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E-voting Could Turn Close Vote into Fiasco
Published on Tuesday, November 7, 2006 by the Guardian / UK
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E-voting Could Turn Close Vote into Fiasco
3 key states using electronic machines for the first time
Democrats poised to capture House, leading pollsters say
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by Tim Harper
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The American political landscape will undergo its most radical overhaul in 12 years today if Democrats are successful in turning mid-term elections into a national referendum on President George W. Bush and the war in Iraq.
Republicans were trying to cling to control of the U.S. Congress — or at least minimize losses — by mobilizing their base with their much-vaunted get-out-the-vote machinery and warning Democrats would pull the plug in Iraq and make this country more vulnerable to another terrorist attack.And both sides airlifted in lawyers and observers armed with video cameras to deal with the real elephant in the room in today's vote, the fear that electronic voting machines and murky voting eligibility rules could turn a close election into a fiasco ultimately settled in courtrooms.Every leading poll in this country on the eve of today's vote showed Democrats ahead in national preference. But for that to turn into a takeover of Congress, voters across the country would have to cast their ballot strictly along party lines, ignoring personalities in local races.The stakes are high. For Bush, it could mean his remaining two years in office are spent dealing with adversaries bent on revisiting decisions made in a bloody and morale-sapping war and Republicans who consider him politically toxic.For the Democratic leadership, anything short of a takeover of the House of Representatives will lead to angry recriminations and would totally deflate the party as the 2008 presidential race begins in earnest.Bush spent his last day on the campaign trail in Florida where he predicted a great victory today and said Democrats have no plan for Iraq, only a consensus that the job is too tough and it's time to get out before the job is done."They have taken a calculated gamble,'' Bush said of the Democrats. "They believe the only way they can win this election is to criticize and offer no plan."So if you happen to bump into a Democrat candidate, you might want to ask this question — what is your plan?''But Bush was playing defence in the campaign's final days, travelling to reliable Republican states where he could rally the base and win big local media coverage.Yesterday, he went to Pensacola, Fla., to campaign for Republican gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist.But Crist went somewhere else.Democrats appear ready to take control of the 435-seat House of Representatives, with one leading analyst, Stuart Rothenberg, projecting the party will pick up 30-36 seats, far more than the 15 they need.The Senate results, are far less clear.The Democrats need a swing of six to take that chamber as well, and the race for control could come down to three of the nation's closest races in Virginia, Missouri and Montana.In all, Americans were electing 435 members to the House of Representatives, 33 senators and 36 governors."This is going to be a blockbuster election for Democrats,'' Rothenberg said."Voters are about to send a loud and clear message to President George W. Bush that they are dissatisfied with his leadership and with the direction of the country.''Bush also seems to have lost the independent voter and some are already calling the 2006 mid-terms the "revenge of the independent.''U.S. mid-terms do tend to play out on national issues once every decade or so — in fact the last three, if this one plays out as indicated, every 12 years.The last two big national swings were 1982 and 1994, but in those cases voters swung back halfway through the first term of two-term presidents, in those cases Ronald Reagan in '82 and Bill Clinton in '94.A CNN poll released yesterday showed 61 per cent of respondents now oppose the Iraq war and they found Democrats with a 20-point lead nationally.Other polls show much more modest gaps, but the smallest lead for the Democrats in this spate of polls — seven points — was exactly where Republicans were 12 years ago when they swung 54 seats.After 12 more years of expert redistricting aimed at protecting incumbents, many observers argue a swing of that magnitude is no longer possible.If there was momentum with the Democrats going into today's vote, there's only one reason, says Chuck Todd, editor-in-chief of the political tipsheet The Hotline."Iraq, Iraq, Iraq,'' Todd said."Iraq is 70 per cent of this election and that other 30 per cent is a tiny bit of everything else ... ethics and maybe in some places the economy is not so great."But overall, the anger is all around this war and unease about Iraq.''Rahm Emanuel, the Illinois congressman who chaired the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, told reporters yesterday that 3 1/2 years of war has cost $350 billion, killed nearly 3,000 Americans and wounded 20,000 more."We've had a policy that's long on slogans and short on strategy,'' he said. "We've heard `Mission Accomplished,' `The terrorists are in their last throes,' `We have finally turned the corner,' `They stand up, we'll stand down.'"None of those is a strategy.''Then there is the actual vote itself.Elections here are overseen by 10,500 individual jurisdictions operating under different laws, and nine out of every 10 of an estimated 80 million voters, will use electronic or computerized voting machines today.In some key states — Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania — they will be using electronic voting for the first time, and 40 per cent of voters nationally will be using them for the first time.The U.S. Justice Department is dispatching some 800 observers around the country to watch for irregularities.In some Democratic areas of Virginia, the e-voting machines have cut off part of the name of the Democratic candidate on the ballot and Maryland encountered huge delays and problems when it used new technology during their primary voting days.The laws in Ohio concerning voter ID have been changing almost daily, based on a series of court rulings."There's a massive amount of change in a highly competitive political environment,'' Doug Chapin, head of the non-partisan electionline.org., told ABC News. "We're in an election where a tiny number of votes can make a big difference."
Copyright Toronto Star Newspapers Limited
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