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September 18, 2004

The Euros, in your local polling place Nov 2, 2004

Note: this article was first published at Redstate.org on August 7, 2004. I've written an update at the end of this article.

For a goodly portion of the Democrats in this country, 2000 still rankles. Nine Congressional Democrats wrote to Kofi Annan just prior to July 4, 2004, requesting the United Nations "assign international observers to the U.S. presidential election in November." Needless to say, this challenge to United States sovereignty did not sit well with many Republicans.

Of course, the myth-mongering of these Democrats that the 2000 elections were really one rife with deliberate corruption has not been lost on the Johns. Kerry proudly feeds the sophistry with his own cadre of mobilized lawyers.

On Election Day in your cities, my campaign will provide teams of election observers and lawyers to monitor elections and enforce the law ...

Lawyers for Kerry-Edwards is working with the DNC's Voting Rights Institute (VRI) to organize thousands of attorneys across the country to be in every polling place on Election Day and to educate voters locally about their ballot, their voting machine and the voting process.

It appears that the Democrats are determined to wave the red flag of the "stolen" 2000 election, both attempting to get a less than America-friendly UN involved, or having lawyers ready at the courthouse doors at 12:01a.m. on Nov 3 to challenge the election if it doesn't go Kerry's way.

There doesn't seem much the Bush administration can do with this scenario. The Democrats are poised to scream "thief!" at every turn. So the report that President Bush has invited the OSCE to observe the November elections is a bit breath taking.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe will monitor the U.S. election Nov. 2 at President Bush's invitation. Members include Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Russia, Spain and the United States.

What? French observers poking around US polling places? What about US sovereignty? What do the Russians have to teach us about voting?

Immediate emotional reaction is "No No No! What the hell is Bush thinking?" I confess, I was stunned at this announcement.

Then I started digging a bit and thinking. Sometimes we are not given the luxury of the choice between good and bad, only between bad and worse. Or, as the adage goes, when handed lemons, make lemonade. In this scenario, I believe President Bush is making lemonade.

First, the US has been a member of the OSCE since 1973, and in November of 1990 signed "the Charter of Paris." Relevant section

(8) The participating States consider that the presence of observers, both foreign and domestic, can enhance the electoral process for States in which elections are taking place. They therefore invite observers from any other CSCE participating States and any appropriate private institutions and organizations who may wish to do so to observe the course of their national election proceedings, to the extent permitted by law. They will also endeavour to facilitate similar access for election proceedings held below the national level. Such observers will undertake not to interfere in the electoral proceedings.

Second, this is not the first time OSCE has observed a US election, they were in Florida in 2002. Certainly, I don't remember this being widely reported in the media.

Third, the way the "invitation" was framed by the State Department's Wendy Silverman who spoke before the OSCE in session in Vienna, Austria, July 15, gives one pause:

The United States is dedicated to the OSCE commitments regarding free and fair elections and has resolved to implement these commitments effectively.

...

Free and fair elections, in which the electorate has confidence, are vital to the development and consolidation of democracy in every country in the OSCE region. The presence of domestic and international observers can enhance the electoral process and public confidence in it. That is why the United States has invited ODIHR to observe our own presidential and congressional elections on November 2. Furthermore, the United States commends other participating States organizing elections this fall that have also already issued invitations to ODIHR. [emphasis added]

...

ODIHR monitoring teams should not be seen as "interference in [a country's] internal affairs," but rather as an international resource, like the Election Assistance Commission that works domestically in the United States, which is available to countries that seek to improve public confidence in elections and uphold their OSCE commitments.

President Bush's invitation is a pre-emption of Kerry's efforts and the Democrat Magical Thinking Bus. The UN effort is thwarted, the Kerry partisan Cadre with JD's skulking about the country's polling places will not be "observing" in a vacuum, and such a third party outside of the UN AmeriHate parade will dash grounds for any Kerry boilerplate lawsuit. And with the added bonus that Silverman has tossed down the challenge to the Euros that are coming to watch us that we are expecting them to act in the same manner.

I think I can drink this lemonade.

UPDATE You can find out more about the OSCE here. This issue is back in the news again as international observers invited by Global Exchange made the news. Global Exchange is a NGO and though, in perusing their site, they are of the Leftist persuasion, there is little to indicate they are out to make mischief or interference in America's election process.

Indeed, Americans themselves provide observers in their own elections, from Federal observers to local organizations. Election boards have rules for observers (no electioneering, no interference, etc.) but basically are open to any one that wants to hang and watch.

