I’m waiting for numbers. As in how my Portland precinct voted in the presidential election. Only county-by-county totals are available, though I know Barack Obama’s tally will be staggering. During the campaign, I saw only one John McCain sign in the neighborhood, and it was homemade. Obama signs, including this one in my yard, spread like dandelions. And nobody is taking them down.
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Four years ago on Election Day, I saw the face of voter intimidation. It belonged to a tall thick-chested man standing outside the elections office in Portland. He glowered at the people waiting in line, looking them over head to toe. He was among Republicans dispatched to “protect” us against voter fraud.
Of course there is no widespread voter fraud in the United States. Investigations galore, including a bipartisan congressional inquiry, have proved this again and again. Yet Republicans across the country fraudulently hype the non-existent problem to divert attention from their systematic attempts to block voting by people likely to choose Democrats.
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No presidential election has consumed my life like this one. And it will soon be over, creating an emotional and intellectual gap that I’m not sure how I’ll fill. What will I read about incessantly? What will I talk about with family and friends?
All signs point to Barack Obama winning. Unless something momentous happens in the campaign’s waning days, a nagging fear of many Obama supporters. We can’t be blamed for paranoia, considering that this quest look impossible less than a year ago and the recent mob-mentality bile spewing from the other side.
Barring a tragedy so unthinkable that I won’t put it to words, the election is all but over. The biggest question is whether the United States can still hold a fair and free election. And that’s a fear that I never thought I’d have regarding my country.
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After reading this account of programming errors plaguing touchscreen voting machines in Ohio, can anyone have any confidence in a free and fair election? Too bad the story doesn’t detail if there’s any pattern to the dropped votes. For example, how do they correlate to the party registration of voters whose ballots aren’t counted?
And why is any electronic voting allowed anywhere in the United States when it’s not proven to be fail safe? And to think that some states don’t require a backup paper trail. Oregon has its share of problems but holding reputable elections isn’t one of them.
Once upon a time, we lived in a democracy.
News flash: A Civil War cannonball kills a relic collector 140 years after it was fired near Richmond, Virginia.
Analysis: Wars don’t end when peace is declared; the weapons fight on.
Would the soldier who lit the cannon’s fuse done so had he recognized the potential consequences rippling out over Time . . . consequences (collector’s son fatherless, wife widowed) that have triggered yet more ripples with effects unknown?
Votes cast in elections create ripples, too.
