Sin of the Month • Abby Bardi
	Elections

In those halcyon days before the 2004 election, when I was sure John Kerry was going to win because Zogby told Jon Stewart he would, I thought to myself, hey, this is a good time to quit writing about politics.   I know it gets on people's nerves, and is potentially a problem for me, since who knows, my students might Google me and discover that I'm a rabid "Lib," and then they will no longer respect my opinions about Yeats or dangling modifiers.   Or people who have read my novel ( The Book of Fred ) and incorrectly deduced from it that I have an affinity with fundamentalist Christianity might read the Takoma Voice , discover that I am flagrantly "Blue," and chuck Fred into the pile of books they're burning.

Yes, I thought, it's time.   From now on, when Kerry is president, I will only write about the small, nagging irritations of human life: my despair over the floor tiles in my kitchen, my dental woes, my perpetual battle with the poison ivy in my backyard.

But those folks in the Red states and the guys at Diebold had other plans.   Though I was positive that a surge of irate, Bush-hating Blues would triumph over the tide of homophobic Redness, the exit polls and I were evidently wrong.  

Bush's apparent victory has thrown a huge wrench into my plan to devote myself to mundane domestic subjects.   We are entering into a state of national emergency, and nothing else seems to matter.

Although I've lived through the reigns of Nixon and Reagan, I can't recall ever experiencing any political phenomena quite as scary and saddening as this past campaign season.   The alleged referendum on same-sex marriage (though perhaps a media myth) appears to signal a plunge into the dark ages.   Bush's insistence on calling his three-million-vote lead in the popular vote a "mandate" so he can dismantle social security, his opposition, and the American economy, calls to mind the opening gambits of the Third Reich.  

For those of us who are Blue, Bush's acquisition of four more years seems like a catastrophe in many ways just as terrible as 9/11.   You might object that unlike with     9/11, no one has died--but the fact is, far more people have been killed in Iraq so far than died on 9/11, and we show no signs of getting our troops out of there any time soon, let alone of "winning."   Bush has made campaign promises not to institute a draft, and I'm sure he'll keep them: he'll institute something that's not called a draft, probably something like an "Invitation To Service"; anyone who thinks Bush can feed his penchant for conflict for any length of time without dragooning more of our children into it is dreaming.   The war in Iraq--Vietnam at warp speed--is a pointless, terrifying bloodbath, and Bush's "election" will just intensify it.

I put the word "election" in quotation marks because the one thing that keeps me from concluding that America has gone insane in returning Bush to office is the very real possibility that there was something wrong with the voting process and that in reality, just as Zogby, the exit polls, and I thought, America actually elected John Kerry on November 2.  

Though the major news media have so far dismissed "conspiracy theories" about vote fraud (on the basis of inadequate investigation--well, none), it's clear that there have been enough peculiarities, ranging from systematic voter disenfranchisement to suspiciously malfunctioning voting machines, to raise questions about the election results.

So while as some Blues castigate themselves for not having "reached out" to "moderate" voters about "moral issues," those who are concerned about election irregularities bleat distraughtly to each other via the internet.   Almost no one in the mainstream media appears to be following the "Votergate" story except to comment that they find accusations of vote fraud unsubstantiated at best, and at worst, poor sportsmanship.   It would appear that in the Bush-based community we now find ourselves in, the media, like the other institutional checks and balances that have sustained the American democratic experiment--Congress and the courts--have been eroded by the Bush administration's domination.

I've been convinced for some time that Bush and his handlers will eventually be caught in a Nixonesque act of hubris that will bring them down, Watergate-style--but in order for this to happen, we need Woodwards, Bernsteins, and perhaps most important, Ben Bradlees and Katherine Grahams so it can be investigated and reported on.  

But apart from Keith Olbermann of MSNBC and a few other stories trickling in about the impending recounts in New Hampshire and Ohio, I have yet to see any signs that journalists apart from the "blogosphere" are the slightest bit disturbed about the election irregularities.   The DNC vows to "count every vote" but claims that "the 2004 election outcome is undisputed."   This, of course, is not true--it is disputed, since Ralph Nader has demanded the recount in New Hampshire, and the Greens are working on Ohio.   (Ralph, come home!   All is forgiven!)

You see where I'm heading with this.

I am no Woodward or Bernstein, but as long as I write for a paper that is not subject to censorship because of its corporate sponsorship, I feel that it's my responsibility to complain indefatigably about the sins of the Bush administration.    I hereby dedicate myself to writing about politics for the next four years.  

Meanwhile, I'm still hoping that the recounts will prove that there has been a horrible mistake, and that Kerry won after all.   If you hope so, too, donate to any of the following:

· Black Box Voting (.org)

www.blackboxvoting.org

· Green Party:

web.greens.org

· Ralph Nader:

www.votenader.org

· Help American Recount Fund

www.helpamericarecount.org

  (Which is the best organization to contribute to?   I don't know.   Give them all money.)

Perhaps, by the time you read this, the recounts will be over and George Bush's second theft of the presidency will have been averted.

If so, expect a treatise next month on my encounters with termites.

If not, you can count on this column for ongoing political diatribes.   It's a dirty job, but someone's got to do it.   While we still can.