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[snorklequeen]

i heard on the news yesterday, t.v., in Houston, Texas. that there would be NO recount of all the ballots

cheers,

Queenie

[Guy Courchesne]

Free to drive to Mexico City!

[delacosta]

A full recount has not been ruled out. Where they have decided to open up the boxes is where there are obvious mathematical errors. If upon opening them they find a mess and proof of fraud then perhaps they will demand to open the rest. But there are many who are already saying that during htis time the boxes have been adjusted so that the numbers add up.

Here's a recent Greg Palast take entiteled 'We Don't Need no Stinking Recount'

Mexico�s Lesson In The Dangers Of The Paper Ballot

By Greg Palast
for The Guardian, Comment is Free
Monday August 7, 2006

In the six years since I first began investigating the burglary ring we call �elections� in America, a new Voting Reform industry has grown up. That�s good. What�s worrisome is that most of the effort is focused on preventing the installation of computer voting machines. Paper ballots, we�re told, will save our democracy.

Well, forget it. Over the weekend, Mexico�s ruling party showed how you can rustle an election even with the entire population using the world�s easiest paper ballot.

On Saturday, Mexico�s electoral tribunal, known as the �TRIFE� (say �tree-fay�) ordered a re-count of the ballots from the suspect July 2 vote for president. Well, not quite a recount as in �count all the ballots� � but a review of just 9% of the nation�s 130,000 precincts.

The �9% solution� was the TRIFE�s ham-fisted attempt to chill out the several hundred thousand protesting supporters of Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador who had gathered in the capital and blocked its main Avenue. Lopez Obrador, the Leftist challenger known by his initials AMLO, supposedly lost the presidential vote by just one half of one percent of the vote.

I say �supposedly� lost because, while George Bush congratulated his buddy Felipe Calderon on his victory, the evidence I saw on the ground in Mexico City fairly shrieks that the real winner was challenger AMLO.

President Bush should consider some inconvenient truths about the Mexican vote count:

First: The exit poll of 80,000 voters by the Instituto de Mercadotecnia y Opinion showed that AMLO bested Calderon by 35.1% to 34.0%.

Second: The precinct-by-precinct returns were quite otherworldly. I used to teach statistics and what I saw in Mexico would have stumped my brightest students.

Here�s the conundrum: The nation�s tens of thousands of polling stations report to the capital in random order after the polls close. Therefore, statistically, you�d expect the results to remain roughly unchanged as vote totals come in. As expected, AMLO was ahead of the right-wing candidate Calderon all night by an unchanging margin � until after midnight. Suddenly, precincts began reporting wins for Calderon of five to one, the ten to one, then as polling nearly ended, of one-hundred to one.

How odd. I checked my concerns with Professor Victor Romero of Mexico�s National University who concluded that the reported results must have been a �miracle.� As he put it, a �religious event,� but a statistical impossibility. There were two explanations, said the professor: either the Lord was fixing the outcome or operatives of the ruling party were cranking in a massive number of ballots when they realized their man was about to lose.

How could they do it? �Easy pea-sy,� as my kids would say. In Mexico, the choices for president are on their own ballot with no other offices listed. Those who don�t want to vote for President just discard the ballot. There is no real ballot security. In areas without reliable opposition observers (about a third of the nation), anyone can stuff ballots into the loosely-guarded cardboard boxes. (AMLO showed a tape of one of these ballot-stuffing operations caught in the act.)

It�s also absurdly easy to remove paper ballots, disqualify them or simply mark them �nulo� (�null,� unreadable).

The TRIFE, the official electoral centurions, rejected AMLO�s request to review those precincts that reported the miracle numbers. Nor would the tribunal open and count the nearly one million �null� votes � allegedly �uncountable� votes which totaled four times Calderon�s putative plurality.

Mexico�s paper ballot, I would note, is the model of clarity � with large images of each party which need only be crossed through. The ruling party would have us believe that a million voters waited in line, took a ballot, made no mark, then deliberately folded the ballot and placed it in the ballot box, pretending they�d voted. Maybe, as in Florida in 2000, those �unreadable� ballots were quite readable. Indeed, the few boxes re-counted showed the �null� ballots marked for AMLO. The Tribunal chose to check no further.

The only precincts the TRIFE ordered re-counted are those where the tally sheets literally don�t tally � precincts in which the arithmetic is off. They refuse even to investigate those precincts where ballot boxes were found in city dumps.

There are other �miracles� which the TRIFE chose to ignore: a weirdly low turnout of only 44% in the state where Lopez Obrador is most popular, Guerrero (Acapulco), compared to turnouts of over 60% elsewhere. The votes didn�t vanish, the ruling party explained, rather the challenger�s supporters, confident of victory, did not bother to vote. Confident � in Mexico?

