Why Are We Back In Iraq?

I never thought much of the Wonkette, since way back even before she made an ass of herself taking up space at the D.N.C. in Boston this past July (most bloggers blogged about the convention, the Wonkette blogged primarily about alcohol consumption and anatomical size estimations). But I've visited her site once or twice the past couple of weeks ever since Watching the Watchers began linking to headlines from selected representatives of the blogosphere (including little-old-me).

The other day Wonkette published a post entitled Ohio Recount: So Worth It which compelled me to take a peek through the peephole. I don't want to suggest that I felt more than a touch of disappointment after reading her words, since I don't see how anyone aside from, say, people on the same wavelength as Nick and Jessica could consider anything that she ever-ever-ever wrote (or probably will write) as something to be taken even half-serously. But this was a new low for the Wonkette. What a moron. What a galoot. What a waste of bandwidth and time (not that it takes all that much time to read the majority of her short, vapid posts). Is she really for real or what?

In just a few snarky sentences, the Wonkette belittles all the effort and work and money contributed these last eight weeks by the thousands of people in this country who have every reason in the U.S. Constitution to question the non-Ukrainian-exit-poll-defying 2004 presidential election results. People like Rev. Jesse Jackson, Rep. John Conyers (the highest-ranking Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee), Green Party presidential candidate David Cobb, Libertarian Party presidential candidate Michael Badnarik, BBC Journalist Greg Palast, Air America goddess-of-the-mike Randi Rhodes, and everyone else who is committed to the fundamental Democratic principle that every single, stinkin' vote should be counted, no matter the costs.

After snarking that the Ohio "recount" only managed to add an additional 300-or-so votes to Senator Kerry's total, Wonkette snarls, "We lost, everybody. L-O-S-T. Just concentrate on your Canadian visa applications; if you screw that up, you can't blame [sic] Deibold."

Sorry, Wonkette, but I - for one - am not going to give up or get out. I'm not going to stop screaming about this re-run of 2000. Nor am I going to stop working on my project - "50 States Mislead Their Voters."

Thank you very much for your understanding, Wonkette, but I'm going to continue to concentrate on enacting significant election reform in the United States of America. I'm also going to continue to concentrate on defending myself (and other wackadoos like me) from the mob of "liberal" and "progressive" voices in the Media, government and blogosphere who have turned out, so far, to be our greatest enemy in the battle to ensure that our elections accurately and openly reflect the will of the people.

Voices that belong to the likes of the Wonkette are either sadly misinformed, pathetically misinformed or intentionally misleading (for whatever reasons). The same voices that would rather blame this excrutiating loss on frames or fundies or abortions or homosexuals or Michael Moore or P. Diddy (each day it's something else; it seems like Mr. Rove is sending out his daily talking point memos to both parties these days) instead of the 2000 defending champions of fraud and duplicity. The same sounding voices that derided the purpose of the recounts in the Washington gubernatorial race which did end up being "so worth it" to the election day "loser."

Here are some facts about the half-ass Ohio recount: It only applied to 3% of the ballots. Those ballots were supposed to be randomly selected by the counties, but numerous reports have indicated that the chosen ballots may have been predetermined and, possibly, pre-slanted. Plus, over 90,000 "spoiled" ballots (undervotes, overvotes and who-knows-how-many completely legitimate, luckless machine rejects) were excluded from the "recount" by Ohio's Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell (one of the head Bushmen for Ohio who was once quoted as saying that "[t]he only thing worse than running for secretary of state would be being secretary of state," although he probably didn't intend to be speaking for the rest of Ohio's African-American voters), when those ballots should have been the first batch to be recounted. (Did I say recounted? I gotta watch that. Those particular ballots have been anything but counted.)

Sorry to bum you out, Wonkette, but it still ain't over yet.

The big news of the day concerning the future (past and present, too) of our democracy appeared at Truthout.org in an article written by William Rivers Pitt, a frequently bylined New York Times contributor: "Conyers to Object to Ohio Electors, Requests Senate Allies." In a letter which was mailed out to every United States Senator, Rep. Conyers wrote, "As you know, on January 6, 2005, at 1:00 P.M, the electoral votes for the election of the president are to be opened and counted in a joint session of Congress. I and a number of House Members are planning to object to the counting of the Ohio votes, due to numerous unexplained irregularities in the Ohio presidential vote, many of which appear to violate both federal and state law."

