Lingering controversy surrounded the inauguration of George W. Bush in 2001. His motorcade was forced to flee the parade route as protesters hurled rotten food at the procession. That was a forecast for George Bush, as the Republican-controlled Senate flipped to the Democrats when Republican Jim Jeffords of Vermont became an Independent and sided with the Democrats.
Then the financial unraveling began. Enron, WorldCom, et al., bogus accounting, market manipulation, theft, looting and fraud had been exposed in America's corporatocracy. The dot.com bubble had burst, and Bush was facing severe economic problems. Additionally, the Pentagon had identified over TWO TRILLION dollars that was UNACCOUNTED for at a September 10, 2001 news conference.
However, .............. ALL THAT CHANGED on September 11, 2001.
Here is what we do know:
On 9/11, two airliners rammed into WTC towers 1 and 2, and three buildings at the WTC plaza collapsed at free-fall speed later that morning and afternoon. Something slammed into the Pentagon, although no one can be sure what at this point. Something happened to an airliner in Pennsylvania; however, it is unclear exactly what. Within hours the government had declared Muslim terrorists responsible for the crime, within days the government declared the toxic and poisonous atmosphere of Ground Zero to be safe, and within months had completely cleared and cleaned up the crime scene -- without conducting a proper forensic investigation.
Nevertheless, the administration quickly seized on the events to rally Americans for an attack on Afghanistan.
By the turn of 2002, the Bush Administration began planning for the invasion of Iraq. By the fall of that year, the administration had been highly successful in convincing most Americans that Saddam Hussein was involved in the 9/11 attacks, had assisted terrorists, possessed vast quantities of WMD, was restarting a nuclear bomb program, and was prepared to pounce on American coastlines with unmanned aero vehicles filled with chemical or biological weapons. They made support of a resolution for war a campaign referendum on the "War on Terror," and the American public bit.
By January of 2003, the plans for the Iraq invasion were in motion. A disingenuous courtesy call was placed to the United Nations for approval of the aggression, and lies were presented to the Security Council to justify such action. The U.N. failed to approve of the U.S. war plan, yet in March 2003, the U.S. inflicted a massive aerial bombardment known as "Shock and Awe." U.S. troops rolled into Baghdad, and Republican strategists foresaw a quick takeover of Iraq with limited occupation problems for the upcoming 2004 presidential campaign.
Despite economic uncertainty and inequalities within the U.S. economy in 2004, I grant George W. Bush the Prosperity factor in 2004. Though the accumulated deficits will saddle America with an ever-increasing burden, the effects of such future troubles were nowhere in sight for the American public in 2004; however, over the summer, the Peace angle for George W. bush began to turn.
2004
One problem I had was I read a lot of political crap by the likes of Liz Bumiller, so I knew the mood of the country was for change. Half-packed, private halls for the Prez were the enthusiasm was more than the crowd, friends of the family who voted for the boy in 200, but were voting against him this time.
By November 2004, George W. Bush had lost the Peace leg of reelection, and should have faced rejection at the polls. But this did not happen. This report will touch mostly on the 2004 presidential election discrepancies, with some references to suspicious Senate and House results.
The first alarm was raised when I watched the "Topic A with Tina Brown" show on the CNBC channel before the election. Howard Dean (a victim himself of strange primary results, as the corporate candidate Senator John Kerry emerged from nowhere to claim the Democratic nomination) filled in for Tina, and had Bev Harris of BlackBoxVoting on as the guest. Bev informed the public that other than far-flung places with hand-counted paper ballots, most voting is subject to some sort of computer tampering. She proceeded to demonstrate for Dean how an election could be swung.
In a mock election in one precinct, Harris gave the true totals as such: candidate Howard Dean, 1000 votes; candidate Lex Luthor, 500; and candidate Tiger Woods, 0. She then "flipped" the results by hacking into the computer, making the election day tally (and probable media report) read: Lex Luthor, 900 votes; Howard Dean, 500; and Tiger Woods, 100. Harris commented that they had just "edited an election in under 90 seconds."
