and no paper record. It is the paperless TSX machines that are especially vulnerable to undetectable manipulation and fraud." There is a heated debate within the election reform community as to whether Optical Scanning is an acceptable improvement over DREs, or whether, on the other hand, only hand counted paper ballots will do. But that’s a topic for another essay).
• The Alaska "flip-flop." The Republican state government of Alaska refused to release to the Alaska Democrats the Diebold database files from the 2004 election on the grounds that it was "a company secret." (These were records of a public election, mind you). After persistent requests, the state relented albeit under very restrictive conditions. But then, just two weeks ago, the state again denied the request, claiming that it was a "security risk" to the state of Alaska.
• December 20, 2005: Rather than obey a North Carolina law requiring that source codes be made public, Diebold withdrew its machines from the state elections.

There is much more, which you might find here and here. But this much suffices to make my point.

What we find, then, is an industry and a political party which, on the one hand, insists that the totals from electronic voting machines are entirely accurate and honest, though these same machines are so designed that they preclude any independent evidence to support these claims. On the other hand, this same industry and party steadfastly resist any and all attempts to introduce reliable methods of validation, much less the most reliable system of all: hand counted paper ballots.

Persistent suspicion and charges of fraud are damaging to the industry and the GOP. If they are as innocent as they claim to be, why don’t they just eliminate these damaging suspicions by offering proof, and then allowing, and even encouraging, paper records, independent audits, and exit polls?

Despite a near-total embargo by the mainstream media of news, analysis, investigation and commentary on ballot security and allegations of fraud, combined with an astonishing indifference to the issue on the part of the Democrats and their allies, public doubts about the security and accuracy of elections and hence of the legitimacy of the Republican control of the White House and the Congress, simply will not go away. In fact, these concerns appear to be increasing and will likely continue to increase, as the credibility and public approval of the Bush regime continues to drop.

Here’s a thought experiment for those who insist, despite all evidence to the contrary, that the past three elections were above reproach and doubt. Put this confidence aside for a moment and just imagine, hypothetically, that the elections of 2000, 2002, and 2004 were all fixed, and that the coming election of 2006 will be fixed. Then ask yourself: if this were so, how would the behavior of the industry and the GOP be in any way different from what it is now?

Then ask, if the elections are honest and accurate, why don’t the industry and the Republicans act like it? In short, if they are innocent, why do they willingly persist in appearing guilty?

These questions must be asked by the Democrats, loudly and persistently, for as Karl Rove and the GOP propaganda machine knows so well, repetition is the key to successful persuasion of the public. Satire and ridicule are also very much in order. We must "pile it on" until continuing silence by the GOP and by the compliant mainstream media becomes unendurable.

And if the e-voting establishment – party and industry – are ever forced, however reluctantly, to enact reforms consistent with their protestations of innocence, what might they do?

Here is a list of proposals that any honest voting machine industry and political party should be willing to endorse:

a) Publish the source codes. (The copyrights can be fully protected.)

b) Include printers with all machines. Stipulate by law that in case of recounts, the paper receipts are to be the official ballots of record.

c) Require independent audits – of local balloting, and of regional compiling of election returns.

d) Allow examination and "test hacks" of machines, selected randomly.

e) Outlaw all data inputs (by direct line, wireless, or UV) to voting machines and compilers with the exception, of course, of the "inputs" by the voters.

f) Rigorously enforce and prosecute election fraud laws.

If the industry and the Republicans won’t agree to these assurances, then they must present a plausible explanation as to why they decline to do so. Absent that explanation, we citizens of this alleged democracy under an alleged rule of law must demand that every vote be counted and verified, and we must be supplied with proof that this has been accomplished. Furthermore, every individual who has engaged in election fraud must be tracked down and prosecuted to the full extent of the law. We are entitled to no less than this.

Dr. Ernest Partridge is a consultant, writer and lecturer in the field of Environmental Ethics and Public Policy. He publishes the website, The Online Gadfly and co-edits the progressive website, The Crisis Papers. He is at work on a book, Conscience of a Progressive, which can be seen in-progress here. Send comments to: crisispapers@hotmail.com.

Crisis Papers Archive

Re-posted from Democratic Underground

by Buzzflash.com columnist Maureen Farrell
Extracted from Top 10 ‘Conspiracy Theories’ about George W. Bush, Part 2.
See also… Top 10 ‘Conspiracy Theories’ about George W. Bush, Part 1

"There was one exact moment, in fact, when I knew for sure that Al Gore would Never be President of the United States, no matter what the experts were saying — and that was when the whole Bush family suddenly appeared on TV and openly scoffed at the idea of Gore winning Florida. It was Nonsense, said the Candidate, Utter nonsense. . .Anybody who believed Bush had lost Florida was a Fool. The Media, all of them, were Liars & Dunces or treacherous whores trying to sabotage his victory . . Here was the whole bloody Family laughing & hooting & sneering at the dumbness of the whole world on National TV. The old man was the real tip-off. The leer on his face was almost frightening. It was like looking into the eyes of a tall hyena with a living sheep in its mouth. The sheep’s fate was sealed, and so was Al Gore’s."
— Hunter S. Thompson, ESPN, Nov. 27, 2000

"[The Bush Family’s] sense of how to win elections comes out of a CIA manual, not out of the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution."
— Former GOP strategist Kevin Phillips, BuzzFlash, Jan. 7. 2004

While some believe a coup began on Sept. 11, others will tell you it began with the 2000 election. Even though George Bush’s first cousin declared him the winner and his brother Jeb assured him he’d won Florida, many Americans remained unconvinced.

