Great post on Daily Kos
"We could lose, I suppose, if they cheat us out of it" and Other Tales of Republican Delusionhttp://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/10/12/83238/044/321/628179Every four years the republican party attacks the democratic nominee as "out of touch" with "mainstream America." This strategy has been pretty effective (outside of Clinton) and now is being used more than it ever has. I don't have cable but I've been watching some Fox News online, and listening to some right wing radio. It's pretty clear that the GOP is readying itself for a blowout loss and plans on accusing the democrats of fraud. Afterall as the article says, if the country is truly pre-dominantly conservative, the victory of the "most liberal senator in the country" would seem like an outlier occurrence.
It's a shame the Obama campaign hasn't taken an aggressive, factual stance against the anti-Acorn hysteria being propagated by Fox and the McCain campaign. As Ben Smith points out
The key distinction here is between voter fraud and voter registration fraud, one of which is truly dangerous, the other a petty crime.
The former would be, say, voting the cemeteries or stuffing the ballot boxes. This has happened occasionally in American history, though I can think of recent instances only in rare local races. Practically speaking, this can most easily be done by whoever is actually administering the election, which is why partisan observers carefully oversee the vote-counting process.
The latter is putting the names of fake voters on the rolls, something that happens primarily when organizations, like Acorn, pay contractors for new voter registrations. That can be a crime, and it messes up the voter files, but there's virtually no evidence these imaginary people then vote in November. The current stories about Acorn don't even allege a plan to affect the November vote.
I can register to vote 100 times but my vote will only be counted once. I can register Micky Mouse to vote, but since he doesn't exist he cannot physically vote. Such a simple exercise of critical thinking right?
When I was homeschooled my history book described Bill Clinton's presidency as a moral/social dark spot in American history, but this was prefaced by arguments that Clinton squeaked into office thanks to third party votes; after all, as the author argued, Clinton failed to receive 50% of the vote, therefore he
really wasn't the dominant choice of most Americans. Interestingly this was an older history book, and didn't cover the 2000 elections; I wonder what it would have to say about Gore's popular vote victory. Clinton won the popular vote by a good margin, but it was a pretty convincing blowout in terms of what matters: the electoral vote.
If Obama pulls off a 330-360 EC thubbin' I wonder what the spin will be
1. John McCain ran a horrible campaign and wasn't a true conservative. If he told the American people about Wright he would have won
2. Obama benefited from
voter fraud in every battleground state
3. Christian Conservatives stayed home like in 2000. If they came out in full force like in 2004, McCain would have won
Hm, I'm going to pull a Palin and choose all of the above
