FOX News decided to do a segment on the attempts by Republicans to syphon off 20 or so electoral vote via a ballot initiative. This thing could swing the entire election. So, they decided to bring in two people to talk about. The person in favor was described as "pro-reform" and the Democrat against was called...wait for it....wait for it "anti-reform". TPM has the screen grabs and notes:
We are never told anything more about who these men are, who they work for, or what their partisan activities might be — all we're told is that the guy for this initiative is "pro-reform" and the man opposed to it is "anti-reform."
As it turns out, "pro-reform" Kevin Eckery is a Republican consultant and the spokesman for Californians for Equal Representation, the astro-turf group offering the initiative. And "anti-reform" Ari Swiller is a Democratic fundraiser.
You can help us stop this, no matter where you live. Here is petition the Courage Campaign is gathering signatures on. Sign the petition and join our Facebook group.
By signing below, I am adding my name to thousands of citizens who oppose the "Presidential Election Reform Act" regardless of where one lives in the United States.
This is a craven right-wing power grab by the Republicans to hijack the presidency on June 3, 2008. The measure, if passed, would dictate that California divide up its electoral college votes by congressional district -- resulting in the Republican theft of at least 20 electoral votes in November's general election, the equivalent of Ohio.
A powerful New York Times editorial titled "Stacking the Electoral Deck" explains that this cynical scheme by a "shadowy group" of California Republicans will "do serious damage to our democracy":
If voters understand that the initiative is essentially an elaborate dirty trick posing as reform, they are likely to vote against it. But judging by the misleading name of their organization, the initiative’s backers want to fool the public into thinking the change would make elections more fair. They are planning on putting it to a vote in June 2008, an election when there will be few other things on the ballot, and turnout is expected to be extremely low.
While reform of the electoral system is certainly needed, it must be a national process -- not an "elaborate dirty trick" to hand over the White House to the Republican presidential nominee.
Even if I don't live in California, I will oppose the most recent right-wing power grab now by signing here.
We need to start organizing to stop this now. No joke, the presidential election may be decided by the results of a low turnout election in June in California.