First there was the surreal sight of the Bush family on national TV, as staged and phony as Susan Smith’s tearful plea to return her "kidnapped" children. Then came the well-groomed thugs, sent on Enron and Halliburton planes to stop the Florida recount. But it wasn’t just James Baker’s ploys or the Supreme Court’s ruling that signaled something was amiss — it was the attitude of ordinary citizens who were more concerned about their "team" winning than about democracy itself.

Unless you rely solely on FOX news (the modern equivalent to "living under a rock"), the shenanigans that occurred in pre-election Florida are now old news, and have been dissected at length in documentaries, magazines and to some degree, in the mainstream press. A St . Petersburg Times op-ed later deemed the election "stolen," the Associated Press reported that Florida had "quietly" admitted "election fraud," and Vanity Fair devoted a sizable portion of its Oct. 2004 issue to exactly how Team Bush pulled it off. By the time CNN sued the state of Florida for its ineligible voters list in 2004, the underbelly of the beast was plainly visible.

But in Nov. 2001, when Greg Palast uncovered then Secretary of State Katherine Harris’ role in the shameful voter roll purge in Florida, the news was explosive. The New York Times — the paper that would later print front page disinformation to sell the war in Iraq — took a pass, however, until three years later, when it was too late to do anything about it.

At first, election irregularities were featured as anomalies, like when the Washington Post covered computer glitches that literally subtracted thousands of votes from Al Gore and gave them to a Socialist candidate. By the time similar problems were reported during the 2002 midterm and 2004 primary elections, people were understandably skittish, with e-voting failures having "shaken confidence in the technology installed at thousands of precincts" — with as many as 20 states introducing legislation calling for paper receipts on voting machines.

In early 2004, Mother Jones predicted that "Ohio could become as decisive this year as Florida was four years ago" and sure enough, Americans awoke the day after the election without a decisive winner. And though John Kerry later conceded, questions have since been raised by computer programmers, mathematicians, journalists and others. "Was the election of 2004 stolen?" columnist Robert Koehler asked, before addressing the many "numbers-savvy scientists are saying that the numbers don’t make sense."

There were warnings before the election, of course, with red flags being raised by researchers at prestigious Stanford and John Hopkins Universities. But despite Diebold’s CEO’s promise to deliver Ohio’s electoral votes to George W. Bush, Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell’s prominent role in the Bush/Cheney campaign, and the suspicious election night lock-down in Warren County, Ohio, many still believed election angst could be attributed to a super-sized case of "sour grapes."

When Christopher Hitchens, who is admittedly not a Kerry fan, also weighed in, however, that excuse flew out the window. "Whichever way you shake it, or hold it to the light, there is something about the Ohio election that refuses to add up. . . ," he wrote.

Rep. John Conyers and the Government Accountability Office also found widespread irregularities, and when statisticians picked apart the election results, Bush was not the legitimate winner. Pollster John Zogby compared the 2004 election to 1960’s suspicious contest, and University of Pennsylvania professor Steven F. Freeman put the odds that exit polls were that wrong, in that many states, at 250 million to one.

The evidence was so compelling, in fact, that NYU professor Mark Crispin Miller took it upon himself to tackle the proverbial suggestion "somebody should write a book." His extensively-researched yet largely ignored Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election & Why They’ll Steal the Next One Too (Unless We Stop Them) shines a crucial light on the "stealthy combination of computerized vote theft, bureaucratic monkey business, systematic shortages of viable equipment and old-fashioned dirty tricks. . . " that led to democracy’s last debacle, and will most likely lead to the next.

Ohio’s 2005 election also failed the smell test, and by late Jan. 2006, the Washington Post looked into allegations of election tampering — without the dismissive, lazy reporting usually afforded the subject. Describing tests conducted by Florida’s Leon County supervisor of elections Ion Sancho, using "relatively unsophisticated hacking techniques," the paper quickly uncovered how easy it is to steal an election. "Can the votes of this Diebold system be hacked using the memory card?" election officials asked test participants, and though two marked their ballots "yes" and six said "no," by the time they went through Diebold’s optical scan machine, the results read seven "yes" votes and one "no."

"More troubling than the test itself was the manner in which Diebold simply failed to respond to my concerns or the concerns of citizens who believe in American elections," Sancho said. "I really think they’re not engaged in this discussion of how to make elections safer."

Hmmm. You don’t say.

There is a reason, you see, that "None Dare Call It Stolen," and that reasons extends beyond the preponderance of evidence. "If electronic voting machines programmed by private Republican firms remain in our future, dissent will become pointless unless it boils over into revolution," former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury Paul Craig Roberts wrote. "Power-mad Republicans need to consider the result when democracy loses its legitimacy and only the rich have anything to lose."

