So Close! -- But Still No Fraud

Published Oct 17 2008, 01:37 PM by David S. Bernstein

As you may have noticed, a very large number of people -- including the GOP's nominee for President of these United States -- seem to be convinced that there's some massive voter fraud being perpetrated. There's not much new about this; it gets brayed about fairly regularly, and every time it gets looked into, there's no there there. Simply put, there has never been any evidence of organized voter fraud in modern American politics resulting in ineligible people voting, or eligible people voting multiple times.

But now the New Mexico GOP claims to have found 28 voters in a state-rep Democratic primary earlier this year that they think are fraudulent -- based mostly on information missing from their registration forms. (That's right, a Democratic primary; a progressive Latina beat the incumbent Dem, and is now the rep-elect because there is no Republican running.)

One of those 28 "voters" has the entertaining name Duran Duran. Aha! National Review Online's Jim Geraghty triumphantly declares vindication! Because, you know, people trying to commit organized voter fraud aren't smart enough to think up plausible fake names:

The person who is "Duran Duran" almost certainly voted under their real name, and thus got two votes in the primary. God knows how many of those 27 others exist; for all we know one person might have cast all of them. Anybody who voted once had their vote diluted by the guy who cheated to vote 27 times.

Amanda Carpenter, Townhall.com's "National Political Reporter" and one of the rising stars of the know-nothing wing of the conservative movement, also trumpets this "bombshell."

Turns out Duran Duran is a real dude. Which you can find out by, say, searching in an online directory.

So close! But hey, keep looking!

Oh, and by the way, why was the GOP looking through voter-registration forms for voters in a Democratic primary, for a small district seat where there is no Republican candidate running? Are they really concerned about the integrity of which Democrat represents the NM House 13th District? I mean, I'm sure they aren't just targeting Hispanic voters in a battleground state. Right?

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4 Comments

LorenzoJennifer said:

Allegations of voter fraud appear to be attempts to shift the blame for voting irregularities. Florida's infamous "butterfly ballot", in use by Palm Beach county for the 2000 presidential election, saw a vote count and recount characterized by confusion as to which of the main candidates - - including Gore, Bush and Buchanan - - the voter had chosen. Blame, in 2000, was placed on the election commissioners for the "butterfly ballot" design, for name and punch hole placement on the ballot and subsequent issues in accurately counting the votes. Ohio, in the 2004 presidential election, saw Black and poor areas receive a scarcity of voting machines and/or malfunctioning equipment and/or poorly managed voter lists. Cast were a lot of provisional ballots - - those filled out by voters whose eligibility to vote was questioned at the polling place and whose vote would be counted only when eligibility requirements were satisfied by the local election board. Additionally, Ken Blackwell, a Republican and then Ohio's Secretary of State, allowed local election commissioners to take voting machines home with them the night beore the election. Reason given was that would expedite the voting process on election day. The current Ohio Secretary of State, a Democrat, has stopped this practice. Blame, in 2004, was placed on state and local election officials for equipment shortages, malfunctioning machines, and voting list inaccuracies. A lot of heat and finger pointing but no light. So, why not blame the improperly registered voter? Perhaps they were just plain ignorant or so stupid as to be manipulated by community organizers or others with ulterior political motives. Did they perhaps have malicious mischief in mind when they voted, intentionally creating the ruckus that followed? Blaming the victim, using mental gymnastics if necessary, is still the name of the game.

October 18, 2008 9:07 AM
commander0 said:

I clicked the link to the white pages thing and there was a box to the right for background checks on Duran Duran. I clicked that and found that there were 74 Duran (various) Durans sprinkled all over New Mexico.

October 18, 2008 12:08 PM
commander0 said:

I clicked the white pages link. It was very interesting. How did you decide that that particular duran duran was the one out of the 74 sprinkled throughout New Mexico who the Republicans were referring to? There is a little box just to the right that lists background checks as an item. I hit it and found 74 listings for assorted duran durans with different addresses and middle initials all over New Mexico. They also gave me an option to search other states so just for laughs I thought I would see how many there were in NY. Damn, only 5. Seems like there are an awful lot of Durans in New Mexico. Some kind of cult, maybe? Did you call the phone number? Ask to speak to duran? I wonder if duran duran voted in all of the towns. Are you a reporter? Or a campaign aide?

October 18, 2008 12:22 PM
Bruce said:

It's not necessarily about getting people to actually cast fraudulent votes. It's about flooding the system with bogus registration forms to perpetrate a paper version of a Denial-of-Service attack on our electoral process.

Jam up the works, then accuse those who object of suppressing the vote.

If it were an isolated case, you'd have a point, but this attack is so widespread and deliberate, that only the most ideologically blinded among us will fail to see it.

October 20, 2008 8:56 AM