DEPARTMENTS
ANTI-WAR
DEATH PENALTY
ELECTIONS
ENVIRONMENT
GLBT ISSUES
HEMP
INTERNATIONAL
NATIONAL
REVIEWS
|
Departments Election Issues The hollow democracy Every one of these rights is in jeopardy as 2012 opens and another presidential election season gets serious. But this is nothing new. After all, democracy is nothing if not a perpetual nuisance to the powerful. It asserts that public policy is everyone’s business, and that the concerns of even the most financially and socially marginal citizens are equal to those of the most elite. Indeed, no one is marginal in a democracy — a concept we embrace as a nation but don’t believe. And thus citizens are marginalized all the time. “Even in 2008, which saw the highest voter turnout in four decades,” Ari Berman wrote last September in Rolling Stone, “fewer than two-thirds of eligible voters went to the polls. And according to a study by MIT, 9 million voters were denied an opportunity to cast ballots that year because of problems with their voter registration . . . long lines at the polls . . . uncertainty about the location of their polling place . . . or lack of proper ID.” Berman pinpoints two serious problems in this passage. The lesser of the two, though still immensely troubling, is the cheat factor: the placing of impediments in the way of vulnerable voters or the outright disenfranchisement of certain constituencies, by legal, quasi-legal or outright illegal means. The cheat factor can also refer to the actual manipulation of election results, something eerily easy to do on electronic voting machines — with evidence of widespread irregularities permanently tarnishing George Bush’s re-election in 2004, for instance. This year, the democracy impeders are out in full force. The NAACP has issued a report called “Defending Democracy: Confronting Modern Barriers to Voting Rights in America,” which, as reported by Harvey Wasserman and Bob Fitrakis, “takes on the new Jim Crow tactics passed in fourteen states that are designed to keep minorities from voting in 2012.” The organization has petitioned the U.N. to investigate. The most notorious of these tactics has been the proliferation of laws, usually passed by Republican-controlled state legislatures, requiring would-be voters to present photo IDs at the polling place, allegedly to control “voter fraud” — a made-up problem invented by GOP operatives like Karl Rove to justify laws aimed at cutting voter turnout among typically Democratic constituencies. These constituencies — African-Americans, Latinos, the poor, the elderly — are far less likely than middle-class whites to have an ID such as a driver’s license. To obtain a state ID at the Department of Motor Vehicles requires a long wait and, possibly, the prior purchase of a birth certificate, which has been likened to a modern-day poll tax. Other legislative impediments include new bureaucratic hurdles complicating voter registration drives, which, Berman reported, caused the League of Women Voters to shut down its registration efforts in Florida and may lead Rock the Vote, which signed up 2.5 million new voters in 2008, to do the same; and the disenfranchising of ex-felons, a disproportionate number of whom, thanks to an array of historical forces, are African-American or Latino. (Many people happening to bear the same name as ex-felons also got purged from election rolls in a number of states in recent elections.) Beyond the cheat factor — the disenfranchisement of certain voters or the manipulation of results — American democracy is being hollowed out by a process, to my mind, even more insidious: the slow, steady usurpation of power by unelected special interests and the privatization of the commons. This process continues no matter who gets elected, because elected power is subordinate to it. I still have dazzling memories of lines snaking around the block at Chicago polling places throughout Election Day 2008, as the Obama campaign mobilized hope and possibility in almost unprecedented numbers. But as Berman pointed out, even though this was the best turnout the country had in four decades, it represented less than two-thirds of eligible voters. Along with the 9 million people who tried to vote and for various reasons couldn’t in 2008, more than 40 million people marginalized themselves by not even trying. This isn’t a problem of “laziness.” It’s more like pragmatic despair. The media do their best to trivialize the election process and turn it into a horse race. And the military-industrial economy, through organizations such as the American Legislative Exchange Council, or ALEC, to which some 2,000 state legislators and hundreds of corporations (e.g., Koch Industries, Wal-Mart, Pfizer, AT&T) belong, quietly shapes legislation and wields political power on behalf of moneyed interests. The good news is that, as we reclaim, anew, our right to vote, we counter organized, secret, unelected corporate power and regain our own. Real democracy is represented by citizen activism and, most spectacularly in 2011, the Occupy movement, which demonstrated that “voting” is something we do by our actions every single day. ---------------------- Robert Koehler is an award-winning, Chicago-based journalist and nationally syndicated writer. His new book, Courage Grows Strong at the Wound (Xenos Press) is now available. Contact him at Email or visit his website at Common Wonders. © 2012 TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC. |
|
