THIS MODERN WORLD

Enjoy the Draft!

That was the refrain in 2000 — the more ridiculous things got, the more the talking heads on tv insisted that it was all “proof the system works.” I literally heard one of the CNN biggies declare that the lack of rioting in the streets was, yes, “proof the system works.” It’s the same thing that happens whenever the stock market goes into a decline and the various financial “experts” are all over the cable nets “talking the market up,” reassuring investors that everything’s fine, there’s no reason to worry — when in fact there’s probably very good reason to worry. In the same way, Wolf and Judy and the gang seemed to feel it was their duty to talk democracy up — to reassure voters that we’d just hit a little snag in the road, but there was no real cause for concern. At the same time, though most attention was focused on Florida, reports of voting irregularities started coming in from all over the country, and I got to thinking about just how approximate our democracy is, and wrote the cartoon below.

I intended this one as over-the-top satire, but as so often has been the case these past few years, reality has surpassed my feeble efforts, and I fear it may turn out to be a fairly accurate representation of Election Day, 2004. (Well, maybe not the part about eating live hamsters, but you get the idea.) We’ve been hearing disturbing reports of attempted voter suppression for weeks now, and I suspect the fun is only beginning. (An advance heads up, incidentally: my friend Jack Hitt is working on what sounds like an extraordinary piece on voter suppression for This American Life, which is set to air this weekend. I’m probably not supposed to say too much about it, but he has some really astonishing interviews, and I strongly recommend you make a point of listening.)

Anyway, we’ll probably be seeing quite a lot of “proof the system works” over the next six days. Here’s the latest, from this morning’s Tampa Bay Tribune:

The Republican Party said Tuesday that it may equip its Florida poll watchers with lists of voters whose registrations appear fraudulent, then use a little- known section of state law to try blocking them from voting as they arrive at the polls.

Democrats quickly denounced the unprecedented tactic but did not rule out the possibility that they, too, may file eligibility challenges next week.

With both sides amassing armies of lawyers, the prospect of the fight working its way into neighborhood polling stations is frightening county elections supervisors because the arcane procedure is so unwieldy it could shut down entire stations each time it is exercised.

…More here:

Two e-mails, prepared for the executive director of the Bush campaign in Florida and the campaign’s national research director in Washington DC, contain a 15-page so-called “caging list”.

It lists 1,886 names and addresses of voters in predominantly black and traditionally Democrat areas of Jacksonville, Florida.

An elections supervisor in Tallahassee, when shown the list, told Newsnight: “The only possible reason why they would keep such a thing is to challenge voters on election day.”

Not exactly proof that the system works…but it is proof that Republicans know how to work the system.

Bob suspects the Supreme Court may be going through some changes sooner rather than later. I don’t know about you, but the words “Chief Justice Scalia” scare the shit out of me.

This looks like a must-see.

With the United States Army deployed in a dozen hot spots around the world, on constant alert in Afghanistan, and taking casualties every day in Iraq, some current and former officers now say the army is on the verge of being “broken.” They charge that the army is overstretched, demoralized, and may be unable to fight where and when the nation desires. This fall, FRONTLINE and the Washington Post join forces for an in-depth assessment of the state of the American army and the nation’s military establishment. The program digs into the aggressive attempts to assert civilian control and remake the military by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his allies.

Krugman, this morning:

Yesterday we got two peeks under that shroud. One was The Times’s report about what the International Atomic Energy Agency calls “the greatest explosives bonanza in history.” Ignoring the agency’s warnings, administration officials failed to secure the weapons site, Al Qaqaa, in Iraq, allowing 377 tons of deadly high explosives to be looted, presumably by insurgents…

Informed sources quoted by the influential Nelson Report say explosives from Al Qaqaa are the “primary source” of the roadside and car bombs that have killed and wounded so many U.S. soldiers. And thanks to the huge amount looted – “in a highly organized operation using heavy equipment” – the insurgents and whoever else have access to the Qaqaa material have enough explosives for tens of thousands of future bombs.

So, to summarize: Iraq had no WMDs, no nuclear weapons or biological agents with which to wreak havoc on far away lands. But there were large stockpiles of conventional explosives, and because the Bush administration ignored the warnings of weapons inspectors, they ended up in the hands of terrorists who are using them against US troops who were allegedly sent to Iraq in order to reduce the threat of terrorism. With us so far?

And then there’s this:

An article in yesterday’s Wall Street Journal confirmed and expanded on an “NBC Nightly News” report from March that asserted that before the Iraq war, administration officials called off a planned attack that might have killed Mr. Zarqawi, the terrorist now blamed for much of the mayhem in that country, in his camp.

Citing “military officials,” the original NBC report explained that the failure to go after Mr. Zarqawi was based on domestic politics: “the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq” – a part of Iraq not controlled by Saddam Hussein – “could undermine its case for war against Saddam.” The Journal doesn’t comment on this explanation, but it does say that when NBC reported, correctly, that Mr. Zarqawi had been targeted before the war, administration officials denied it.

I watch these guys claim that John Kerry isn’t fit to lead the war on terror, and I just keep thinking of that line from The Usual Suspects: the greatest trick the devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn’t exist. The greatest trick these guys ever pulled is convincing the country that Bush is fit to lead. Things aren’t going to get better right away — when John Kerry wins, he’s going to inherit a real mess. Nonetheless, this blogger has it exactly right. It’s a very simple choice next Tuesday — you’re either for this or against it: