The Kerry Campaign, Ohio and Ken Blackwell

[mrgorth]

First let me say that I love John Kerry. In retrospect, I'm not sure who else we could have put up against Bush but that doesn't matter. The voters sent Kerry in to go up against Bush. After the primaries I volunteered for Kerry. I live in Bucks County, PA, a heavily republican suburb/exurb of Philadelphia that often goes blue nationally. I went to an organizational meeting for Bucks for Kerry when it came around. We were spoken to by a Kerry staffer who told us that we were ground zero for the PA campaign. She also told us that the campaign had decided to battle in PA, OH and FL. "Fine" I thought. What the fuck do I know? I figured they knew what they were doing even though I was nervous about FL being on that list after what happened in 2000. So the 2004 election happened and I've heard lots of criticism of Kerry as a candidate and of the campaign in general. I would think that, post-Dukakis, even a chimp would know not to let the swift liars thing fester. Regardless, I don't know who could've done any better. I'm not here to say Dean or Clark could've.

So I'm driving in the car on Sunday listening to NPR and This American Life starts into a show about relgious fundamentalists, the theocracy they want to create and their debate with those of us who want to keep the nation secular. Here's a link to the show:
http://www.thislife.org/ra/290.ram

Well, next thing you know who's talking but the Ohio Secretary of State at the time of the '04 election Ken Blackwell. HOLY FUCKING SHIT?!?!!? Have you guys ever heard this fucking guy talk? He puts anyone...ANYONE the right can put out there to shame with his justification for creating a theocracy and I'm talking on par with Falwell, Bob Jones, you fucking name it and Blackwell put 'em to shame. Now I'm listening to this fascist prattle on and on and, not wanting to jump on the castigate Kerry bandwagon, I have to think to myself "what kind of idiots did we have to have on our team to assume for a millisecond that this guy would play fair?" The Kerry campaign was not only trusting that he could win by enough votes to overcome foul play in FL but that he could do the same in OH, and I'm telling you now, you'd have to do much better than Katherine Harris to find someone who sounded as drowned in Kool-Aid as Blackwell.

Now, I know hindsight is 20/20. I'll also be frank and admit that, electorally, I'm not sure what Team Kerry should've focused on to make up for losing FL and OH but IMHO any assumption that Blackwell was going to play anything close to fair was being irresponsible to the whole fucking world. Blackwell is as talibanic as they come and they should've figured something else out. This isn't a blackbox post. As far as I'm concerned we should've been able to turn IA and NM blue at least. I just can't believe that the Kerry campaign didn't factor Blackwell into their math.

[sybylla]

1. Shocking, isn't it?

Yeah, I can forgive the Kerry campaign for handling most of the mistakes/poor strategy issues, but Ken Blackwell is not one of them. This was the product of either total incompetence, absolute apathy, or the product of a behind the scenes handshake, skull and bones style. Either way, my contribution to the "count every vote" fund went unspent and that is the last money Kerry ever sees from me.

[LittleClarkie]

4. How do you know it went unspent?

17000 lawyers gotta eat, don't they?

Are you privy to the campaign finances?

[Eloriel]

2. You're kidding, right?

Kerry conceded not even 24 hours later and you still find it unbelievable that the campaign "didn't factor Blackwell into their math?" Clueless would be a Guinness Book of World Records understatement to apply to him and the whole team. And maybe even: didn't really want it all that much afterall. Or maybe no stomach for the fight. Take your pick, choose all that apply.

[NewYorkerfromMass]

11. None of them apply

Kerry and Edwards assembled as good a ground crew of lawyers and activists as was possible in all 3 states.
The key was registering voters and getting them to the polls/ filling out absentee ballots correctly.
They did everything possible, including getting the courts to rule that voters would be allowed to cast the provisional ballots that Blackwell was trying to prevent them from doing.
The only oversight I know of, and it would have been very hard to foresee, was the disproportionate allotment of voting machines.

So Jesus fucking Christ- would you stop blaming Kerry!?!

[okieinpain]

16. kerry screwed up. example letting blackwell get away with not putting

enough voting booths in black neighborhoods. they should have had the lawyers on that one from the get go. no way somebody should have to wait 4 hours to vote. that's bullshit, they should have went in with the number of registered voters in each county and demended enough machine be available for that county. yeah kerry sucks.

[LittleClarkie]

3. I wonder how the lawsuit is going in Ohio

I think the last time I checked it was waiting for a date to be set. I think the last action I saw was in January.

I think Kerry and Co could have factored alot of things into their math. I think they were using 2000 as a guide, and got punked in a whole new way. They were expecting recounts, ala Florida. They got other things in Ohio.

I just think the party itself as a whole needs to beef itself up. That's why I'm pinning alot of my hopes on Dean. I'm hoping he's feeding the party its veggies and making it grow up big and strong. Because no matter what candidate we put up there on the national level, he/she can't do it alone.

[politicasista]

5. I smell another flame war coming

not from the OP, but elsewhere. I do agree that the campaign should have never underestimated Blackwell or any repuke SOS. He is EVIL period.

[LittleClarkie]

6. I have my weiner stick ready

Why let a good flame go to waste.

Eh.

[Lady President]

7. Just a couple thoughts

First, I began volunteering for Kerry in the spring of 2003, I do believe he was our best choice, and I think he received the most votes in Ohio. (Just figured I should lay my cards on the table.)

I agree that Blackwell was NOT part of the Kerry campaign picture. Why? Because the campaign chose the wrong staffers to come to Ohio, especially central Ohio. Apparently, the campaign picked the 'cream of the crop' to work in Ohio. Unfortunately, none of the upper ranking staffers were Ohio natives. Those of us that were long time volunteers for Kerry tried to explain about Blackwell, Diebold, etc., but the staffers were over confident that they knew best. Heck, we couldn't convince staffers that we might know which events to attend. The bottom line was that all the staffers wanted to make a name for themselves by winning Ohio-- they were city slickers from the east and would show us how it was done. :eyes:

Again, I still believe Kerry won Ohio and I always will because I was out there in the rain election day and heard what people were saying. I do think with some better planning we could have won by such a huge margin even Blackwell couldn't have taken it away.

[blm]

8. Part of the pronlem is they get 4 years to plan the theft, and our side

gets 4 months to uncover it AND campaign at the same time.

The institution that SHOULD have been prepared during that 4 years is the DNC. It's not just presidential votes that are stolen on those machines.

[cybildisobedience]

10. couldn't agree more

I live in Pa., and was contacted early by the Kerry campaign once they had their "man on the ground." I worked for Dean, but it was apparent the long knives were out for him and Kerry was going to be the only viable vehicle for going up against Bush.
I had my doubts about Kerry's ability to really take it to Bush -- he seemed to demure a bit too much for my taste -- but I really started to panic when I started to have conversations with the Kerry folk.
I kept saying, "The media, electronic voting, the media, electronic voting," and they acted like I told them I was abducted by aliens.
On the plus side, they were well-organized and hard-working, but I don't ever think they comprehended what they were up against.

[PsycheCC]

9. Support Opposition to Blackwell's Run for Ohio Governor

I'm sure his campaign will be very well funded in return for delivering Ohio to Bush. If anyone wants to support his opposition, there's a website. It's OhioDems.com, but it isn't working right now. As Molly Ivans said, organizing Democrats is like herding cats. Hopefully, they'll get it running soon.

Ken Blackwell--> :evilfrown:

[Lady President]

12. Correct link

I agree that we are going to desperately need money if we have a chance against Blackwell. He's already brought in tons of money with $1k dinners in D.C.

Here is the link to the Ohio Dems website: http://www.ohiodems.org/

[PsycheCC]

13. Thanks for the link!

Thanks Lady President. I should have researched more carefully before giving the wrong link. :blush:

[orleans]

14. welcome to DU psyche

(come for the show, stay for the small talk :hi: )

[PsycheCC]

18. Thanks for the Welcome orleans

:bounce:

[zulchzulu]

15. Ohio was a huge Kerry effort.....I was there...Blackwell was in crosshairs

I was in Cleveland and Dayton for some efforts throughout the campaign as a grassroots supporter and videographer.

People knew about Blackwell. People knew that they were trying to rip Ohioans off with different crap. But you can only stop a crook the best you can.

This was common knowledge in the Kerry Campaign:

Pre-November 2

Dirty tricks return to the sunshine state
Phony letters tell people they cannot vote
58,000 Absentee Ballots Missing in Florida
New Florida vote scandal feared
Gallup Poll Racially-Biased
Electronic vote machine too easily corrupted
Purposely Corrupted Diebold Voting Terminals
Paid Bush supporters cause uproar
1 Million Kerry Votes Already Stolen

November 2

Late Ruling Allows GOP to Challenge Ohio Voters
Foreign monitors 'barred' from US polls
Six news groups sue Ohio elections chief
Voting list snafu causes problems in Marion County
Bogus calls target area Democrats
GOP doing all it can to keep minorities from voting
Is there inner-city election suppression in Ohio?
E-Voting Problems Crop Up

November 3

Group tallies more than 1,100 e-voting glitches
Residents turned away at polls
E-Voting machines give Bush 5% advantage
Exit polls and ‘actual’ results don’t match
CNN changes Ohio exit poll page
Errors plague voting process in Ohio, Pa.

More:
http://whatreallyhappened.com/2004votefraud.html

[Lady President]

19. I disagree

The grassroots groups that came to Ohio knew about Blackwell and Diebold long before the election. The Ohio Democratic Party knew. The county parties knew. All the active volunteers knew.

The official Kerry campaign distanced themselves from this type of discussion. I still think highly of several of the Ohio staffers, but they considered potential voting fraud tin foil hat material and dismissed it. It was the grassroots organizations who had volunteers at the polls watching for irregularities, not Kerry.

Kerry played gentleman politics. Unfortunately, when its Gentleman vs. Sumabitch, the gentleman usually loses.

You are completely correct that Nov. 3 the staffers did have to acknowledge that odd things happened here.

[windbreeze]

17. I Don't Know

IF Kerry & Co.,underestimated Ken Blackwell, or not....but the fact remains that the owner of the Diebold machines promised he would deliver the state of Ohio to Bush, way before the election was ever held...so IF Kerry did underestimate his opponents, which was a combination of Diebold/Blackwell AND Bush...I can't understand HOW....and UNTIL/UNLESS the Dems take action to secure changes in voting procedures....do I really have to finish???
windbreeze