The stolen election of 2004: Chapter 53

[one...two...tree 2,762]

I don't mind that Dorothy Fadiman's film "Stealing America: Vote by Vote" raises once again the massively vexed question of whether the 2004 presidential election was fixed. That spectral possibility lingers in many people's minds, retains at least a general outline of plausibility and, thanks to the electronic voting systems in use in so much of the country, can never be conclusively proven or disproven. I do mind, though, that "Stealing America" is a clumsy if well-intentioned work of recycled propaganda, a mixture of hard evidence, random anecdote and far-flung inference that may convince some viewers that a clear verdict can be rendered on that impossibly murky event.

To those who've been following the work of investigative journalist Greg Palast, New York University professor Mark Crispin Miller and activist attorney Robert F. Kennedy Jr. over the last four years, there's not much that's new in "Stealing America." (Palast and Kennedy appear in the film, and Miller is listed as a consultant.) Fadiman has compiled a greatest-hits collection of problems, anecdotes, rumors and theories about what happened in 2004, with only the briefest lip service paid to the crucial information that hardly any of that year's problems were new, even the ones that appeared to be unique.

Voices in "Stealing America" range from computer analyst Bruce O'Dell (one of its producers, and provider of its most nuanced and eloquent perspective) to pollster John Zogby, Florida election official Ion Sancho and former Wall Street Journal editor Paul Craig Roberts, among many others. Like Kennedy, Palast and Miller, those people all smelled a rat in 2004, but Fadiman never makes clear that you might not get any two of them to agree how big the rat was or how it got in the house.

Did election officials in many jurisdictions make it inordinately difficult for African-Americans and other pro-Democratic demographics to vote, either through incompetence, malice or both? I think there's no question about it, and by showing us those appallingly long lines at black Ohio precincts, Fadiman drives that home. If the Voting Rights Act had any teeth, and if the Justice Department wasn't in the hands of a cabal of anti-federalist radicals that does whatever it can to avoid enforcing civil rights law, I strongly suspect that on that basis alone John Kerry would have been elected president in 2004.

"Stealing America" leaps directly from that level of inquiry, and several related questions about vote suppression, to the twilight zone: Was there also massive electoral fraud in 2004, involving hundreds if not thousands of conspirators, in which 6 million votes or so, along with four or five states, were electronically switched from Kerry to George W. Bush? And does the much-bruited exit-polling problem -- in 10 of the 11 crucial battleground states, Election Day exit polls suggested a better result for Kerry than the reported vote -- constitute an almost-smoking gun?

Look, I don't know. I write about show business. It would be idiotic for me or anybody else to insist that it's an impossible scenario. Explanations abound for the exit-poll anomalies, but I think we can all agree they're a problem. Here's what I do know: 1) As Fadiman's computer experts tell us, fixing a moderately large number of votes is technically feasible. 2) If Karl Rove and ####### Cheney could do such a thing, they certainly would. 3) The whole thing is unproven and unprovable, and gets a pretty low Occam's-razor score for probability. Conspiracy theories, whether they're about the JFK assassination or 9/11 or Flight 800 or, I don't know, the 2002 Kings-Lakers series, represent our desire to see order in a chaotic and ambiguous universe, whose patterns are generally too large for us to grasp. On a more practical level, they generally require a degree of competence, organization and secrecy for which human beings are not much noted.

My former Salon colleague Farhad Manjoo endeared himself to many, many readers (that's a joke!) by scrutinizing the cases for fraud made by Kennedy and Miller, among others, and finding them flimsy. Fadiman never even acknowledges, let alone addresses, the counter-arguments raised by Manjoo, pollster Mark Blumenthal, investigative journalist Mark Hertsgaard and many others. That's why I describe her film as propaganda, and why I haven't called it a documentary. It's one thing to have a point of view, even an unpopular or outrageous one, and pursue it vehemently. It's quite another to feign an interest in the truth while ignoring all complicating or contrary evidence.

