“It is now apparent that a concerted and forceful program of election-day fraud and abuse was enacted with either the leadership or co-operation of governmental authorities.”
— Senator Richard Lugar (R)
referring to the 2004 Ukranian Presidential Elections
Mr. Bush likes to say America is leading the world toward democracy. In the Middle East, especially in Iraq, American-style democracy is on the march. We’re shipping so much democracy over there, it’s literally raining down from the skies, shaking the earth, and destroying the infrastructure with the force of its impact.
Mr. Bush would have you think America is the ultimate democracy — a model for the world to follow.
Are we?
In fact, there is excellent evidence that America is no longer a democracy. In the 2004 election, Republicans prevented more than 350,000 votes from being counted — easily enough to change the outcome of the election.
Exit polls — surveys that ask departing voters, “Whom did you vote for?” — have long been accepted by both scholars and critics as the most reliable predictors of election results. Prior to 2004, exit polls had never varied from election results by more than two percent. (There was one exception, in 1982; the resulting investigation revealed the cause: “massive voter fraud.”)
In the 2004 elections, mathematicians tell us, the exit poll results in Ohio alone differed from the election results by almost eleven percent. Differences in the exit poll numbers and the final vote tallies in Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania consistently favored Mr. Bush; the odds of this occurring by chance are one in 660,000. In the end, voter surveys differed significantly from election results in more than half of the fifty states. The odds of this occurring by chance, according to statistical experts, “are astronomical.”
Based on exit poll inconsistencies, Senator Richard Lugar contested the outcome of the 2004 Ukrainian elections, saying “It is now apparent that a concerted and forceful program of election-day fraud and abuse was enacted with either the leadership or co-operation of governmental authorities.”
Why Lugar (and others) failed to challenge even greater inconsistencies in the American presidential elections remains a mystery.
In tiny former Soviet republics, the idea of manipulated elections sends people streaming into the streets. Voters, enraged by the mockery of democracy, overturn cars, burn buildings, and revolt.
In America, though, democracy died without so much as a squeak. There is overwhelming evidence that our current leaders attained office through fraud and manipulation. We know this. The evidence of fraud is clear and indisputable. And yet, we Americans simply shrug and say, “Whatever.”
What qualifies us, then, to position ourselves as the worldwide guardians and enforcers of democracy?
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