- Top Features:
- War Room
- Glenn Greenwald
- Broadsheet
- Joan Walsh
- Camille Paglia
- Since You Asked
- Follow Salon:
Read other letters about this article
London Chic asks: “Why not simply accept that a majority of Americans VOTED Bush in the 2nd time around?”
Firstly: Because the President is elected by the Electoral College, not a majority of Americans - that same Electoral College that elected Bush in 2000 after a majority of Americans voted for Gore – so the popular majority is legally irrelevant. More is the pity.
Secondly, and far more importantly, because disenfranchising voters on partisan grounds and other forms of electoral fraud are inherently wrong and destructive of democratic legitimacy whether or not they actually affect the outcome of an election.
Thirdly, and most importantly, because if after election officials are known to have acted in a partisan and abusive manner and everyone is happy to pretend otherwise or just “let bygones be bygones” because it didn’t really make a difference, such conduct becomes all the more likely future elections when it really could make a difference (consider Election 2000). The speculations about Ohio's 2004 election may seem like hairsplitting, but sometimes splitting hairs has serious consequences; the 516 votes that split the 2000 Florida vote, for example.
Yes, the Americans have the democratic right to choose the neo-cons as their leaders, no matter how much others don't like the results. And yes, that is what a democracy is; but a democracy is – or at least should also be about following the rules and fairly and transparently determining who the electorate does in fact choose as a leader.
