The McCain Campaign is in Total Disarray

by David McReynolds

As we approach the day of election, and (in my view) it becomes clear that the mandate of heaven has fallen, the McCain campaign is in total disarray. It is more than mud - it some cases it is categorical lying that passes anything I can remember.

The charge that Obama is a socialist, the absurd charges against ACORN, the lifting up of the Bill Ayers charges, (as if Obama belonged to some secret cabal of Chicago terrorists), and now rumors that the McCain camp may raise the Rev. Wright matter, it is clear the Republican Party will not go gently into that good night, nor leave the stage with dignity.

Nothing has worked, and the McCain camp sinks deeper into the mud. (I cannot believe McCain himself has really totally or thoughtfully approved of all these attacks - I think they are the mark of extreme disorientation, not careful plotting, and also a mark of normally decent men who are frustrated, worn out, caught up in the paranoia of their own making).

Decent conservatives are leaving the ship, not because it is sinking, but because it is a sinking into a moral swamp.

There are lots of problems with the Obama "camp", and I'll get a column done on that in my EdgeLeft op ed before the election. But nothing compares to the sickening end of this campaign.

Thoughtful Republicans need to ask why Powell has come out for Obama, and has so carefully sliced and diced the GOP campaign in the process, and need to ask why papers, such as the Chicago Tribune, have come out for Obama. It is not a matter simply of people rushing to Obama. It is also a matter of people rushing away from McCain and Palin.

As a socialist, I will not vote for Obama, and that issue I'll also take up in an EdgeLeft op ed next week. But while I'm ironically amused that the McCain campaign may yet give socialism a good name, I am sorry that John McCain, whose career has had moments of honor, and who, on the campaign trial has had flashes of decency, will see his life end in tatters. What he has done is far beneath him.

This editorial from the Los Angeles Times (McCain's old voter-fraud saw) suggests that my dismay at the internal hysteria of the McCain camp is shared by responsible papers.

Perhaps as the day of the election comes, people should gather at the polling places, not only to vote, but to guard and protect. It is my assumption that the Obama camp is smart enough to enlist every honest attorney in the country to fight ballot fraud. But demonstrations for a fair count, as close as possible to the polling places, would not be out of order.

David McReynolds was on the staff of the War Resisters League for many years, and, as the Socialist Party candidate in 1980 and 2000, the first openly gay person to run for the U.S. presidency. He lives with two cats on Manhattan's Lower East Side.

McCain's Old Voter-Fraud Saw

His attack on ACORN undercuts real efforts to improve the system.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-ed-acorn20-2008oct20,0,4738098.story
From the Los Angeles Times, October 20, 2008

John McCain committed a malicious misrepresentation in the last presidential debate when he claimed that ACORN, the liberal activist group, "is now on the verge of maybe perpetrating one of the greatest frauds in voter history in this country, maybe destroying the fabric of democracy."

As ACORN acknowledges, it has collected voter registration forms with bogus signatures. But even when they aren't winnowed out by election officials, transparently invalid registrations don't lead to fraudulent voting. Even the most lax poll worker wouldn't allow "Mickey Mouse" or "John Q. Public" to cast a ballot.

There's a case to be made for cracking down on errors and, yes, fraud in election procedures, and the FBI reportedly is conducting a preliminary investigation of whether ACORN, the Assn. of Community Organizations for Reform Now, encouraged its canvassers to falsify signatures. But wild claims like McCain's undermine reform efforts and make it harder to hold ACORN accountable for its real faults, including providing a financial incentive for canvassers to fake signatures. (A commission chaired by former President Carter and former Secretary of State James A. Baker III recommended in 2005 that states engage in special scrutiny of registration forms turned in by third-party organizations that pay their canvassers.)

Swamping election agencies with obviously phony registrations distracts officials from the serious business of verifying other registrations, as contemplated by the Help America Vote Act approved by Congress in 2002. That law, which figured in a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last week, requires states to establish a "centralized, interactive, computerized statewide voter registration list" that "shall be coordinated with other agency databases within the state."

To its credit, California tries to match registrations with both driver's license records and the last four digits of Social Security numbers. If there is a mismatch, county election officials contact the potential voter to verify his or her status. The problem isn't obvious examples of fraud, such as a "Mickey Mouse" signature, but the possibility that a real person is registering multiple times or seeking to vote where he no longer lives.

The debate about election fraud is complicated by the fact that the political parties have different priorities. Democrats emphasize increasing the number of voters, particularly the poor and minorities, and too easily dismiss the possibility of fraud. Republicans claim to be concerned about widespread fraud, but aren't bothered if their alarms discourage Democratic-leaning blocs from voting. What's needed is a commitment by both parties to take both fraud and voter suppression seriously.