A Thousand Here, A Thousand There, Pretty Soon You're Talking Millions of Illegitimate Votes
What Rep. Jim Clyburn Really Meant By “Voter Suppression” How Voting By Mail, Combined With Chronically Inaccurate Voter Rolls, Can Destroy The Foundations of Our Democracy.
by Pem Schaeffer: Paging Rep. Jim Clyburn (D, SC), House Majority Whip! Rep. Clyburn! Call for Rep. Jim Clyburn! Jim? Are you there, Jim?
I've been watching the news closely since election day, but have yet to see Rep. Jim Clyburn, (D, SC) rise to a podium and shed tears over the rampant voter suppression he saw on election day, just as his grievous concerns warned us that it would.
I wonder what happened; why isn't “our good friend, the Honorable Representative from South Carolina,” on camera telling us how right he was in his predictions? And then at age 78, I realized I was being taught the same lesson I've been taught over and over and over in the past, and I still don't learn it for good.
I watched Clyburn utter his warnings about “rampant voter suppression” assuming he was scared witless that white racist election officials all across the fruited plains would contrive to prevent eligible blacks from voting as the law allows. In retrospect, after a couple of well-placed palm shots to my own forehead, I realized I'd fallen for a classic trap; taking a comment as if it was meant in the seemingly obvious way, when it was actually meant in exactly the opposite way.
asn't worried about legitimate votes not being cast, he was worried about illegitimate votes not being cast. And we haven't seen him appear since election day because his fears were never realized; in fact, he may be sipping some fine whiskey with friends as they congratulate each other for how things “worked out.”
I think I can make exactly that case – that instead of suppression of legitimate votes, massive creation of illegitimate votes may well be what we have witnessed, and in all likelihood, it will impose false outcomes upon our nation.
Let me explain. I live in a small town of 21,000 in a small state of 1.3 million. In a state of this size, a town of 21,000 is bigger than most, and we are known as a “service center community” because we have things like hospitals, Wal-Marts, Lowes, and even a choice of supermarkets. Not to mention an elite, highly selective liberal arts college.
After the recent election, I decided to look up the local results, and they were overwhelmingly in favor of Left/Progressives for the most part, which is our tradition. But what really jumped out was that we have 20,700 eligible voters in a town of 21,000, according to local officials.
Anyone who has been involved in elections at more than a cursory level knows that voter registration lists (rolls,) which originate and are maintained at the municipal level, are notoriously out of date and strewn with errors. This is for many reasons, of which the most basic is that there is no robust, consistently applied, national methodology for seeing that they are accurate and up to date. The real tragedy, of course, is that this roll of voters determines who is eligible to vote, having previously registered. Of course, in most places, if you are not registered, you can do so at the polls on election day, and if you have no proof of residence or age or citizenship, you can simply sign an affidavit, and you will be given a ballot just like any long term resident of town.
What could go wrong with this system, right? Let's start with this: in a town of 21,000, in which approx 3,000 children are in the town's schools, or too young to enroll, 18,000 seems like a logical upper limit on eligible voters, not 20,700. There are other reasons to think the number should be even lower, but let's use 2,500 as the number of actually ineligible voters included in the 20,700 figure reported. Even though my town did not use “Voting by Mail,” if they had, at least 2,500 illegitimate ballots would have been distributed across the municipal landscape, with completely unpredictable results, and ripe for mischief of known and unknown types. It is unknowable how many of those ballots would have been returned, and worse, how many would have been rejected, because they would have all correlated with the voter list in effect as of election day. In other words, all manner of voter fraud schemes would have been undetectable.
Now, let's do a little extrapolation. In my town, at least 14% of the names on the rolls look to be ineligible (3,000/20,700). Close to 150 Million votes have been cast in this election so far. For purposes of discussion, let's say there were 250 Million voters on the rolls nation-wide. I'm not sure of how many of those were being sent Vote by Mail ballots, but let's use half as an estimate.
That would mean 125 Million Vote by Mail ballots were sent out nation-wide. I see no reason to think that the voter registration lists driving those mailings were any more or less accurate than the list in my town. That would mean that more than 17 million of those mailed out ballots were illegitimate.
And the worst part is that it is unknowable where those ballots ended up, and what ended up being done with them. But one thing is sure; in an election year where the race for President boiled down to something like a few hundred thousand contested votes, it is abundantly clear that systemically inaccurate voter registration rolls nationwide, coupled with a shotgun distribution of ballots to names on the rolls, who did not request them, and who may well no longer belong on those rolls, is an insult to the notion of election integrity.
Once again, if you think about what you just read, you can readily understand that the historic claims of “voter fraud being virtually unknown” is because in a system like this, it is in most cases unknowable from the git-go. And even if it was, the fact that ballots are “secret” and untraceable after being counted (or even worse, being falsely tallied), further corrupts election integrity.
Which is why political machines in places like Chicago, Philadelphia, and various other bastions of fixed elections have prospered for decades and decades.
And unsurprisingly, why we haven't heard from Rep. Clyburn since election day. It looks like “our good friend from the State of South Carolina” got all the votes and more he could have possibly wanted to elect his choice for President. Voter suppression? Not on your life. Not even close, Jim.
--------------------------
Pem Schaeffer is a retired engineer who progressed to a position in business development leadership in defense electronics. He lives and writes in Brunswick, Maine, and blogs ot The Other Side of Town.
