What evil will we credit the Republicans are capable of? Here's a little litmus test, which sets up an attempt to redirect fraudsters towards a more winnable battle.
It is eerie that Paul Hackett's narrow defeat by a GOP that had promised to crush him, has been accompanied by two deadly attacks in three days on the same Marine battalion based in Ohio.
We can draw from this one certainty: Both the GOP and the Iraqi Insurgency want to crush Marines, in this case Marines from Ohio.
14 Brook Park(OH)-based Marines killed Wednesday
BROOK PARK, Ohio (AP) -- Military official says 14 Marines killed in Iraq on Wednesday were members of Ohio-based battalion that lost six members on Monday.
There is an unfortunate parallel there. And if Paul Hackett had run a different kind of campaign, in support of Bush, Bush's starting the war, and without drawing the contrast he did between military service people and the civilian leadership that utilizes it to its own ends, then this would not be so troubling.
But as it is, we cannot fail to note that the Insurgents want to kill US service people. And the GOP wants to stop men like Paul Hackett from preventing further US casualties either by a timely withdrawal from Iraq or simply by challenging the obedient mindset that got us into this war in the first place and could well get us into the next, and the next, and the next.
While I by no means equate the GOP with the Iraqi Insurgency, we must fight the GOP for the same reason we must fight the Insurgency. But in many ways it's a harder battle. These are our neighbors, friends, countrymen.
We can consider insurgents to be irredeemable. We cannot consider republican voters or officials to be irredeemable. We (at least) are not willing to be lawless or unethical. Yet we must fight nonetheless, we must fight for hearts and minds the way men like Paul Hackett understand the big battles can be won, by never being fought.
To do this, we must respect them. We have to give the GOP their due. However they won in Ohio, they won. If they won through fraud, an allegation I will point out is entirely unsubstantiated, then they did so because they had won the hearts and minds (and in that case, souls) of the people behind it. It is rather unlikely, is it not, that coin tosses keep landing almost on their edge? What are the odds that such a large swing would come so close, yet be rebuffed by a hand count in the last district? Slender. But credible, and credibility is oh so important, right?
But it is important for people to doubt the honesty of the returns. I said this same thing in November, and I'm saying it again now. Republicans voted for Paul Hackett. And we need republicans on our side. Fundamentally, we need that half of the country to remember that we are all, ultimately, on the same side. We need to do that too, to bring them around. We need to show them both sides of the coin. We need to congratulate them on their win; let them go back to sleep by all means if they are so inclined. But if they are inclined, perhaps because they voted for Paul Hackett, to pursue allegations of fraud, then we must let them do that too.
Today, there are certainly dozens, perhaps hundreds or even thousands, of people in OH-02 who derided "fraudsters" just months ago, but today feel kinship. Wondering if their vote counted. Wondering whether they were previously complicit through silence or even derogatory dismissal in the undermining of democracy.
As in November, I happen to doubt organized fraud of the miscounting the votes variety, but I have an open mind.
However, allegations of fraud are tacitly being allowed by Republicans. They aren't doing everything they could to discount it if its false, or hide it if its true, and I don't buy the idea they are so bold as to rub our faces in it. No, I have another theory. It is that some Republican strategists have decided that allegations of fraud work in their favor. Here's how:
- Some republican voters will believe the fraud claims and will think that fraud is okay. That person is then bound to the party with a blind obedience and, perhaps, a guilt complex that is frightening. This is the kind of party before genuine patriotism mindset that is the stock in trade of the party lately defined by the Swift Boat Liars.
- More importantly, fraud claims have the observable effect on the left of radicalizing a few (in the eyes of the majority), and making the majority more docile and credulous overall. There is a net effect from such choices as to whether to credit fraud claims or not. Although some steps removed, I think the resurge in "centrism" here reflects a willingness to cleave to what is perceived as societal bedrock, because to believe fraud is to feel very very hopeless.
- Finally, fraud claims afflict many of the most motivated people. They do feel hopeless. And they say unfortunate things like, "To Arms!" which if not precipitous of a "whup whup whup" sound of black helicopters... I don't know what would be. Fraud claims make people take stock and decide not to stick their necks out, not to bother, not to fight, actually.
And that's my conclusion: Fraud is a Rovian scheme designed to cover up the broad-daylight voter suppression, roll-purging, redistricting, propagandist hijacking of democracy that will never land anyone behind bars in any foreseeable future. But which we should, figuratively, be up in arms about.
So, no to fraud. There I said it. That is not what this diary started out being about. But as I worked through it rationally I arrived at this conclusion. We should shout down fraud claims. Not because fraud is impossible (it is in fact common the world over, and in past US elections too, plus we know many republicans are favorable toward such extremes). But rather, because voter suppression and voter subversion through propaganda, is totally real. And fraud claims demonstrably prevent those from being adequately combated with the hopeful energy that is required.