But let's back up for a second and acknowledge that Fadiman's film, like Miller's book and Kennedy's Rolling Stone article and Palast, Hertsgaard and Manjoo's reporting, is motivated by righteous indignation and aimed at virtuous ends. Manjoo was pilloried in Salon's letters section as an election Pollyanna, a Rovian agent and worse, but here's what he wrote while reviewing (and rejecting) Mark Crispin Miller's book in 2005: "The fact is that the machinery of American democracy is broken; mistakes, inaccuracies, chicaneries, snafus, frauds, fiascos and disasters debilitate almost every race everywhere every two years, with the result that increasing numbers of Americans report feeling alienated by the voting process. It's no exaggeration to say the problem has reached the level of a national emergency."

"Stealing America" is evidently part of a would-be activist campaign to revive the electoral process, mitigate the many problems seen in recent elections and return to paper ballots whenever and wherever possible. That's a fine idea on its own terms. We saw enormous turnouts of voters signing on to the tattered ideal of American democracy in both 2000 and 2004, and the result -- one gibbering, nightmarish clusterfuck of an election, and another with a pervasive rotten-lunch-meat smell -- was positively scandalous.

Where I might part company with Manjoo and Miller and Fadiman and everybody in between is on the question of whether it's only the machinery of democracy that is broken. What good is an accurate vote count in a contest between two members of the same secret society who support the same disastrous war? Or, for that matter, between two self-described maverick outsiders whose resistance to corporate power and neocon foreign policy mysteriously melts in the summer heat of election year? Of course, maybe Barack Obama didn't really vote for warrantless eavesdropping and immunity for the telecom industry. There must have been a problem with the machine.

"Stealing America: Vote by Vote" is now playing at the Quad Cinema in New York, and opens Aug. 15 in Denver and Los Angeles; Aug. 22 in Philadelphia; Aug. 29 in Boston, Minneapolis, Santa Fe, N.M., and Washington; Sept. 5 in Austin, Texas, San Francisco and Seattle; and Sept. 26 in Columbus, Ohio, with more cities to be announced.

― Andrew O'Hehir

http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/btm/featur...ies/btm/feature

[Ban Hammer 13,356]

steven, this was in the pi forum and i moved it to ot.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

steven, this was in the pi forum and i moved it to ot.

Thank you.

[alienlovechild 75]

How come there wasn't anything about the "stolen" election of 1960? Back then the cheating was more obvious and historically American elections always had some irregularities. The photo of a handful of oddballs protesting was priceless.

If Obama loses, I wonder which state will be blamed in 2008? If Obama wins, there will be no charges the election was stolen and this documentary will collect more dust than most documentaries.

"Stealing America" is evidently part of a would-be activist campaign to revive the electoral process, mitigate the many problems seen in recent elections and return to paper ballots whenever and wherever possible.

Weren't paper ballots evil in 2000? Now the liberal activists want to go back to the old way of holding elections.

The last time I saw a violation at a polling station, there was old Democratic lady voter who smelled of urine and was practically shouting. The problem was her rustbucket car was parked out front and spray painted the with words "Vote Treason, Vote for Bush".

[almaty 19]

steven, this was in the pi forum and i moved it to ot.

Thank you.

Liooks like brother charles beat me to it

[SteveLaura 0]

The mistake people tend to make today is to believe that quicker equals better. It does not. There is largely nothing wrong with a simple paper ballot. A list of candidates which you put a cross against. The number of people who come through the door should eqyal the number of slips of paper in the box. If fraud is to be achieved, it would have to be instigated on a massive scale involving a large number of people. With the computer system, fraud can be achieved by one guy with a computer.

Unfortunately, after many months of campaigning, we seem to feel the need to have the results instantaneously. The election is in November; the President is sworn in in January. I'd rather those intervening months were spent checking and re-checking (if necessary) the ballots by hand. Accuracy over instant gratification, thank you.

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

How come there wasn't anything about the "stolen" election of 1960? Back then the cheating was more obvious and historically American elections always had some irregularities. The photo of a handful of oddballs protesting was priceless.

If Obama loses, I wonder which state will be blamed in 2008? If Obama wins, there will be no charges the election was stolen and this documentary will collect more dust than most documentaries.

"Stealing America" is evidently part of a would-be activist campaign to revive the electoral process, mitigate the many problems seen in recent elections and return to paper ballots whenever and wherever possible.

Weren't paper ballots evil in 2000? Now the liberal activists want to go back to the old way of holding elections.

