Like biologists with evolution and atmospheric scientists with global
climate change, those who warn us that our elections have been stolen and
will be stolen again must now be wondering, “just how much evidence must it
take to make our case and to convince enough of the public to force reform
and secure our ballots?”
The answer, apparently, is no amount – no amount, that is, until more minds
are opened. And that is more than a question of evidence, it is a question
of collective sanity.
In his new book,
Fooled Again, Mark Crispin Miller not only presents abundant
evidence that the 2004 election was stolen, but in addition he examines the
political, social, and media environment which made this theft possible.
When I first read the book immediately after its publication, I confess that
I was a bit disappointed. What I had hoped to find was a compendium of
evidence, from front to back. To be sure, Miller gives us plenty of
evidence, meticulously documented. But evidence tells us that the election
was stolen. Miller goes beyond that to explain how and why it was stolen,
and how the culprits have managed, so far, to get away with it. So on second
reading, I find that it was my expectation and not Miller’s book that was
flawed. We have evidence aplenty, to be found in
John Conyers’ report, and the new book by
Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, in addition to the
Blackbox voting Website
among numerous others. Soon to be added is Prof. Steven Freeman’s book on the
statistical evidence of election fraud. What we don’t gain from these
sources is an understanding and appreciation of the context in which this
crime was committed. This we learn from reading Miller’s book.
If, in fact, the last two presidential elections have been stolen, and if in
addition there is a preponderance of evidence to support this claim, then
this is the most significant political news in the 230 year history of our
republic.
So what is the response of the allegedly “opposing” party to the issue of
election fraud? Virtual silence. And of the news media? More silence. Case
in point: the media response to Mark Crispin Miller’s Fooled Again.
As he reports:
"There have been no national reviews of Fooled Again. No network or cable TV
show would have the author on to talk about the book. NPR has refused to
have him on... Only one daily newspaper – The Florida Sun-Sentinel– has
published a review.” (Smirking Chimp. Link lost).
Force the question of election fraud and demand an answer, and the most
likely response will be a string of ad hominem insults – “sore
losers,” “paranoid,” “conspiracy theorists” -- attacks on the messenger and
a dismissal of the message. We’ve heard them, many times over
Persist, and you might get as a reply, not evidence that the elections were
honest and valid (there is very little of that), but rather some rhetorical
questions as to the attitudes and motives of the alleged perpetrators and to
the practical difficulties of their successfully accomplishing a stolen
national election. Questions such as these:
-
How could the GOP campaign managers believe that they
could get away with a stolen election?
-
Why would they dare risk failure, and the subsequent
criminal indictments and dissolution of their party?
-
What could possibly motivate them to subvert the
foundations of our democracy?
The answer to the first two questions is essentially the
same: they believed and they dared because they controlled the media and
thus the message. Miller’s sub-text throughout his book is that the great
electoral hijack has been accomplished with the cooperation, one might even
say the connivance, of the mainstream media, without which the crime could
never have succeeded. Immediately following the election, the critics were
shouted down with such headlines as this: “Election paranoia surfaces;
Conspiracy theorists call results rigged” (Baltimore Sun), “Internet Buzz on
Vote Fraud is dismissed” (Boston Globe), “Latest Conspiracy Theory – Kerry
Won – Hits the Ether” (Washington Post), and in the “flagship” newspaper,
the New York Times: “Vote Fraud Theories, Spread by Blogs, Are Quickly
Buried.” (Miller, 38). Even more damaging than the slanted “reports” in the
media, was the silence. The Conyers investigations? Ignored. The scholarly
statistical analyses of exit poll discrepancies? Ignored. Evidence that Bush
cheated in the debates with a listening device? Dismissed. The recent GAO
report on e-voting vulnerabilities, and the Florida demonstration hacking of
computer vote compilation? Ignored. And most appalling of all: the media
blackout last week of Al Gore’s eloquent speech, warning of the threat to
our Constitution and our liberties posed by the Bush regime.
And all this merely scratches the surface of media malpractice. For more,
read the book.
The motivation to steal the election, says Miller, combined religious (or
quasi-religious) dogma and self-righteousness and a perception of the
opposing Democratic party, not as “the loyal opposition,” but as “the enemy”
deserving, not defeat, but annihilation. (“You are either with us or against
us,” says Bush). Together, this adds up to what Miller calls “The Requisite
Fanaticism.” He writes:
It is not “conservatism” that impelled the theft of the
election, nor was it merely greed or the desire for power per se...
The movement now in power is not entirely explicable in such familiar
terms... The project here is ultimately pathological and essentially
anti-political, albeit Machiavellian on a scale, and to a degree, that
would have staggered Machiavelli. The aim is not to master politics, but
to annihilate it. Bush, Rove, DeLay, Ralph Reed, et al. believe in
“politics” in the same way that they and their corporate beneficiaries
believe in “competition.” In both cases, the intention is not to play the
game but to end it – because the game requires some tolerance of the
Other, and tolerance is precisely what these bitter-enders most despise...
(Miller 81-2)
Reiterating a theme that is prominent in his writing, Miller
points out that the psychological pathology most conspicuously at work in
the right’s demolition of politics is projection: the attribution in
“the enemy” of one’s own moral depravity:
The Bushevik, so full of hate, hates politics, and would
get rid of it; and yet he is himself expert at dirty politics: an
expertise that he regards as purely imitative and defensive. Because his
enemies, he thinks, are all “political” – dishonest, ruthless, cynical,
unprincipled – he is thereby “forced” to be “political” as well, in order
to “fight fire with fire.” As we have seen, this paranoid conviction of
the Other’s perfidy suffuses and impels the propaganda campaigns of the
right, and it was especially important in Bush/Cheney’s drive to steal the
last election. Indeed it was their firm conviction that they had to
steal the race, in order to frustrate the Democrats’ attempt to do it
first. (Miller, 82).
This is just a brief sampling of Miller’s astute political
and psychological analysis of the “why” and the “how” of the stolen
elections of 2000, 2002 and 2004. That analysis, which takes up about a
third of the book (Chapters 3 and 4), adds an invaluable dimension to our
understanding of the political disaster that has befallen our Republic, and
that analysis suggests guidelines in the struggle to avoid the theft of the
upcoming elections of 2006 and 2008.
I have
written at length about what might be done if we are to restore the
ballot box to the voters. These crucial steps come immediately to mind, as I
read Miller’s “Fooled Again.”
Briefly, we need a media, we need an opposition party, we need an aroused
public, and we need a miracle. But take heart: history tells us that
political crises have a way of producing miracles.
The mainstream media (MSM) must be discredited and an alternative
media established in its place. The internet offers a voice to an opposition
that is excluded from the mainstream, and a few independent publications and
broadcasts remain, however feeble in comparison to the MSM. If a sizeable
portion of the public deserts the mainstream, and directly informs the
publishers and broadcasters why they are doing so, the media, and
particularly their sponsors and advertisers, will take notice. Recently,
some of the media have become more critical of the Bush regime and the GOP
Congress, but it is, by and large, too little and too late. So either the
commercial media must resume the role of watchdog of government power, as
intended by Jefferson and Madison, or it must be made irrelevant. The
Russian dissidents late in the Soviet era have given us an example: if you
have no media, create one, even if it is suppressed by the government. It
was called “Samizdat” – a painstaking process of typing several
carbon copies of forbidden manuscripts on condition that the recipients
would do likewise. Similarly, the Iranian dissidents during the reign of the
Shah copied and distributed audio tapes of revolutionary speeches. In the
computer age, there are huge advantages: internet publication and, if the
internet is taken from us, CDs and minidisks. For now, the internet is our
Samizdat.
The Democratic party is the only potentially effective opposition
party in sight. But at the moment, it is a toothless tiger. We must tell
that party that it must either lead the struggle to restore electoral
integrity or step aside. When the Clintons, Cantwells, Liebermans and
Feinsteins run for re-election, they must be opposed in the primaries by
authentic progressives. Even if those progressives lose, but with a
creditable showing, the “establishment” Democrats will nonetheless get the
message. Next time you get a solicitation notice from the DNC or the Senate
or Congressional Campaign Committees, tell them “no dice” unless they deal
with the election fraud issue. Then tell them that instead of a
contribution, you are purchasing Miller’s book and donating it to the local
library.
As for the public, remember that more than half the public is awake,
aware, and opposed to the Bush regime. Of these, a small but significant
minority is convinced that election fraud is a serious problem. But that
dissenting public lacks a voice, cohesion and leadership. This is a recipe
for potentially sudden change: like fuel and oxygen, lacking the third
necessity – heat of ignition. A message, from a Tom Paine or a Jefferson, or
leadership from a Washington, a Gandhi, a Mandella or a Sakharov, can ignite
the fire that will consume this evil regime. Or not. That depends on whether
concerned citizens sit by and wait for others to act, or instead take some
initiative and join the struggle – writing to Congress, talking to any and
all associates that will listen and perhaps a few that won’t, contributing
to alternative media, copying and distributing dissenting essays, and
generally raising hell.
And finally, miracles: they are, by nature, unpredictable. Some
possibilities: A few corporate and financial elites will finally come to
realize that where Bush is leading, they don’t want to follow, and they will
join the opposition. (There are a few intimations of this already).
Similarly, perhaps a few journalists, and even some Republicans, will
finally if belatedly decide that they would prefer not to live in a
dictatorship. Bushenomics is bound to lead to an economic collapse that is
certain to wake up the public. And even now, some state Attorney General or
some District Attorney may be preparing an indictment for election fraud
against an e-vote company executive that could break this conspiracy wide
open.
But don’t wait for miracles to happen – make them happen.
If we are to take back our country, we must first take back
our vote. Mark Crispin Miller’s book will tell you what has happened, how
and why it has happened, and what must be done about it.
Will we, the people, take up the challenge? On that question rests the fate
of our republic, of our liberties, and of “our lives, our fortunes, and our
sacred honor.”
Copyright 2006 by Ernest Partridge
