Post links to your favorite columns by Jane Hamsher, American commentator.

[JackRiddler]

I know Jane Hamsher from her columns at Fire Dog Lake. I find her to be a brilliant daily dissector of empire and of political hypocrisy.

Fairly often she's a lightning-rod for controversy on DU. Some DUers may not be familiar with her work, so I thought to introduce some of her most recent columns here.

This is an appreciation thread. All are invited to post their favorite Jane Hamsher columns.

Please, if you are considering attacking her, I ask you to stay civil in your critique and provide content: links and quotes, instead of labels and insults. Thanks.

http://firedoglake.com/author/Jane-2/

What Do You Do When the President is Just Not Into You: Netroots Nation and the Shifting Tide

http://firedoglake.com/2011/06/20/what-do-you-do-when-the-president-is-just-not-into-you/

More Blame US Wars than Medicare or Social Security for Deficit
By: Jane Hamsher Thursday June 9, 2011 9:10 am

http://firedoglake.com/2011/06/09/more-blame-us-wars-than-medicare-or-social-security-for-deficit/

Medicare Cuts: What’s Real, What’s Kabuki?
By: Jane Hamsher Thursday June 2, 2011

http://firedoglake.com/2011/06/02/medicare-cuts-whats-real-whats-kabuki/

Joseph Stiglitz: We bailed out Citibank and called it a bailout of Mexico
By: Jane Hamsher Friday May 20, 2011

http://fdlaction.firedoglake.com/2011/05/20/joseph-stiglitz-we-bailed-out-citibank-and-called-it-a-bailout-of-mexico/

Our elected officials have basically set up a political system that legalizes and facilitates bribery. And our failure to deal with that has created the most successful business model of the late 20th and early 21st centuries: maximize your profits by making bigger and badder loans that precipitate a “crisis” when they go belly up (which you fuel with a massive PR campaign), then you squeeze the government to make you whole.

Best Rebrand of the Year: War
By: Jane Hamsher Wednesday March 30, 2011 11:45 am


Two years ago war in the Middle East was something that only reactionary hicks, discredited neocons and those with too many X chromosomes supported. Now it’s the purview of hip technocrats and “cruise missile liberals,” having been successfully repackaged as benevolent liberal paternalism.

[JackRiddler]

1. Oh, and FireDogLake is to be commended for their coverage of the "Catfood Commission"!

http://firedoglake.com/fdl-coverage-catfood-commission/

[JackRiddler]

3. In fact, it appears that Jane Hamsher coined the term...

some research on its origins:

http://www.angrybearblog.com/2010/09/who-coined-catfood-commission-contest.html

[LoZoccolo]

4. Exactly, it's a bullshit splinterist asspipe smear. n/t

[JackRiddler]

5. Thank you for expressing your critique of Hamsher in civil terms, using fact and logic.

Your kicks are always welcome.

[mmonk]

7. Lol.

[Vanje]

20. snert

I kinda laughed at that

[mochajava666]

58. Well put.

[Luminous Animal]

6. Splintering whom from whom? Republicans from Democrats? Good.

Because any kind of cuts to Social Security (including raising the retirement age) will impact poor working class folks the most. And that is at least one demographic for which Democrats purport to advocate.

I've witnessed poor old folks buying cat food for their own consumption. In the 70s, before designer cat food, the variety was called BIF. In the market, we called it Beef for Indigent Folks. And really, if you liked beef, it didn't taste so bad and the ingredients included potatoes, carrots and celery.

[LoZoccolo]

9. So because poor people ate cat food, Obama wants everyone to eat it.

Got it.

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[LoZoccolo]

12. Right, so then how does Jane Hamsher get off implying that Obama has

collected a group of people to find a way to get people to eat cat food?

[Luminous Animal]

15. Intelligent people realize, with Social Security cuts, there WILL be more people eating cat food.

It certainly was not a commission empaneled to elevate the standard of living for poor disabled and old folks who already rely on cat food for sustenance.

[Vanje]

22. yep. nt

[snooper2]

30. Actually, cat food is pretty fucking expensive...

maybe she should have called it the hot dog commission, those are still cheap :)

[Luminous Animal]

60. Nope. According to the Safeway website... the cheapest catfood is .09 per oz

the cheapest hotdogs (turkey) are .125 per oz.

