Under Currents: Not Yet Time to Declare a Kerry Victory

Under Currents: Not Yet Time to Declare a Kerry Victory
By J. DOUGLAS ALLEN-TAYLOR (11-12-04)

Time for my Democratic friends, I think, to pause and take a breath. You’re beginning to freak me out, guys.

My e-mail inbox—yours, too, I imagine—is filled with messages of alternating, intertwined subject lines: either “Kerry Won” or “Evidence Mounts That National Vote Was Hacked.” Unfortunately, it appears that this virus has spread too far and too fast to be contained, and we can probably only stand at the edges and make comments while it runs its course.

Some brief comments, and suggestions.

The “Kerry Won” declaration seems derived from the old disappointed sports fan chant of “my team won, except that your guys cheated” or, in the alternative, “except that the refs got the call wrong.” As a tool to buck up the depressed psyche it’s a useful exercise, but worthless in the real world. The only measure of “winning,” after all, is to see your team with the World Series rings or the Superbowl trophy. Or sitting in the White House. Mr. Bush is still in the White House. Mr. Kerry is not. The real question is: If my Democratic friends really believe that Mr. Bush came in first by illegal means, what are they going to do about it?

That brings us to the area of allegations of fraud in last Tuesday’s election, a point on which my Democratic friends must exercise some care, caution, and patience.

We are being swamped with examples of what you might call “troubling oddities” in the vote-instances where Democrat majority counties using paper ballots recorded majority votes for Mr. Kerry, while adjoining Democrat majority counties, using touchscreen voting machines-recorded majority votes for Mr. Bush, sometimes even huge majorities. My Democratic friends—many of them frantic at the thought of a second Bush term—are pushing these instances as “evidence of voter fraud” which can be used to reverse the outcome before the certification of the vote. Few things in life are certain, but this is one of them: Even if Chief Justice William Rehnquist is ill and unable to vote, the present United States Supreme Court is not going to overturn the presumed results of the Nov. 2 national election based upon some “troubling oddities” in the vote. Popular revolt, military coup, or divine intervention aside, that means Mr. Bush will be taking the oath of office again, come next January.

Rest is here:

http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/article.cfm?issue=11-12-04&storyID=20084

the agenda is to get rid of auditless vote tabulation software.

If we could get Kerry into the presidency, I'd be ecstatic. Really really really ecstatic. But we also need to get a grip on these e-voting machines and other voter fraud to make it more difficult for the next election to be stolen also. Likewise, IMHO, Nader calling for a NH recount works towards this end also. Computers are fine, as far as they go, but not for paperless, trackless voting.