Posted by Darleen at September 18, 2004 11:45 AM

Comments

Hi Darleen, I'm new here, and a total lefty.

Do you seriously think that the 2000 election fraud was a "myth"? If so, why?

The fraud and blatantly unfair actions of the Bush campaign and its supporters is well evidence. Have you seen the DVD "Unprecedented"? It's a documentary. It shows the memos, it's supported by multiple independent sources, and I can't see any way to dismiss it all. It happened - the Bush team did, in fact, violate law in their efforts to win.

In addition, I wonder what your standards are regarding elections - is independent verification a bad thing, or just if another country is involved?

Should votes be required to be verifiable, to protect against fraud tampering and so on?

I would never want a Democrat elected by cheating. I'd rather have an honestly elected Republican.

Cheers!

Posted by: Binacontenda at September 19, 2004 02:17 AM

Hi Scott and welcome

Be assured I have no problems with people with differing points of view, so I hope you will stick around and debate.

Yes, I think the "fraud" is a myth because every serious investigation while admittedly finding problems and errors (those done by the US and those done by the OSCE) found no evidence of fraud. For fraud to exhist, there has to be intention. "Spoiled" ballots are just a fact of every election in every locality. Under almost every recount scenario conducted independently by major newspapers gave the FL vote to GW. The OSCE came into FL during the 2002 vote to see what changes the state had made during the two years and was impressed by both the changes and the attitude of the officials who were committed to correcting the weaknesses. Indeed, the OSCE's 2002 report states:

"The 2000 presidential election revealed serious shortcomings in the administration of
elections in Florida, which resulted in a highly controversial, divisive and litigious end to the
presidential election process. Following the adoption of remedial measures at the county,
state and federal levels, these shortcomings have been addressed to a significant degree,
demonstrating the responsive nature of U.S. democracy. While room for some further
improvement remains, a number of measures adopted in Florida can serve as an example of
good practice to the rest of the U.S. and other OSCE participating States."

Constitutionally, primary responsibility for polling places and vote regulations has remained the perview of counties and states. The Federal government only steps in if needed in cases of egregious problems. In 1998 there were Fed observers sent to localities in which there was reason to believe minorities might be intimidated.

As I said earlier, the immediate visceral reaction to hearing foreign observers coming to "oversee" our election rankles because it implies that we cannot police ourselves or that countries with many less years of experience with democracy have something to teach us. Certainly, I would thoroughly reject any "observers" from the United Nations because of that body's demonstrated hostility towards the United States and its very poor record in accomplishing anything of note outside of some humanitarian projects.

Posted by: Darleen at September 19, 2004 08:46 AM

Hi again,

I agree that some studies did't find fraud. How do you determine which are "serious" though? Did some investigations or studies find fraud?

Of course, some investigations have failed to find the facts before, so that's not really the last word.

By the way, did you learn about those investigations directly, or did you hear that assessment of them from another source?

Of course, you realize that citing studies does not address the issue of such documented actions as ordering the private felon purge firm to NOT verify names, and Harris' memo to them saying that the goal was to "capture" names which were not necessarily felons.

I think that's wrong. You? I don't consider it acceptable for such a felon purge to have, in some counties, over 90% of the names being innocent non-felons. Half the list was black, and 93% of the black vote historically went to Dems - which the RNC knew.

Could you answer about whether you think ballot counts and voting in general should be verifiable?

I wouldn't mind any international organization overseeing it, as long as they were impartial - I would be proud to demonstrate to the world that we could have honest elections. Perhaps two separate independent orgs could test the system, to protect against outside bias.

I'm mostly interested in your general principles and standards, not so much whether you can find some specific study to support a particluar view.

Then of course, there is the well documented discrimination problem. Even the DOJ acknowledged it, after a while. I've seen many people telling the stories of police intimidation, requiring more forms of ID than required by law, etc. Do you think that's important?

Posted by: Binacontenda at September 19, 2004 07:33 PM

Discrimination should, of course, be addressed; swiftyly and decisively.

Um... I've worked at polling places. ID is never required to vote and anyone who for one reason or another doesn't find their name on the list, can still vote, provisionally, and the ballot will be counted later after the persons registration has been verified (ie a person moves and re-registers but it hasn't gotten on the new list yet).

Posted by: Darleen at September 19, 2004 09:48 PM

I'm glad you agree that discrimination in elections is not acceptable.

You're right about the ID and provisional ballots, if you're saying that's the law and how it should be.

