Monday, November 01, 2004

The Reality of Voting - Rethugs Hate Democracy

Much though some people want to pretend that there is an equivalence between the "dirty tricks" played by Democrats and Republicans as concerns voting, the facts simply won't bear them up.

I received one claim of voter registration fraud concerning ACORN, and there evidently really was somone in Pennsylvania who fraudulently filled out some registration cards with Disney cartoon characters - allegedly for some cocaine in exchange. Farhad Manjoo on Salon has demonstrated that the ACORN story is, in fact, a fabrication of the Florida Republican party. There was only ever one source for the news, a Rethug astroturf operation that fights against unions and living wages for ordinary Americans. So, folks, before you send me links to "proof" do your homework and see if the information can be sourced to more than one location.

However, the jerk with the cocaine habit is a true loser.

What the apologists for the Rethug tactics keep overlooking is that the Republican National Committee, state Republican parties, and local Republican party chapters are knowingly conspiring to destroy voter registrations and intimidate voters at the polls. There was Sproul's multi-state fraud effort, there are the guys under indictment in South Dakota for voter registration fraud are working for Bush in Ohio, another guy indicted on felony charges for crimes in the *last* presidential election is working for Bush in New England, and the increasing number of scams in swing states to bully and threaten Democrats into not voting.

They aren't worried about double voting - they are worried about voting period. They are deliberately targeting African-Americans, revealing the deep committment of Republicans to racist disenfranchisement of 12% of the population. After all, when the Dixiecrats finally abandoned the Democrats after the Civil Rights victories of the 60's and 70's, they ran their racist butts right over to the Republicans. They engage in elaborate schemes to find anything to challenge a Democratic voter's right to vote - like saying the lack of an apartment number on a registration should invalidate the voter.

It is a sorry state of affairs when the only way you can win is by being anti-democrats, not by promoting your own policies and true successes. Even with the Media Whores cheering for them, BushCo doesn't have a damn thing to say for itself. So they engage in voter intimidation, in the finest Southern tradition.

But it is backfiring. Voters aren't intimdated - they are mad. 30% voter turnouts already in states with early voting, disproportionately going for Kerry.

Ang

Kerry/Edwards - Not just Democrats, democrats

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