The Polls
As election day approached, Zogby International (which had predicted the 2000 outcome more accurately than any other pollster) was indicating a Kerry victory. Here I draw upon author Alan Waldman in an article published on November 18, 2004:
"Zogby... did exit polling which predicted a 100-electoral vote triumph for Kerry. He saw Kerry winning crucial Ohio by 4 percent. Princeton professor Sam Wang, whose meta-analysis had shown the election to be close in the week before the election, began coming up with dramatic numbers for Kerry in the day before and day of the election. At noon EST on Monday, Nov. 1, he predicted a Kerry win by a 108-vote margin in the electoral college.
[My count was Kerry-325, Bush-213 -- a 112-vote margin]
In the Iowa Electronics Markets, where 'investors'... wager real moolah on election outcome 'contracts,' Bush led consistently for months before the election.... But a 7 p.m. CST on Nov. 2, 76.6 percent of the last hour's traders had gone to Kerry, with only 20.1 percent plunking their bucks down on Bush. They knew something. As the first election returns came in, broadcasters were shocked to see that seemingly safe Bush states like Virginia, Kentucky and North Carolina were being judged... as 'too close to call.' Then, at 7:28 EST, before the Ohio and Florida results were hacked, networks broadcast that both states favored Kerry by 51 percent to 49 percent."
In his research paper, Steven Freeman reports:
"Exit polls show Kerry had been elected. He was leading in nearly every battleground state, in many cases, by sizable margins. But later, in 10 of 11 battleground states, the tallied margins differed from the predicted margins -- and in every one the shift favored Bush."
In 10 states where there were verifiable paper trails -- or no electronic machines -- the final results hardly differed from the initial exit polls. Exit polls and final counts in Missouri, Louisiana, Maine and Utah, for instance, varied by 1 percent or less. In non-paper trail states, however, there were significant differences.
Florida saw a shift from Kerry +1 percent in the exit polls to Bush +5 percent at evening's end. In Ohio, Kerry went from +3 percent to -3 percent. Other big discrepancies in key states were: Minnesota (from +10 percent to +4 percent); New Mexico (+4 to -1); Nevada (+1 to -3); Wisconsin (+7 to +0.4); Colorado (-2 to -5); North Carolina (-4 to -13); Iowa (+1 to -1); New Hampshire (+14 to +1); and Pennsylvania (+8 to +2). Exit polls also had Kerry winning the national popular vote by 3 percent.
In close Senate races, changes between the exit poll results and the fiddled final tallies cost Democrats anticipated seats in Kentucky (a 13 percent swing to the GOP); Alaska (9 percent); North Carolina (9 percent); Florida; Oklahoma; South Dakota; and possibly Pennsylvania -- as well as enough House seats to retake control of the chamber.
Republican consultant and Fox News regular Dick Morris wrote after the election:
"Exit polls are almost never wrong. They eliminate the two major potential fallacies in survey research by correctly separating actual voters from those who pretend they will cast ballots... and by substituting actual observation from guesswork."
It is not credible that Bush could have legitimately won the 2004 election. Kerry's victory was predicted by previously extremely accurate Harris and Zogby exit polls, by the formerly infallible 50 Percent Rule (an incumbent with less than 50 percent in the exit polls always loses -- Bush had 47 percent, requiring him to capture an improbable 80 percent of the undecideds to win) and by the Incumbent Rule (undecideds break for the challenger, as exit polls showed they did by a large margin this time).
Nor is it credible that: the surge in new young voters (who were witnessed standing in lines for hours on campuses nationwide) miraculously didn't appear in the final totals; that Kerry did worse than Gore against an opponenet who lost support and that exit polls were highly accurate wherever there was a paper trail and grossly underestimated Bush's appeal wherever there was no such guarantee of accurate recounts. Statisticians point out that Bush beat 99-1 mathematical odds in winning the election.
Zogby pollster Colin Shea, after thoroughly testing the discrepancies among total registration, turnout, party registration and the official tallies in Florida and Ohio, concluded:
"The facts... defy all logical explanations save one -- massive and systematic voter fraud."
By my count, Kerry carried Florida, Ohio, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada and Iowa, all of which were awarded to President Bush.
