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(As Will Pitt has stated, we need one Senator re: Conyers/House voting hearings. This is my attempt to get one. Sorry about its length - please comment, suggest changes, etc. Also, would it be a good idea to have multiple signatures on a letter, or to publish it somewhere? $$)
To the Democratic members of the United States Senate,
I write to you today as both a citizen of this country and a defender of her values.
As a child, the civics books and history classes taught of a land where the vote was a precious thing, given to some by choice and to others, eventually, by default. It was the ultimate weapon against those who put forth values challenging the great American dream that was crafted so many years ago. The mantra was, for so many years, beautiful in its simplicity and stunning in its concept. One man, one vote. I watched as the elders took this badge of honor to the voting booths, and as they cried that November day when Camelot ended I began to understand. As I grew older, and became of age, I too took it as a sacred trust. I worked to make sure that those who could die for this nation could also partake in directing her course, and I walked proud on the day when, as an 18 year old, I closed the curtain behind me for the very first time.
Over time, due to a myriad of reasons, voting became not a privilege, but a chore. This once sacred trust now became passé, with citizens deserting the voting booth in droves, choosing instead to fill their heads with the lunacy of hate radio and the foolishness of Fox News. It seemed as if no one really cared anymore. What if they gave an election and nobody came? Worse yet, what if we had an election and it really didn’t count?
In 2000, George W. Bush stole the election right out from under the majority of the American people. Using tactics that would make the lady in the harbor cover her eyes, he disenfranchised thousands upon thousands of black Floridians, with his brother and his henchmen riding shotgun. The Congressional Black Caucus knew, and they begged you for help. You did nothing, and on a rainy January day George Bush was sworn in.
How do you feel? This holiday season, as grieving parents buy gifts for shadows, how do you feel? As the misnamed Patriot Act tears the Constitution to shreds, how do you feel? As No Child Left Behind sends child after child deeper into despair, and as The Clean Skies Initiative destroys the very air we breathe, how do you feel? Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?
Now, four years later, with a chance to rid us of the horror, we did our part. We organized, we canvassed, we sent money many of us did not have, and we voted. Oh yes, we voted. In droves we came, and after we voted we went to Ohio, and Florida, and New Mexico, to make sure that others could vote as well. What we saw sickened us.
We saw 2000 all over again. We saw blacks being designated once again as second-class citizens; only this time the racism was far more subtle. We’ll just “challenge” your vote, they say, but in the meantime how many bubbles are on this bar of soap. We saw suburban precincts glitter with the shine of new voting machines, while inner city ones got the hand-me-downs that broke down at will. In Ohio, we saw a Secretary of State behave as if this was still the Old West, and Marshall Dillon was nowhere in sight.
We saw it all –exit polls that did not match final results, precinct lockdowns, voting patterns that made no sense, 600 person precincts giving George Bush 4000 votes. We knew, right then, that he was stealing it again. We knew also, sadly, that it would be up to us to prove it.
And we are. With the help of John Conyers and his fellow patriots in the House, we have been heard. While we are shut out of the mainstream press (as we knew we would be), we have delivered our message. We now turn to you and ask for your help as well.
When the time comes, and it will, for the House members to ask for Senate support in their effort to investigate this election, what will you do? Will you turn and run, happily ensconced in the Washington bubble, or will you stand and fight? Will you let this election, fraudulent as it is, become the benchmark for future thuggery, or will you help restore the luster to what once was a noble cause? If not now, then when? Private citizens beholden to a political party now run our elections, and if you believe that they do not have the means to bring their agenda to the fore whenever they see fit then you are sadly mistaken.
We ask that one member of this august body – just one –stand up for those values that we cherish so deeply. We ask that just one member look to America and by his or her actions tell us all that we matter, that our vote counts. By our votes, we have given you a mandate to do what is best for this nation. Please do not let us down. Prove to those of us who grow more skeptical by the day that democracy is indeed still alive, and that one of more of you will do not what is right for your re-election, but what is right for us all.
America is watching.
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