[JackRiddler]

61. Thanks for the research, but everyone should step back and understand metaphor when they see it.

No, very few people whose benefits are cut, as the ultimate aim of the Peterson campaigns and the Catfood Commission, are going to eat catfood.

Most of them will just have to go hungry a lot of the time.

[JackRiddler]

31. Or nothing.

[formernaderite]

46. is cat food cheap.... not that I've ever noticed.

In fact...it's not. There is plenty of people food much cheaper. Those of us old timers.... who perhaps grew up during belt tightening years... have always heard these cat and dog food stories. Im pretty old...and my family of five kids growing up lived on plenty of cheap food... beans and rice by the end of the month. But somehow my mother never resorted to pet food... makes you wonder.

[Luminous Animal]

59. I just looked on the Safeway site... a can of catfood is .09 per oz. A can of beans .18 per oz.

Of course it is cheaper to buy dry (.09 per oz) but then you have to pay for the gas or electricity to cook them.

[eridani]

25. That's precisely what he did. Pete Peterson backed the Catfood Commmission--

--and he's about as useless a parasitic shitstain as any of the one percenters. Sad that tumbrils have gone out of style.

[Avant Guardian]

65. You take it literally?

It is hard to believe that anyone here could actually be that naive.

[Luminous Animal]

13. Yes. That is exactly Hamsher's position. Hahahahahaha!!!!

Just how stupid do you think DUers are?

[Vanje]

21. Tastes like fairly decent meatloaf

But, have you priced canned cat food lately?

We poor are going to have to switch to kibble.

[sabrina 1]

18. Only if you are not a senior or disabled or a dependent child.

If you think the elderly and the poor are not already eating catfood, they you haven't been to some of America's supermarkets in poor areas.

Btw, do you support cutting SS? Or do you support taxing the rich and ending the wars, the real causes of the debt.

[eridani]

24. If you want to give up your Social Security and Medicare--

--just leave the rest of us out of it, 'K?

[sudopod]

32. That was mature, lol nt

[bullwinkle428]

66. Well, Rachel uses the "catfood" reference all the time when talking

about potential cuts to Social Security. Does this make Rachel a "bullshit splinterist asspipe"?

[Luminous Animal]

2. A couple of mine (so far)

http://firedoglake.com/2011/02/14/key-players-in-operation-ratfk-interactive-relationship-map/

Key Players in Operation Ratf%$k: Interactive Relationship Map
By: Jane Hamsher Monday February 14, 2011 10:35 am

Last week, Anonymous released an enormous vault of 44,000 emails written by the principals and employees of HP Gary and HP Gary Federal, two sister companies that worked as government contractors in information technology. HP Gary Federal’s Aaron Barr, along with Patrick Ryan of Berico Technologies and Matthew Steckman of Palantir Technologies, worked on a WikiLeaks proposal for Bank of America that involved using the same tech tools these firms used on Al Qaeda to smear and discredit people like Glenn Greenwald, David House and others who were actively working to counter the flow of disinformation surrounding WikiLeaks. For background, see Marcy Wheeler’s work here.

http://firedoglake.com/2011/06/03/hillary-clinton-hosts-iraq-opportunities-party-for-war-profiteers/

Hillary Clinton Hosts “Iraq Opportunities” Party For War Profiteers
By: Jane Hamsher Friday June 3, 2011 7:57 am

"FIRST LOOK: WALL STREET IN IRAQ? – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Deputy Secretary Tom Nides (formerly chief administrative officer at Morgan Stanley) will host a group of corporate executives at State this morning as part of the Iraq Business Roundtable. Corporate executives from approximately 30 major U.S. companies – including financial firms Citigroup, JPMorganChase and Goldman Sachs – will join U.S. and Iraqi officials to discuss economic opportunities in the new Iraq. Full list of corporate participants:"

[slipslidingaway]

11. Sorry, guess I should have read your post first ...

but found this link when looking for more info.

http://www.iraq-businessnews.com/2011/06/11/clinton-urges-u-s-companies-to-invest-in-iraq/2/

"...Now, we are entering a new phase in our relationship with Iraq, and we are very committed to making a major civilian commitment to Iraq’s future. We’ll be opening, as you know, and running consulates in Irbil and Basra, we’ll have civilian experts available to work with not only Iraqi counterparts, but also Americans and to support American businesses in the years to come, as we do in our diplomatic — especially our commercial diplomatic work all over the world. And so it’s time for the United States to start thinking of Iraq as a business opportunity. And the sacrifice that the Iraqi people have made for your freedom is one that we highly respect..."