James Madison predicted a similar scenario. "The day will come when our Republic will be an impossibility," he reportedly told the New York Post. "It will be an impossibility because wealth will be concentrated in the hands of a few."

Those would be the "one percenters." And chances are, you aren’t one of them.

*************

© Copyright 2004, Maureen Farrell

Maureen Farrell is a writer and media consultant who specializes in helping other writers get television and radio exposure.

Extracted from Top 10 ‘Conspiracy Theories’ about George W. Bush, Part 2. See also… Top 10 ‘Conspiracy Theories’ about George W. Bush, Part 1

From Scoop Independent News

State and County Elections officials from coast to coast to coast are now in a mad, confused, frustrated scramble trying to figure out how the hell to comply with and make sense of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) legislation.

HAVA has proven to be an unmitigated disaster, gamed as it was from the start by Congressmen like Ohio’s Bob Ney working in cahoots with voting machine companies. The effort has shamefully employed disabilities groups like the National Federation for the Blind (NFB) and American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), who received more than a million dollars from companies such as Diebold, Inc., to help trump up the sympathy factor in order to force jurisdictions to purchase unreliable electronic voting machines (read: junk), said to be needed by disabled voters who would be unable to vote in secret without assistance from others.

As of the 1/1/06 HAVA deadline, Boards of Elections are now officially plunged into complete and utter disarray as they attempt to comply with the reckless and cynical legislation’s mandated requirement (dreamt up by the American Voting Machines Vendors who stand to make billions) for at least one disabled-accessible voting device in every precinct around the country — even in small precincts without a single disabled voter!

Touch-screen (DRE) voting machines created by mega-corporations like Diebold, Inc. and ES&S have been proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt, to be unsecure, hackable, unreliable and finally, not fully accessible by many segments of the disabled community. Meanwhile, the one electronic-based device in which voters with disabilities have expressed the most interest, the AutoMARK system, has reportedly been kept largely out of the marketplace through a number of means. ES&S, the voting machine company who managed to secure exclusive rights to distribute the AutoMARK system, has reportedly been overpricing it in favor of their own DRE systems. As well, there have been a number of reports of ES&S sales reps being actively dissuaded from properly demonstrating that system in pitches to potential customers around the country.

As well, states such as Florida and many others have been incredibly slow at certifying the system — which prints a readable, verifiable, recountable paper ballot with every vote cast — even while they’ve already giving their blessings to DRE systems made by both Diebold and ES&S, despite the demonstrated inaccuracy, hackability and secret-software that employs "interpreted" source code, explicitly banned by HAVA guidelines.

With the rapid approach of the 2006 primary elections, the question is now: What the hell are these Boards of Election around the country going to do, to both meet HAVA requirements for voters with disabilities and provide all voters with some semblance of an accurate, reliable, recountable, democratic means of casting their vote in secret and with some certainty that it may be counted, and counted correctly?

Comes now, with not a moment to spare, an ingeniously simple, non-electronic device to allow voters with disabilities of all sorts to be able to cast their own vote, in secret, and with the knowledge that their paper ballot will accurately reflect their intent.

Say hello to the Vote-PAD, the little paper and plastic voting assistive device, that just may save American democracy…

At approximately one-tenth of the cost of competing (and crappy) electronic devices, the Vote-PAD (which stands for "Voting-on-Paper Assistive Device") was designed by Ellen Theisen, the former Executive Director of the non-partisan election watchdog group, VotersUnite.org. She created it along with the cooperation of people with dexterity and visual impairments.

It may well be the solution that exasperated Elections officials across the country have been praying for.

Vote-PAD is little more than a plastic sleeve which is fitted to an existing paper ballot, allowing voters with disabilities a number of ways to mark and verify their ballots without additional assistance. It is used along with an audio prompt and an electronic "verification wand" to further assist blind voters.

The paper ballots that the voter marks with the assistance of Vote-PAD can then be either optically-scanned or hand-counted. The device, Theisen says, requires no Federal HAVA certification since it doesn’t contain any software (secret or otherwise) or electronic parts that would require such approval from Federal authorities, according to HAVA guidelines.

And apparently both disabled voters and Election Officials from around the country who have been given demonstrations of the device seem to love it!

Last week it was announced that Yolo County, California has agreed to purchase Vote-PAD to assist persons with disabilities in marking a paper ballot. Yolo is the very first such jurisdication in the country to come aboard, but, in interviews with The BRAD BLOG, Theisen suggests that more counties and even whole states may be on the verge of signing on to Vote-PAD, as well.

Freddie Oakley, the Clerk-Recorder of Yolo County, is quoted in Vote-PAD’s press release about the first contract, as singing the praises of the new system:

While the cost of the system varies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction based on a number of elements, Theisen pointed out to us that Oakley had informed her that the cost for their county to use Vote-PAD for five years would roughly be "the same amount of money Yolo County had been planning to allocate for storage of electronic machines alone."