Tags: Pem Schaeffer, A Thousand Here, A Thousand There, Pretty Soon You're Talking, Millions of Illegitimate Votes To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!
 |
| Pem Schaeffer |
I've been watching the news closely since election day, but have yet to see Rep. Jim Clyburn, (D, SC) rise to a podium and shed tears over the rampant voter suppression he saw on election day, just as his grievous concerns warned us that it would.
I wonder what happened; why isn't “our good friend, the Honorable Representative from South Carolina,” on camera telling us how right he was in his predictions? And then at age 78, I realized I was being taught the same lesson I've been taught over and over and over in the past, and I still don't learn it for good.
I watched Clyburn utter his warnings about “rampant voter suppression” assuming he was scared witless that white racist election officials all across the fruited plains would contrive to prevent eligible blacks from voting as the law allows. In retrospect, after a couple of well-placed palm shots to my own forehead, I realized I'd fallen for a classic trap; taking a comment as if it was meant in the seemingly obvious way, when it was actually meant in exactly the opposite way.
asn't worried about legitimate votes not being cast, he was worried about illegitimate votes not being cast. And we haven't seen him appear since election day because his fears were never realized; in fact, he may be sipping some fine whiskey with friends as they congratulate each other for how things “worked out.”
I think I can make exactly that case – that instead of suppression of legitimate votes, massive creation of illegitimate votes may well be what we have witnessed, and in all likelihood, it will impose false outcomes upon our nation.
Let me explain. I live in a small town of 21,000 in a small state of 1.3 million. In a state of this size, a town of 21,000 is bigger than most, and we are known as a “service center community” because we have things like hospitals, Wal-Marts, Lowes, and even a choice of supermarkets. Not to mention an elite, highly selective liberal arts college.
After the recent election, I decided to look up the local results, and they were overwhelmingly in favor of Left/Progressives for the most part, which is our tradition. But what really jumped out was that we have 20,700 eligible voters in a town of 21,000, according to local officials.
Anyone who has been involved in elections at more than a cursory level knows that voter registration lists (rolls,) which originate and are maintained at the municipal level, are notoriously out of date and strewn with errors. This is for many reasons, of which the most basic is that there is no robust, consistently applied, national methodology for seeing that they are accurate and up to date. The real tragedy, of course, is that this roll of voters determines who is eligible to vote, having previously registered. Of course, in most places, if you are not registered, you can do so at the polls on election day, and if you have no proof of residence or age or citizenship, you can simply sign an affidavit, and you will be given a ballot just like any long term resident of town.
What could go wrong with this system, right? Let's start with this: in a town of 21,000, in which approx 3,000 children are in the town's schools, or too young to enroll, 18,000 seems like a logical upper limit on eligible voters, not 20,700. There are other reasons to think the number should be even lower, but let's use 2,500 as the number of actually ineligible voters included in the 20,700 figure reported. Even though my town did not use “Voting by Mail,” if they had, at least 2,500 illegitimate ballots would have been distributed across the municipal landscape, with completely unpredictable results, and ripe for mischief of known and unknown types. It is unknowable how many of those ballots would have been returned, and worse, how many would have been rejected, because they would have all correlated with the voter list in effect as of election day. In other words, all manner of voter fraud schemes would have been undetectable.
Now, let's do a little extrapolation. In my town, at least 14% of the names on the rolls look to be ineligible (3,000/20,700). Close to 150 Million votes have been cast in this election so far. For purposes of discussion, let's say there were 250 Million voters on the rolls nation-wide. I'm not sure of how many of those were being sent Vote by Mail ballots, but let's use half as an estimate.
That would mean 125 Million Vote by Mail ballots were sent out nation-wide. I see no reason to think that the voter registration lists driving those mailings were any more or less accurate than the list in my town. That would mean that more than 17 million of those mailed out ballots were illegitimate.
And the worst part is that it is unknowable where those ballots ended up, and what ended up being done with them. But one thing is sure; in an election year where the race for President boiled down to something like a few hundred thousand contested votes, it is abundantly clear that systemically inaccurate voter registration rolls nationwide, coupled with a shotgun distribution of ballots to names on the rolls, who did not request them, and who may well no longer belong on those rolls, is an insult to the notion of election integrity.
Once again, if you think about what you just read, you can readily understand that the historic claims of “voter fraud being virtually unknown” is because in a system like this, it is in most cases unknowable from the git-go. And even if it was, the fact that ballots are “secret” and untraceable after being counted (or even worse, being falsely tallied), further corrupts election integrity.
Which is why political machines in places like Chicago, Philadelphia, and various other bastions of fixed elections have prospered for decades and decades.
And unsurprisingly, why we haven't heard from Rep. Clyburn since election day. It looks like “our good friend from the State of South Carolina” got all the votes and more he could have possibly wanted to elect his choice for President. Voter suppression? Not on your life. Not even close, Jim.
--------------------------
Pem Schaeffer is a retired engineer who progressed to a position in business development leadership in defense electronics. He lives and writes in Brunswick, Maine, and blogs ot The Other Side of Town.
Tags: Pem Schaeffer, A Thousand Here, A Thousand There, Pretty Soon You're Talking, Millions of Illegitimate Votes To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!
Posted by Bill Smith at 10:10 AM - Post Link
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home