[slipslidingaway]

8. Hillary Clinton Hosts “Iraq Opportunities” Party For War Profiteers

http://firedoglake.com/2011/06/03/hillary-clinton-hosts-iraq-opportunities-party-for-war-profiteers/

"As Congress launches a bipartisan PR campaign to stay in Iraq forever, the White House throws a corporate looting party"

http://dyn.politico.com/members/forums/thread.cfm?catid=18&subcatid=59&threadid=5521029

"FIRST LOOK: WALL STREET IN IRAQ? – Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Deputy Secretary Tom Nides (formerly chief administrative officer at Morgan Stanley) will host a group of corporate executives at State this morning as part of the Iraq Business Roundtable. Corporate executives from approximately 30 major U.S. companies - including financial firms Citigroup, JPMorganChase and Goldman Sachs - will join U.S. and Iraqi officials to discuss economic opportunities in the new Iraq. Full list of corporate participants:"

Clinton urges U.S. companies to invest in Iraq
http://www.iraq-businessnews.com/2011/06/11/clinton-urges-u-s-companies-to-invest-in-iraq/

"Iraq is open for business, and American companies should make an effort to invest there, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (pictured) has said, according to a report from CNN.

The Secretary was addressing the Business Forum Promoting Commercial Opportunities in Iraq, which included executives from companies as far-ranging as Occidental Petroleum, JP Morgan Chase, General Electric, Microsoft and Lockheed Martin in a round-table discussion aimed at getting companies focused on commercial opportunities in Iraq despite its current “tough environment.”

Secretary Clinton said, “President Obama and I and our government believe strongly that expanding economic opportunity is as essential as building democratic institutions. We think they go hand in hand. And in particular, it’s very important for people going through the changes that are sweeping the region and that Iraq has, in many ways, been a leader in demonstrating, to believe and to see that democracy delivers: Is your life better or not? Do your children have a better opportunity or not?

“And this is clearly not a job for government alone. It is a very important partnership that has to be forged. Businesses like those represented here at this table create jobs, provide livelihoods, increase standards of living, give hope to individuals and their families. And what government should do, whether it’s in the United States or in Iraq, is to be a good partner, to help create the conditions for investment and growth that will be broadly spread and create a ladder of economic opportunity for those willing to work hard, to acquire the education and skills required in the modern world..."

[TriMera]

14. Thanks, JackRiddler. I must admit that I haven't

read much of Ms. Hamsher's work. It's nice to have some choice articles to look at.

[Stinky The Clown]

16. I'm going to kick this

It is almost the 4th of July and exploding heads are almost as good as exploding fireworks.

[neverforget]

17. LOL Never a shortage of that around here

:rofl:

[Bobbie Jo]

19. Here's mine....

.

[inna]

23. "solidarity" with whom, Bobbie?

[Bobbie Jo]

27. Whom? Let me put it this way, inna...

Anyone who is actively working to make it possible for RW Teabagging Psychopaths to hold the fate of this country and my family in their hands, is no friend of mine.

It certainly doesn't include the likes of Grover Norquist, or his new-found ally in solidarity Jane Hamshire, Inc.

Glad you asked.

[mmonk]

29. Then tell the Democrats that vote with them

enough on occasion to stop progress or advance their agenda to quit doing so. There's always just enough Democrats to keep the right's agenda going.

[JackRiddler]

34. Then Democrats who vote with the Republicans are no friends of yours.

RW Teabagging Psychopaths already are partly in charge, thanks to Democratic politicians who collaborate and capitulate preemptively to their demands.

[Bobbie Jo]

37. Obviously we disagree as to the cause of the midterm losses.

No doubt Ms. Hamshire, Inc. continues to thrive under these conditions.

She has created a nice little win/win operation for herself.

[AlabamaLibrul]

48. The RWers already control the fate of the nation, and "they're holding it for a friend" n/t

[Bobbie Jo]

54. Here's the thing...

While we were busy making nominations for progressive sainthood, and proclaiming Democrats inept and evil, RW'ers ( running with the inept/evil meme) managed to get out the vote.

It's not rocket science.

