Monday, April 11, 2005
And In Other Vote-Rigging News...
Remember Clint Curtis, the software designer for Yang who raised allegations last December that he was asked by U.S. Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) to create an electronic vote-rigging software prototype in 2000? ("Curtis filed a sworn affidavit which was then followed up several weeks later with sworn testimony under oath to members of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee.") Over at The Brad Blog, they're reporting that he passed a polygraph test.
There has been considerable flak back and forth about this issue, and the whole thing is a mess of accusations of conspiracies and attempts to paint Curtis as a wild-eyed wack. As usual, those making the accusations are portrayed as unstable or laughable, the blogs who report the stories are described in comic terms, and the mainstream media spends more journalistic energy guffawing than actually investigating.
I'm not saying Curtis is the poster boy for truth, here, but neither do I think his story has ever been given the serious investigation it should have. But more to the point is that despite many, many charges leveled and much evidence compiled of voting irreglarities all over the country, none of them has ever been picked up and followed through by the media, with the result that the papers were peppered with little blips of notice, immediately followed with the trademark silence that so characterizes journalism in these dark days. As long as mainstream journalists can marginalize concerns about vote-fraud by making them sound absurd, they can avoid having to do the hard ethical work of actually finding out if those concerns have a basis, which then has the chilling effect of essentially discrediting every later individual who may have dared to level a charge.
Very gratifying to the powers that be, and very easy on the careers of those who may fear ostracization if they make waves.
There has been considerable flak back and forth about this issue, and the whole thing is a mess of accusations of conspiracies and attempts to paint Curtis as a wild-eyed wack. As usual, those making the accusations are portrayed as unstable or laughable, the blogs who report the stories are described in comic terms, and the mainstream media spends more journalistic energy guffawing than actually investigating.
I'm not saying Curtis is the poster boy for truth, here, but neither do I think his story has ever been given the serious investigation it should have. But more to the point is that despite many, many charges leveled and much evidence compiled of voting irreglarities all over the country, none of them has ever been picked up and followed through by the media, with the result that the papers were peppered with little blips of notice, immediately followed with the trademark silence that so characterizes journalism in these dark days. As long as mainstream journalists can marginalize concerns about vote-fraud by making them sound absurd, they can avoid having to do the hard ethical work of actually finding out if those concerns have a basis, which then has the chilling effect of essentially discrediting every later individual who may have dared to level a charge.
Very gratifying to the powers that be, and very easy on the careers of those who may fear ostracization if they make waves.
