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If a dead body turns up in your back yard, that fact by itself is no proof whatsoever that foul play was involved. Does this mean that no investigation should take place? That you should just get over it and move on, because it is obviously impossible to bring the dead person back to life? If the score is 100-75 with 2 minutes left in the fourth quarter, does that mean that the referees are entitled to stop calling fouls on the grounds that the outcome is pretty well determined? I am certainly glad that Senator Boxer and 32 Congresspeople thought otherwise about our possibly compromised election, and value the integrity of our voting system enough to call fouls when they see them.
From the Partridge essay--
"Wait 'till next time!," say the leaders of the Democratic Party. "We'll try a different approach, we will sharpen and focus our message." "The 2004 election is over, we lost, now let's move on!" To skeptics such as myself, such talk is profoundly disheartening. For missing from all this is serious consideration that the problem was not the message or the candidate's poor performance – that in fact, the intended votes in this election were sufficient to put John Kerry in the Oval Office, and perhaps even to allow the Democrats to regain control of the Senate.
The Democrats too readily forget that 2004 was "next time." Why believe that 2006 and 2008 will be different? If in fact GOP control of the mechanisms of the election allowed them to steal this election, they will do so next time, and the time after that. Issues, messages, tactics, attractive candidates will all be unavailing. Republican control of all branches of the government and of the media will be permanent, and independent of the consent of the governed.
Perhaps this election was scrupulously honest. Perhaps George Bush in fact received 59 million authentic votes, and 51% of the popular vote. But dare we accept this on faith, without reflection, without careful examination of the abundant evidence to the contrary? If the election was fair, then no harm will result from a scrupulous assessment of the contrary evidence. The facts will compel that the assessment will come up short. But can we afford the luxury of blind acceptance of the "official" tally? Must we ignore the accumulating evidence of foul play? I submit that we must not. The fate of our democracy is at stake.
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