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Departments Election Issues The One-Two Punch of Racism: Whitewashing the Voter Fraud Issue On this day after the election-fraud hearings led by John Conyers and his Democratic colleagues at the Judiciary Committee, I am beginning to feel the effects of racism's one-two punch. On the overt side, we have the written testimony of Judith A. Browne, acting co-director of the Advancement Project in Washington, D.C. For Browne, whose testimony to the Conyers committee is posted online, "voters of color" have been targets of Republican-led disenfranchisement in the elections of 2000 and 2004. http://www.house.gov/judiciary_democrats/brownevotestmt12804.pdf target=brown "In 2004," writes Brown, "it became clear that there were efforts underway to dust off Reconstruction Era statutes in order to disenfranchise voters, particularly minority voters." "There were clear warnings that challenges would be used to disenfranchise voters," says Browne. "Prior to Election Day in Nevada and Ohio, 17,000 and 35,000 challenges were filed, respectively, disproportionately in urban areas. (Over 17,000 of the Ohio challenges were filed in Cuyahoga County.) In addition, poll observers registered in unprecedented numbers in Florida and Ohio, with the intent to engage in massive challenges inside polling places." Browne is referring to laws that allow pollwatchers to act as self-deputized vigilantes at voting precincts, thrusting their bodies between ballot boxes and voters, demanding proofs of identification and registration. If you have never seen this process at work, then you might not feel the nausea. But I have seen them, the close shaven, starched-pants Republicans who show up on election day to a black community center and lean over old women with their dirty questions. Makes you want to spank them on their freshly cut heads. Didn't their mothers teach them no manners? "The targets," Browne reports, "were new voters in urban areas." Or to put it more plainly, new Black voters, the "Vote or Die" crowd that P-Diddy was trying to mobilize. Add to this the "felon purge" technique, in which Republican Party officials, knowing that they are working with "felon" lists "tainted by racial discrimination", set out to challenge thousands of voters by the batch. "This," says Brown, "is voter suppression in 2004." And this is what we may call racism of the overt bigotry kind. Racism type one. On this form of racism, Browne's statement continues for several more pages at the Conyers hearing website. Which brings us to racism type two, the invisibility maneuver. For this type of racism, it's best to begin with liberal columnists. Scan their morning-after reports for words like "minority", "black", "civil rights." Or try this Google test. First do a news search for Conyers hearings. Very good, lots of fresh hits. Now try a news search for Judith Browne Advancement Project under "News." See there. Your search did not match any documents (at 9:25 am CST). Overt racism by right-wing Republicans is the core dynamic at work here, but it is aided and abetted by invisibility racism found in left commentators and media reports, who fail to center the civil rights struggle. An issue that is clearly about racism and civil rights has been whitewashed into "voter fraud" generica. Type one racism answered with type two. Browne's careful citation of race-based discrimination followed by Browne's invisibility in the press. The one-two punch continues. There may not be much that can happen to change the results of the presidential election, so the whitewashing of "election fraud" may not have an immediate consequence for those who are focused on the Bush machine today. But here in Texas, Republicans are taking three newly elected Democrats into a costly process of hearings before a Republican-controlled chamber. "Election fraud" is the allegation that Republicans are bringing against the Democrats. In Texas, therefore, the generic cry of "election fraud" will very likely make invisible the crucial civil rights component that ties together the fates of three would-be state legislators with racist powers in Ohio and Florida. In particular, take the case of Hubert Vo, a Vietnamese immigrant who beat a Republican powerhouse by about 30 votes. If the Vo election is overturned by a Republican-led Legislature on whitewashed charges of "election fraud", then the losers will be a coalition of urban voters who worked hard on this grassroots coup. And the winners will be white suburban voters, again. Yet, if the pattern of injustice in "voter fraud" is a pattern that seeks to favor white suburban voters over struggling urban voters, wherever they are, then making this pattern visible, for once, could tip this 30 vote scale in Vo's favor, and reverse for the first time in more than 30 years a steady trend toward Republican domination of Texas politics. The white left is meaningless without a civil rights coalition. The sooner the white left embraces this, in deed and word, the sooner we'll be able to see a real future in front of us. The sooner, also, that a national movement of progressives can make a real difference in the South. -- Greg Moses is editor of the Texas Civil Rights Review and author of Revolution of Conscience: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Philosophy of Nonviolence. His chapter on civil rights under Clinton and Bush appears in Dimes worth of Difference, edited by Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair. |