There are "no maintenance fees, no licensing fees," Theisen explained, "All you have to do after you buy the original package is replace the consumables," like the plastic sleeves when they eventually run out.

The Vote-PAD website quotes a number of citizens with disabilities who also sing the praises of the device. "The Vote-PAD keeps my marks inside the circle, and the pages are easier to flip," says one tester with quadriplegia.

"For me, this 2005 election on the difficult-to-use DRE machines was just another real reminder that we definitely need your Vote-PAD," said another voter who is blind.

While evidence continues to mount about the many failures of computerized voting systems, the exhorbitant costs associated with them, and the lack of accessibility that many disabled voters have complained about while using DRE machines, Vote-PAD just may save democracy after all.

Theisen is struggling to arrange for the manufacturing of the device quickly and in large enough numbers to meet the sudden demand for the product. But, as she told us recently, she’s determined to make it all happen since witnessing first hand, in her role with VotersUnite, just how needed and necessary a device such as Vote-PAD now is for this country.

The BRAD BLOG fervently endorses the much-needed device, and recommends strongly that readers who give a damn about democracy make sure their local and state election officials are aware of the Vote-PAD!

The mega-corporations such as ES&S and Diebold are spending millions to promote their flawed devices and to ensure potential customers won’t hear about Vote-PAD. So, once again, it will be a matter of the citizenry making sure that word about Vote-PAD gets to the folks that need to know about it!

The Vote-PAD was recently featured in an article by WIRED NEWS which includes a few instructive graphics showing how the device basically works.

Much more information, explanation, testimonials, graphic explanations and downloadable brochures are available via the Vote-PAD website at www.Vote-PAD.us.

Vote-PAD can be contacted via email by clicking here.

Let’s make some noise about it!

from The Brad Blog 

Introduction: … Mark Crispin Miller is a professor of Media Studies at New York University. He has written articles for The Nation and the New Yorker and many books. He’s been on many different national radio and television shows, and we are extremely fortunate to have him with us here today. He is a real champion for election integrity and for getting the word out about what we need to do to save our Democracy.[Loud Applause]

Mark Crispin Miller: Well, thank you very much and thanks to both groups for doing all this great work and for making enough to bring me here for a book tour.

I want to start out by telling you a story, which some of you may have heard. And in fact much of what I have to say will probably not come as news to many of you, because I know you all are very well informed about these issues. Two years ago I got myself invited to a fund raiser for John Kerry, when he was just one of many aspirants to the Democratic party nomination for president. I got myself invited by the New York treasurer of his campaign, who shared my concern about the integrity of the electoral system, precisely, or I should say primarily, because of the use of electronic touch screen machines. This had been a profound concern of mine and of certain other people, since the passage of the HAVA Act. And this limited network of people were trying to do everything they could to get this on the national agenda, so I got a little face time with the senator.

It was at George Plimpton’s house. He came in. I was introduced to him. I looked up at him, he was very tall. And he looked down at me. I had about 5 minutes to try to convey the seriousness, the complexity of this problem to him, and with a sense of urgency. And so, you know, I think the cards were stacked against me because I’m sure I sounded psychotic, you know. (audience laughter) And as far as he was concerned, I probably looked psychotic,… short but psychotic…(audience chuckle) because he had never given this a thought. I think he didn’t know about it at all, but he did wear a look of grave concern, you know (smoothing his hair back in a John Kerry gesture, audience chuckle). He nodded thoughtfully for a moment. (Like Kerry, Miller crosses his arms and rests his left first finger on his chin with his face looking downward in a thoughtful pose.)

He thanked me for my effort to enlighten him. He was going to take this under advisement, you know. I could almost see my words go, you know, in one ear and out the other. I also met with Terissa Heinz Kerry and talked to her about it. And she at least seemed to get it. She was very exercised about it. But nothing came of this. And we all know what happened, well, I should say we all think we know what happened.

Concerning that, what we think happened, as you know I wrote a book about the Election 2004. And I wrote this book to give people a panoramic sense of what went down last year and to try to give people a view of the kind of mentality that drives the anti-democratic crusade. I wrote this book for one reason only, I’m not going to challenge the outcome of the last election, there is no constitutional way to do that. I wrote the book to jump start a national movement of radical electoral reform. And so, knowing as I did that the mainstream media is not going to take this seriously, I decided that I’ve got to get to as many prominent people as possible….So two weeks ago, I got myself invited to a fund raiser for John Kerry. (audience laughter.)

His political action committee was meeting in New York. They were going to have a dinner, and I was allowed to come in before the dinner. And in he came, tall as ever, and I had a very different perception of him this time. (audience chuckle.) Ok, I had the book held up, you know, for all to see, and he looked very interested. And I said, "You were robbed, senator!" And he said "I know" (and held his hands up to his head like he had a headache, as Kerry would do) just like that. "I know! (Miller makes the same hand gesture.) And he started to say, "I can’t find the evidence." I can’t persuade my colleagues to take this seriously. I certainly knew what he was talking about. But I had to say, it was more than refreshing to hear him say this. I was delighted. He said he just had a big argument the week before with [Senator] Christopher Dodd from Connecticut trying to tell Dodd that these voting machines are really not reliable. And Dodd just got mad. He didn’t want to hear about it. Dodd said: "We looked into this. There’s no story there!" He (Kerry) said, "Well is there evidence in your book?" I said, "Well, yeah, you know, there is really quite a lot of evidence." I told him what the Government Accountability Office Report said, the GAO Report. People in here have heard of it. Most people in this country have not, because this ground breaking report on the flaws and dangers of touch screen voting, by a very, very establishment government body, has gone almost completely unreported in this country. In fact, Kerry had not heard about it. [Kerry said]: "Oh really, the GAO report?"

