Nixing the Fix – Lessons from U.S. Elections Past

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The video co-production that heads this blog edition is a fast-paced cautionary report on how investigative reporting, the Green Party, the Election Protection movement, pre-emptive litigation and just plain angry voters saved the Dems from Karl Rove in a key 2012 battleground state – Ohio – which is also a key swing state in the upcoming 2016 election.

Investigative reporters Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein, election protection attorney Cliff Arnebeck and Columbus community activists tell how election theft was – and CAN BE – prevented.

Is Democracy Possible in America? Just maybe.
A recent study of three decades of data by liberal mainstream political scientists Martin Gilens of Princeton, and Benjamin Page of Northwestern, found that the U.S. political system has become “an oligarchy,” where wealthy elites and their corporations “rule,” regardless of which party is in Congress and the White House.

“The central point that emerges from our research, Gilens and Page wrote, “is that economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence.”

As Gilens explained in an interview, “ordinary citizens have virtually no influence over what their government does in the United States.”

Former President Jimmy Carter, famous for his work assessing election systems around the world, agrees. “We’ve become now an oligarchy instead of a democracy,”
Says Carter, who ought to know whereof he speakes.

Vote Rigging – American as The Flag, Motherhood, and Apple IPads
Since the beginning of the Republic, vote rigging has been as integral a part of American elections as flag-waving, dirty tricks and un=kept campaign promises. But, never before has it reached the level of dysfunction which has increasingly infected the entire electoral system now for over a decade. The advent of ‘Citizens United,’ manipulatable social Media, electronic voter roles, privately owned electronic ‘black box’ voting machines and tabulation systems with ‘man-in-the-middle’ cyber fraud impenetrable to citizen oversight, and a whole host of means for disenfranchising entire demographic blocks of voters makes the reported outcomes of America’s elections dubious at best, if not totally fraudulent.

When ‘Healthy Skepticism’ Becomes Dysfunctional Denial
More sobering for those of us who have studied the workings of this system in depth, is the level of denial on this most fundamental of all issues common to otherwise well-informed people across the political spectrum. “EEUUU! Conspiracy theory!” is the almost universal response to the mention of this thousand pound gorilla in the corner of our election system. Widespread denial of human-caused climate chaos, and denial of the existential risks of nuclear energy, weapons and waste, are matched by denial of a broken election system. And, without the integrity of electoral choice, how can the policies that cause climate change and nuclear brinksmanship ever be changed?

Curing Electoral Dysfunction and Preventing Unwanted Presidencies
Given this state of affairs, how can we hope to cure electoral dysfunction and prevent unwanted presidencies?

The first of several video offered in this Election Protection blog edition tells one of the few recent success stories from the growing election protection movement.

Since 2004, EON has been honored to collaborate with the FreePress.org team of investigative reporters and election protection litigators on a series of video reports on the election protection movement – over 50, in fact, on our YouTube Election Protection playlist. We offer some highlights below.

The Ohio Plan for Election Protection
This election season, FreePress.org investigative reporters Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman are working hard to forewarn voters and election protection advocates of the ‘Strip & Flip’ dirty tricks already in play and provide what they call ‘The Ohio Plan’ to defend against them.

As they explain, the Ohio Plan is this:

1. Voter registration must be universal and automatic for all citizens as they turn 18;
2. Electronic poll books are banned, with all voter registration records maintained manually;
3. All elections happen over a 4-day weekend—-Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday—-which together comprise a national holiday, preferably around Veterans Day in November.
4. All voting happens on paper ballots, using recycled or hemp paper;
5. All vote counting is done manually, with ballots preserved at least two years;
6. Polls are run and ballots counted by the nation’s high school and college students, who will get the days off and be paid a “scholarship” for their work at $15/hour. Read more

See also:
Will the GOP Strip & Flip the 2016 Election?
By Mimi Kennedy, Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, Reader Supported News

Why Can’t The Nation & the Left Deal With Election Theft?
By Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman, Reader Supported News

Highlights of EON’s Election Protection Series

Code Red – No More Stolen Elections
Harvey Wasserman & Jonathan Simon
Our election system is rigged. Here’s how it got that way,… and how to fix it.

For more info: CodeRed.com facebook.com/electronicelectionfraud

The Price of Liberty – America’s Election Protection Movement 2008
58-minute DVD documentary produced in cooperation with the Columbus Institute for Contemporary Journalism & FreePress.org.
This fast-moving 58-minute documentary by award-wining filmmakers James Heddle and Mary Beth Brangan explores the issues and strategies embodied in America’s growing grassroots, people-powered ‘Election Protection’ movement.
Scientists, journalists, activists, attorneys and whistleblowers reveal how, why and by whom the last two presidential elections were stolen, even as they fight to keep it from happening again.

The Price of Liberty – America’s Election Protection Movement 2008 from Ecological Options Network on Vimeo.

Help America Vote…On Paper
– A citizen call for election integrity 18 mins.
An empowering, fast-moving 18-minute briefing on the dangers to democracy posed by privately owned electronic voting machines, what patriotic citizens, activists and officials of all parties are doing about it – and how you can help.

Got Democracy?
Leading researchers, journalists and activists from around the country present massive evidence of the unacknowledged electoral crisis in the United States… and what we can do about it.

A Little Light’ll Do Ya
Blacked out or dismissed as ‘conspiracy theories’ by corporate news outlets, reports of massive vote fraud in the 2004 presidential election circulated on the internet and independent media.
As the Jan. 6th, 2005 deadline for a challenge to the Electoral College vote drew near, a tiny village on the California coast raised funds to send a delegation of its citizens and an award-winning documentary team to Ohio and Washington, D.C. to get the facts.
They found overwhelming evidence of a stolen election – and a small, diverse group of committed people from the street and the elite who were defending democracy against overwhelming odds.
This is their report – a precursor of the subsequent Election Protection movement that is still growing today and that is making a difference in upholding our right to accurate vote counts.
This film was translated into Urdu and broadcast in Pakistan during the 2007 election in which Benizir Bhuto was assassinated.

Cheated – The Comic
Wake up and save your country…

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