Many of the "unexplained irregularities" were listed in a letter sent by the House Minority Office to S.o.S. Blackwell on December 2nd (Link to the letter), which asked for answers to 34 legitimate questions that Wonkette evidently doesn't care about. Questions that require answers, explanations and justifications.

The way I see it, January 6th portends to be the day of judgment for the Democratic Party. Either one of our Senators stands up and does his best to preserve our democracy (even if a Senator co-signs the objection, there is probably not much of a chance of anything changing but at least our movement will gain some legitimacy for a moment and be discussed by the entire Senate for a few hours) or the Democratic Party might have to get used to losing a shitload of elections in future years. And you better believe that those elections won't be lost solely due to the machinations of Republican-leaning companies such as [sic] Deibold, Sinclair or Fox News Corp. Nor will it be because all of the lefties will be moving up north to a more progressive country with universal health care. Many strong Democrats and politically active liberals such as myself will be paying more attention (and, probably, monetary contributions) to the third parties that are doing so much to fight this battle.

In his article, Mr. Pitt sets his sights on Senators Biden, Bingaman, Boxer, Byrd, Clinton, Conrad, Corzine, Dodd, Dorgan, Durbin, Feingold, Harkin, Inyoue, Jeffords, Kennedy, Kerry, Lautenberg, Leahy, Levin, Lieberman, Mikulski, Nelson (FL), Jack Reed, Harry Reid, Rockefeller, Sarbanes, Stabenow, Wyden and Obama as possible conscientious objectors. I don't see how anyone could think that "Democrats" like Lieberman or Reid would be candidates for liberal sainthood but I'm going to suggest someone probably even more unlikely. The Senator I'm thinking might have enough backbone (and power) to say, "Hey, wait just a cotton-picking minute, let's give our House mates some consideration and spend at least two measly hours debating this," isn't a Democrat and has never renounced his party affiliation no matter how much its sickened him (or been sicked on him). Of course, you know who I'm alluding to, M - C - and-I-don't-mean-Hammer. He might not do it for the right reason. There might be a "right" reason for it. But I can see it happening next week quite easily.

If not him, then I'd guess that Byrd or Kennedy or one of the two Johns are our only real hopes. Let's hope at least one Senator steps up. Remember the disgraceful scene from "Fahrenheit 9/11" in which the pleas of the mostly black congresspersons were ignored by the Senate? I'd prefer that "Fahrenheit 1/6" be a sequel and not a remake. I'd also prefer it to be a sequel like Rocky 2, you know, the one where the underdog wins at the end and the audience goes home cheering.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/31/2004 08:41:00 AM

Why the hell not? Everybody's doing it. This will be the first official Why Are We Back In Iraq? annual wrap-up (according to Colin there will be at least four more but that's not exactly a neoconservative figure).

Even though - for the purpose of this (whatever-this-is) blog or post or article or agitprop tomfoolery - I'm going to concentrate on the "best" elements of 2004, there is no getting over the "worst" this year had to offer: an unending war and an unending W. And (though it should go without saying) to me, November 3rd was the worst day of the year in America; other countries may have experienced worse days (especially over the last week) but no day will echo longer or further.

On to the "best."

Best Films - I still have a lot of catching up to do so I reserve the right to revisit this list: (10.) Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill Vol. 2" (9.) Zhang Yimou's "Hero" (8.) Takeshi Kitano's "Zatoichi" (7.) Coen Bros.' "The Ladykillers" (6.) Zhang Yimou's "House of Flying Daggers" (5.) Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" (4.) Sam Raimi's "Spiderman 2" (3.)Michel Gondry and Charlie Kaufman's "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" (2.) Lars Von Trier's "Dogville" (1.) David O. Russell's "I Heart Huckabees."

Best Acting Performances - (10.) Irma P. Hall in "The Ladykillers" (9.) Tony Leung in "Hero" (8.) Uma Thurman in "Kill Bill Vol. 2" (7.) Tobey Maguire in "Spiderman 2" (6.) Macaulay Caulkin in "Saved" (5.) Kirsten Dunst in "Eternal Sunshine" (4.) Tadanobu Asano in "Zatoichi" (3.) Nicole Kidman in "Dogville" (2.)Kate Winslet in "Eternal Sunshine" (1.) Mark Wahlberg in "I Heart Huckabees."

