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ida, and eventually the White House, to Bush.
* In California, a governor elected in a fair vote just nine months ago is now subject to recall and replacement, even though he has done nothing criminal or outrageous that would warrant such an extreme move.
In short, what is going on here is an attempt to get these large, electoral vote-rich states into the Bush column for 2004 and to the GOP beyond.
And we haven't even gone into detail about the computer-voting scandal, which may well have led to a number of other large states, such as Georgia, going into the Republican column in the 2002 election, thus giving control of the U.S. Senate to the Republicans.
(See our Electoral Integrity file for stories about how the three companies that make computer-voting machines -- one partially owned by a Republican senator, all three supporters of Republicans, at least one tied to a right-wing foundation -- refuse to permit examination of their software, which has been shown to be highly manipulable to vote-tampering, without leaving any evidence of having been altered. In Georgia, for example, Democratic war-hero incumbent Senator Max Cleland was ahead in the polls right up to the election, and surprisingly lost by a significant percentage; similar oddities occurred in five other states where computer-voting screens were employed. And no one has fully explained why exit-polling, the most accurate predictor of election results, was suddenly cancelled in the 2002 election, just as the polls were closing.
OVERTURNING ELECTIONS
What is happening is a persistent attempt to overturn the outcomes of previous elections by using dirty tricks and changing the rules in midstream.
In Texas, as Molly Ivins writes, the Republicans want to alter the partisan makeup of the Texas Congressional delegation -- from Democatic majority over to Republican -- even though this would be in violation of the redistricting laws. In California, even though the governor was elected fair and square in November, the GOP is using an arcane 1911 recall law, to oust him and install one of their own in his place. (The California population is angered by the failing state economy and by the way the energy companies, led by Enron, manipulated prices -- and have been encouraged to take out their frustrations on the one public figure everyone can see each day, the governor.)
So, in all the hoopla about Arnold Schwarzenegger and the 200+ other candidates running, Rove and friends back in Washington, D.C. must be chortling with glee. The focus of national media attention has shifted from Bush's crimes, lies and failures to Hollyweird on the Left Coast.
Even if Davis manages to hang on to his job -- the strong union movement in the state is mobilizing, Schwarzenegger has many vulnerabilities, etc. -- the recall might be partially successful for the GOP: The Democrats would have had to spend millions of dollars that would otherwise have been been reserved for the 2004 general election. And if Davis is taken down, California -- which normally votes overwhelmingly Democratic in presidential elections -- is put back into play, forcing the Democrats to divert precious resources from elsewhere in the country to fight Bush in the Golden State. (Of course, this assumes that Bush will be the GOP nominee in 2004 and not in the impeachment well of the Senate.)
DEFEATING THE RECALL
The bottom line: What Democrats and Independents need to concentrate on is the defeat of the California recall.
If Davis can somehow cut through the media mayhem to the issue of fairness, he could have a
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