Like I said, it's a win/win for Hamshire, Inc.

[JTFrog]

26. +1 n/t

[Name removed]

28. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[SidDithers]

33. She's good for a laugh...

thanks for the material.

Sid

[dionysus]

35. pure comedy gold. thank you.

:rofl:

[dionysus]

36. here's my favorite;

http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2009/12/strange-bedfellows-indeed


→ Politics
Strange Bedfellows Indeed
— By Kevin Drum

| Wed Dec. 23, 2009 3:52 PM PST

.

Apparently Jane Hamsher has decided that a healthcare bill that provides a trillion dollars worth of benefit to low and middle income workers is so odious that mere opposition isn't enough. Nor is opposition that increasingly employs the worst kind of right-wing talking points. No, it's so odious that it deserves a scorched earth campaign against the Obama White House in partnership with Grover Norquist. Hard to know what to say about this. What's next? A joint Twitter campaign with Sarah Palin? A letter writing campaign cosponsored by Richard Viguerie? A joint lawsuit with Orly Taitz? Jeebus.

[AtomicKitten]

38. Thanks for the MotherJones link. They are a reputable source.

:thumbsup:

[JackRiddler]

40. "Source" doesn't trump the fact that the actual text is rabid nonsense.

[EFerrari]

41. LOL. It's an opinion, not a news piece.

[JackRiddler]

42. It's more like an incoherent grunt of anger that doesn't actually say anything about the object

of its distress (i.e., the actual content of the Hamsher-Norquist collaboration). Because talking about Rahm Emanuel's time at Freddie Mac doesn't look good for him.

[AtomicKitten]

43. In the reputable source Olympics, MotherJones stands head and shoulders above FDL.

[EFerrari]

44. Someone who can't tell the difference between a sourced story

and an opinion piece probably isn't someone I will be taking tips from but thanks anyway.

[AtomicKitten]

45. I can tell the difference between a shit source (FDL) and a reputable source (MotherJones).

As an example, FDL made fools of themselves - catfood commission ring a bell? - insisting President Obama was going to announce gutting Social Security in his 2011 SOTU speech. It had all y'all atwitter. How'd that shoddy reporting or more accurately demented opinion (oh dear, were you confused about opinion vs. reporting?) pan out? Oh that's right, their breathless prediction fell flat.
Pfft.

[JackRiddler]

49. Whatever. If you can sort the sources into "reputable" vs. "shit," then...

that saves you the trouble of having to actually read anything!

Which is the impression your comments give. Having read them.

I keep making that mistake: reading things, instead of, like you, knowing in advance whether to accept or reject based on the quality of the source.

[AtomicKitten]

51. You're right. I exclude horseshit from my repertoire of reading material in forming an opinion.

FDL's bent is obnoxious, fractious, and flat-out BS too often to be taken seriously. I know that to be true because I've read it. There are plenty of other reputable sources to glean information from in the process of forming an opinion.

It seems to me some people here only seek out that bent they are predisposed to having an affinity with, believing them above all other cohesive factual reporting. In my view, that's the mistake you and others make.

[JackRiddler]

53. I read an incredible range of material, perspectives and publications.

I really do.

In fact, I bet most of the people posting here do!

We're almost all very likely reading the NYT, the old-guard weekly and monthly political mags, and probably stacks of books (over years and decades) and I hope delving into actual political reports and journal essays, not just blogs.

What I find selective is not the choice of reading material, but who people choose as their scapegoats and smear targets. It's a curious spectacle, to see people who might quote the NYT or AP without caveats, despite these organs' hair-raising histories as propaganda platforms for the military-spook state and corporations, hone in on FDL as the enemy.

[AtomicKitten]

62. No doubt I've been annoyed with Jane Hamsher's bombastic demeanor. LOL.

I just don't see much point in setting myself on fire over predictions particularly since too many coming from FDL have been hugely off the mark. I look to people like David Corn who is reliable and thoughtful in his blogging and admittedly reject those that rely heavily on unsourced gossip as gospel delivered as flame-throwing.

A prescient piece (2002) from MotherJones on ALEC: Ghostwriting and the Law.
http://motherjones.com/politics/2002/09/ghostwriting-law

Peace.

