NYT, Herbert: With news all bad, GOP strategy is voter suppression

[DeepModem Mom]

OP-ED COLUMNIST
For Bush, Bad News Is Bad News
By BOB HERBERT

Published: October 25, 2004

Here's George W. Bush's problem. How does a president win re-election when all the news the voters are seeing is bad?...

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Unable to counter the bad news with stories of major successes, the Bush campaign has turned almost exclusively to the so-called war against terror. The message in a nutshell: be very afraid....

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At the same time, the Republican Party is doing what it can in key states to block as many Democratic votes as possible. Party officials have mounted a huge organized effort to challenge - some would say intimidate - voters in states like Ohio and Florida, in a bid to offset the effects of huge voter registration drives and a potentially heavy turnout of voters opposed to Mr. Bush and his policies.

Election officials in Ohio said they'd never seen such a large drive mounted to challenge voters on Election Day.

Voter suppression is a reprehensible practice. It's a bullet aimed at the very heart of democracy. But the G.O.P. evidently considers it an essential strategy in an environment with so little positive news.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/opinion/25herbert.html?hp

[doni_georgia]

1. Kick - now if * supporters would read the newspaper

I went to a wedding last night. I rode with a friend (a friend of mine who flip flops from Kerry to Bush depending on who she talked to last). She said that she had decided to vote for Bush because a friend of hers (who is a repug) told her Kerry voted to slash the defense budget after 9/11. I asked her had she looked this up for herself? She, of course, had not. I explained that Kerry voted for a cut in defense spending in the 1990s (long before 9/11) which was aimed at wasteful spending at the Pentegon. Then informed her that Bush had cut combat pay of soldiers serving in Iraq NOW. That he cut veteran benefits, etc. She said, "Wow, Karen didn't tell me that." Well, no she isn't going to. She believes whatever lies she is told by the * administration and their lying buddies. My friend now says she is voting for Kerry (again), at least until some otherlying SOB sends her an email or calls her on the phone. ARGH!!!!

[requiem99]

2. Thoes kind of idiots are the worst.

People who will believe whatever either side tells them without looking for themselves.

[mandyky]

3. Maybe you should offer her a ride to vote

It is best you are the last one she speaks to before she hits the booth.

[0007]

4. Evertything is being thrown out, hoping that something sticks

As the final campaign kicks in, we can see more Republican advertising trying to negatively portray Kerry's voting record in the Senate, while Democratic adverts are hammering Bush's deceptions to the American people and his decision to divert the war efforts from al-Qaida to Iraq.