Allen Raymond, author of How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative, spent three months in federal prison for his role in rigging the 2002 New Hampshire Senate election.
He collected $15,600 from the Republican State Committee and paid a telemarketing company $2,300 to make non-stop hangup calls to six phone lines, jamming them for at least an hour and a half. Five of the lines were being used by the Democratic party to remind people to vote, and one was being used by the firefighter’s union, which gives people rides to the polls.
The Republican candidate won by a slim margin, but it’s not clear whether he would have won without the phone jamming. Raymond and three others were found guilty of federal crimes. (He denies helping George W. Bush defeat Al Gore in 2000, saying he couldn’t bring himself to work for Bush.)
Raymond expects “dirty tricks” to play a role in the upcoming Presidential election. He says tactics that have been used in the past include hiring off duty police officers to hang out at the polls in certain communities to intimidate voters, and putting up flyers telling people that because of where they live, they have to vote on a different day.
I’ve already seen one arguably dirty trick: this video. Type in someone’s info, and it emails them a video accusing them of losing the vote for Barack Obama by not voting.
A little dirty but perfectly legal, the video is sponsored by MoveOn.org, and they say they’re aiming to reach 10 million people before election day. They say their goal is to convince people that everyone else is voting, and everyone will know if they don’t vote for Obama.
I’m sure there will be more of this stuff from supporters of both parties. (I guess some people might consider PalinAsPresident another example.) Be sure you aren’t tricked into not voting, or voting for someone who’s not your choice.
The election is Tuesday, November 4, 2008, regardless of what any suspicious people or mysterious flyers may tell you. Have both your driver’s license and voter card with you just in case. Also, 31 states allow you to vote early in person without an excuse, and 28 states allow absentee voting without an excuse.
I live in Florida – home of the election incompetence! I’ll be voting November 4th – and holding my breath, hoping it “counts”.
Kathy @ Virtual Impax´s last blog post..The Name of the Game is Trust
My ex husband sent my son that one vote video. We thought it was hilarious. A joke, not a dirty trick. Are you serious? Have you seen the video? I believe that there will be lots of dirty tricks come Nov 4th, there already have been, but I don’t think this video is one of them. And if someone is so stupid that they believe it, maybe they shouldn’t be voting. I’m just saying.
Hi Hunter: The US is suppossed to have one of the cleanest political races in the world (if not the most), but the more that you hear about hanging chads, the US Supreme Court basically deciding who the next President will be, Acorn, and people like Allan Raymond that more you have to wonder about the political process. Maybe we should just forget the whole notion of government and come up with something else.
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@ Kathy, let’s hope the Florida ballots aren’t so confusing this time!
@ Carol, that’s just it–it’s a political message disguised as a joke. People get this video and think it’s hilarious (which it is), so they pass it on to their friends, purely for entertainment value. They say it’s now going out to more than 30 people per second (which I find hard to believe, but that’s what they say).
After you send it to someone, they send you an email from “Peter Koechley, CNNBC News.” CNNBC is not a real organization as far as I know, but it sounds like CNN and NBC so it sounds official to people. Peter Koechley is actually a staff writer for The Onion.
This email basically says that the video is designed to trick people into voting for Obama, although they try to make it look like they’re just encouraging people to vote in general.
I wouldn’t necessarily call it dirty (certainly not compared to phone jamming), but it’s definitely controversial. This is why they have to say “Not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee” in the email, to keep Obama from getting in trouble. If it was just meant for entertainment or to encourage voting, they would offer a pro-McCain version as well.
“And if someone is so stupid that they believe it, maybe they shouldn’t be voting.”
I completely agree–most people shouldn’t vote. Unfortunately, they will.
@ Marelisa, it’s definitely a mess, but unfortunately I don’t know what to do about it. Anarchy is no good. I guess eliminating corruption would be a huge step forward, but that’s easier said than done.
I can’t add to this post as I am not an American. As a general observer, all I can say is that politics can be a really tricky business anywhere in the world.
Evelyn Lim´s last blog post..Can You Read My Mind?
@ Evelyn, I’m sure even crazier things happen in politics in some other countries, so yes, very tricky indeed.
Nice article Hunter. I actually received one of those MoveOn.org emails, and i thought it was really funny. I actually forwarded it to a few people because I thought it was a good laugh, and for no other reason besides that. It’s a great example of viral marketing, because they are actually getting non-democrats to promote a leftist agenda, simply because of a funny, personalized video….pretty savvy marketing!
Keep it up!
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@ Conrad, yup, it’s funny enough to go viral, even among non-Democrats. It was very well executed.
I saw similar videos a few months ago about [insert your name] being a presidential candidate, and it was funny too. When I saw this one, in the first fraction of a second I thought “OK, another one of these funny videos.” Then I saw it was pro-Obama, and I thought, “OMG, it’s not just humor, it’s a political message!”