[Whisp]

79. :)

:thumbsup:

[EFerrari]

81. Demented would be sittng back and expectng this president

to lead on preserving what is left of our social safety net. We need ten more FDLs and MoJos -- an outfit that isn't in tension with Hamsher OR FDL, btw, as a regular reader would know. :)

Obama Puts Social Security on the Chopping Block
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/01/obama-puts-social-security-chopping-block

Obama's Tax Deal and the Future of Social Security
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2010/12/obamas-tax-deal-and-future-social-security

In the Social Security Debate, Today's Democrats Are Worse Than Yesterday's Republicans
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/01/social-security-debate-todays-democrats-worse-yesterdays-republicans

[AtomicKitten]

83. Hmm, same author. Aren't these those opinion pieces you warned about? LOL.

btw, "in tension" = in contention

FDL aspires to attain half the credibility of MotherJones.

[JackRiddler]

39. Ah yes, would this be the Grover Norquist who testified to the Deficit ("Catfood") Commission

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2UusWiTsmM

Apparently it's all good to work with him (and with the Tea Partiers) if you're the White House or the president's appointed commission, but not if you're Jane Hamsher.

And what was her cooperation with Norquist? You chose a link that actually says nothing about it, only throws invective at her for being a traitor, which is par for the course for anti-Hamsher Pavlovian reactions.

Why not link to the actual offense? Oh look, it involves allegations of corruption by the DLC hero himself, Rahm Emanuel:

Jane Hamsher, Grover Norquist Call for Rahm Emanuel’s Resignation
By: Jane Hamsher Wednesday December 23, 2009 12:17 pm

Today, Grover Norquist and I are calling for an investigation into Rahm Emanuel’s activities at Freddie Mac, and the White House’s blocking of an Inspector General who would look into it. The letter follows:


http://firedoglake.com/2009/12/23/jane-hamsher-grover-norquist-call-for-rahm-emmanuel’s-resignation/

[creon]

69. Too bad

Jane Hamsher does have talent as a polemicist; she does invective very well.

Too bad that she a problem with target selection. I doubt if she will ever recognize that.
She has becomme a useful idiot.

[DevonRex]

47. She's always good for comic relief. Thanks.

:rofl:

[dionysus]

57. wadsworth spit a whole cup of earl gray tea from his nose reading this thread...

:rofl:

[KamaAina]

50. Well, here's my favorite column about her

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=439&topic_id=1337889&mesg_id=1337889

[JackRiddler]

52. Except that's a Rovian hit piece written by Dana Houle, the dirty-tricks insider...

who spent years on Daily Kos disguised as a Joe Activist (and not a DC insider) while engaging in smears against the left, for which he was finally banned.

For some reason the OP you link to snipped out the by-line, so maybe people should know who they're reading?

[fascisthunter]

55. Good catch...

[JackRiddler]

78. sneaky kick

[fascisthunter]

56. figures...

that one is on ignore

[eridani]

63. From Firedoglake--highly documented proof that AARP has always been weak on SocSec

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1347652

[JackRiddler]

64. surprise surprise surprise

[Armstead]

67. I look at her as I look at Dennis Kucinich

I basically agree with most of what they say and believe in.

And i'm glad they're willing to stand against partisan orthodoxy when they feel it is necessary.

But sometimes they each go a leedle bit too far, and do things that undermine their credibility. So I have a hard time wholeheartedly endorsing either of them.

I guess there's an invisible and nebulous line that shouldn't be crossed, and they haven;t mastered the skill of straddling it.

By comparison, Bernie Sanders is a master at it. He'll go whole hog into things, and is willing to challenge the Democrats when itis called for. But he also knows how to do politics and public relations, and manages to just skirt that invisible line without going over it.

Nevertheless, the vitriol against Hamsher by blind partisan loyalists is somewwhat distressing.

[JackRiddler]

70. You also have to wonder what kind of press the "blind partisan loyalists" want to see.

Her crime is in taking a journalistic and editorial stance. (A journalistic stance is what to cover, an editorial one is ideally what one concludes after consideration of the coverage.) These stances are not criticized for being wrong, or even addressed really, but attacked for the (I think patently false) perception that they harm the electoral prospects of a political party. Everything is either "with us or against us," although hypocrisy is allowed: Norquist as the guest of the Deficit/Catfood Commission or Boehner as the golf partner of Obama is great, Hamsher working with Norquist to expose allegations of corruption by Rahm Emanuel should not even be allowed in this world view. (It's just an "attack," the allegations are not to be considered for possible truth value.)