Best Albums - (10.) D12's "D12 World" (9.) Masta Killa's "No Said Date" (8.) The Roots' "Tipping Point" (7.) Young Buck's "Straight Outta Cashville" (6.) U2's "How To Dismantle a Nuclear Bomb" (5.) Wilco's "A Ghost Is Born" (4.) Danger Mouse's "The Grey Album" (3.) Usher's "Confessions" (2.) Kanye West's "College Dropout" (1.) Nas's "Street Disciple."

Best Songs - (10.) Nelly's "Flap Your Wings" (9.) Immortal Technique's "Bin Laden" (8.) D12's "How Come" (7.) Juvenile's "Slow Motion" (6.) Destiny Child's "Soldier" (5.) Jadakiss's "Why?" (4.) Mobb Deep's "Got It Twisted" (3.) Usher's "Damn" (2.) Usher's "Confessions" (1.) Kanye West's "Jesus Walks."

Best Speech - Reverend Al Sharpton at the DNC.

Best News In New York - Minimum wage increase.

Best Sporting Event - Red Sox/Yankees (regular and post season).

Best Presidential Debate Moment - "Wanna buy some wood?"

Best Personal Political Moments - A tie between my gotv effort on election day in Pennsylvania and protesting outside Madison Square Garden during Bush's speech.

Best Blogs - (10.) At Ease (9.) Loaded Mouth (8.) My War (7.) Xymphora (6.) Cannonfire (5.) The diaries - and the diaries alone - at Daily Kos (4.) Eschaton (3.) Democratic Underground (2.) Watching The Watchers (1.) It's my fucking list so I'm voting for me.

Best 'Best of the Year' List - The Common Ills Year In Review not only because they selected my blog as one of the "Web sites that Nourish the Heart, Mind and Soul." Well...maybe I'm lying. Thanks!

Best Blogger I Love To Hate - Blonde Sagacity

Best Newspaper/Periodical - Ha.

Best TV Moment - A TIE between John Stewart on Crossfire and Janet Jackson as Condi Rice on Saturday Night Live.

Best Hope For The Future - Air America Radio.

Person of the Year - Greg Palast

And farewell to Marlon Brando. And to ALL those who lost their lives in Iraq.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/30/2004 01:56:00 AM

I posted this excerpt of a scene from my play because I had to take an unwanted holiday from the Internets for three weeks. Now that I'm back, I've decided to cut it for length reasons. But the rest of the scene can be found at this link.

(The setting is the Marine Officer Training School at Quantico, Virginia. The left half of the stage is set up as a classroom, the other side is impossible to make out. All the lights are off as a slide show on biological and chemical weapons is in session. SIX JOURNALISTS, including TED and ONE FEMALE - each in desert camouflage fatigues - are listening to a lecture in progress by the decorated Lieutenant Colonel, TAYLOR.)

(TAYLOR stands behind an impressive looking podium that is micro-phoned for sound though the classroom itself is small. The room seems to have employed the same interior director who helped design the CENTCOM media room in Qatar.)

(The journalists sit with their backs to the audience, but the room is set at a slight angle. TED is seated in the most left seat in the corner. To TAYLOR's left and right, standing guard are two MARINES, both African American, as still as statues with their eyes focussed dead ahead.)

TAYLOR - That's what a smallpox victim looks like without the benefit of Nuclear Biological Chemical protective gear and without the Center of Disease Control recommended inoculations for the theater. LIGHTS!

(The room lights back up but the slide of the smallpox victim remains on display until the end of the scene)

TAYLOR - And now...

(TAYLOR smirks as he glances, conspiratorially, at the two MARINES, who retain their icy postures without so much as a blink.)

TAYLOR - We come to my favorite portion of the session.

(TAYLOR adapts a wide grin)

TAYLOR - The part where we get to gas you!

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/23/2004 05:10:00 PM

What the fuck is going on in this country? Specifically, what the fuck is going on with our media? I know I shouldn't be surprised at anything they say or do or lie about, but two recent events have gotten to me.

Yesterday, the dickless dickhead most responsible - this past year - for the loss of at least 1,000 U.S. troops, three public debates, and 100% of this country's honor and reputation, was anointed Time Magazine's Man of the Year. Personally, I believe Karl Rove deserved that honor, for getting away with stealing another election.

Speaking of "stealing another election" (no surprise...it's about all I've spoken about for the last eight weeks), the winner of this year's Associated Press survey for the top news story of 2004, as voted on by an associated assortment of editors, news directors, and homeland security officials: Election 2004. This must be the first time the top news story of the year also happens to be the number one suppressed news story of the year (especially over the last eight weeks).

