The election was nearly doomed to fail from the start. Months before votes were cast, steps were taken by the powerful political party to see to it the election swung in their advantage.
Minorities found themselves facing roadblocks on the way to the polls, forcing them to take much longer routes to cast a simple vote. Any former felons were removed from the eligible voter list. Overall that is not a big issue but thousands of people who had names remotely similar to former felons, or anyone that shared a birthday with a former felon, or as long as there was an 80% match in relevant information, were also removed from the list. All in all, 173,000 voters found themselves bared from voting - 66% of which were minorities. Any of those that contested were told they had to submit to a review, which included fingerprinting, to get reinstated. Oddly, one of those involved in the ruling party slipped by. A wife of one of the ranking members of the party had been caught sneaking in $19,000 worth of jewelry from another country, a felony, yet was allowed to vote.
But it just doesn’t stop there. One of those seeking office had voted against Equal Right Amendments in the past. So who cares about those minorities that were told they no longer had the right to vote? Especially when 90% of those minorities historically vote for the other party.
Of course I’m speaking about the messed up election in Zimbabwe. (NYTimes link - free registration required.) No one would believe those things would or could happen in America right?
But the truth of the matter is I’m not referring to Zimbabwe or President Robert Mugabe at all, despite the fact that there is plenty of evidence he horked that election too. All of the stuff I mentioned above happened right here, in Florida. But we don’t like to believe that stuff happens here. Only in 3rd world countries…
The fact is that Jeb Bush and Katherine Harris gave the company that administers the database of Florida registered voters $4 million to hijack the list. Then, as the recounts were taking place, Katherine Harris sent out a memo telling those counting the votes to disregard state laws on overseas ballots, which lead to some votes for George Bush to be counted twice. Hell, 183 of the “overseas” ballots were postmarked as coming from inside the US, which makes them ineligible to be counted… unless you’re voting in Florida. And it was Jeb Bush’s wife that was caught by immigration officials trying to sneak in that jewelry because she didn’t want to pay taxes on it. That’s a felony, unless you’re married to power.
And that was Dick Cheney that voted against Equal Rights Amendments. He even voted against a House resolution that would pressure South Africa to release Nelson Mandela when he was in prison. What a swell guy he is.
Another SpittingLlamas service to you, folks. Helping you understand who runs your country.