Over at HuffPo, Nancy Scola files a nice piece asking whether or not “New Media’s obsessiveness” can save democracy, given that “Elections in the U.S. involve countless moving parts and…so many different players [that] Improving the way we vote demands sustained, focused attention — not exactly the strong suit of the American Press.”
It’s a job for bloggers, she suggests, since the corporate media have, at least so far, not proven up to the task. She may be right, even though the thought simply exhausts me more than I am already.
She goes on to mention a few of us (yes, she names me specifically) who have been fighting this battle for quite some time. “From the sidelines, their campaign often seemed quixotic,” she writes, “But [as electronic voting machines are now being scrapped for junk, recycled and/or sold on eBay] we’re watching history bend their way.”
Nice. Though not as nice as the following turn of phrase, so well writ that I had to share it:
Game, set, match. Well done, Nancy.
With that, one friendly critique for her if I could be so bold: Paperless electronic voting is not the problem — as she suggests in the piece — as if adding “paper trails” to touch-screens makes a damned bit of difference (this article and its accompanying video from the Computer Security Group at UC Santa Barbara should make that crystal clear, no matter what some computer scientists like Princeton’s Ed Felten and Verified Voting’s David Dill keep saying out loud.) The problem is that democracy in this country demands nothing short of the transparency offered by a hand-marked paper ballot — one that is actually counted, and counted accurately — for every vote cast in America. Period.
And that point should be served from a silver platter, and carried directly to every election official and election official in the country, in the beak of a bald eagle.
Talk talk talk — the dictators of the world can’t stand it.
Democracy demands action from individuals and bloggers have taken up the fight.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to drinking one large elitist glass of iced tea. Yum yum.
I am of the belief that as the election nears;when it will matters, certain blogs (especially Bradblog)will be hampered from functioning due to technical problems.
We should create a “continued communication contingency” (The CCC) plan involving email lists, cell phone contacts, text mail,….
Preparing is the best offense.
#2
Sounds like a damn good idea but, no offense, who is Anthony Look? Credible, white-hat-wearing, patriotic progressive?
Or sly, black-hat-wearing, sabotaging neo-con?
Just askin’.
God, am I paranoid.
Brad sez (emphasis mine):
Amen, Brad!
Errr, that would have to be hand-counted, wouldn’t it?
Paper Ballets mit (with) Hand Counting . . .
. . . and another (dead soldier) empty bottle of Scotch.
Black folks were SLAVES in these United States of America.
Yet they served in all the American WARS only to come home to bigotry, prejudice, persecution and discrimination … I would be lying if I didn’t say I have my own Pre Judgments … having been a minority in the a black community.
This may be Americas the last opportunity to redeem itself as
well as save itself … period.
Bamboo Harvester- I agree with you that this may well be America’s last opportunity to redeem/save itself, but while I feel we are an increasingly ill-informed/ignorant country, my every fiber and much of what I experience in dealing with real people everyday (and I live in Republican Orange County, CA) tells me that a large majority of Americans wants to get rid of the Republican shackle that has latched itself on to us for the past 8 years and, in many ways, since Reagan came to office. That said, I don’t think it will happen because the criminals that dominate the Republican Party are well-prepared and well-practiced to steal this election. There will be all kinds of lame excuses for why that happened, as Mark Crispin Miller’s article enumerated yesterday. The rest of the world will view us as hopeless fools and the US will be increasingly (and more easily) marginalized as we continue our decline. One of the most painful excuses for the Dems failure to take the White House will be that we continue to be a racist country. While there is still plenty of racism here, I truly believe this country is ready to elect a black man, Barack Obama, whatever his faults, to be its leader. Unfortunately, I don’t believe the Republican criminals would allow a black, white, green or any other color Democrat win this election. I pray (and I’m not religious) that I am wrong.
Unfortunately, there is a branch of organized crime that has a very large influence in this country. The Lansky-Bronfman arm of the international syndicate has been accused of owning every Arizona politician, Democrat or Republicsn (since it supplies money to all sides) and DEFINITELY owns McCain, since it supplied the money for his first political campaign (and his wife owes her fortune to a legacy from her father, who was Kemper Marley’s right hand man. Oh, who was Marley? Arizona’s first billionaire, and the Godfather of Phoenix. Naturally, organized crime wants representation in government, and has had it since the time of Nixon. So – I guess what we have to do is persuade the mob that they’ll get a better deal if they dump the Republican crooks who give organized crime a bad name.
If bloggers don’t do it then nobody will.
Although there are quite a few guys like this right here that are on the edge of doing something. What we need are MILLIONS to feel exactly like this.
This sounds about like the call I made to Pelosi’s office a few days after she committed treason when she said “Impeachment if off the table”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIZiTSnCNBY