Delay the Election???

In case you missed it, the Depart of Homeland Security is deciding whether or not to delay the presidential election. (see CNN Article) The election day, a highly inconvient Tuesday, instead of across a few days including, say, a weekend day, is set in the constitution. You vote that day or you vote absentee before that day. This was what our "founding fathers" decided. To change the voting day ought to require a constitutional amendment. But the supreme court has been voting straight party line sometimes, regarding elections, and had no problem simply appointing our president before, so hey, why not let him delay the election?

Um, cuz it would scare ths shit out of people and effect the outcome of the election. And also, an election is like the day your final paper is due. It's a snapshot of that moment. On that particular Tuesday, everybody who wants to and is elligible can stand up and be counted. Your state goes with whatever the most people in your state say. Woot. Democracy in action. Apparently Bush feels he's going to be unprepared for that day. He wants to take an incomplete this term. Have some more time to do his research and work on his final project. Our constitution set an election day to prevent this. A sitting president isn't allowed to delay an election until he feels ready for it. This would be unthinkable. Election are what seperates us from a feudal monarchy. And with our current state of things, elections are the only thing seperating us from a feudal monarchy.

The Administration has been planning on delaying the election for months. As soon as that bombing in Spain happened right before their election (thus letting the Socialists win), Republicans have been claiming that Al-Quaeda will want to interfere in our elections. On May 2, 2004, the article on the cover of the New York Times Datebook contained an aside by Condeleeza Rice that terrorists would certainly try to interefere in our elections. Is there actual data on this? Is it speculation? Is it wishful thinking? With our current state of "intelligence," is there really any difference between data points, speculation and wishful thinking? I'm still waiting for them to find the WMD in Iraq.

It seems obvious that any attempt to move elections is an assault on democracy itself. Bush says things would be easier for him if this were a dictatorship. He had no problem getting into office through massive election fraud. But even then, he barely made it. why have the election at all? Or why not use federal resources to scare the shit out of people and delay thigns until he knows he can win?

Right now, they're just preparing us for it. Talking about the eventual "possibility" to see how people are going to react. will we sit quietly at home watching thigns unfold on TV like we did while he stole the election? If so, then why not go for it?

you know all that patriotic stuff? We're the World's Oldest Democracy. We invented a new system of government. Liberty and Justice for All. All that nice sort of fuzzy stuff about our government and the ideals of democracy that we're supossed to represent. Those ideas are ideals. We've never reached those ideals. But they're ideals worth having. Throwing them away is throwing away America. We cannot allow this to happen. Jefferson envisioned that freedom would periodically be threatened by corrupt men. He imagined that we would need to periodically have new revolutions, to protect our democratic ideals. In the Declaration of Independence, he wrote, ". . . in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them . . .." If Bush tries to delay the election, if he decides that constitutionality no longer applies to him, that he is entitled to lead us not because of our laws, but because of his own will and political might, he will have broken the contract we have with our government. It will "[become] necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them." We will have revolution.

We must, as citizens of this nation, pledge that we will do whatever it takes to save our country. We must all stand together and say that we will not allow this to happen. We will not go to work. We will not go to school. We will be in the streets. We will not disperse. We will not follow the orders of a police that is defending a state no longer based on laws, but based on the whim of powerful men. We will not back down. If Bush's people are seeing how we'll react if he tries to destroy our democracy, we need to let them know that we will not take it lying down. We will not sit at home and watch it on TV. We will shut down the machinery that makes the economy and the country run. We will sit down strike in our office dorrways, in our factories, in our streets.

It is therefore necessary to put this position forward, so that those who would destroy our country know that we are willing to defend it. It must be blogged. It must be written to the editor. We need chatter saying that this would be a very bad idea for them.

would it be bad for us, though? I have no question that we would win. Citizens would again have power. Our "leaders" would be reminded that they rule at our consent. Huge strikes in the 30's yielded results that were very very good for the people. We have nothing to lose but our chains.