Caging Voters, Killing Democracy

The U.S. Attorney Scandals suck onward. Alberto VO5 can't seem to remember anything, except that he can't remember anything. Well, that and everyone else, including his Deputy Attorney General has more power, more accountability and a better memory than he does. Even when he can't be bothered to stop his bedside pestering of John Ashcroft for another FISA transgression, all while the former Attorney General is high on painkillers, post-surgery. Shades of Teri Schiavo, shades of Richard Nixon, shades of tampering, votejacking and all other manner of moral and political trespasses we will be busy paying for later.

Because that's when the hammer should come down, according to smartass muckraker and investigative reporter Greg Palast, who chatted up attorney David Iglesias, one of Gonzales' victims as well as the dude Tom Cruise played in A Few Good Men. As Palast reports, what really pissed Rove and his cronies off the most was the fact that Iglesias started out playing ball but ended up bailing on the Bush bandwagon after he refused to push through bogus cases of voter fraud.

"They wanted a political operative who happened to be a US attorney," Iglesias told Palast, "and when they got somebody who actually took his oath to the Constitution seriously, they were appalled and they wanted me out of there. The two strikes against me was, I was not political, I didn't help them out on their bogus voter fraud prosecutions."

See, this whole scandal is not about improper firings, departmental ineptitude or simple partisanship invested in the, ahem, pleasure of the president. (Does anyone else feel creeped out in a sexual way when they hear or read that phrase? Man, I totally do.) No, the brouhaha over Gonzales and his cadre of Pat Robertson grads is about votejacking, plain and simple. It is the messy residue of a botched attempt to swing the national vote towards the president, by any means necessary. Even if that means firing a Hollywood success story. Actually, especially if it means firing a Hollywood success story.

And thank the Big Bang that Iglesias has gone Hollywood, or this scandal may have never blown up into the front-page material it is. Now, thanks to Palast, the blogosphere and other unafraid shit-stirrers, votejacking and the caging lists that make it possible are national news. What is a caging list, you ask? A good question, as it is at the heart of how the Republicans stole millions of votes in 2000, 2004 and will in 2008, according to Palast and Robert Kennedy Jr.

Caging is a practice that works best in two areas, direct-mail marketing and votejacking. And Karl Rove is an old hand at both. From Wiki:

"Caging has also been used as a form of voter suppression. A political party challenges the validity of a voter's registration; for the voter's ballot to be counted, the voter must prove that their registration is valid. Voters targeted by caging are often the most vulnerable: those who are unfamiliar with their rights under the law, and those who cannot spare the time, effort, and expense of proving that their registration is valid. Ultimately, caging works by dissuading a voter from casting a ballot, or by ensuring that they cast a provisional ballot, which is less likely to be counted."

In other words, the Republican National Committee fires off a letter challenging a voter's identity, at which point the voter must verify their identity -- because, really, they have nothing better to do all day, right? -- or lose their vote. Wham, bam, thank you ma'am. The fact that most of these people are of color or without cash should surprise no one. The fact that we're talking about Imus, Sanjaya, Mormons or other so-called issues of color should. Especially if you want it all to stop.

Look, voting and its labyrinthine mechanics are snooze-inducing matters. But all you are is a vote in a liberal democracy, so if you lose it, or allow others to lose theirs, you're aiding and abetting apathy at best, fascism at worst. I didn't make the rules up; I just play the game the way they tell me to. And so should you: Remember, just because the Democrats swept Congress in the midterms doesn't mean millions of votes weren't destroyed. They were. What matters now is that the elections get cleaner every year. And that's impossible to do with a Republican in the White House. Remember that when you hear the criminal activities of Alberto Gonzales and Karl Rove referred to something innocuous like, well, what I called them at the beginning of this screed.

"U.S. Attorney Scandals." Sounds so innocent. So technical.

"Votejacking." There, that's better.