I've been unable to provide details about all the latest news concerning the latest stolen election the past few weeks (sorry...but my blogging has been temporarily derailed by my financial situation...but I'll soon be back), so please check out BradBlog and Cannonfire for a never-ending barrage of unreported news stories concerning Election 2004.

Peace.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/21/2004 01:59:00 PM

Last Tuesday night, well over 1,000 New Yorkers ignored the rain to turn out for a lecture held at the New York Ethical Center located on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. So many showed up that hundreds had to be turned away since there was only room for a thousand inside the auditorium. The two-hour conference featured four renowned speakers: Richard A. Clarke, former anti-terrorism czar and author of the best selling “Against All Enemies”; Amy Goodman, host of NPR’s Democracy Now!; Esther Kaplan, senior editor of Nation Magazine; Greg Palast, BBC journalist and the author of “The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.” Each gave a brief ten-minute speech before answering some questions submitted on index cards by members of the audience. Not surprisingly, Mr. Palast crammed in more words during his allotted time, and didn’t stop when he was supposed to, although, thankfully, there was no orchestra around to cut him off.

As the only official to offer any apologies to the victims of 9/11, Mr. Clarke was greeted with a standing ovation by most of the audience. Mr. Clarke spoke a bit about the bill to overhaul America’s intelligence community, which he later happily announced was passed by the House of Representatives that same night. He also had some strong words to say about the recent comings and goings from President Bush’s cabinet, which has been viewed by many as an attempt to purge any and all hints of dissent and close ranks. “If the old cabinet was a closed circle, this cabinet is an infinite dot,” scoffed Mr. Clarke.

Ms. Goodman spent the majority of her time decrying the dangers of the corporate consolidation of media, and the lack of coverage given to the anti-war movement. She complained that the mainstream media only paid attention to the sides taken by the two major political parties, both of which were responsible for the mad rush to invade Iraq, and since they broadcast upon the public airwaves they need to “go outside that extremely narrow spectrum.”

Turning her attention toward the Administration’s deliberate and deceptive conflation of the attacks on 9/11 with the war in Iraq, Ms. Goodman mentioned New York Governor George Pataki’s plan to incorporate pieces of the toppled Saddam Hussein statue - which had been staged for the media to mark the end of the war over a year-and-a-half ago – into the foundation of the next incarnation of the World Trade Center. “If he does that,” she remarked, “I think it will be the first proven link between Iraq and September 11th.”

Esther Kahn talked in some detail about the Christian fundamentalist movement, and about how much power they really possess and how much has been over-hyped by the compliant press. She emphasized that many, and perhaps, most Christians didn’t agree with the fundamentalist agenda, and that there were many ways to woo them to the Democratic Party. On the subject of morals, which it’s believed that many fundamentalists based their presidential votes on, Ms. Kahn noted that liberals and progressives voted morally as well, citing beliefs against war and the death penalty and for a woman’s right to choose. She declared, “We have morals that kick the ass out of their values.”

Mr. Palast wasn’t the last speaker (he spoke before Ms. Kahn), but he was – according to my eyes and ears – the most dynamic, along with being the main reason why I braved the inclement weather in order to attend. He opened up by warning us about “kooks on the Internet” who believe that John Kerry was the actual winner of the 2004 presidential election. One such “kook” even wrote an article the day after the election entitled “Kerry Won.” Of course, Mr. Palast was making fun of himself, to the delight of the crowd. He joked that he received an e-mail from The New York Times the day after his column hit the Net, which contained two questions: “Are you a conspiracy nut?” and “Are you a sore loser?”

While Mr. Palast didn’t offer up any new revelations or scoops regarding the election, it’s fair to assume that most of what he did say was news to the majority of the audience, since it hasn’t exactly been widely circulated throughout the “narrow spectrum.” He defined “spoilage” as the votes that haven’t been – and probably won’t ever be – counted due to hanging chads, undervotes, overvotes and etc. He also made fun of the fact that he was forced to work in exile, and that his stories reached more people overseas than they did in America because he didn’t work for the “Petroleum Broadcast System.” He didn’t fit in here because here “you’re not a reporter, you’re supposed to be a repeater.”

There was one story that Mr. Palast told that I hadn’t heard about. Despite a “media lockdown” (in my opinion, a self-imposed one, half due to the White House and half due to the DLC and moderate Democrats) on election abnormalities and irregularities, CNN has recently been devoting some attention to the topic. Many liberals have chalked up CNN’s stepped-up coverage to a desire to improve ratings, and while that may be partially true, Mr. Palast attributed it to something else. It seems that Rev. Jesse Jackson paid a visit, recently, to CNN’s headquarters in Atlanta and “kicked in the door.”

