OlmWeb

One would think that all this fancy modern technology we have today would not only bring crappy webcam videos on YouTube to the people, but also say, make rigging elections and cheating in politics more difficult? Most major software companies today put millions on making computing safer and fiddling with computer systems more difficult - but that doesn’t really mean squat when some key systems in the US for example are still not protected enough. Systems that should be protected because their safety can be decisive importance for the future of one of the most powerful countries today and indeed the whole world.

Ok, so we all now that Bush jr. got into office by rigging the elections back in 2000. It was so obvious that many people all over the world were outraged at how a country forcing democracy on the rest of the world wouldn’t even be able to conduct fair elections itself. But somehow the cheater remained at his post. In 2004 it was time again. By this time everyone knew that the elections weren’t going to be fair and indeed the cheating was done more discreet this time. So again, people didn’t care… at least not enough. But what many people don’t know even today is how close it really was! By slightly over dramatizing one could say that the US presidential election in 2004 was decided by little more than 500 votes.

So how did they do it this time? Well as democratic as it is, the US election system still has one major flaw which is completely different from most other real democratic, eg. the European, election methods. The candidate that wins in a certain state gets all of votes from that state. Ie. also the other candidates votes. This one flaw makes the election almost childishly easy to manipulate - just rigging the election in one state can affect outcome. And if you have relatives governing in a particular state, especially one that often has been the state were it all boils down, you’re even better off.

The state was Florida and the candidate was Bush. His relative was his brother Jeff Bush, governor in Florida who obviously controls all aspects of the state’s administration. The Division of Elections for example. That very division orders a company called Database Technologies to do a checkup of the voting rights on about 20 000 voters, mostly democratic voters and mostly black, because these have a “criminal record”. Turns out that almost none of these were criminals anymore than I am because I got a ticket for talking on my mobile phone while driving. Yet most of these people were not allowed to vote on the big day.
And it doesn’t get any more complicated than that. The showdown was to be in Florida and the the parties would be neck in neck. So if one party could steal 20 000 votes from the other party that would make a huge difference. And it did. The republicans won in Florida by about 500 (fivehundred!) votes, and thus Bush was once again president of the U.S of A. So what difference does it make that we all pay millions, perhaps billions for safer PCs and computer systems when the systems that really matter still are so easy to manipulate? How can any private company have the authority to make 20 000 honest Americans loosing their right to vote?
Democracy, anyone?

A very good BBC documentary about this can be found over at Google Video (same as the above!). And there’s lots where that came from. I know this is sort of old stuff but I still want to bring it up once again because this is a topic that can’t be discussed enough. It should be brought up again and again until justice is served. What shocks me the most about all this is how the people in America just don’t seem care about all this. Maybe I’m being spoiled by REAL democracy here in little Finland, or maybe you fat lazy Americans with you fat dollar bills just have to good a life to care? You will still drive around in your fuel gulping SUV’s, eat your Big Macs and watch your stupid ass tv-shows no matter who’s the president. But what happens when all that change?
I don’t know - but I do care. Not because I live there - but because I know that the idiocy of the American people affects the rest of the world.

So say we all!