Then there is the USA Today graph that says that the Election Day exit polls had Kerry with a 51-48 percent advantage; however, from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. there were "no reports due to computer problem," and when the system came back online at 1:33 a.m., Bush held a 50-49 edge, eventually widening the gap to 51-48 by the afternoon of Nov. 3.
Strange Returns
The following information was provided by the Edward R. Murrow of his age, Keith Olbermann, on his "Countdown" show days after the election (numbers I meticulously documented). Olbermann spotlighted glaring irregularities and provided de facto evidence that the election was stolen.
Ohio
Actually, my local carried an AP piece on Nov. 6, 2004 that noted machine errors in small Franklin county. Of 638 votes cast, Bush received 4,258 votes, Kerry 260.
The Cincinnati Enquirer reported on Warren County, where election officials locked down the administration building to prevent observation of the vote count. Unique among Ohio's 88 counties, the secrecy was attributed to a Department of Homeland Security concern of terrorism!!! Reporters were kept in the lobby, and the count went on two floors above (WC polls last to close. last to report, helped clinch for Bush). A local news anchor said DHS excuse a "red herring." She said this had "never happened before," and was told the media would have access.
Statewide, 92,000 votes were not counted, there were more votes in 93 precincts than registered voters, and one precinct had 13,000 registered voters where 18,000 voted.
Florida
29 Democratic counties flipped to Bush to give him the win. Those 29 (of 52) that tallied votes using optical scan machines by Diebold, Sequoiya, or Election Systems & Software. Here are 5 examples where counties with decided Democratic margins (during a campaign, like in 2006, in which Democrats were unusually united as never before) that suddenly voted overwhelmingly for Bush.
Baker County: Pct. Dem: 69; Vote Total: Bush - 7,738, Kerry - 2,180
Holmes County: Pct. Dem: 77; Vote Total: Bush - 6,410, Kerry - 1,810
Dixie County: Pct. Dem: 78; Vote Total: Bush - 4,433, Kerry - 1,959
Lafayette County: Pct. Dem: 83; Vote Total: Bush - 2,460, Kerry - 845
Liberty County: Pct. Dem: 88; Vote Total: Bush - 1,927, Kerry - 1,070
In the Florida vote where op-scans were not used, no such swings were reported. Counties with heavy Democratic registration voted heavily Democratic; counties with heavy Republican registration voted heavily Republican. The state was awarded to Bush on the basis that 29 Democratic counties became Republican strongholds. Furthermore, an extremely liberal ballot proposition passed overwhelmingly: an amendment to raise Florida's minimum wage by a dollar garnered 71% of the vote!
National Totals
The tracking of national vote totals is astounding as well. Conventional myth holds that the Republican's vast "turn-out" operation accounted for the unexplainable surge in Republican presidential candidates national vote totals. In 1996, Bill Clinton received 47 million votes nationwide, Republican Bob Dole 40 million. In 2000, the count was Gore - 51 million, Bush - 50.5 million. Gore won the popular vote! Then in 2004, Bush vaulted to 62 million(!!), while Democrat Kerry gathered 59 million!!!
This would seem to vindicate Democratic unity, and one has to really, really wonder where Bush got those extra 12 million votes (out of thin air and rigged machines, no doubt)!
Aftermath and Reinauguration
What was astounding in the aftermath of the hijacked 2004 election were several comments that historically and personally confirm that Bush lost.
"Bush... entering... second term with the lowest approval ratings of any recent, two-term president (Boston Globe January 8, 2005)."
Because he didn't win!
"Bush's approval ratings at 48... noticeably low for a president about to partake of the Inauguration Day pageantry (Boston Globe January 11, 2005)."
I'd say so!
"Four years ago, 150 of Bush's 1964 Phillips-Andover classmates... gathered in Washington... honoring the Bushes. This year... about 60 are... to attend....
Tom Seligson, a CBS news producer who helped organize the 2001 class party, offered a slightly different take on 2005 versus 2001:
"This time around... those of us who didn't vote for the boy are staying away in droves (Boston Globe January 18, 2005)."
The guy did NOT WIN HIS OWN CLASS, and yet we are told he won massively nationwide?
So how are you feeling about 2008, readers?