In other words, despite the right to paper ballots, the election was fiddled, finagled and fixed.

Does this mean US activists should give up on the fight for paper ballots and give in to robo-voting, computerized democracy in a box. Hell, no! Lopez Obrador has put hundreds of thousands in the street week after week demanding, �voto por voto� � recount every vote. But AMLO�s supporters can only demand a re-count because the paper ballot makes a recount possible. Were Mexico�s elections held on a Diebold special, there would be no way to recount the electrons floating in cyberspace.

Paper ballots make democracy possible, but hardly guarantee it. �Null� votes, not voters, have chosen Mexico�s president. The only other nation I know of with such a poisonously high percentage of �null� votes is the �Estados Unidos,� the USA.

And just as in Mexico, the �null� vote, the trashed, spoiled, rejected ballots, overrode the voters� choice, so it was north of the Rio Grande in 2000 and 2004. Ballot spoilage, not computer manipulation, stole Ohio and Florida in those elections � and will steal Colorado and New Mexico in the 2008 election.

In other words, my fellow gringo activists, we�d better stop fixating on laptop legerdemain and pledge our lives and fortunes to stopping the games played with registration rolls, provisional ballots, absentee ballots, voter ID demands and the less glamorous, yet horribly effective, methods used to suppress, invalidate and otherwise ambush the vote.

*****

Greg Palast is the author of the just-released New York Times bestseller, �ARMED MADHOUSE: Who�s Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China Floats Bush Sinks, the Scheme to Steal �08, No Child�s Behind Left and other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War.� Go to www.GregPalast.com.
See Palast�s July 12 investigation of the Mexican election on Democracy Now

[Guy Courchesne]

Delacosta, you're convincing me. Now I don't know what's worse...an AMLO presidency or a Calderon fraudulent election. Maybe Madrazo would've been best after all.

[Samantha]

According to the news we watched, the Tribunal was presented with no real evidence of fraud (or errors or whatever they are looking for) in the election, but agreed to a recount in the areas where Calderon clearly dominated. The next step will come after these results.

In the meantime, the AMLO tactics are pretty childish, just the kind of man we need running this country. We watched (on live TV) his supporters wandering in the traffic and plastering stickers on the back or side of each passing car on the toll highway between Puebla and DF.

Getting people ticked off with inconvenience, them losing money by not getting to work, destroying city businesses etc. is not going to win him new votes if there was to be a new election. This only hints at what a scary dude many predict he can be. And he has nothing to lose at this point.

[M@tt]

any word on the airport? plans to block the airport?
i have flights on the 15th and the 27th. it would be really bad if the second flight got postponed as i'm starting the new semester the following day.

anyone with a crystal ball?

[periodista-masajista]

No crystal ball, but the television just told me there was no election fraud.
What a relief! For a while I was afraid there might be corruption in Mexico's electoral process!

[Guy Courchesne]

Feds won't allow the airport to be closed or blockaded. That's a red line to cross. I'd worry more about something happening at Luz y Fuerza and CFE, like a supportive strike among unions there. 'Course, that might also shut the airport. Have you considered growing wings?

...and after today's events in the UK, there's no way the Fed will let protesters come anywhere near the airport.

Poor Tim...flew out this morning. Going to be a long day for him to get to see his folks.

[M@tt]

after all the shit going on this morning, maybe i won't bother flying down after all.

[Guy Courchesne]

Well whaddya know...they did try out at the airport today, temporarily blocking an off ramp from Circuito at the entrance to the airport. Like the blockade at the Stock Exchange and taking the toll booths, it was temporary.

[M@tt]

i was actually refering to the terrorist attempts in london, but between those and the protestors it seems possible that i'll get stuck coming in or out of the country.

honestly people who block the airport should just be run over or shot.

[Guy Courchesne]

They don't even need to use cars or guns...the biblical style hail we're getting should do the trick.

[delacosta]

From today's New York Times:

Op-Ed Contributor
Recounting Our Way to Democracy

By ANDR�S MANUEL L�PEZ OBRADOR
Published: August 11, 2006
Mexico City

NOT since 1910, when another controversial election sparked a revolution, has Mexico been so fraught with political tension.

The largest demonstrations in our history are daily proof that millions of Mexicans want a full accounting of last month�s presidential election. My opponent, Felipe Calder�n, currently holds a razor-thin lead of 243,000 votes out of 41 million cast, but Mexicans are still waiting for a president to be declared.

Unfortunately, the electoral tribunal responsible for ratifying the election results thwarted the wishes of many Mexicans and refused to approve a nationwide recount. Instead, their narrow ruling last Saturday allows for ballot boxes in only about 9 percent of polling places to be opened and reviewed.

This is simply insufficient for a national election where the margin was less than one percentage point � and where the tribunal itself acknowledged evidence of arithmetic mistakes and fraud, noting that there were errors at nearly 12,000 polling stations in 26 states.