So instead of saying, "What, is your staff in a coma?" (loud audience laughter and applause)….so because you can attract more flies with honey than with vinegar, I didn’t say that. (Audience laughter) I said, "Yeah, the GAO Report, you can just go on-line and get a copy." He was quite pleased. You could see…see that it was obvious that he was going to use this, these arguments. So I said, "Now senator, I believe that, in the spirit of these ground breaking investigations into Iran Contra and the BCCI in the Senate," which I happen to think is his best, his greatest work, "in the spirit of those investigations, you should really look into what happened last year. And you should make a larger inquiry into the state of American electoral apparatus. Because it’s in a shambles." And I cannot remember how I put this, I can only tell you what I was trying to say to him.

But I was being tactful, so I don’t know what I said. I was trying to say to him: "If you think you are going to get like 10 votes from the people you sold out last time, you know, if you don’t embrace this issue with both arms, you don’t have a prayer." So I didn’t say that either (audience laughter.) So I said, "There are a lot of people felt disappointed…" [Kerry] nodded. Now he wasn’t just wearing a mask of concern. He was really listening. He said, "Well I don’t know if I can be the one to do that because there is the sour grape factor," he said. OK. Well I understand that. I’m not a politician. It is very easy for me to say, "Do this, do that." But I said, you know, “Read the book. The book is very persuasive.” He said “I will. I’m really excited. I’ll read it this weekend. Thanks a lot.” He punched me on the arm. He gave me the thumbs up. (audience chuckle) Threw me a football, you know. (audience laughter) I caught the football. (laughter) We rough housed a little bit. (loud audience laughter.) The memory is very precious to me. (loud laughter)

So anyway, I was really happy. I thought this was a great thing. It didn’t occur to me that this was news exactly. But I did tell my friend, I emailed people that "Kerry thinks the election was stolen." And my book tour started Tuesday a couple weeks ago in New York. And I found that telling that story really went over. I mean, it really made people feel optimistic. Then I was on Democracy Now last Friday. Did any of you hear that? (audience applause) I was debating with Mark Hertzgaard who’s got a piece in the latest Mother Jones, seeking to throw cold water on the "wild theory" that the Republicans stole the election last year. And one of the things that struck me in his arguments …. he’s a friend of mine, OK, I have known him a long time. I don’t think this is his best work. (audience laughter). One of the things that struck me was that he was unduly swayed by the "say so" of Democrats.

So we’re talking about Warren County [Ohio]. You know how they declared a terrorist alert throughout the press before the vote count. His claim was, “Well I talked to a Democrat who was there, and he said: "Gee, I wish I could tell you that it was suspicious, but, you know, frankly there is nothing to it." It turned out the next day according to the FBI said that there was no terrorist alert, and then the Cincinnati Inquirer reported that this plan had been in the works for nine days. So I don’t care what a Democrat told him. Who is this democrat? Who cares? Why does that trump common sense? (Audience applause). I didn’t say any of this. But I says to myself, I says, ‘Well, if he wants to strut out Democratic authorities, I’ve got a great response.’ So I said, “Well as a matter of fact, Kerry thinks the race was stolen.” And I told the story. And Mark was very impressed. “Wow this is really big news. You really buried the lead. You should call a press conference. This is important.”

Well in fact that day, Democracy Now sent out a press release. "Breaking: Kerry Believes the Race was Stolen." So there was a lot of stuff on the internet. It was all over the place. And sites like Democratic Underground, long threads about it. Raw Story, in a website in D.C., called Kerry’s office to get a response. And a staffer of Kerry’s office made a statement that categorically denied that he had ever had this conversation with me. (Audience says "Whoa") "The only true thing in Mr. Miller’s account is that he gave the senator the book"…(audience gasps)..like a process server. He kind of pressed it on his arm and ran away…"You’re served!"

This was….the most galling thing to me personally was the fact that this implied that I had made this up to sell the book. "We know that Mr. Miller is trying to sell the book," they said. This really pissed me off. So I gave Raw Story my response. And the next day Robert Perry, a great reporter who has the website Consortium News, ran a piece based on what he was told by a guy named John Weiner, who was an old Kerry associate, who said to Perry: "John thinks the race was stolen, he said that to me too."

