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This huge increase in Absentee Ballot voting--reported all over the country--is a PROTEST AGAINST THE RIGGED MACHINES!
People DON'T TRUST the machines, and are trying to get around the rigged system by AB voting.
The war profiteering corporate news monopolies began "spinning" this two weeks ago--articles in the NYT, AP, the Sacto Bee--all similarly worded, that the big increase in AB voting is voters "choosing convenience." NO mention of voter distrust of the machines--not even as a possibility. The WSJ chimed in a few days ago, descrying all the Absentee Ballot voting as disruptive. Spin, spin, spin. Why are they spinning this do hard? That is the question.
I think the answer is obvious. They are afraid that this huge new block of distrustful voters (it's up to 50% and 60% of the vote in some places), if it gets organized, will undermine and destroy their newly acquired (2002-2004) direct corporate control over election results (via the TRADE SECRET, PROPRIETARY programming code in ALL the electronic voting machines and central tabulators).
The election reform movement needs to get on this, and quick. Get out ahead of it, and provide focus and leadership. These many discontented voters are GIVING us the strategy to achieve transparent, verifiable vote counts. We must use this vast discontent to force local election officials to, a) HAND COUNT Absentee Ballot votes, and b) POST the results BEFORE any electronics are involved. These two simple, common sense demands--which are clearly what AB voters WANT--will give us a paper ballot system BY DEFAULT. Even more people will then vote by AB, because that will be the only way to get your vote counted properly.
What we have now is a national CAMPAIGN, not a STRATEGY, to achieve transparent vote counting. We are up against huge and entrenched corruption--affecting both Dem and Repub election officials and legislators--involving billions of dollars in e-voting contracts. THIS is why we haven't gotten rid of these EGREGIOUSLY insecure and insider hackable machines. The corrupt have dug in their heels. And no amount of national exposes of Diebold, or lawsuits, or yet more alarmed scientific reports, or GAO reports, or news articles, or computer "breakdowns" is going to change anything. The Dem majority in Congress that is being crafted will be a majority tilted toward Corporatists, which, combined with residual Bush "pod people," is NOT going to remove Corporate control of the voting system. They will, at best, slightly amend it, giving us a mandated "paper trail" (which is pretty useless considering the "trade secret" code in the central tabulators, the lack of auditing, and the rarity and difficulty of recounts).
Ergo: We need a BACKDOOR strategy to achieve transparent vote counts--one that circumvents all this corruption. And I think all these citizens who are trying to get their votes counted, by voted with an Absentee Ballot, are pointing the way. We don't say, "get rid of the machines." We say, "Count all the Absentee Ballot votes! And count them properly!"
No big and difficult purge of corrupt officials, dangerous rightwing corporations and their machines. CIRCUMVENT it, with the simple, reasonable demand for hand-counting the AB votes and posting THOSE results BEFORE scanning or entering them into the rigged electronics. The election officials who have been hoodwinked, and/or feel bullied or disgusted by these corporations--and I think there are lot of them--will do the right thing on AB vote counting. Those who resist this reasonable demand can be targeted for removal, or given a special dose of public pressure (and exposure).
It's a messy, LOCAL strategy, involving many jurisdictions--but I really think LOCAL is our only hope, and that this huge AB vote is the key to it. And it is, above all, a PEOPLES' strategy--inspired directly by the actions of the People, in this outpouring of AB voting--which doesn't wait around for our corrupt/collusive Dem Party officials or any federal "god" to save us. They ain't gonna. Mark my words. Russ Holt's bill (HR 550) will NOT be passed, in tact, by THIS Dem majority in the House (--and even in tact it has some holes), or the Senate will block it, and it will be compromised into oblivion in House/Senate negotiations. Most of the Dems voted *FOR* HAVA (albeit in the Anthrax Congress); then we were treated to our Party leaders' MIND-BOGGLING silence, as Bushite electronic voting corporations took over our election system. This is not going to be undone by another Diebold/ES&S elected Congress (--let's face it, they're pretty much ALL beholden to Diebold/ES&S now, even those who would be elected anyway--Diebold/ES&S controls our PRIMARIES, as well as the general elections). I frankly don't know what's going on, with the powers-that-be, who seem to want the Bushites out. I don't trust them at all. Maybe they've looted us so far beyond expectations that they can afford a snapback to mere Corporate Rule--from outright fascism--in order to put the American people back to sleep. In any case, DON'T EXPECT any earthshaking reform from this Congress--and I'm pretty sure some kind of deal has been made to immunize Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld from what should be their fate (prison, and confiscation of all their wealth).
So, to achieve REAL reform of the election system, we have to do it ourselves. Still. And this AB voting strategy is the ONLY strategy I see that doesn't involve a head-on collision with the Dark Lords, which they keep winning BECAUSE OF their control over election results, control of all news/opinion, and vast monetary and other resources (spying, blackmail, black ops, fear, bribery--how they got rid of our anti-Diebold Secretary of State Kevin Shelley in California).
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