In a recent diary on Daily Kos, Mebe revealed a multi-state purging of voter registrations, disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of voters. This is a tactic that has been used by the Republican party in the past to remain in power, and there has been much debate on how the media needs to get off their duffs and start reporting this, and how this is going to cost us the elections.
I have a different take on this, and see the recent voter purges as something that was potentially quite damaging, but is in fact one of the best things that could have happened for the Obama campaign and for the Democratic party.
As I recently commented over on the Contrary Brin blog titled: Some Things Palin Comparison, the purge of voter records does at first glance seem rather ominous for Democracy as a whole in the United States. However, on second reflection it's actually a good thing.
First, the silence of the Mainstream Media on this is understandable. It takes the media several days to react to events that have subtleties to them. If it's not a storm or some natural disaster, the media has to be cautious in gathering as many facts as possible before reporting on a story. Failure to do this leaves them open to lawsuits and dilutes the power of the story. The media has been caught with its pants around its ankles far too often for it to jump immediately into a story of this potential magnitude without researching it further. So give them a few more days. They will be reporting on this. Just it won't happen all at once.
Now as I said above, this is a good thing. How could this be good, you ask? Think about it for a second. Whoever was behind this acted prematurely. Imagine if this had happened a week before the end of Voter Registration for the general election. The chaos it would have caused, the fact that it would take the media time to tell the story, the time for the Obama campaign to react... it would have been a done deal and the Republicans would have prevailed. But we have a month to rectify this situation... and Obama already has teams in these states and an existing voter registration team working to register as many new voters as possible. The Obama campaign has the time and the opportunity to learn who was removed from the voting rolls and work to get them reinstated or to re-register them.
Basically, Obama's people are going to be working hard to re-register voters who will be feeling angry at the establishment (ie, Republicans) and who will vote to punish them. There could be a widespread ouster of Republicans in what were originally safe districts for the conservatives. Further, once the news media finally gets off their collective duffs and starts reporting on this story, questions are going to be asked. Blame is going to be given. And the ball is going to fall in the McCain court, along with the blame, even if he didn't directly give the order to purge these voters.
Yes, this could have been bad. If it had been timed better, it could have cost Obama the election. But as it has happened now, and because Obama is now warned that more of these could happen, it will benefit Obama and the Democratic party as a whole. The Republicans acted too early, and in too large of numbers for it to be dismissed as accidental or coincidental. This attempt to cheat America of its rightful election will ensure Obama's victory.
(As an aside, I strongly recommend readers to check out Contrary Brin for Dr. Brin's latest comments on Palin and on the RNC. It's well worth reading, and Dr. Brin is always interested in hearing intelligent and well-thought-out comments on his opinions.)