So, there is trouble in making things up. I don’t make things up. In this world, these days, you don’t have to make things up. (Audience laughter.) Do you know what I mean? You can’t. It is impossible to keep track of reality. So I tell this story to make a few larger points. It is not about Kerry per se. And it is not about my personal pique, about being treated so disrespectfully. This is not a personal issue. It is not even a partisan issue. It is a civic issue. It is a civic issue of profound importance. And I tell the story about Kerry partly to make clear that this is not a left versus right, or Democrat versus Republican issue. In fact, on this issue, it’s really the people at risk because of the collusion of the two parties. I think the collusion is passive. Some people have said that they know, they have made a deal, but I think that is unlikely.

If someone has the evidence, I’ll look at the evidence. But I don’t think that it is necessary for there to be a deal, because this has happened before. When you have a resolved, well organized, highly disciplined fascistic movement of some kind, (audience applause) right. (Audience applause) Let’s hear it for Fascism. (Sarcastically…Loud audience applause.) Calm yourselves. (Laughter) And they have a tremendous amount of social power and media influence, and they manage to get the press on their side for various reasons, those who would resist this, but who aren’t all that zealous about it, are simply going to deny that there’s a problem. Now why do the Democrats refuse to face this issue? Does it make any sense? Their existence as a party is threatened. They will cease to be, if this Republican party, the Bushevic party, (audience laughter) the theocratic Republican party, has it’s way, there will be no more Democrats. Now, one of the reasons that Democrats refuse to look at this, or read the evidence, or listen to it, is just corruption. Because a lot of democrats are in fact republicans. And in places like Ohio, rural Ohio….maybe you’ve had Bob Fitrakis come here and speak? …(audience confirms)…as he explains to me and he says in his writing, the democrats in rural Ohio are just as much a part of the status quo as the republicans. They are very close to the Republicans and they all serve at the pleasure of Ken Blackwell. So they all toe the line.

There was only one board of elections member, a democrat in the state, who blew the whistle. And that was Sheryl Eaton, who …(loud audience applause)… We love Sheryl, we know she exposed the deliberate subversion of the recount that was supposed to take place. And it has never taken place. And there are still 100,000 plus votes in that state that haven’t been counted to this day. She is the exception. Since a lot of Democrats just go along to get along and they figure, hey, you know, the two parties have divided the spoils. We can work it out. This is our turf. We’ve got the Sharks and the Jets, you know? We’ve got to divide it up. So why upset the apple cart? There is a lot of that.

But aside from that there is just plain old denial. Kerry was describing denial to me. Dodd wouldn’t have gotten angry if this thought did not frighten him. Because the implications of what happened last year are quite frightening….quite frightening. It doesn’t make any difference how brilliant a campaign you run. It doesn’t make any difference how smart your TV ads are. It doesn’t make any difference what a stellar profile your candidate has. You could run Jesus Christ for President, ok? You’re not going to win. You’re not going to win because this is not a functioning Democracy. America is no longer a Democracy. The last three elections have been stolen.

This refusal to confront the implications of what is going down has to do with deeply rooted ideological assumptions that we all have. Like "it can’t happen here." That’s the very important one. Like this is "The city on the hill." This nation was claimed by God. And what has happened to other countries can’t happen here, can’t happen here. So however copious and solid the evidence you have that it has happened here, you can’t get anywhere. It’s fascinating. You’ve got a moment in which pretty much everyone now finally agrees that the Bush regime lied, or deluded itself and the rest of us, to get us into a major war that we are losing. That’s really not a good thing. And people will face that. And the press will say yes that seems to be true. You’ve got a moment at which the people will say: yes, they did deliberately conspire to out a CIA agent who was responsible for keeping us safe from weapons of mass destruction, and they did it for petty political reasons. The people struggling to deny this are having an ever harder time. We accept this. We accept that they had to know that the attack was coming on 9/11 and they, at best, did nothing about it. (Audience applause.) We also accept that in the face of one of the worst natural disasters in our modern history, they did nothing and they continue to do nothing. All of this we accept. Right? All of this we accept. All this the press will admit "Yeah that’s true." OK. Progressives, everybody snarling foaming at the mouth…Bush is wicked, terrible. But somehow there is this magic circle drawn around "The Election." "Oh no, they wouldn’t do that! They wouldn’t to that!" Well, that’s what they would do first of all. In fact, that’s what they did do! That’s why they’re there. (Applause)

Understand this…I want to try to give you a sense of what we’re really up against, because I think it’s only if we face that, will we be able to deal with it. Ok, here it is folks. It’s about the elections. The electoral system is a mess. I think there are certain policies we should all pursue to improve the system. And we can talk about those policies. I want to give you a foretaste, because often people want to hear that. These are "take home points." We should go back to paper ballots. (Applause.) We should ban the participation of all private vendors in our electoral system. (Loud long applause.) So that means in Oregon, you know, you’ve got the paper ballots. You’ve got to get the software out of there, because as you know, using proprietary software to count the votes is like having a secret vote count. And so this is COMPLETELY UNACCEPTABLE. Anyone who defends this is a foe of American Democracy. It’s a simple as that. We also need a uniform federal standard for our election from coast to coast, from county to county, from precinct to precinct. We have to have….I’m going to say the dirty "B" word…we have to have an efficient, utterly non-partisan bureaucracy, on the order of the Post Office (it just delivers mail) to oversee our elections.

