Reasons to Vote November 7th, 2006

I can give you plenty of reasons to believe the election might very well be stolen out from under us tomorrow, just as they were in 2000, 2002 and 2004. I can provide you with all the information showing how the Diebold machines are likely to be hacked so as to keep Congress under Republican control so it may continue acting as George W. Bush's rubber stamp. And I could tell you to be afraid, very afraid, of this likelihood.

But I won't. I won't tell you to be afraid, because fear causes people to do stupid things they wouldn't ordinarily do -- like vote Republican, or worse: stay home and not vote.

Don't be afraid. Be angry. Be so angry, dear readers, that you turn out in great numbers tomorrow to vote Democrat. Get so angry, that you get as many registered voters as you can to vote Democrat. Get so angry, that you crowd the vote-counting rooms and offices and DEMAND your right to watch YOUR votes BEING COUNTED.

In Ohio, the stakes cannot be any higher; even though polls have consistently shown Democrat Ted Strickland leading Republican J. Kenneth Blackwell by double digits, the current state secretary has the means, the motive, the opportunity and the history to rig the election in his favor. Even if the rampant electoral fraud he is in the process of carrying out fails to put him in the governor's mansion, Blackwell will still try to take as many Democratic candidates down with him as his political career goes down in flames.

Democrat Sherrod Brown, who gave up his safe seat in Ohio's 13th U.S. Congressional district to run against incumbent and rubber stamp Mike DeWine, leads by a comfortable lead -- a number of polls show him ahead by double digits going into tomorrow's election. But Blackwell is a master at vote-tampering; he will make sure Democratic ballots are not counted. This sordid travesty of a tale will be replayed over and over again as the election unfolds.

These crimes against our democracy, or republic, or whatever you want to call it, will be carried out no matter what we try to do. But we can ensure that they fail.

The secret to winning against massive, systemic GOP electoral fraud to to vote. This is what the Republican Party fears most. It is why it has worked relentlessly to deny you that right, and get you to give up on the system YOU pay for with your tax dollars. The secret to winning against rampant GOP electoral fraud is this: DON'T GIVE UP.

This is my last entry before tomorrow's election, and time is short, so here are a few reasons why Ohioans should vote Democrat. On the local AFL-CIO website, the reasons for voting for Strickland and Brown are laid out:

Ohio working families are supporting Senate candidate Sherrod Brown and gubernatorial candidate Ted Strickland. Brown, a U.S. representative, voted 97 percent of the time for working families, while his opponent, Mike DeWine, voted against working families 80 percent of the time he has been in the Senate.

Meanwhile, Strickland supports an increase in the state’s minimum wage, where voters have a chance this election to boost the wage. His opponent, Ken Blackwell, opposes a minimum wage increase and will roll back prevailing wage laws and project labor agreements.

And that's not all. The Akron Beacon Journal, whose editorial board in 2004 was ordered to endorse George W. Bush for president or no one at all by its Republican publisher, posted the following letter to the editor on its website:

Six more years of Mike DeWine will only help ensure that change never comes. Make no mistake, I'm not implying that DeWine himself has been involved in corruption, but I am saying he has allowed it.

He has done nothing to help clean up the mess that Washington has become. He's been a member of the rubber-stamp Senate, which has allowed the Bush administration's lies, coverups and incompetence.

This dereliction of duty on oversight has been allowed to go on because the Republicans have put partisan party politics and staying in power ahead of the welfare of this nation.

It was not only about the Bush administration, but also about both houses of Congress that the 9/11 commission said: ``Many obvious steps that the American people assume have been completed, have not been. Our leadership has been distracted.''

Mike DeWine has been a party to all of that.

And for a member of a party whose battle cry has been ``personal responsibility,'' he's demanded very little of it.

So if you want continued corruption and incompetence, DeWine is your man. If you want another do-nothing Congress, which works even fewer days than the current one (which worked the least number of days of any Congress in history), cast your vote for DeWine.

But if you are tired, as I am, of a party that controls both houses of Congress and campaigned on ``cleaning up Washington'' yet has allowed a cesspool of corruption and incompetence to fester there, then give Sherrod Brown a chance.

Robert Huddleston

Akron

DeWine, like Blackwell, is George W. Bush's bitch. And Ohio voters know it:

[DeWine] has continued to oppose national health care, which causes millions of children to have none. Some 45 million Americans have no health care thanks to a Republican-led Congress, which includes DeWine, that accepts millions of dollars in campaign contributions from the insurance companies and the medical industry.

DeWine should get credit for auto safety, also. But Ohio has lost more than 200,000 high-paying manufacturing jobs on his watch, with his approval by way of his voting record on such issues as international trade deals.

DeWine also supports the war in Iraq, which had nothing to do with 9/11, at a cost of billions of dollars a week.

We have had the largest federal deficit in decades, due to tax cuts to the wealthy corporations and citizens. DeWine has voted to give corporations tax breaks for sending our jobs offshore. DeWine has a 92 percent voting record with the Bush administration. One might call that a rubber stamp.

Sherrod Brown will put the residents of Ohio and citizens of America first, not second or not at all. His record should speak for itself, the same as DeWine's.

Time after time, Brown has voted for middle-class Americans and the elderly. So if you're going to take credit for your record, it should be your entire record.

Jack Hefner

Vice president

United Steelworkers Union Local 2L

Akron

DeWine's record in the Senate is a travesty of rubber-stamping George W. Bush's criminal activities in an office he was never legitimately elected to. This may be confirmed by a simple Google search and a little bit of free time.

Strickland, whose various jobs include teaching and the ministry, showed moral fortitude by refusing payraises Congress gave itself despite the fact the poorest Americans make little or no money in dead-end service jobs. He has also refused participation in the generous Congressional health care program, which you and I pay for with our tax dollars; he pays for his own health care out of his own pocket -- unlike Blackwell, who cynically and falsely preaches about morality, the Democratic gubernatorial candidate actually practices it.

Blackwell wants to hand control of Ohio's turnpikes over to foreign nations; raise taxes on the poor and middle class while slashing taxes for the very wealthy; and enforce extreme right-wing, pseudo-religious persecution against gays. He is not even close to being interested in creating jobs in Ohio.

These are the stakes, and the reasons for you to get off your ass and VOTE. If you believe in the American Dream, if you know in your heart that the fascist Republican Party will do even more damage to this once-great nation in the next two years than it has in the last six, it is your DUTY as an American citizen to VOTE. Do NOT let the GOP steal another election.