There was only enough time for the guests to respond to a few questions, one of which was along the lines of “now, what should we do?” Mr. Clarke said that we owed it to ourselves to stay informed while Ms. Goodman and Ms. Kahn stressed organizing and constant communication with the media, politicians and political organizations. Mr. Palast reminded us that we had been given a lot of information and that it was our job to “get it out there” on the Internet, through e-mails and to all of our friends and families.

Mr. Palast provided the biggest laugh for the night, when he interrupted the audience questions to ask one for himself of Mr. Clarke, whom he noted had worked for and with President George Bush. “As a journalist, because no one’s ever asked this question: Is he crazy?” After the laughter died down, Mr. Clarke good-naturedly replied, “Let me be polite and say he is uncurious.”

After I left the auditorium I ran into an activist distributing flyers urging people to demonstrate this coming Sunday and Monday in front of the Statehouse in Columbus, Ohio:

Sunday, December 12, 2:00 - 4:00 PM, and Monday, December 13, 11:00 AM – 5:00 PM: Picketing on the sidewalk in front of the Ohio Statehouse, corner of Broad and High Streets, Columbus, Ohio. Protesting the slow approach to the recount, requesting Blackwell’s recusal, supporting the recount and the contest of the election, and protesting the fact that the Electoral College is meeting BEFORE the recount is finished. Sponsored by C.A.S.E. Ohio and www.donotconcede.org. Contact: 51 Capital March: http://www.51capitalmarch.com. Endorsed by www.TrueBlueUs.org and other groups fighting to reverse the fraudulent election.

Wish I could go, maybe you can.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/10/2004 08:52:00 PM

For some bizarre reason, there was a lock down in Warren County, Ohio (http://www.enquirer.com/editions/2004/11/10/loc_warrenvote10.html). According to Commissioner Pat South, he received word from an FBI agent "that Warren County ranked a "10" on a terrorism scale."

"It wasn't international terrorism that we were in fear of; it was more domestic terrorism," South said [November 9th]. "I much prefer sitting here today telling you why we did implement security rather than why we didn't."

I'm not going to speculate - at this particular moment - why the lock down might have taken place. All I'm going to do is throw out some electoral numbers.

As of the 200 census, there are 158,383 people residing in the county (Wikipedia). There is no doubt that Warren County is staunchly Republican, so much so, that no Democrats even ran for office in the last eight county races over the last eight years. But that's not my point.

In 1996 Dole beat Clinton 33,210 to 17,089, and in 2000, Bush beat Gore 48,318 to 19,142. There were only 78,393 people registered to vote in 1996, 56,669 turned out to vote. That number leapfrogged to 96,536 registered voters in 2000, with a turn out of 69.078.

Then there's 2004. According to the soon-to-be-certified official election results (Election.sos.state.oh.us), out of a total of 125,919 registered voters, 94,419 voters turned out for this election, and Bush beat Kerry 68,035 to 26,043.

Wow. Is it really possible that 80 percent of the population in Warren County are registered to vote? In 2000, 27.70 of the population were under the age of 18. These numbers make it seem like there isn't a single resident in the county, of age, who isn't registered to vote.

As you can see, Bush received more votes in Warren County this past election than the amount of people who voted for either candidate in 1996. What's changed? For one, J. Kenneth Blackwell was elected in 1998. Also, this blog - Nixguy.com - mentions a 14 percent increase in the population, but I can't verify that number at this time.

An additional 29,383 people were registered to vote for this election. That's an increase of nearly 31 percent.

Remember when I mentioned that Warren County voted staunchly Republican. Try this on for size: 38,467 residents are registered as Republicans, 12,370 as Democrats, and a whopping 74,316 residents have no party affiliation listed for their registration (Co.Warren.oh.us). But they sure like Dubya, don't they. Or at least, that's what the results suggest.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/05/2004 01:46:00 AM

Okay, call me extremely confused.

Why does this link to Cuyahoga County, Ohio show that 1458 precincts were counted (Cuyahogacounty.us), while this link to the Secretary of State Website says that there are only 1436 precincts in Cuyahoga County (Sos.state.oh.us) ?

What are the odds of Green Party candidate David Cobb receiving 24 votes statewide (Sos.state.oh.us) before the provisional and absentee ballots were counted, and after 186 votes (Sos.state.oh.us)? Yes, I realize that Cobb was a write-in candidate, but the new, soon-to-be-certified total amounts to a more than 700 percent increase. Oddly enough, the Cobb figure posted on Thurday was 373, as I mentioned at Democratic Underground. Also, 66 of Cobb's votes came from Hamilton County, since he had zero votes before the provisional/absentee count that would be a 6600 percent increase, perhaps Cobb has a large family that lives there. One other third party candidate's revised numbers stand out; write-in candidate Joe Schriner's total jumped up from 14 to 114, an even higher percentage increase than Cobb's total jump, plus that's a suspicious-at-least-to-me 100 extra vote gain right on the dot.

The presidential votes counted for the state stand at 5,625,631, up from 5,481,804, an increase of 143,827 votes. It's been reported that 121,598 of the provisional ballots were approved, which means that 22,229 overseas absentee ballots were included. Kerry picked up a total of 17,708 votes with the additional ballots.

I imagine these numbers may be revised again. I don't have to imagine that I'll most likely still have questions after those changes.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/04/2004 11:30:00 PM

By most accounts, this was the election to end all elections. An election in which 117,897,556 Americans directly participated in our democracy by voting for their favored candidate.

Twenty years ago, only 92,653,233 Americans voted. That was a different race, though. Nearly everyone agrees that the 2004 election may have been one of the most important elections that this country has ever held.

To the rapidly-increasing-number-of people who are questioning the results of this past still-not-really-over election, Ohio's Cuyahoga County has become the center of attention. According to the census of 2000, 27.4% of the population of Cuyahoga County is black or African-American (Wikipedia.org), out of a total population count of 1,393,978 people. While most Americans were able to cast their vote in the time it would take them to eat on their lunch break, many voters in Cuyahoga County waited on line for up to ten hours. There are many reports that there were less polling machines in Cuyahoga County then there were in the last presidential election, even though 2004 was supposed to be the "mother of all elections."

There were 651,633 votes for president recorded in Cuyahoga County (http://serform.sos.state.oh.us/sos//results/). Not in 2004, but in 1984. A year when 25,2144,323 less votes were cast nationwide in the general election.

In 2004, there were 665,334 votes for President in Cuyahoga County.

Do you see what I'm getting at? Only 4,547,619 voted in the 1984 general election in Ohio, compared to 5,574,476 in 2004. Shouldn't the number of voters in Cuyahoga County this past election be on par with the increase in state and national votes?

How many voters stayed home because of the tremendously long lines?

There was a total of 1,005,807 voters in Cuyahoga County registered for this election. The percentage of votes cast for the county is pegged at 66.15%, compared to a state percentage of 69.86%. Hamilton County recorded a percentage of 72.87%. Bush beat Kerry in Hamilton County with 215,639 votes to 190,956. As of the 2000 census, Hamilton County's population of 845,303 people consists of 23.43% black or African-Americans.

If Cuyahoga County recorded a percentage of 72.87%, another - roughly - 70,000 people would have voted.

Another interesting thing about the two counties. While Hamilton County recorded an increase of over 12,000 registered voters, Cuyahoga's number decreased by nearly 5,000.

This is the voter turnout in Cuyahoga County for the presidential elections in between 1984 and 2004: in 1988, 601,117 votes; in 1992, 640,241 votes; in 1996, 580,030 votes; in 2000, 586,914 votes. Do you notice how low those last two numbers are? Maybe that has to do something with the Secretary of State.

According to Ohio's Secretary of State Website, "[a]s Ohio's chief election officer, Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell oversees the elections process and appoints the members of boards of elections in each of Ohio's 88 counties."

In 1998, J. Kenneth Blackwell, the Republican candidate, won a three man race for Secretary of State against two Democratic candidates who split the vote, though Mr. Blackwell received less votes than the two Democrats added together. Before Blackwell, Bob Taft - also a Republican - served for two terms (eight years). The last Republican Secretary of State in Ohio, before Mr. Taft, was in 1974.

I'm not suggesting that all the Republican Secretary of States suppressed the vote in Ohio. I am suggesting that, at least, J. Kenneth Blackwell has. If you are one of those people who think Kerry really won Ohio in 2004, you should also assume that Gore won Ohio in 2000. It's all about the turn out.

# posted by Ron Brynaert : 12/02/2004 05:40:00 AM