Are You Sure The Election Was Real? by Lorenzo Hagerty

Are You Sure The Election Was Real?

Lorenzo Hagerty, November 5, 2004

Maybe the reason I'm questioning whether the recent election was real is that (in order to keep some semblance of sanity) I've restricted my television news input to a single program. Yes, the only TV news I trust is Jon Stewart's fake news on The Daily Show.

What I like best about that show is the fact that the news, as presented by Stewart and his team of highly trained investigative reporters, seems so real. When he shows those funny clips of Bush saying something that he later denies ever having said, I actually believe he caught Bush lying. But then Jon laughs and says it's just fake news.

With input like that, you can see how it would be natural for me to think that the 2004 presidential "election" was not an election at all, but was a pre-scripted event. Before I explain what I mean by this, let me make it absolutely clear that this is a fake news story. No one could possibly believe it is true because that would involve one of those insane conspiracy theories, and intelligent people are forbidden by natural law from believing anything that smacks of a conspiracy, because we all know that conspiracies don't really exist. Just because the facts happen to fit this story doesn't mean it's real. So relax and enjoy my little fantasy.

Many years ago, I was a political activist engaged in the issue of the live POWs we left behind in Viet Nam. As those of you who were also involved know, the issue had almost gained enough momentum get national attention when Kerry and McCain buried it in their disgraceful Senate committee hearings. At the time, many Viet Nam veterans and their families concluded that neither Kerry or McCain could ever be trusted again. It had become obvious that they must be reporting to some higher authority than the US Constitution.

Flash forward to 2003. A hick governor from a small state is all of a sudden whipping up a major anti-war movement and has figured out how to leverage the Internet to overpower the other contenders for the top spot on the Democratic ticket. At the same time, the dark forces in our government hadn't noticed the digital revolution until it was too late, and now pictures of Americans torturing Iraqi citizens flooded the Net. For a moment there, it began to look like the Capitalist Elite were losing control of the political situation.

Suddenly, as if a switch had been thrown in the back corner of a dark cellar somewhere, the Corporate-Controlled Media, as if in lock-step, turned on Howard Dean and practically anointed John Kerry. Something struck me about that as being just a bit too well-orchestrated to have happened so quickly and smoothly. Then I recalled that over a year before the first primary, several party insiders told me that Kerry, without any doubt, was going to be the Democratic Party candidate in 2004. Apparently, as early as January 2001 the fix was in for Kerry. At least that is the story I heard. … NOW REMEMBER, this is a fake story. So it's OK to suspend your disbelief for a while, just for the fun of it.

Now comes the good part. We hold an election, and our two candidates, the two very best men our nation has to offer, just happen to be very rich white men from powerful establishment families. They both just happen (this is surely a coincidence) to be alumni of the same elite Eastern university and to have been in the same super-secret, dark-edged society where they swore blood oaths to one another, oaths they are unwilling to disclose to the American public. While all of this is actual fact, let's be honest here. Maybe this secret society oath they swore was nothing more sinister than, "I'll be your friend if you'll be mine." Maybe they won't disclose their secret pledge simply because it sounds too goofy. That's a possibility too, but it doesn't really change the story much.

The Big Day finally arrives, and the Capitalist Elite aren't worried at all. After all, it's going to be a Skull n Bones victory one way or the other. However, Bonesmen follow their own code of honor, one that includes the tenet, "If you broke it, you've got to fix it." So, as a matter of honor, Bush has no choice but to serve another four years in a desperate attempt to straighten out the mess he's made of the world. And Kerry does his part by running an inept campaign to help Bush win. For example, Kerry completely ignored the immense amount of energy available from the anti-war movement. It was quite convenient for his fellow Bonesman, however, that Kerry almost single-handedly neutered the rapidly growing band of anti-war activists that Howard Dean had courted.

Still, We the People wanted change so desperately that we were even willing to accept Kerry as a stop-gap measure. Now Kerry was in real trouble. How could he let Bush remain in power if he got too many votes? Granted, he was the Corporate Elite's backup man, but they were far better off with the more simple-minded Bush to push around. Kerry knew that the Democrats would be thinking about the 2000 election, the one that was stolen through the massive vote fraud conducted by officials of the state of Florida. So, taking his cue from Karl Rove's Big Lie propaganda machine, late on election night Kerry sent young John Edwards out to announce that the fight wasn't over until every last vote was counted. Considering the fact that a significant amount of voting fraud had already been reported, the nation went to bed feeling secure in the knowledge that this time the Democrats wouldn't fold, and that the election would be fair. No one would have to go out and riot in the streets the next morning. Everyone relaxed.

What a shock it was then to awaken to the news that the Bush people had already declared Bush the winner, and that John Kerry was about to make a concession speech. HUH? Did they really count every vote like they promised? What about the 250,000 votes in Ohio that still hadn't been counted? That was almost twice the size of the current margin in Ohio. There didn't even need to be a recount or a court fight. All Kerry had to do was to simply wait until all the votes were counted. Isn't that what Edwards had promised just a few hours earlier? Instead, Kerry simply folded, gave up, quit.

OK, now remember, things couldn't have actually happened this way. It's simply an interesting series of coincidences that make the facts fit this story so well. If you try, I'm sure you can come up with even better stories about what just happened. But please, don't tell me that the recent election was real. No story should be that sad.

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