By Jonathan David Morris
It’s not easy being a weekly columnist. Every week, in order to keep my readers, I must challenge conventional wisdom to a fistfight.
Sometimes this means saying the things other people are thinking. Other times, it means saying the things people think they are thinking, but think they shouldn’t say.
I don’t think many people are thinking what I’m going to say this week. But who knows? In a few weeks, maybe they’ll start to.
The way I see it, there’s only one way the GOP can hold onto Congress. And that’s if they fix the elections.
I know this sounds crazy. Or even vaguely Democratic. But trust me: I say this as neither a Democrat (which I’m not), nor a concerned American (which I’m not). I am simply a casual observer who has casually observed Republicans screwing up the country over the last six years.
If the vast majority of political polls are correct, roughly one Republican congressman will hold onto his congressional seat in this year’s midterm elections. Perhaps it’s too soon to call this a foregone conclusion, but let’s face it: It’s not too soon to call this a foregone conclusion. If any victory has ever been guaranteed, this year’s Democratic landslide would be it.
That said, we need to start asking: What if they lose this thing? What if Republicans manage to stave off destruction?
I’m not asking “What if?” in terms of how we’ll survive. I’m asking in terms of: How could this happen?
Really, it couldn’t.
Unless, of course, there’s a fix.
I know this idea will not be popular. And some people will write and call me a conspiracy theorist. But it’s not about conspiracies. It’s about an odd crack in the system.
In 2004, exit polls showed John Kerry trouncing George Bush all throughout Election Day. Somehow, we went to bed without a president-elect that evening. And when we woke up the next day, Kerry was dead.
(Okay, he conceded. But same thing.)
We accepted this fate for a number of reasons. One, because we didn’t want to go through Election 2000 all over again. And two, because Kerry was vastly unappealing, and didn’t seem worth the time.
Few people thought that election was fixed. And make no mistake: I’m not saying that it was. But the media blamed themselves for getting the exit polls “wrong” that day. If this happens again—if all these pre-election, pro-Democratic polls turn out to be false positives—we’ll have to consider the real possibility that something is rotten in the state of Denmark (or Florida, or Ohio, or whichever state it will be).
The only other way to explain it would be we’re a nation of liars, and the polls are all based on lies.
Neither explanation is comforting. But I invite you to take your pick.
Rate this post:
(No Ratings Yet)
Loading ...
Stumble It!
Patriot said,
It’s real cute the way you “allege” things with full explanations and then mention you’re not really saying you believe those things. If you explain it and argue it, you believe it. You’re just not admitting it.
October 31, 2006 at 9:40 am
Mike LaSalle said,
There are 180,000 voting precints in the U.S. That’s a lot of potential for fraud right there.
U.S. voting machine companies have been investigated for ties to Hugo Chavez. They deny it, though one of those companies is owned by Venezuelans.
Lou Dobbs also did a story on the potential for election fraud using software hacks.
Neither of the major political parties have clean hands.
October 31, 2006 at 10:25 am
Will Malven said,
A majority of the public opinion polls are, just as Patriot said, polling the wrong demographic. Only a fool would believe the polls that are coming out these days. Most of them are intentionally heavily weighted toward Democrats. In many of them the numbers are nearly 2:1 Dems to Republicans. These numbers are not even remotely reasonable.
Secondly, even the Democrats are pulling back from their absurd claims of only 1 month ago. Their internal polls are showing the same thing that Republican internal polling is showing. It is more than likely that they will fall short of gaining control of either house in Congress.
A majority of Americans are Conservative both culturally and fiscally. The only reason Democrats even have a chance is because of the tremendous push given them by the Paleo media. One only has to examine the differences in how the Foley scandal was handled by the MSM vs. how the Studds scandal was handled, or the Kennedy scandals, or the Franks scandal, or the Clinton scandals.
On the issues the Democrats lose…it’s not even close. They have to run on scandals to stand a chance and scandal, no matter how disgusting or titillating, is not going to motivate voters the way issues does.
Repunlicans don’t need to “fix” the elections, they just need to stick to being Republicans.
October 31, 2006 at 1:12 pm
Steve Farrell said,
“Republicans don’t need to “fix” the elections, they just need to stick to being Republicans.”
My response: “If only they would. Last I checked, Compassionate Conservatism was synonymous was but a remake of Clinton, Blair and Gingritch’s Third Way, which was but another name for Fabianism.
November 1, 2006 at 12:52 am