Tuesday, August 17, 2004
I'm back
After a long hiatus, here's a quick post today. I've been busy moving to Seattle (and before that, attending a conference at Stanford). I'm going through a bit of culture shock adjusting to my new home, but as soon as I start my regular work routine, hopefully I feel feel more normal. It wouldn't hurt to have my bed and desk here, though...
I don't have time for a long news post, and have been a bit out of touch. So just a few election related items. The first regards Florida, where the GOP already seems to be starting up the intimidate-the-black-vote we know and love. See Bob Herbert for more details. Are state police going to randomly selected homes in a predominantly-black neighborhood to ask about voting? What is this, the bad old days of the South?
Of course, Jeb Bush's administration could try to assuage fears of state-run electoral fraud by creating a paper trail for ballots. But he won't. This article mentions the myriad opportunities for election machine meddling (along with an interesting run down on how the voters of Florida are leaning). And we already know the state of Florida tried to get a bunch of black non-felons thrown off the voting rolls again, as Paul Krugman mentions today.
If there were a "rogue state" out there where the re-election of the government depended on voting in a region governed by the president's brother, with unverifiable voting procedures, evidence of voter intimidation, and documented efforts to illegally disenfranchise opposition-supporters, well, let's just say we'd have what the Bushies consider cause for invasion and "regime change".
We can hope Florida won't be decisive in this year's presidential race. We can even hope that if it is pivotal, at least this time all the votes will be counted, uniformly, with the highest respect for the process of democracy. But we may as well face the likelihood that few of us will trust whatever results come out of the state, because it is clear that the people in charge would sacrifice democracy for partisan (and family) gain. Five years ago, I would have scoffed at the notion that American political leaders would show so little regard for the democratic process. So would most political scientists. We would have been quick to insist that the US is not Sierra Leone or even Argentina. But today...
Which brings me to my second topic. You can see my entry in a 2004 election pool, made up of political scientists, here; my entry is the top right (Kerry 292 electoral votes). Note that 8/9 of us picked Kerry to win it all, but 3/9 have Kerry "winning" Florida. I wonder how that number would change if we had faith in a fair election in Florida.
I don't have time for a long news post, and have been a bit out of touch. So just a few election related items. The first regards Florida, where the GOP already seems to be starting up the intimidate-the-black-vote we know and love. See Bob Herbert for more details. Are state police going to randomly selected homes in a predominantly-black neighborhood to ask about voting? What is this, the bad old days of the South?
Of course, Jeb Bush's administration could try to assuage fears of state-run electoral fraud by creating a paper trail for ballots. But he won't. This article mentions the myriad opportunities for election machine meddling (along with an interesting run down on how the voters of Florida are leaning). And we already know the state of Florida tried to get a bunch of black non-felons thrown off the voting rolls again, as Paul Krugman mentions today.
If there were a "rogue state" out there where the re-election of the government depended on voting in a region governed by the president's brother, with unverifiable voting procedures, evidence of voter intimidation, and documented efforts to illegally disenfranchise opposition-supporters, well, let's just say we'd have what the Bushies consider cause for invasion and "regime change".
We can hope Florida won't be decisive in this year's presidential race. We can even hope that if it is pivotal, at least this time all the votes will be counted, uniformly, with the highest respect for the process of democracy. But we may as well face the likelihood that few of us will trust whatever results come out of the state, because it is clear that the people in charge would sacrifice democracy for partisan (and family) gain. Five years ago, I would have scoffed at the notion that American political leaders would show so little regard for the democratic process. So would most political scientists. We would have been quick to insist that the US is not Sierra Leone or even Argentina. But today...
Which brings me to my second topic. You can see my entry in a 2004 election pool, made up of political scientists, here; my entry is the top right (Kerry 292 electoral votes). Note that 8/9 of us picked Kerry to win it all, but 3/9 have Kerry "winning" Florida. I wonder how that number would change if we had faith in a fair election in Florida.
