My brother called my attention to this video and whenever I'm feeling vexed and out of sorts lately, I cue it up and watch it.  It cracks me up, especially the bit where the trumpet-playing thing gets bitten on the ass by the little dog.  It's by a Barcelona band called The Pinker Tones.  Repeat after me, "All politicians are crooks/and we are karma hunters!"

WARNING: Watching this clip will embed the song in your consciousness forever.  You will find yourself rapping, "Vote for the Instant Karma Party right now!" whether you want to or not.  I was walking downtown the other day and it just started looping around and around and around in my head until I was walking in rhythm with it and chanting it under my breath.  That and this part:

"Hi, there voters, how do you feel? Tired of the same old voting deal?  Well, look who's back with a brand new style, a brand new look and a brand new smile!"   

"EEEEYYUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGHHH!!" 

It just seems appropriate somehow.

So, I'm going to put a question to the crowd tonight.  A lot of us, myself included, are understandably leery about casting our vote on Diebold machines.  Especially in Georgia where our Secretary of State (an alleged Democrat) has repeatedly ignored questions about the reliability and security of Diebold machines and even signed off on the shady Diebold software patch that may have swung our senatorial election away from Max Cleland and into the fat, sweaty hands of Saxby Chambliss in 2002.

From The Booman Tribune: 

So basically, there was a deal where Diebold had free reign over the entire Georgia election process for 2002. Which included training the workers, setting up the machines, counting the votes, and, well, just about everything else.

And then Diebold's election unit president stepped in and made the story even more interesting:

Then, one muggy day in mid-August, Hood was surprised to see the president of Diebold's election unit, Bob Urosevich, arrive in Georgia from his headquarters in Texas. With the primaries looming, Urosevich was personally distributing a "patch," a little piece of software designed to correct glitches in the computer program. "We were told that it was intended to fix the clock in the system, which it didn't do," Hood says. "The curious thing is the very swift, covert way this was done."

And thanks to the agreement between Cox and Diebold, there was no need to certify the change to the software, since Diebold was pretty much running the election process – at least the administration of it.

"It was an unauthorized patch, and they were trying to keep it secret from the state," Hood told me. "We were told not to talk to county personnel about it. I received instructions directly from Urosevich. It was very unusual that a president of the company would give an order like that and be involved at that level."

Absolutely no major media outlet in Georgia has covered this story.  The only paper that has seen fit to look into the matter at all is Atlanta Progressive News.  I would urge you all to spotlight this piece to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and demand some answers.  I, personally, have written to the office of Cathy Cox on three separate occasions and each time gotten the brush-off, i.e., a form letter and a pat on the head.

Now, if things go like I think they may, I may well be up in Connecticut for the elections, so I'll be voting absentee.  I've heard both sides of that issue.  Some people say, "Yes!  Demand a verifiable paper ballot!" whereas others are saying, "Absentee ballots can be stolen or destroyed!  Demand a paper receipt from your Diebold machine!"

What do you guys think?  We're down to the last twenty days before the election.  I find it ominous that people are talking about Preznint Pusbag and Karl "Dirty Tricks R Us" Rove showing signs of eerie calm in the face of what many are predicting as a full-on disaster for the Reich Wing come November.  Is there something they know that we don't?   Do you trust your vote to Diebold?  What do you feel like are your alternatives?  Is it too late to start ringing the alarm bells and pushing for a national voter-strike against Diebold voting?

I believe this matter to be of paramount importance.  Our votes are the central tenet of our democracy.  We can all sign up to be poll-watchers and election monitors (and we should!), but if someone tampers with the machines the day before the election, how would we know?  The Princeton video shows pretty clearly that a rigged Diebold machine looks and acts just like a clean one.  What can we do now to ensure a clean and fair election in three weeks?

I'm counting on you guys for good ideas.  This is something that's been bothering me for the better part of the last year and at this juncture I am ready to accept that the Reich Wingers are capable of anything.  No institution in our democracy has been too sacred for them to shit all over.  Why would they stop at our votes?

So, speak up, O Great Hive Mind.  What can we do about this at this late date?  The future of democracy in America may well depend on it.