Anyways, perhaps I expect too much from political analysis and rhetorics.

Maybe this makes one happier:

Gooooooooo TEAM!!! Go, go, go!

[AtomicKitten]

73. You suffer a difference of opinion with an utter lack of grace.

You are entitled to swoon at her badly-sourced horseshit but you are not entitled to belittle those that aren't enamored with her. It doesn't make your case and only makes you look like a jerk.

Jane Hamsher is no David Corn. Enough said.

[JackRiddler]

75. You live in an alternate reality where the bullies get to play victims.

I'm not the one who launched a disinformation campaign to demonize Hamsher for insufficiently following DLC party line, or who accuses her readers of being crypto-Republicans.

If you feel belittled by a defense of her work, or by a critique of moral witch-burning, then that's definitely in your head, not mine.

And thanks for the quotable non-sequitur: "Jane Hamsher is no David Corn." That's right. Score another point for her.

[AtomicKitten]

76. David Corn is a pro, Hamsher a gossipy wannabe.

And your word salad while amusing does not a case make.

Have a great day.

[JackRiddler]

77. David Corn is an apologist for the CIA. Don't know if that's as a pro or an amateur, but whatever.

And you wish you could write in anything other than cliches.

[EFerrari]

80. LOL. Davd Corn is the "pro" who dismissed 2004 election fraud out of hand

even as the Ohio recount was being put together. He's pro something, all right.

[AtomicKitten]

82. Here's David Corn's piece. DU'ers can read it and decide for themselves.

The Nation: A Stolen Election?
This column from The Nation was written by David Corn and posted in its entirety with permission.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/11/opinion/main655162.shtml

Before the vote counting was done, the e-mails started arriving. The election's been stolen! Fraud! John Kerry won! In the following days, these charges flew over the Internet. The basic claim was that the early exit polls -- which showed Kerry ahead of George W. Bush -- were right; the vote tallies were rigged. Could this be? Or have ballot booths with electronic voting machines become the new Grassy Knoll for conspiracy theorists?

Anyone who questioned the integrity of the nation's voting system -- before the election or after -- has had good reason to do so. Electronic voting that does not produce an auditable paper trail is worrisome -- as is the possibility that the machines can be hacked. The proponents of these systems claim there are sufficient safeguards. But in this election there were numerous reports of e-voting gone bad. Votes cast for one candidate were registered for another. In Broward County, Florida, software subtracted votes rather than added them. In Franklin County, Ohio, an older electronic machine reported an extra 3,893 votes for Bush. Local election officials caught that error. But when I asked Peggy Howell, one of those officials, why the mistake occurred, she replied, "We really don't know." Were these errors statistically insignificant glitches that inevitably happen in any large system? "It gives us the uneasy feeling that we're only seeing the tip of the iceberg," Cindy Cohn of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which is part of the Election Protection Coalition, told Reuters. "What has most concerned scientists are problems that are not observable," David Jefferson, a computer scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, explained to the Associated Press. "The fact that we had a relatively smooth election...does not change at all the vulnerability these systems have to fraud or bugs." And the 2000 fiasco in Florida demonstrated that non-electronic voting can also have serious problems, which often disproportionately affect low-income counties.

Then there's the issue of who is running the show. Only a few companies manufacture electronic voting machines. They are not transparent. They do not use open-source code. Last year, Walden O'Dell, the head of Diebold, a leading manufacturer of touch-screen machines, declared in a fundraising letter for the Ohio Republican Party that he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." That hardly inspired confidence. And across the country, oversight of voting is conducted by partisan officials. In Ohio, Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell, a Republican and conservative activist, oversaw the voting. On his watch, the polling place for Kenyon College was equipped with only two voting machines. Yet about 1,100 people -- mostly students -- wanted to vote there. These voters (and you can guess whom they preferred) had to wait up to nine hours. It doesn't require much cynicism to suspect that this was no accident.