And I will add, that I would like to have as an ally in this fight any authentic conservative who believes in The Bill of Rights, way before I’ll accept the half hearted support of an Al Franken or somebody like that, or Mother Jones. The people, now this is us, not the Democratic Party, not the media, the people have got to fight back. We are at that point. And in order to do that we’ve got to make common cause with a lot of people we don’t ordinarily talk to. The Bush administration and the movement it represents is only one part of the Republican party. The Republican party is divided now. A lot of Republicans voted against Bush or just stayed home. In "Fooled Again" I gave a lot of examples. The very prominent Republicans of all kinds came out publically against Bush before the election and the press would never report on this trend, which was remarkable. But you had Bob Barr of Georgia, you can’t get much more right wing than that. You had John Eisenhower. You had General Tony McPeak of the Air Force, who was a pro-Bush military guy in 2000, now coming out for Kerry! You had Tom Clancy! You had Lee Ioacoca. You had an open letter signed by 169 tenured emeritus business professors deploring Bush’s economic policies. And the letter started at the Harvard Business School. You remember who went there? Bipartisan groups of diplomats, military men, moderate Republicans. A guy who ran a chapter of Republicans Abroad said he could not in good conscience support Bush. This guy [Bush] did not really win the election, because very few people really voted for him! (Audience applause.) Just read my book.

The thing is that it can happen here, and they knew it. And if we don’t reacquaint ourselves with their concerns, it will happen here, and have happened here for good. Because this is what we’re up against, ok? We are not up against conservatism. Bush is not a conservative president. Cheney is not a conservative vice president. The movement that we’re fighting is not a conservative movement. That is why it didn’t get all those Republican votes. I am not a conservative, but I respect conservatism. I see it as a coherent philosophy. I see it essentially as a philosophy that’s based on the improvement or at least the maintenance of THIS world. See. They believe in limited government, fiscal prudence, no foreign wars, all that kind of stuff. I can live with all of that. What does that have in common with this regime and its agenda? This is a guy who with all his tax cuts has spent more money than all of our other presidents combined. Did you know this? He has vastly expanded the police powers of this government, vastly expanded them. He has repealed Habeas Corpus. I mean, if on his say so, you’re a terrorist, they can come and drag you off to prison, and they don’t have to tell anybody that they did it. This is called disappearing people. This is unprecedented in our history. We don’t have freedom of assembly. We have First Amendment Zones. (Audience groan.) Freedom of Speech has been radically abridged. I mean, you know all that I am saying. Right? This is not conservatism. It is extremely radical. It’s much closer to Fascism. It has a great deal to do with the power of corporations. You can hiss all you want, and I am with you, but they are not going to listen. The fact that End Corporate Personhood is involved with this is really something that makes me very happy, because in a sense the idea that corporations should have the rights of persons, the status of persons, can be regarded, in a sense, as the worm in the apple here. I mean, things really started to go wrong in this country when corporations took on such power. Indeed as we have seen from the dangerous sway of the corporate manufacture of touch screen voting machines, corporations are reeking havoc on American Democracy, because corporations are driven by concern for only one thing, and that is their own profits. That’s money over the franchise, money over votes. This is something I think we can all agree on. We have to take a step further because there is something else at work here. It’s not just corporations. It’s not just the drive for profits. It’s not just corporate capitalism. As a matter of fact, certain large sectors of the corporate system are extremely unhappy with this president, like the insurance industry has done a big about face on global warming. Well for rational reasons. (Audience laughter.) Because they don’t want to go bankrupt!

So this is rational self interest at work. You read accounts of the financial get together in Datyl, Switzerland…it’s like a wake there now. They’re just miserable because this guy, this cabal, this movement is destroying the economy. They are on a suicide course. So even though they are infinitely pleasing to many corporate interests, you know, Haliburton and so on, especially their cronies, they are on a suicide course. They had an apocalyptic streak, that cannot be explained in economistic terms. Now people on the left tend to explain everything in economistic terms. It’s always about the money, follow the money. That’s true to a great degree. But it is not enough, because it does not account for the ferocious strain of anti-enlightenment activism that this regime represents. (Audience applause.)

Understand that this is a theocratic movement. It is not just a bunch of corporations, that know better, slyly manipulating the pieties of the masses. That is a leftist fallacy. Because we are talking about the energetic, political participation of a number of extremely right wing billionaires with enormous clout, people like Richard Mellon Scaif, and Howard Ahmanson. These are people who are extraordinarily active and productive on the political front and they make [George] Soros look like a piper. They spent far more money that he does. They spend it on propaganda; they spend it on political issues. Howard Ahmanson is the motive force behind the schism in the Episcopalian Church. He supports the Discovery Institute which is behind the spread of Intelligent Design. So to say there is religion over here and there are corporations over here is a mistake. It’s not that simple because there are points of convergence.