If Florida 2000, however, hundreds, maybe thousands, of black voters were turned away for lacking ID, and were not informed of the provisional ballot option.

Those whose names were on the felon purge list, including pastors, and even one of the election workers, and another's husband, thousands and thousands, were told they could not vote.

Those exact problems were documented in "Unprecedented."

Can you address the other stuff, like whether elections should be verifiable? The voice of the people, in my opinion, shouldn't come down to just someone's say-so. It should be proveable.

Isn't that just common sense? We should know for sure.

When the owner of a company making voting machines is an active partisan, and promises publicly to deliver votes for a certain candidate, that's not good.

Right?

Posted by: Binacontenda at September 19, 2004 11:21 PM

Scott

Thousands of blacks were turned away for lacking ID? I think not. The US Commission on Civil Rights and the DOJ's Civil Rights Division found no evidence of intentional disenfranchisement. All the rumors, all the "I heard from my neighbor who has a sister who's hairdresser saw with her own eyes...." suddenly evaporated into the ether when actual bona fide investigations took place. Again, this is not to say that some really sloppy practices weren't revealed. They were. OSCE's 2002 report refers to them. But a "spoiled ballot" is usually the fault of the voter and there were almost as many spoiled ballots in Chicago as there were in the whole state of Florida. This doesn't minimize the problem, I'm just putting it in perspective. The whole hand-clapping-to-face-with-looks-of-horror attitude over Florida was just a tad too studied. The focus was there because the race was so close, so problems that exist in every locality looked worse under scrutiny.

I'm not sure what you mean by "verifiable." There always need to be some secure way to recount. It can be hard copies for any computer or scan system.

The problems that exist with the punch cards are voter induced, not system. People who "over voted" (double punch) or did not punch through completely which had put the phrase "hanging chad" forever in the American vocabulary. Computer touch screen doesn't allow double voting. I don't consider "under voting" a problem because many times (and I've done it too) People refuse to vote for anyone in a particular office. The right to vote "none of the above" as it were.

I have no idea which voting machine person you're talking about. I know of the several manufacturers, Diebold, has been decertfied in California.

Posted by: Darleen at September 20, 2004 08:13 AM

Hi Darleen,

If you had seen "Unprecedented," I don't think you could be so sure. It's so blatant, and there is so much evidence. But before I address specifics...

Seriously, Darleen, this isn't some sort of partisan flaming - think about a world in which Dems owned these companies, and made voting machines with secret software, and you had no way to verify their results. Imagine that scenario, and think about the importance of elections.

Here's a link to a non-partisan citizen group which has been very concerned about this:

http://www.blackboxvoting.com/

This is not a liberal or conservative issue - I'm sure all of us could agree that we don't want some software weenie or anyone who can manufacture voting machines playing Tetris with our votes. But they can do it now - ask a software / computer expert who you trust to be non-partisan about it.

Anyway, you said: "The US Commission on Civil Rights and the DOJ's Civil Rights Division found no evidence of intentional disenfranchisement."

Maybe not. But "intentional" is a matter of opinion, right? And others have indeed found it. And come on, it's no real stretch to say Ashcroft wouldn't want to reveal any wrongdoing by his boss's party.

It wasn't all about 'spoiled ballots," you know. There were many other problems. And all of the "irregularities" or "anomolies" resulted in more votes for Bush and less for Gore, just like the felon purges. It's just too much for coincidence.

This is not "my cousin's friend's hairdresser said..." stuff. See "Unprecedented" to see the real people involved, and the documents, and lots more. And it has not "suddenly evaporated into the ether" - it's real.

Okay, you also say that the voters were at fault - but the "chad" machines would fill up with the punched out chads so you couldn't punch it through anymore, which was a mechanical fault. Not some evil plan. But still, the problem wasn't taken seriously, which is troubling.

Re. "I'm not sure what you mean by 'verifiable'."

The usual meaning, that anyone can test the count results by the same standards and come to the same conclusion. It's just a basic principle, like saying medicine should be tested for safety and side effects.

Just say yes, it's a no-brainer. I'm sure you don't want to give the impression that you would prefer allowance for fraud or inaccuracy.

I'm impressed that you're informed about Diebold's status in California, good for you. That's the guy who made the statement about "delivering votes" to Bush. But that's 1 state out of 50, and other companies are similar.

What's really alarming is that they refuse to reveal testing data or methods. I mean, come on.

You don't want to win by cheating, I'm sure. If we allow that, this isn't America anymore. Right?

Posted by: Binacontenda at September 22, 2004 07:38 PM