Jo Walton -- Yes, I do not understand the subtleties of the US voting system, but with the importance of "swing states" and the introduction of those Diebold voting computers, I think technically it is possible to "correct" results in a way that is very hard to detect.
OTOH, I remember a tale about a voting district soewhere in the former East Bloc where the official were so eager to please the party that the reported more votes in favor of it than voters existed. And they were, probably, very experienced at that kind of fraud.
So I have some doubt that those people who have brought us the last few years´ US show will be able to be subtle and effective now.
Spontaneous thought: It would be interesting in a horrible way if there is fraud and a winner is declared and then, perhaps even after the inauguration, there are enough clues about some foul play. I guess there would be still quite a few people demanding that in favor of stablity and national safety nothing must be changed.
Slightly OT: a few weeks ago, a quite-left german newspaper, the taz/tageszeitung (they use the lower-case style), speculated that another four-year term for Bush would be what Europe really needed. And they weren´t sarcastic: They argued that with continued US unilateralism, the Europeans would be forced by the circumstances to get up and make their common policy and their common defense projects work, finally, instead of relying on the US/Nato for such things. At least an interesting line of thought.
Joerg
I am reading this blog (and others) now for a few weeks and let me say, it is really reassuring to see this liberal and critical thinking.
The most/loudest things that reach us Europeans from the US were quite depressing.
But anyway, in this thread and elsewhere I have found the fear that the november elections might be cancelled after another terrorist attack and/or martial law might be installed.
Is this really a possibility? I mean, from what (little) I could stomach to read of some right-wingers opinions, there seems to be the strong and eerie conviction that they are always correct per se and that those who disagree are either lying or immoral/godless or America-hating - so after all, there might be people (beyond the immediate administration) who would favor such measures if the current administrations approval ratings drop and martial law seems like the only way to maintain the Crusade on Terror. "Protecting the public from itself", or so.
But still, could it happen? Would the military support this?
If it did, what measures could and would be taken against internal "unpatriotic" opposition?
How would the general public react? Outside the decidedly pro-Bush or anti-Bush circles, what is the general opinion? On one hand, many Americans maintain how much they love (and would fight for) freedom, but there have been historical cases where "getting rid of the troublemakers" was met with much more acceptance by the population than seemed likely beforehand - so would it depend whether the Martial Government would "just" try to mute the opposition or attempt to remake the US according to their non-centrist convictions? Or would, after a terrorist attack, their position no loege be radical?
IMO, the currently ruling group would probably bungle it anyway, since they seem to be in the habit of relying on wishful thinking and crony talk; but I admit that I only watch from the distance. And frankly, I am glad about that.
At least quite a few of the right-wing-bloggers I have sampled really look like they could need being the suporting chorus of anti-democratic putschists for a few weeks and then appropiatly chastened afterwards, IMO.
But believe me, I would also be happy if you answer that I have read too much dystopian SF for coming up with these questions at all.
Joerg
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