Who cares if our votes count?
Who cares if a bunch of corrupt politicians and businessmen steal our democratic franchise?
Nobody does.
I know because I've seen it happen first-hand and reported about it for years - and I've seen that nobody cares.
I was really sick on Election Day but I got out of bed with an empty stomach and put on my suit, grabbed my notepad, and travelled some 40 miles, by car and train, to be at the Cook County Clerk's office where all of the votes from Chicago and Cook County are "counted."
Now Cook County is no small county. It represents one of the three largest urban populations in the United States. The city alone has some 3 million residents.
There is nothing that can be observed at the precinct level (I learned that last time) because the poll workers lock the doors at 7:00 p.m. and the so-called election judges don't do anything that even resembles vote counting anymore. They just plug in the machines and open the doors.
Everything is centralized now. (Where have you heard that before?)
The only "counting" of the votes occurs on the 5th and 6th floors of the county building at 69 W. Washington. The so-called "counting", i.e. processing of data, occurs in the closed and guarded rooms of Election Systems and Software (ES&S), the super-secret firm from Omaha who operates and controls elections in Chicago - and across much of America.
One might think that the citizens of Chicago would be interested to see how their votes are counted in the "most-contested" presidential race in decades (media talk, not mine).
Sadly, one would be wrong. There was nobody from the public there except for a poor guy I met on the elevator who was looking for a place to cast his vote in the South Loop area at a quarter to 7, and he wasn't interested in watching the vote "counting."
The county clerk, David Orr, had graciously provided a full table of cookies and coffee, but nobody was there to partake and I was already nauseous.
At 10 minutes to 7, the only people in the room were the Associated Press (AP) people in a far corner setting up their "direct feed" line with the ES&S computer in the back room, and the clerk's staff who were earning overtime.
As I soon found out, I was not supposed to know about that direct feed between AP and the ES&S computer in the back room. So who is feeding whom and what does AP have to do with the vote count?
The Cook County Clerk's office is where the votes of millions of America's wealthiest, most powerful people were being counted. But nobody was there.
I asked myself, "What's wrong with this picture?" Where are the people? Don't they care how their votes are counted? Or don't they know?
The only conclusion I can come to, after several days of contemplation, is that Americans simply don't care. They don't care who is the president. They don't care who governs them. They are useful idiots.
We only vote because we feel we have to. We really don't care what happens to our vote after its been cast.
We'd rather just go home and turn on the TV. Hey, c'mon, we did our part; we "rocked the vote." Just like M-TV told us to.
Compare this scenario to Europe, where I've observed presidential elections in several countries.
Let's take France where I observed the presidential contest between the nationalist Marie Le Pen and the former corrupt mayor of Paris, J. Chirac. I watched the election in Avignon, in Provence, in the sunny south of France where the Foreign Legion hang out and where Le Pen had a lot of popular support.
I stationed myself at Avignon's Hotel du Ville (City Hall).
When the voting ended at 6 p.m. (on a Sunday, if I recall correctly), the light blue envelopes which contained the ballots were dumped from the transparent box from the election judges' table into the middle of 6 election judges.
The ballot envelopes were then counted and placed into large manilla envelopes, exactly 100 ballots per envelope. There were some 700+ votes cast in the precinct that voted at the City Hall. After the count of the total ballots was made it was compared with the number from the registrar's desk. I remember it was one off.
Then the tally of ballots was signed off. They were minus one, if I recall correctly; 1 vote lost or not accounted for.
The judges then moved on to the next stage. Each envelope of 100 ballots was taken down, in order, and each individual blue ballot envelope was opened and its vote counted. Inside each envelope was a piece of paper that either said M. Le Pen or J. Chirac - it was that simple.
The results from each envelope of 100 was written on a chalk board. Everybody followed the tally closely.
Each 100 votes was counted two times, before a crowd of nearly 80 citizens. Each move of the judges was carefully watched. Once a blue ballot envelope fell on the floor and a non-judge tried to pick it up.
"No, no," a citizen in the crowd protested quickly.
The well-intentioned fellow citizen who had tried to pick it up off the floor realized immediately that his helpful gesture could constitute a violation of the election's integrity and he allowed the judge to pick up the fallen envelope.
Every vote was counted and every vote counted - but this was in France, not the United States. Nothing like this happens in the USA. (Are you beginning to understand why France is not engaged in the most artificial war on terror? Do you think that real democracy might have something to do with it?)
In this country, however, nobody cares. It's obvious.
The handful of reporters who came down to see how Chicago's votes were counted quickly retired to the press room where they watched TV. I kid you not. (If drinks had been served they would've already been drunk.)
The Fox News reporter was watching Fox News in the press room while Chicago's presidential votes were being counted in the back room by a bunch of "programmers" for a private company called ES&S.
Did he care? No.
Do Chicagoans care? No.
Did Chicago's super-intelligent public radio people care? No.
Did the rest of Chicago's media care? No.
This is America.
This apathy did not occur only in Chicago. This happens in New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, you name it. It happened all across America on Election Day.
Let's face it. We are a bunch of losers. I mean it. We've lost our democratic franchise and most of us don't even know it.
Instead of counting our votes in front of our neighbors, like in France and as it used to be in this country, we've allowed a bunch of outsiders to come in and take charge of our elections.
These gangster types say, "O.K. We will take the ballots into the back room (to the ES&S room in the case of Chicago) and we will count them for you. We can count better than you. We will let you know who the winner is. Trust us."
So, we've trusted the counting of our votes, our "most cherished" democratic franchise, to people we don't even know.
Would you let some stranger take your money in the back room and count it for you?
How much do we Americans cherish democracy?
Not at all.
Show me otherwise.