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Recent Election Issues Articles Ohio's official non-recount ends amidst new evidence of fraud, theft and judicial contempt mirrored in New Mexico Impossible Phantom Votes in New Mexico
The 2004 Presidential Election: Who Won The Popular Vote? An Examination of the Comparative Validity of Exit Poll and Vote Count Data Ohio GOP election officials ducking notices of deposition as Kerry enters stolen vote fray Another third rate burglary Hacking the vote in Miami County Update from the Ohio Frontlines Lawsuit Before the Ohio Supreme Court Kerry votes switched to Bush and ballots pre-punched for Bush Uncounted votes in Cuyahoga County Provisional ballots in Cuyahoga County Uncounted votes in Summit County Uncounted votes in Hamilton County Default settings in Mahoning County Ohio electoral fight becomes 'biggest deal since Selma' as GOP stonewalls Observations from an election observer TV Networks Officially Refuse to Release Exit Poll Raw Data; Mainstream media finally displays true colors Election results in Southwestern Ohio Voting Rights Groups 'Block' Talk of Machine-Free Elections Statistics from Warren County The greatest story never told The United States of Ukraine?: Exit Polls Leave Little Doubt that in a Free and Fair Election John Kerry Would Have Won both the Electoral College and the Popular Vote Certifiable election results Sinclair Broadcasting's Long History of Journalistic and Corporate Deception Ohio vote count battles escalate amidst new evidence of potential criminal activity American democracy hangs by a thread in Ohio Startling new revelations highlight rare Congressional hearings on Ohio vote New Ohio voter transcripts The One-Two Punch of Racism: Whitewashing the Voter Fraud Issue Rigging the vote in Lucas County
Uncounted votes in Montgomery County Why history demands an Ohio revote Ohio election fraud uproar blasting to new level Dirty work at the Philly polls Voter Suppression: STEALING VOTES IN OHIO URBAN AREAS (full documentation) In Ohio 2004, it's the People versus the Party of Hate & Terror and the Party of Duck and Run...but will the Democrats now stand and fight? Warren County, Ohio: most successful voter registration drive in American political history, or stuffing the ballot box Jesse Jackson demands Ohio presidential recount, blasts GOP election officials, and says Kerry supports the process Kerry Supports Ohio Vote Investigation, Jackson says Hope for the Homestretch Favoritism in the suburbs New Ohio voter transcripts feed floodtide of doubt about Republican election manipulation Election officials gave wrong information about provisional ballots - revealed in affidavit. US tells Ukraine to recount votes on fradulent election! Not counting the votes Stealing votes in Columbus Making every vote count How a Republican election supervisor manipulated the 2004 central Ohio vote, in black and white More Ohio voter suppression testimony prompts upcoming legal filing for statewide recount Ohio Presidential Results to be Challenged Franklin County, Ohio voting machine assignments, and other information Coalition's Support of Voting Machines Causes Confusion
Hearings on Ohio voting put 2004 election in doubt Closing the Circle: The Corporatization of Elections Subordinating nation's secular values to zealots' will The Public Hearings and Rally About Election Fraud in Columbus, OH this weekend, Sat. 11/13-Please pass widely! Slip-sliding away in Columbus Green and Libertarian Presidential Candidates to Demand Ohio Recount An End To Mourning November 3rd action The Bible, The Constitution, and the James Carville Experiment Basic report from Columbus Waiting to vote Confessions of a political Know-Nothing in the wake of the 2004 elections Let the spin begin Back Stabbers Cost Kerry in Ohio! The Last Battle Republican America! Republican Forever! Is there inner-city election suppression in Franklin County, Ohio? Michael Moore in Columbus No love in the Heartland: Kerry gets mocked in Pa. school election Ten reasons for Greens to vote for Kerry Twelve ways Bush is now stealing the Ohio vote GW Bush Before the Iraq War
MISOGYNY Foreign Policy Forecast: If Bush Wins | If Kerry Wins Hope for the homestretch FactCheck.org says Cheney got it wrong Do the Hokey Pokey Hope for the homestretch Addressing Republican issues with John Kerry Gallup Polls- Conditioning for Vote Rigging? Too Many Cameras and Not Enough Truth: John Kerry Dodges the Press Nader 2000 Leaders United To Defeat Bush Shut up and color: the politics of bullying Kerry, Nader and the Greens need to kill the circular firing squad Don’t Believe the Hype; Terrorist Warnings Just Another Way Bush Will Steal Election President of Greater Stark County AFL-CIO speaks out on Bush’s visit in Canton, Ohio I'll Follow Kucinich to Kerry, Sorry Ralph Badnarik Doubles in Recent National Poll ‘A green world is possible’ planned in New York City during the Republican National Convention An open letter to progressives: vote Kerry and Cobb A street fighting man? How Kucinich can win Scary, Scary John Kerry With all deliberate stupidity: US self-isolation makes Iraq a virtual non-issue in the elections so far To support or not to support; the Nader question Halliburton, VP Cheney's Former Company Faces Second Criminal Probe In Four Years The Lone Ranger of Righteousness The Wrong Side of History High Noon in America The Truth is Out: Kucinich is the choice of progressives Dean and Kucinich Bush Should Be Facing 'A Long, Hard Slog' On The Campaign Trail, But Dems Too Busy Fighting With Each Other Read Election Issues Articles by Year: |
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