The scientific analysis of the 2004 exit poll discrepancy, conducted by ten academics for a group called US Count Votes, is the, and I mean THE most important story out there right now. Yes, even more important than John Paul II, who is still dead.
And even if JPII were to wake up and sing 76 Trombones, the US Count Votes study would still be the most significant news development.
Yet if you go to Google news right now and type in the words "US Count Votes" -- what pops up? About five stories. The top-most one is my own post, as relayed via Bellacio. (Some of the responses over there are amusing.) Google also directs you to Brad Friedman's fine work.
But as for mainstream news reportage -- forget it. The Akron Beacon Journal remains the only paper in the country to cover this issue.
Folks, this story is far too important to be left in the hands of Brad or myself. Any blogger is still considered to be "just a blogger."
When Mitofsky issued his half-truths, the papers gave him tons of coverage. Some "liberal" media!
6 comments:
As a former journalist, I share your dismay over the utter lack of coverage of this story of our new American century, one which has regularly deprived me of sleep since election night. I tell otherwise intelligent people about the vote fraud and, now, the definitive proof and they react with either a blank stare or a quick switch to a more "neutral" topic. Few can wrap their minds around the idea that at least two national elections were stolen in front of all of our faces. But during those sleepless nights I often console myself with the following: "Whenever I despair, I remember that the way of truth and love has always won. there may be tyrants (UNDERSTATEMENT) and murderers, and for a time, they may seem invinsible, but in the end, they always fail. Think of it: always."
I'm waiting also for the television documentary pieces about anorexia and bulimia that surely are required by the recent public death of Theresa Schiavo's brain stem. Is not bulimia an important public health problem, and does not the death 15 years ago of Theresa Schiavo have a lesson for us? WHERE ARE THE DOCUMENTARIES ON ANOREXIA AND BULIMIA?!!
The story has entered the realm of the verboten, because it challenges the foundations of American power and legitimacy.
Consider that Noam Chomsky has been dispassionately describing the reality of American domestic and foreign policy for 30 years, making a factual, not an ideological case. And yet his account of the world is completely missing from the public discourse, in favor of the fictions promoted by the likes of Newt Gingrich, Cokie Roberts and Thomas Friedman.
Talk to most journalists (and editors!) and you discover individuals who are deeply conservative at heart, embracing conventional wisdom with high passion. Most can't conceive that the world we inhabit is a public relations fiction, and that they themselves are perpetuating lies. Many are infuriated by the mere suggestion that they're missing the truth, that the world we see on TV isn't the real one.
Of course, there are always people who do know how the world works. Most keep quiet because they want to stay employed (look at what happened at CNN a few weeks ago), or understand that it's a losing battle, that the truth has never entered public discourse for long, in this or any other country. The most they can hope to do is work the edges of acceptability, unless and until the story explodes, which rarely happens.
On the other hand, politicians understand constituent pressure, and broadcasters understand commercial pressures. The only way to get this story out -- if at all -- is to push it relentlessly with elected representatives and news organizations. For that matter, where is moveon.org and the left-wing of Democratic party?
Although we want to vomit up the poison that is this administration, perhaps the best we can hope for right now is to pursue the individual cases of fraud and disenfranchisement that collectively make up this massive sickness. Going after the election officials, the organizations that purported to register voters while disposing of Democrats' registrations, the polling companies that refuse to release data and do not account for major discrepancies, the voting machine companies, the faux journalists and voting rights organizations, etc.
The best we can do is to attack the peripheral issues that have contributed to this illness, and keep them in the forefront and on the defensive. It took individuals to effectuate this unlawful coup, and we need to keep shining a spotlight on those individuals and their contributions to the "syndicate." (Like the GOP campaign officials who are being prosecuted for illegally disrupting Dem. phone banks, for example). This is not as satisfactory as cutting off the head, but it may be all we can do at the moment, and like water eroding rock, eventually it has an effect. Eventually it will reach the consciousness of the public and their awareness will become outrage.
"The best we can do is to attack the peripheral issues...and keep them in the forefront and on the defensive.... like water eroding rock, eventually it has an effect."
Human beings are not minerals and social movements are not rocks. They are living, changing, and growing entities that can repair erosion and adapt to prevent recurrences.
Witness the "creationists," who keep gaining ground despite repeated victories against them. They adapt a defense to every attack; now they are using something called Stupid Design, for which we do not yet have an adequately effective countermeasure.
"And even if JPII were to wake up and sing 76 Trombones, the US Count Votes study would still be the most significant news development."
How about JPII and Terri Schiavo doing a duet? Now THAT would be something.
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