With apologies to the millions of my readers in Ohio: Fuck Ohio.
I've said for a long time that Ohio is the worst state in the union, and I mean that now more than ever. Not only did they lose a war with Michigan, but they also claim -- on their state license plates of all places -- that they are the "Birthplace of Aviation." C'mon -- everyone knows that the Wright brothers took off in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Please. You guys are a drive-thru and fly-over state. It's a boring drive, too, believe you me. Ohio's only bright spot is Cedar Point, an amazing amusement park the Ohioans built because they realized that no one has any other reason to visit their sleepy little shitty state.
Now, though, Ohio really has fucked things up. Just when they're getting ready to count all of those provisional ballots (permalink), it appears that there will be an official inquiry conducted by the federal General Accounting Office on the request of several Congresspeople into possible election irregularities in Ohio (and Florida). The FBI is also starting some investigations into possible vote tampering in Florida.
What are these investigations all about? Well, read the transcript from the only major media organization to cover this developing story, MSNBC. That's right, only Keith Olbermann has had the guts to talk about the possiblity of a fundamental breach of the public trust on a 24-hour news station. The other stations are too busy with the Scott Petersen case, I guess.
Among the irregularities to be investigated in Ohio, according to Olbermann:
All this while the LA Times reports that douchebag Ken Blackwell went all out to do everything possible to minimize Democratic turnout all while minimizing the amount of work that election officials in Ohio will actually have to do. Ralph Vartabedian and Henry Weinstein note: "Blackwell ruled before the election that provisional ballots had to be cast in the correct precinct, and that any cast at the wrong polling place would not be counted." Obviously, Blackwell and his supporters will claim that this decision was made to minimize the chances of someone voting more than once. But if the election officials do their job, anyone trying to do that would be disqualified and prosecuted for a felony. Given that the law already provides stiff penalties for voter fraud, it should be OK to allow registered voters who were confused about their polling place to just go anywhere and vote a provisional ballot. In other words, the right thing to do would be allowing registered voters to vote no matter what. Douchebag Blackwell chose the Republican thing to do instead, which is try to suppress Democratic voter turnout.
Also under scrutiny in Ohio is the issue of ballot "spoilage." There has been no official count of the number of ballots considered unreadable from douchebag partisan Ken Blackwell's office, but he is the ultimate arbiter in Ohio (from what I understand) of what ballots will be thrown out due to illegibility. Here's more on this issue. If you want to add yourself to the growing number of people demanding that douchebag Blackwell release numbers on spoilage, give the man a call at 614-466-2585.
No one (including me) is insisting that Kerry will eventually win Ohio, nor am I asking for the 2004 election to be redone or anything crazy like that, but we do need to understand exactly what happened here so that we can make some reforms. And, as I've said many times before, the most important reform to be made is the creation of non-partisan, independent, public bodies to oversee our elections -- just like all these other democracies do.
I've said for a long time that Ohio is the worst state in the union, and I mean that now more than ever. Not only did they lose a war with Michigan, but they also claim -- on their state license plates of all places -- that they are the "Birthplace of Aviation." C'mon -- everyone knows that the Wright brothers took off in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Please. You guys are a drive-thru and fly-over state. It's a boring drive, too, believe you me. Ohio's only bright spot is Cedar Point, an amazing amusement park the Ohioans built because they realized that no one has any other reason to visit their sleepy little shitty state.
Now, though, Ohio really has fucked things up. Just when they're getting ready to count all of those provisional ballots (permalink), it appears that there will be an official inquiry conducted by the federal General Accounting Office on the request of several Congresspeople into possible election irregularities in Ohio (and Florida). The FBI is also starting some investigations into possible vote tampering in Florida.
What are these investigations all about? Well, read the transcript from the only major media organization to cover this developing story, MSNBC. That's right, only Keith Olbermann has had the guts to talk about the possiblity of a fundamental breach of the public trust on a 24-hour news station. The other stations are too busy with the Scott Petersen case, I guess.
Among the irregularities to be investigated in Ohio, according to Olbermann:
...in the town of Gahanna outside Columbus, Ohio. There in a district with just 800 voters, a voting machine added 3,893 votes to Mr. Bush‘s total.