The last time I saw a violation at a polling station, there was old Democratic lady voter who smelled of urine and was practically shouting. The problem was her rustbucket car was parked out front and spray painted the with words "Vote Treason, Vote for Bush".

Count yourself lucky she didn't have millions of dollars of campaign marketing funds to claim that anyone who criticises the war in Iraq is being disloyal and disrespectful to the armed forces. Only a scumbag would hide behind the reputation of the military to justify their own odious agenda.

[Fandango 1,439]

we're in 08 in case no one's noticed

[SteveLaura 0]

"The fact is that the machinery of American democracy is broken; mistakes, inaccuracies, chicaneries, snafus, frauds, fiascos and disasters debilitate almost every race everywhere every two years, with the result that increasing numbers of Americans report feeling alienated by the voting process. It's no exaggeration to say the problem has reached the level of a national emergency."

It's not about the past. It's about getting it right in the future.

[alienlovechild 75]

Count yourself lucky she didn't have millions of dollars of campaign marketing funds to claim that anyone who criticises the war in Iraq is being disloyal and disrespectful to the armed forces.

6, you're more than usual. An article on voter fraud turns into some nonsense about Iraq.

You're probably not too familiar with laws on voting in this country but ANY political campaigning is unlawful within a certain radius of a polling place (100 ft. I think). She should have gone for self-immolation to get some real publicity.

Only a scumbag would hide behind the reputation of the military to justify their own odious agenda.

You mean like the day when Monica Lewinsky testified, Pres. Clinton bombed empty Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan?

Edited August 1, 2008 by alienlovechild

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Count yourself lucky she didn't have millions of dollars of campaign marketing funds to claim that anyone who criticises the war in Iraq is being disloyal and disrespectful to the armed forces.

6, you're more than usual. An article on voter fraud turns into some nonsense about Iraq.

You're probably not too familar with laws on voting in this country but ANY political campaigning is unlawful within a certain radius of a polling place (100 ft. I think).

Perhaps - but I highly doubt that someone will be intimidated to vote a certain way by one red-faced bag lady with a cardboard sign. Some perspective is probably called for on that score - or if it bothered you that much - the police

Besides I'm sure even you can appreciate the damange the sort of defamatory rhetoric that was flying around during the last election. Regardless of Kerry's record or personal qualities - the Bush re-election campaig did make a point of associating the Iraq war with the record and prestige of the US military as a deliberate means of avoiding dealing with legitimate criticisms of their policy.

Only a scumbag would hide behind the reputation of the military to justify their own odious agenda.

You mean like the day when Monica Lewinsky testified, Pres. Clinton bombed empty Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan?

The old partisan bait and switch eh? I wasn't here then so I don't know the history of that - but if you think I have some sort of loyalty to Clinton that will somehow make me eat my previous words, you're sadly mistaken. Take it as a general argument - so sure if Clinton hid behind the military in this way - then yes that would be no different.

Edited August 1, 2008 by Number 6

[alienlovechild 75]

Besides I'm sure even you can appreciate the damange the sort of defamatory rhetoric that was flying around during the last election.

That happens in all elections to some degree. 2004 wasn't that special.

Regardless of Kerry's record or personal qualities - the Bush re-election campaig did make a point of associating the Iraq war with the record and prestige of the US military as a deliberate means of avoiding dealing with legitimate criticisms of their policy.

Bush really didn't have to make a case for the Iraq War because it was already ongoing and people were free to decide how to cast their votes regardless of some Bush TV ads. By contrast, Kerry never explained what a "smarter war on terrorism" was and the implications for his nonexistent Iraq policy. Instead, Kerry focused on his 3 month tour of duty in Vietnam and the fact Bush didn't serve in Vietnam. The problem was a lot of people didn't care about who did what 32-36 years ago. For the same reason McCain is doomed because voters don't look at military service much now compared to when Eisenhower was president.

I just brought Clinton in as example where domestic policy drove military decision-making.

Edited August 1, 2008 by alienlovechild

[msu17 0]

I think I went to high school with the guy in the tie... Iiiiinteresting. What we really need are 2 computer nerds dueling it out to see who can override the system the best. Whichever party has the smarter guy wins!

Edited August 1, 2008 by msu17