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Subject: 
Re: Question for the Conservatives out there
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.off-topic.debate
Date: 
Tue, 13 Jul 2004 18:50:59 GMT
Viewed: 
1478 times
  
In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Don Heyse wrote:
In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler wrote:
In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Dave Schuler wrote:
Here's a hypothetical:

Let's suppose a major event occurs between now and November 2,
something on the order of 9/11.  Now let's suppose that Dubya's
administration either postpones or cancels the Presidential
election in the wake of the disaster, citing the need for consistent
leadership and contiuity of policy, both of which would be
compromised by a change of President.

How would you Conservatives react to this?

This is hypothetical, of course, but it's hardly impossible.

Well, Dave, I don't think it's all that hypothetical anymore.  What
is particularly interesting to me is the fact that plans are being
discussed for postponement, but they're allegedly only a "worst
case scenario."

Uh, Dave, you're appear to be talking to yourself and you're making
even less sense than usual.  (Just kidding.  Please don't hit me.)
Unless I missed the major event, or the election was already cancelled,
(there's nothing about it in the news yet) this is all still pretty
much hypothetical.

Well, when I first mentioned the hypothetical, it was *my* hypothetical, and now
that the powers-that-be are addressing it, I'm becoming more concerned.  My
reasons for this are several:

1.  Special elections tend to favor the Right wing, due to the
    fact that Conservatives are (generally) more easily mobilized
    for voter turnout at off-schedule electiosn
2.  The Supreme Court, which would likely be dragged into the
    adjudication of the election's results, has been demonstrated
    already to be very friendly to Bush re: election results.
3.  The fact that Tom Ridge and John Ashcroft hit the stage with a new
    "be afraid of everything/no specific information" every time an
    inconvenient piece of news arises against Bush makes me fear that
    some kind of scaremongering is almost certain
4.  Diebold, which heavily favors Right-leaning interests, holds an
    unprecedented and mysteriously un-scrutinized level of power in
    the upcoming election, and the need for "fast and reliable"
    electronic voting methods may be presented as all the more vital
    in a tense and dangerous election-day environment
5.  Additionally, if there's a largescale power-outage or disruption
    of internet security, Diebold is vulnerable in a way that
    conventional hanging-chad ballots never have been.  And if 10 or
    100 or 1,000,000 pro-Kerry votes are lost due to the resulting
    "technical difficulties," what will be the recourse?

While I'm at it, why does anyone believe that a so-called "paper trail" will
improve the veracity of digital voting machines?  It seems obvious to me that
anyone who knows how to program one of these machine can certainly rig it to
give a false paper receipt.  And even if such a fraud or glitch should occur,
what happens?  Are all e-vote ballots declared void?

Dave!


Did you take a blow to the head?

Not that I remember.  Hey, wait a minute...



Message has 2 Replies:
  Re: Question for the Conservatives out there
 
(...) I object to that on the grounds that while Bush was understandably interested in keeping the vote in his favor, Gore only presented an alternative that was decidedly biased in his favor (selectively recounting only known pro-Dem counties in a (...) (20 years ago, 13-Jul-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
  Re: Question for the Conservatives out there
 
(...) Interestingly, it appears that the GOP has decided that e-voting is so unreliable that it's encouraging Florida Republicans to use their absentee ballots instead. (URL) this is all becoming less and less hypothetical as we go along. Hmm... (...) (20 years ago, 5-Aug-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)

Message is in Reply To:
  Re: Question for the Conservatives out there
 
(...) Uh, Dave, you're appear to be talking to yourself and you're making even less sense than usual. (Just kidding. Please don't hit me.) Unless I missed the major event, or the election was already cancelled, (there's nothing about it in the news (...) (20 years ago, 13-Jul-04, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)

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