Reply #227: Jim Hightower would... [View All]

...love this thread. It is a perfect illustration of what he means when he says trying to get Democrats to work together on something is like trying to load bullfrogs in a hot wheelbarrow.

Just a reminder. It is October, 2003. In one year and a week or so, the presidential elections of 2004 will be held. If the vote counts are done on the Diebold and ES&S equipment in place (which already counts more than sixty percent of the vote in the U.S.) and equipment already slated to be in place by the elections (which will boost the total to close to eighty percent of the vote), without the safeguard of mandatory sample handcounts of paper ballots, then the Bush team probably already knows how many votes they will win by state-by-state and nationally. In which case America has ceased to be a Democracy and elections have ceased to have any meaning.

We wouldn't be the first "most poweful nation on earth" to fall under despotic leadership. And history doesn't paint a pretty picture of the long fall such leadership inevitably triggers.

But we do still have a year. Twelve months. We can spend the time trying to prove we are right and someone else is wrong in a momentary disagreement of whatever magnitude, or we can set those disagreements aside and spend the time allotted to us attempting to save our Democracy and our nation.

BBV activists are obviously hurting Diebold, etc., because they have upped the ante in terms of fighting back. The have called off the trolls in the forums and sent in the hackers to take out activist sites, and are spending tens of thousands of dollars on lawyers trying every legal trick at their disposal to shut down activists and keep them from getting the word out; speading dissention where possible amongst activists and activist groups, and rolling out a lobbyist/pr offensive with election officials and local political groups across the country. I more than have my hands full here with the struggle at the county and state level. (Working with the local Democratic Party here is another bullfrong/wheelbarrow experience, but that is another story.)

Personally, I admit I am not sure this is a struggle we can win. But I am absolutely certain it is one we have no choice but to carry forward.

Gordon25