All this while the LA Times reports that douchebag Ken Blackwell went all out to do everything possible to minimize Democratic turnout all while minimizing the amount of work that election officials in Ohio will actually have to do. Ralph Vartabedian and Henry Weinstein note: "Blackwell ruled before the election that provisional ballots had to be cast in the correct precinct, and that any cast at the wrong polling place would not be counted." Obviously, Blackwell and his supporters will claim that this decision was made to minimize the chances of someone voting more than once. But if the election officials do their job, anyone trying to do that would be disqualified and prosecuted for a felony. Given that the law already provides stiff penalties for voter fraud, it should be OK to allow registered voters who were confused about their polling place to just go anywhere and vote a provisional ballot. In other words, the right thing to do would be allowing registered voters to vote no matter what. Douchebag Blackwell chose the Republican thing to do instead, which is try to suppress Democratic voter turnout.
Also under scrutiny in Ohio is the issue of ballot "spoilage." There has been no official count of the number of ballots considered unreadable from douchebag partisan Ken Blackwell's office, but he is the ultimate arbiter in Ohio (from what I understand) of what ballots will be thrown out due to illegibility. Here's more on this issue. If you want to add yourself to the growing number of people demanding that douchebag Blackwell release numbers on spoilage, give the man a call at 614-466-2585.
No one (including me) is insisting that Kerry will eventually win Ohio, nor am I asking for the 2004 election to be redone or anything crazy like that, but we do need to understand exactly what happened here so that we can make some reforms. And, as I've said many times before, the most important reform to be made is the creation of non-partisan, independent, public bodies to oversee our elections -- just like all these other democracies do.
Just as a truce was underway, he goes and rips off another one of my talking points.
http://manoablogger.blogspot.com/2004/11/shameless-theft-of-ideas-at-erik-love.html
I'd just like to state for the record that I'm done with this until Erik wants to blog about something more interesting.
Ian
We all know it is just a drive-through state anyway...
I'm from Ohio and the county(Stark) I live in went to Kerry.
But yes, our state is boring.
One thing though...
North Carolina isn't really the birtplace of aviation either. The plane was designed by men from Ohio, built in Ohio, and then taken down to North Carolina for flight. But since the flight did not take place in Ohio it cannot be considered first in flight either.
Fuck you and your Michigander butt. :P
The Wright Brothers were from Dayton(which is a dreadfully boring place in the middle of Ohio) and this is actually where they built AND attempted to fly their first plane. They then tried in KittyHawk for the wind. Hence, BIRTHPLACE OF AVIATION. Also, I do believe Ohio has had more Presidents than any other state. How many has Montana had. Finally, we are actually a swing state, i.e. we have been known to vote Democratic. Has Montana?
These are my favorites.
"The Wright Brothers workshop was in Dayton! See, Ohio is great!"
Look, the fact that the Wright Brothers had a workshop in Ohio is, at most, a footnote in the history of aviation. They lifted off, made history, and had another workshop in North Carolina.
The fact that Ohioans put this little footnote on one of the most public of places to make a slogan and define the state -- the license plate -- just proves the point that Ohio has nothing to be proud about.
And "we're a swing state!" doesn't really cut it after 2004.
Where the hell did Montana come from? Who's standing up for Montana? Although, at least Montana has natural beauty and pristine wilderness. Ohio?
It wasn't just their workshop in Dayton; they were actually FROM Dayton and built the plane there. Therein lies the reason why the National Air Force Museum is in DAYTON. The only reason they ended up in North Carolina was for the wind.
Again, these are mere footnotes. While Ohio can claim that the Wright bros. were born in Dayton, that does not justify the use of "Birthplace of Aviation" on the Ohio liscense plates.
This is why I respect Indiana so much more than Ohio. Indiana realizes that it's a drive through state. That's why their license plates say "Crossroads of America." Respect.
Every time You start your car you can thank Ohio. The electric starter was invented there. So was the parachute, pull tab cans, ejection seats for aircraft, the first flyable aircraft being the wright flyer which was fully built in dayton but the air density and lack of wind kept them on the ground. The national weather service suggested kitty hawk and that is were they made history. North Carolina was merely a test site. If you built a car that went 1000 MPH on the salt flats would Utah get the credit for it or would you and the state where you built it. Nuff said.
If you go to dayton website you can see a huge list of inventions. Ohio has also had more astronauts than any other state with 24 including Niel Armstrong the first man to walk on the moon and John Glenn the first man to orbit the earth. So ohio has done its fair share to help the union. Just for your info, Ohio won the battle with Michigan that is why Toledo is in Ohio. The rest of the country is really ignorant when it comes to history.