But did something more foul than minor slip-ups and routine political chicanery occur? Those who say yes -- at this point -- are relying more on supposition than evidence. They cite the exit polls to claim the vote count was falsified to benefit Bush. The pollsters say they over-sampled women, that their survey takers were not allowed to get close enough to the polls and that Kerry supporters may have been more willing to cooperate with the pollsters than Bush backers. Impossible, huffs pollster/consultant Dick Morris: "Exit polls are almost never wrong." But Morris argues that the faulty exit polls are not a sign the vote count was off but an indication that the pollsters deliberately produced pro-Kerry results "to try to chill the Bush turnout." (Talk about conspiracy theory.) The screwy exit polls do raise questions, but they are not proof of sabotage. And left-of-center accusers have promoted contradictory theories. Many suggest Diebold and other vendors put in the fix via the paperless touch-screen machines. But other critics -- including progressive talk-show host and author Thom Hartmann -- also point to a spreadsheet created by an activist named Kathy Dopp that shows what she considers anomalous pro-Bush results in Florida counties that used optical-scan voting, not electronic touch-screen voting. (The optical-scan machines were manufactured by Diebold and the other firms that produce the touch-screen machines.) But Walter Mebane, a Cornell professor, and colleagues at Harvard and Stanford examined this allegation of fraud and concluded that it is "baseless." They note that the counties in question are mostly in the conservative Florida Panhandle and "have trended strongly Republican over the past twelve years."

Making a different "we-wuz-robbed" claim, journalist Greg Palast, in an article bluntly titled "Kerry Won...," contends the Democrat would have definitely triumphed in Ohio had the final tally included the uncounted ballots -- by which he means 92,672 ballots that did not register a vote when run through a counting machine -- and the 155,000 provisional ballots. Palast wrongly assumes that an overwhelming majority of these ballots contain votes for Kerry, who lost by 136,000 votes. Not all of the provisional ballots, however, would pass legal muster. (Ohio Democrats estimated less than 90 percent would be valid.) And more important, the 92,672 other ballots, if hand-counted, probably would not have produced a major vote gain for Kerry. After the Florida 2000 mess, I examined almost a third of the 10,500 uncounted votes in Miami-Dade County. Of those, only a few hundred contained a discernible vote. Tallying them produced merely a five-vote edge for Al Gore. It is highly improbable that the pool of uncounted and provisional ballots in Ohio could have yielded Kerry a net gain of more than 136,000 votes.

Clear away the rhetoric, and what's mainly left are the odd early exit polls (which did show Kerry's lead in Ohio and Florida declining as Election Day went on and which ended up with the current national Bush-Kerry spread), troubling instances of bad electronic voting, and curious -- or possibly curious -- trends in Florida. This may be the beginning of a case; it is not a case in itself. Investigative reporter Robert Parry observes, "Theoretically, at least, it is conceivable that sophisticated CIA-style computer hacking -- known as 'cyber-warfare' -- could have let George W. Bush's campaign transform a three-percentage-point defeat, as measured by exit polls, into an official victory of about the same margin. Whether such a scheme is feasible, however, is another matter, since it would require penetration of hundreds of local computer systems across the country, presumably from a single remote location. The known CIA successes in cyber-war have come from targeting a specific bank account or from shutting down an adversary's computer system, not from altering data simultaneously in a large number of computers."

The skeptics -- correct or not in their claims of fraud -- are right to be concerned in general about the vote-counting system. Representatives John Conyers, Jerrold Nadler and Robert Wexler have asked the Government Accountability Office (formerly the General Accounting Office) to investigate the "voting machines and new technologies used in the 2004 election." Blackboxvoting.org -- a group that has long decried electronic voting and now claims that "fraud took place in the 2004 election" -- has filed Freedom of Information Act requests to obtain internal computer logs and other documents from 3,000 counties and localities, in an attempt to audit the election. The public does deserve any information that would allow it to evaluate vote counting. Beyond that, extensive election reform is necessary. Electronic voting ought to produce a paper trail that can be examined. There should be national standards for voting systems and for verifying vote tallies. And vote counters should be nonpartisan public servants, not secretive corporations or party hacks. The system ought to be so solid that no one would have cause even to wonder whether an election has been stolen.

David Corn is The Nation's Washington editor and also the "Loyal Opposition" columnist for www.TomPaine.com and www.Alternet.org.

[creon]

68. useful idiot

Hamsher is a useful idiot.
There is, of course, nothing unusual about useful idiots.

Norquist finds her quite useful.

[JackRiddler]

71. (yawns)

[creon]

72. so what

Not interested in your (yawns)

[JackRiddler]

74. Yes! Thanks for the kick!