Recent Election Issues Articles Story notes For television producer Shonda Rhimes Timeline 2004 – One more look at the Ohio election Dysfunction at Maricopa County Elections department disenfranchises tens of thousands SWING STATE: How the Fix was Nixed in Ohio Romney may have lost, but the voting system is still broken OPINION: Your vote got counted. Here's why Matrix of Deceit: Forcing Pre-election and Exit polls to Match Fraudulent Vote Counts Bifani rap on the state of the elections in the USA An America Yet To Be Born Voter Supression In Center City Allentown PA An Election Protection Agenda for 2016 Vote totals for Obama and Romney inexplicably decreasing in three Ohio counties Opening of polls in Franklin County on Election Day Fitrakis returns from federal court hearing on Ohio voting machine software patch Good news for OSU students trying to vote Video of vote flipping in Pennsylvania Bob Fitrakis from the hearing today Reports from election observers and voters: Broken scanners and too many provisionals Nearly 1000 voters forced to vote provisional in a single Franklin county precinct Breaking News: Judge denies request to stop illegal software patches Election watch report from Columbus Ohio Action at the Driving Park polling site The Battleground States: True Vote Sensitivity Analysis Woman not allowed to vote Breaking News: Results of today’s hearing in state court on the uncertified and untested software Election Protection News Conference - Pt. 1 Election Protection News Conference - Pt. 2 Another Husted dirty trick in Ohio: Secretary of State's Office admits direct reporting function of untested election software OHIO – VOTE HEIST 2012? Invoices prove Romney-related voting company Hart InterCivic does maintenance on Cincinnati voting machines Columbus Free Press Editor and Publisher files suit in federal court to stop suspicious software November 5 Press Conference: FEDERAL E-VOTING LAWSUIT FILED VS. OHIO SECRETARY OF STATE JOHN HUSTED GREEN PARTY PRESIDENTIAL AND CONGRESSIONAL NOMINEES REVEAL DETAILS The electronic architecture of voter suppression As Ohio Faces vote-rigging lawsuit, are dems, liberals, election officials ready to safeguard votes? Busting election theft attempts Will Your Vote Even Get Counted? The Free Press confirms installation, secret justification of uncertified last minute election tabulation reporting software in Ohio Will "experimental" software patches affect the Ohio vote? Why we fight to prevent stolen elections in 2012 and beyond Mike Connell: Man in the Middle Gripping documentary exposes voter suppression and election rigging in the 2004 presidential election Thom Pintello: I Just Want My Vote to Count" Why Romney has already won this electronic election, unless… Partisan lies about the security of Hart e-voting machines continue to flow from Hamilton County Romney family and friends will help tabulate the vote count in Cincinnati: Hart Intercivic holds maintenance contracts on their own machines Election software company Scytl on the run from the Free Press, from one fake address to the next The case for irrational voting Why are legal scholars dismissing election fraud?: Manufactured skepticism and exit polls Jamia Shepard: Advocate for Voter Rights Does the Romney family now own your e-vote? Secretary of State’s directive allowing early voting during three days before Election Day long overdue: Lawsuits and voter confusion could have been avoided “It’s Ok to leave your abuser,” says Green Party VP candidate Will H.I.G.-owned e-voting machines give Romney the White House? Ignore debate zingers, focus on issues Bob Fitrakis speaks at Neighborhood House candidate forum Last three days before election early voting reinstated in Ohio...sort of Book Review: A Must Read for All U.S. Citizens Vote counting company tied to Romney Will 9 GOP governors electronically flip Romney into the White House? Ohio Elections Commission finds probable cause that anti-Issue 2 ad is misleading Who owns Scytl? George Soros isn’t in the voting machines, but the intelligence community is Will the GOP steal America's 2012 election? Pragmatic Racism Four ways the Ohio GOP is already stealing the 2012 election Gubernatorial Recall Ballots Saved from Destruction in Waukesha County, WI - For Now... What Paul Ryan has and Obama wants Playing field is tilted against voters Colonels in mirrored sunglasses The new Jim Crow: Massive disenfranchisement returns Mishandled Redistricting disenfranchises 3,000 voters Corporate vote theft and the future of American democracy PART ONE New certifications, planned expansion Progressive morality Was the election stolen in Wisconsin - what are the odds? Columbus Free Press in the news: A million voters purged Wisconsin: New year, same stench Republican retreat - Ohio House Republicans defeat their own voter suppression bill Elections: What are they good for? The peace movement needs Kucinich, with or without Congress Ron Paul, "Progressive" for who? Do We Approve of Murder Based on Political Party? Pollsters Don't Want You to Know The State of Obama's 2008 Promises The election we should be following Booing the Golden Rule Six Problems with New Hampshire Elections The hollow democracy Read Election Issues Articles by Year: |
FREE PRESS EMAIL UPDATE
Donate to the Free Press Election Protection Fund to help us investigate and monitor election fraud in this year's election.
FOLLOW US ON
twitter
facebook
SEARCH THE FREEPRESS
1021 E. Broad St. Columbus, OH 43205 | 614.253.2571 | truth@freepress.org
All content © 1970-2012 The Columbus Free Press
Disclaimer