It�s worth reviewing the history of this election. For months, voters were subjected to a campaign of fear. President Vicente Fox, who backed Mr. Calder�n, told Mexicans to change the rider, but not the horse � a clear rebuke to the social policies to help the poor and disenfranchised that were at the heart of my campaign. Business groups spent millions of dollars in television and radio advertising that warned of an economic crisis were I to win.

It�s my contention that government programs were directed toward key states in the hope of garnering votes for Mr. Calder�n. The United Nations Development Program went so far as to warn that such actions could improperly influence voters. Where support for my coalition was strong, applicants for government assistance were reportedly required to surrender their voter registration cards, thereby leaving them disenfranchised.

And then came the election. Final pre-election polls showed my coalition in the lead or tied with Mr. Calder�n�s National Action Party. I believe that on election day there was direct manipulation of votes and tally sheets. Irregularities were apparent in tens of thousands of tally sheets. Without a crystal-clear recount, Mexico will have a president who lacks the moral authority to govern.

Public opinion backs this diagnosis. Polls show that at least a third of Mexican voters believe the election was fraudulent and nearly half support a full recount.

And yet the electoral tribunal has ordered an inexplicably restrictive recount. This defies comprehension, for if tally sheet alterations were widespread, the outcome could change with a handful of votes per station.

Our tribunals � unlike those in the United States � have been traditionally subordinated to political power. Mexico has a history of corrupt elections where the will of the people has been subverted by the wealthy and powerful. Grievances have now accumulated in the national consciousness, and this time we are not walking away from the problem. The citizens gathered with me in peaceful protest in the Z�calo, the capital�s grand central plaza, speak loudly and clearly: Enough is enough.

In the spirit of Gandhi and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we seek to make our voices heard. We lack millions for advertising to make our case. We can only communicate our demand to count all the votes by peaceful protest.

After all, our aim is to strengthen, not damage, Mexico�s institutions, to force them to adopt greater transparency. Mexico�s credibility in the world will only increase if we clarify the results of this election.

We need the goodwill and support of those in the international community with a personal, philosophical or commercial interest in Mexico to encourage it to do the right thing and allow a full recount that will show, once and for all, that democracy is alive and well in this republic.

Andr�s Manuel L�pez Obrador, the mayor of Mexico City from 2001 to 2005, was a candidate for president in 2006, representing a coalition led by his Party of the Democratic Revolution. This article was translated from the Spanish by Rogelio Ram�rez de la O.

[Guy Courchesne]

Hail, AMLO, and now an earthquake...I think I'm getting out of this city...

[delacosta]

How are things? Was it a quake or a temblor? I don't even know how to say that in English. Quake or a shake?

More election commentary, that's not in the press:

1. Se ha encontrado hasta el momento que 30% de los paquetes electorales con recuentos tienen causales de anulaci�n. Es decir: 1 de cada 3 casillas en las que ha habido recuento tienen evidencias que indican que la casilla se debe de anular. Estas evidencias incluyen m�s votos que votantes, votos que no aparecen, y paquetes que estaban abiertos de manera ilegal. Otra evidencia es el hecho de que los funcionarios de casilla en varias casillas no pertenec�an a la lista nominal de la casilla, lo cual automaticamente la anula.

2. Si la tendencia se mantiene al final del recuento, y 30% de todas las casillas con recuento tienen causales para anulaci�n, el TRIFE las tiene que anular.

3. Anular el 30% de poco m�s de 4 millones de votos quiere decir anular 1.2 millones de votos, de los cuales m�s de la mitad son para fecal, mientras que al peje le corresponden m�s o menos una cuarta parte (estamos hablando de casillas donde el PAN gan� de manera exagerada con 50% o m�s en muchos casos).

4. Es decir, a fecal le quitar�an 600 mil votos. Al peje 300 mil votos. Restando estos votos del resultado global, esto querr�a decir que el n�mero de votos v�lidos para el peje aumentar�a por encima de la ventaja que supuestamente tuvo fecal, lo cual revertir�a el resultado de las elecciones.

Es precisamente por eso que los medios han estado neg�ndose a decir la verdad sobre estos conteos y es por eso que el PAN endureci� la sarta de pendejadas que eructan cada vez que les ponen un micr�fono enfrente. SABEN perfectamente que lo que de verdad importa de los recuentos NO es los votos recuperados para el peje o los votos que le restan a fecal--aunque tambi�n sea una marranada que le est�n inventando votos a fecal de a 200 por casilla. No, lo que de verdad importa es que se han encontrado suficientes casillas con motivos para anulaci�n como para predecir una tendencia en la que, de anularse de verdad el 30% de las casillas, se revertir�a el resultado inclusive con este mini-recuento.


From el senderodelpeje.com