Positive Liberty

I don’t often link to Daily Kos. I don’t agree with their politics, and I find their tone pretty much as repulsive as Little Green Footballs (a site that still won’t get a link from me). But… If these allegations of vote fraud are true, then I fear for our nation’s future. Here is just a sample from West Virginia:

In a letter, Berkeley County clerk John Smalls cites calls from a cell phone were made to Eastern Panhandle democrats telling them that they were not registered to vote. The letter also said the calls informed democrats in some cases they wouldn’t be able to vote on Election Day [...]

It’s considered an improper act because when upset citizens called the voter registration office to make sure they were registered to vote, indeed they were. So, who made these misleading calls? The Berkeley County Clerk`s Office traced the number voters gave as the source back to the Eastern Panhandle Republican Headquarters.

The same post documents further acts of fraud from Ohio, Wisconsin, and Georgia. Others can be found across the country, and the pattern is too widespread to be a coincidence.

Don’t the Republicans realize that by engaging in fraud, they are actually working against their own best interests? A victory may be sweet in the short run, but the world will remember that George W. Bush’s second term was no more legitimate than his first, and possibly quite a bit less. America can only lose in this exchange, for American democracy itself will have been undermined–and the Republicans will be dragged down with it. Don’t they see this?

At a time when we are said to be fighting a worldwide battle for democracy, it looks poor indeed to subvert democracy at home. Vote fraud gives us a bad name and–dare I say it–even hurts the war on terrorism. If for no other reason, this would be enough to throw George W. Bush out of office: He and his party have done all they can to make American democracy look repulsive across the world. Our biggest weapon is the good example, and right now, the Republicans are busy destroying it.

On a lighter note, let’s talk about the disastrous war on drugs.

Given the many other issues at stake on November 2, it might seem a thankless task to evaluate candidates based a matter that has gotten very little press this season. Still, when the issue is something I feel strongly about, the only thing left to do is to express my gratitude. DrugWarRant has compiled a voting guide to drug policy reform, and I commend it to my readers.

Whether you are a liberal Democrat, a conservative Republican, a Christian, or even a libertarian, DrugWarRant makes a plausible argument for the legalization of private, recreational marijuana use. Of course, true libertarians seldom require any convincing on that score. The voting guide covers House and Senate candidates plus voter initiatives in nineteen states. Unsurprisingly, the Libertarian and Green Parties stand strongest for legalization, though neither is expected to do particularly well this round.

In similar vein, we note with amusement that the Prohibition Party is still on the ballot in at least one state. Prohibitionists have turned to blaming the alcohol industry for their dismal failure these past 75 years; if so, then the alcohol industry has done me two great favors in life, and I happily raise my glass to them.

I write these lines while sipping a grenache/syrah blend from Boordy Vineyards, a delightful winery located north of Baltimore. I visited Boordy Vineyards just yesterday and found it to be a most agreeable industry indeed.

Time was, “industry” used to be a virtue. So did moderation.

Last cycle, Prohibition’s presidential candidate won a mere 208 votes, a total that tempts the author toward launching a party of his own: Were all the regular readers of Positive Liberty to cast their votes for him, he would have defeated the Prohibition candidate in a landslide. But wait–the Prohibition Party boasts what are probably the most expensive campaign buttons around. They’re $39 each, and, “only 50 of these buttons have been made.” Go figure.

Do I have any predictions? No. I’m going to hide in my basement until the storm is over. Assuming that the election ends peacefully, I may yet participate in National Novel Writing Month. But November 3 seems so far away that for the moment I’d prefer not to decide.