As Viktor Yushchenko declared a dramatic victory over Viktor Yanukovych in Ukraine’s
runoff presidential election on December 26, reversing the earlier result of November 21, it’s obvious that authorities had rigged the first election. It happened to a young nation that has embraced democracy for 14 years.
Could the same thing happen to a nation that has championed democracy around the world — the
United States of America?
As long as there exist corrupt authorities, rigged voting machines, collaborated corporations to
finance, operate, and even provide cover-up for the fraud, the answer is — why not?
The majority of Americans aren’t even aware of the stolen election of November 2, in which
George Bush claimed victory over John Kerry. The blackout of mainstream news
seems to be part of a cover-up scheme orchestrated by the news corporations
throughout America. Instead, the alternative news and Internet bloggers have
carried the heavy burden of spreading the word. Now, the public awareness is
growing, about 20% believe in the voter fraud conspiracy. The truth is
out….
The ironies of 2004 U.S. presidential election would raise serious doubts of its
legitimacy.
Like the Ukraine election, the exit poll results predicted that the challenger was leading the
incumbent. Kerry was shown leading in all the swing states before the night was
over but unexpectedly ended up behind Bush in Florida, New Mexico, Iowa, and
Colorado in the final tally. Kerry finally conceded after Ohio declared Bush as the winner. Important point — exit poll results have always served as an accurate indicator of the winner in all
democratic elections throughout the world. Even the Bush administration charged
that the first Ukraine’s presidential election was a fraud based on the exit
poll results. Why would the situation be different in the U.S. presidential
election?
In some states, numerous reports have recorded odd problems dealing with electronic voting
machines distributed by the Diebold and ES&S companies whose owners happened
to be brothers and Republican. Besides the various voting machine problems — the
touch-screen vote switching from Kerry to Bush, votes counted backwards,
negative tally for Kerry, phantom votes for Bush, broken down machines — the
biggest problem of them all was that these machines were deliberately designed
to leave no paper trails, making recounts impossible. Important point — the
counties in many states using Diebold optical scan machines have shown a higher
vote percentage for Bush than the counties using other types of voting machines.
The company experts or the defenders of the Bush campaign tried to explain that
the voting machine problems were simply random “glitches” or “irregularities.”
If so, why did the vote tabulations consistently and overwhelmingly favor
Bush?
Over 30,000 complaints, and climbing every day, of vote irregularities throughout the
country, should raise alarm to a nation that has enshrined the practice of
having a free and open election as a symbol of democracy. Sworn testimonies from
voters and witnesses offered an ugly scenario of the real presidential election:
pre-punched ballots for Bush; double voting; more absentee votes than
absentee voters; unfair provisional voter deletions; last-minute changes of
voting sites; voter suppression and intimidation of minorities and
students; not to mention, systematic tampering with tabulation machines.
Important point — the vote irregularities occurred in all swing states. With
all the mounting problems reported, how could 2004 presidential election have
been fair and open?
Two swing states that were crucial to the fate of the candidates for presidency —
Florida and Ohio — have been under tight scrutiny ever since Election Day.
Nevertheless, both states recorded the highest number of vote irregularities
among all swing states. Important point — the Governor of Florida is Jeb Bush, the brother of George Bush, and the Secretary of State of Ohio, Kenneth Blackwell, who was co-chair of the
Bush-Cheney campaign, administered Ohio’s November 2 balloting; both Jeb Bush
and Kenneth Blackwell delivered the Electoral College votes on a silver platter
to George Bush. How could Ohio and Florida declare that they’d held an honest
and nonpartisan presidential election?
Representative John Conyers, who is leading the investigation in the House of Representatives Judiciary Committee, noted that evidence of voter fraud in Ohio was rampant — dirty tricks
with misinformed fliers, bogus letters, telephone calls to confuse voters prior
to voting; disenfranchisement of new voters, African Americans, and students, by
not entering their names for registration, by intimidating and challenging them
at the polls, and by forcing them with the new law (imposed by Blackwell)
requiring provisional votes to be cast only in proper precincts; and withheld
voting machines in urban areas with high population of Democrats who waited in
line in the rain for as many as 10 hours.
Meanwhile, the two candidates, who received less than 3% of the Ohio vote,
David Cobb of the Green Party and Michael Badnarik of the Libertarian Party
raised $113,600 for a statewide recount after the vote was certified by
Blackwell. Flagrantly ignoring the law, Blackwell refused to recuse himself from
the Ohio recount or to testify in the election challenge lawsuit alleging
massive voter fraud. Even in the recount, the county election boards altered votes and didn’t randomly select precincts for the manual recount, according to observers. Furthermore, a
technician from Triad Governmental Systems, illegally tampered with a
punch-card voting machine, and at the same time, presented a "cheat sheet" to
ensure the recount matches the official results. Important point — Ohio law requires a
full recount if the 3% randomly selected precincts did not match the official
vote totals. Instead, one precinct with unmatched totals was suspended to avoid
a full recount, and another precinct’s signature book to verify the number of
votes cast was withheld until after January 10, four days after the Congress
official approval of all Electoral College votes. Again, Blackwell delivered the
recount to Bush. Why is Blackwell allowed to continue stonewalling the
constitutional rights of voters to have a fair recount?
Republicans and the mainstream media blamed the concoction of voter fraud theory on conspiracy nuts,
bloggers or just Democratic supporters of Kerry. Actually, the citizens that are
fueling the spread of a stolen election are teachers, doctors, lawyers, and
ordinary people who care about democracy enough to scrutinize every complaint,
error, and discrepancy. Like Cobb and Badnarik, many Americans feel that
the issue is no longer just establishing John Kerry as the rightful winner, but
that their democracy is at stake. If Americans can't have a fair and just
presidential election, how can they dare preach democracy to other countries in
the world?
(First published on UniOrb.com, January 2, 2005)
