We won...so why do I feel like crying?

[FourScore]

Before I get attacked, let me please explain...

For the last couple of months I have been very activist about the e-voting machines and optical scanners. I have written poetry, emails, letters, phone calls,entered discussions, and much more to help spread the knowledge about the dangers of e-voting.

To give some history: After the last presidential election, I was SO depressed. I couldn't understand what happened. But, within a couple of days, I found a world of people who felt just like me, and some them had an answer. BradBlog, DU (God bless you, TIA!) and some of the people (though not kos himself) at dailykos became my allies -- I spent more time on these websites in the first few weeks after the election than I had ever spent on a computer in my whole life. I discovered the blogs and a whole new world of news and information came my way. Honestly, it was quite revolutionary for me. The dangers of evoting became so clear; and like many here at DU, I realized, based on the statistical evidence and peoples' testimonies of vote-switching, that the 2004 election was stolen. Why the press -- with the exception of Keith Olbermann -- did not report on it, other than to mock us, was baffling to me. (The last time I watched Ted Koppel's Nightline was because of a terrible piece of journalism he did calling evoting-doubters conspiracy theorists. It was insulting!)

I was so worried as this election came nearer. I thought, too few people are aware of what's going to happen. Then, slowly, the press woke up. Lou Dobbs did alot. HBO aired their documentary. People were much more open to discuss the topic. It moved out of the CT realm and into mainstream. I realized more and more people were poised for the train wreck. I thought to myself, "Now they will see it for themselves, and we will do away with these machines for good!" I will say, I was worried we might lose. I was REALLY worried that it would get rigged just enough to fall short of winning the majority in the House and Senate, but enough Dems would win that the press could poo-poo evoting activists as conspiracy theorists again.

But none of that appears to have really happened. Suddenly, everyone is saying the machines worked. "See? All we need is a paper trail and we'll be good!" IMHO, the paper trail, though better than nothing, is still fraught with problems.

I want to be clear. I am ECSTATIC that the dems won the election. I am just so afraid that now people will accept these damn machines in our lives. Everyone was poised for a stolen election, and it didn't happen.

Maybe it never happened in 2004...Is kos right? DId Bush really win?

I guess I feel like crying because I am afraid of the next presidential election using these machines. Or maybe I am crying because I told everyone to just wait and see, that GWB could not afford for the dems to take control and would do everything in his power to stop it. I was wrong. But WHY was I wrong?

Please forgive my ramblings. I just hate these machines.

[porphyrian]

1. You're just being realistic about the mountain of work in front of us.

We may have stopped the slide into oblivion, but we've got a long way to push this shit back uphill.

[JeffR]

2. Verifiable voting & public financing of elections are huge priorities

The new majority party in Congress needs to move on these issues ASAP.

[FourScore]

4. Of course! John Conyers!!! Now why didn't I think of that?

THAT makes me feel better.

[JeffR]

12. I fervently hope Conyers makes destroying HAVA a priority

and can put together a real voting reform package.

[gully]

3. Believe me, Democrats are not resting easy about the voting machines

just because they couldn't steal THIS one. I do expect a paper trail soon.

[elehhhhna]

5. Kos is full of baloney. Watch Hacking Democracy--youtube has the key

10 minutes btw.

Our dem landslide for Nick Lampson was fraught w/ voting machine problems and much, much more*. Nick won (w/record turnout), but all our locals--ALL OF THEM!--went Reep. I know for a fact we had jillions of straight-party Dem voters.

Explain THAT.

* I was illegally ejected from a polling place, link here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=2656604&mesg_id=2656604

[FourScore]

15. I DO believe there were local problems. In many areas.

But nobody other than those of us who care so passionately about it will hear about those elections.

[elehhhhna]

17. Wanna bet? We had Fed Election observers crawling all over

the County. Fed mid-level lawyers ten do be Dem-ish. Who else goes to law school then takes a realively low-paid Gov lawyer public service gig?

Bad News: they left shortly before I was illegally ejected from the polling place.

Good News: They know all about it, now. And then some.

[bryant69]

6. I'm surprised more people haven't made similar comments

I salute your integrity.

