http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122550597058490345.htmlNOVEMBER 1, 2008
Essay
Will This Election Be Stolen?
As both parties battle over just how fraud could taint this election, two analysts with very different viewpoints look at voting abuses from the beginning of the republic to the present day.
By MARK CRISPIN MILLER
The GOP's attack on the integrity of voters, carried out by party leaders -- a sitting president included -- on the eve of an election, is unprecedented.
The day after John McCain charged the community-based organization Acorn (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) with planning "one of the greatest frauds in voter history in this country," Sarah Palin told a boisterous crowd in Bangor, Maine: "In this election, it's a choice between a candidate who won't disavow a group committing voter fraud, and a leader who won't tolerate voter fraud."
Soon George Bush leaped into the furor over "voter fraud," asking the Department of Justice to determine whether some 200,000 newly registered Ohio voters should have their identities confirmed. (The Supreme Court had refused that measure; and former Justice Department lawyers claim that the probe requested by the president may violate department policy.)
Meanwhile, Ohio congressman John Boehner, House minority leader, wrote Mr. Bush a letter noting "a significant risk, if not a certainty, that unlawful votes will be cast and counted" in his state, where there are now several lawsuits over the apparent threat of Democratic "voter fraud."