What we have here is a movement intent on turning the United States into a Christian republic. Now they often say that the United States is a Christian republic, then you say to them, "As a matter of fact, it isn’t." Look at say the First Amendment, look at Article 6 which forbids a religious test for office holders, look at everything the framers ever said on the subject. Well they don’t want to hear that so they say, "Well, it’s a Christian republic." Does this sound familiar? "Mr. President, there is no evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq." "0h yeah? there is too." "Go back and find it." "Oh, wait. Here it is, here it is." See? We think they are lying through their teeth, but please believe me that Cheney still believes there are weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. If it were only lying, or or if it was only machiavellian manipulation, I promise you we would be better off than we are right now. What we are dealing with is pathological. You tell them, "Hey, there is no evidence for intelligent design," and they say "oh yes there is." They proclaim that there is. There is no evidence that abstainance based sex education does anything except raise pregnancy rates and raise rates of sexually transmitted diseases. They say "Nope…no…" Because it’s faith based.

They live in a faith based universe. I want you to grasp the enormity of this problem. We have all grown up in the shadow of the cold war. All of our politics were forged in the context of a post enlightenment moment. I mean the enlightenment is settled, ok? And now we have the clash between two great enlightenment doctrines, capitalism and socialism. Do you want to know something? That turned out to be a blip on the radar screen. We are right back where we were when the framers wrote the Constitution. We are right back there. They did this incredibly brave and intelligent thing. They forged a national charter that was the first in human history not to invoke the deity. They separated church from state. And this was not a plot by a handful of professorial smarty pantses, who were a lot less religious than the average Joe. This was on the one hand an innovation by brilliant Deists who were indeed Rationalists. But it wasn’t just that. Separation of church and state grew out of American soil. Because this was a nation of religious immigrants, and most believing American were grateful for the separation of church and state. You know that the Baptists for over a hundred years were arch- Jeffersonians? Because they understood that if there is a state church in this country it would be Episcopalian and they would be persecuted again. So it was in everybody’s interest to separate church from state. There is no reason to apologize for it. There is no reason to dance away from it. There is no reason to meet with Hillary and decide, "How we can look more religious?" Screw that! (Loud audience applause.)

When de Tocqueville came here in the 1830’s, he remarked on the fact that this country was the most religious country on the earth and he understood that the reason is because they separated church and state. The reason is because there is no coersion here. So religion thrives. Why can’t Democrats just say that? What’s wrong with that? Is there any problem? Now the fact that they don’t seem to have any faith in our revolutionary division, they don’t seem to have any understanding of what the framers wrote, they don’t really believe in American democracy, leaves us just extremely vulnerable to a highly organized, extremist movement that is intent on undoing all that. We don’t hear about it. Right? Like this business about the Supreme Court, we hear about Alito’s style, you know his style, what kind of person he is, we parse his record. We talk about what kind of demeanor he has and what kind of suit he wears, his life experiences, and so on. Maybe if we get really bold and specific, we’ll say, "They are going to repeal Roe vs. Wade." What they don’t understand is that Roe vs. Wade is only "Step One" for these people, right? Step one!

Do you know what the Constitution Restoration Act is? A few of you do. Go home and do a little google search on it. The Constitution Restoration Act would declare that God is the sovereign basis of American Law. Do you know what that means? That means that a judge could make decisions on the basis of the Old Testament and it couldn’t be reversed. So if you want to see a vision of the possible future as these people imagine it, go home and read the book of Leviticus, and see how many things you can be executed for doing. Heresy, for example, Astrology, Pre-marital sex … well, only the woman gets killed for pre-marital sex. This is directly and ferociously opposed to the whole American tradition. So when I said this is not a partisan issue, I really meant it. The American people don’t go for this, I promise you. A lot of Americans may have been hood-winked by Bush and so on, but understand that his strong support is now at 22% with a margin of error of 4 points. So it could be 18%. I estimate that at least Kerry won by 51 to 48%. Kerry won! And probably by more or would have, because between the votes that were thrown away, and the votes that were pre-empted, and the votes abroad, it’s a significant number.

The American, you know, people for all their, or all our shortcomings, for all the decadence that has been sponded by a consumer culture, which has had a seriously destructive effect on our ability to function in a democracy, for all that, the American people are not extremists. The American people are not theocrats. The Wall Street Journal just a few days ago ran an piece about the new phenomena of the Evangelical Churches trying to do something about global warming through their churches. So it’s time for us all to join hands with each other, all rational Americans who love our traditions got to join hands and insist on electoral reform which both parties seem not to want. Right? It’s not up to the Democrats. It is certainly not up to the media. It’s up to us. Now this is the kind of thinking we’ve become estranged from, as I say, because we’re mostly parked in front of the set, you know, with a big gulp and a bag of Doritos. And we’re thinking, "Oh gee, am I getting fat," or "Don’t I look great?" "Oh let’s watch reality TV" …getting into so and so’s life for a minute, unreality TV, you know.

But we have to get back to that. Do you know why? Because we don’t have any choice. There’s no choice. If we don’t get electoral reform in place, if we don’t reclaim the system from the Right, this experiment is over. If this experiment is over, the world could well be over. I think we should return to the best that our framers had to offer. And consider ourselves as noble and dedicated representatives of that tradition. We have nothing to apologize for, and everything to gain. Thank you.

Farhad, Manjoo
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