That said, I think that the problems with voting were a bit oversold and over simplified. To read some of the comments before this election, you'd think Karl Rove had a big red button in his office saying "Rig election" and it was just that simple. The truth is electoral fraud is a "death by a thousand cuts" sort of thing, in my opinion. It seems clear that there was some fraud in this election, it just was sporadic and unfocused enough that it didn't sway the election(s) that much.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[FourScore]

13. I love the image of the big red button.

Of course it is difficult, but somehow they managed in multiple swing states in 2004. There were many different kinds of machines used as well. How did they pull that off? I'm convinced they did, but how? Was there just more ignorance, so it was more possible?

[StraightDope]

7. I would say that you feel like crying...

Because you have had to bear witness to all of the damage done to the U.S. and the rest of the world at Bush and company's hands over the past six or so years.

I know that's why I still feel like crying, anyway.

[SmokingJacket]

8. It doesn't matter if any elections WERE stolen; fact is, it could happen

in the future, and it could have happened in the past. Frankly, no one KNOWS if elections have been stolen... but we all need to make sure it CAN'T happen.

If I were a sneaky conniving evil vote stealer, I would have NOT stolen this one, because everyone was watching this time. If Dems win, the issue will go away -- that's what I, as an evil vote thief, would be thinking and counting on. But we can't let the issue go away.

[elehhhhna]

9. Nancy Pelosi?!! Izzat you?

[KoKo]

10. It's not over with the machines. Howard Dean is on it and it's just that

so many folks are still in shock on both sides that Dems pulled it out finally.

There are lots of reports of problems with the machines that will come out and John Conyers has documented in the Dem hearings evidence from Selection 2004. Finally Conyers and the Black Caucus can do something with those hearings findings.

Also...to perk you up...yesterday Macaca's Campaign Manager, Former RNC head Ed Gillespi had a consultant up claiming that Machine Errors had caused Webb's win. The consultant talked about "paperless trail voting, power outages, inexperience poll workers and elections officials and faulty machines that switched votes." Gillespi was figuring the "recount" would go until the end of November. HA! I think the reason Webb is going to concede is that Bushies freaked out that their voting corruption would be exposed if Allen stuck it out demanding full recount.

There's just so much work that's been done ...it isn't going to all shut down just because we Dems won. There's a "paper trail" of information and documentation of stolen elections and voter disenfranchisement that with subpoena power will push for overhaul and reform.

[Just-plain-Kathy]

11. We all know republicans fixed the '04 elections.

Whose to say they didn't try this time. I remember in '04 when they fixed the computers in one county where they had more GOP votes then they had GOP voters. Maybe this time they under estimated how many democrats would come out to vote.

I bet we won by a much bigger margin.

I'm fully confident that with all the senators who want to become President in '08, the problem with e-voting will be fixed.

[cooolandrew]

14. I get the feeling only some machines are bad I mean why use only few machines to suppress if it robs

[Tommymac]

16. There were horrible issues with the emachines this time

Just that they have been overlooked in the euphoria of our victory.

Give it a bit of time...

and take heart in events like getting a GREAT SOS in California - who is insisting on Open Source boxes - she will set the trend for the rest of the country in the next 2 years...

As Thom Hartmann said the other day - WE THE PEOPLE must hold the parade...and the pols will jump out in front when it gets big enough. The parade to return the counting of the votes to the PEOPLE is still growing...and the pols will jump in front sooner rather than later.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

18. I did a bit of studying of 2004 returns

vs. 2000 in terms of the presidential race in several states, and I'll repost here:

in light of assumptions of fraud in Florida and Ohio, I thought I'd take a quick look at the vote totals in 3 uncontested, non-battleground, non-swing, "safe" Kerry states. A simple comparison of 2000 to 2004 Bush totals shows the following:

................... ...... 2004..... 2000
Massachusetts 1,067,163 878,502 (21.5% Bush increase)
Rhode Island ..... 161,654 130,555 (23.8%)
Delaware .......... 171,660 137,288 (25%)!!!

You might attribute the high Mass and RI votes to anti-Kerry voters who know him and simply hate him, but the Delaware number is mind numbing.
These percentages also, unfortunately, agree with the Bush popular vote total of 62 million, which would be a 23% increase over his 50.5 million in 2000.
So it appears that Bush somehow, actually, really got all of these new voters this time.

Also, Bush's percent share increased in every state but a few, Vermont being one of them.
The 3 listed here are:
Mass: 32.5% in 2000 to 37%.
RI 31.9 to 38.9
DE 41.9 to 46.2

[FourScore]

19. Wow. Unbelievable. n/t