Below is a purely fictional scenario for the rigging of the upcoming election we face next week and its aftermath:
Busloads of khaki and polo-shirted white guys descend into swing districts and disrupt the voting process and polling places just like Tom DeLay's polo-shirted thugs did in 2000 when they bullied the hapless volunteers who were trying to recount the votes in Dade County, Florida. These legions of privileged white vigilantes seemingly come from nowhere (but are really from everywhere) armed with "McCain-Palin" signs and begin early in the morning of November 4th chanting outside polling places and intimidating would-be voters in Democratic areas, especially new voters, blacks, and other minorities. They'll confront ACORN workers and Obama's Get-Out-the-Vote volunteers and spit at them and frighten them and call them "Communists!" and "Wealth Redistributors!" The disruptions are so widespread local law enforcement can't do anything about it and the federal government is nowhere to be found.
Claiming that Obama voters are committing "voter fraud" on a "massive scale" these legions of angry white men scream so loudly and are so bellicose and potentially violent local television news crews cannot help but put them on the air. Quickly their "concerns" about the "fairness" of the election hit the Right-wing echo chamber and are amplified by Fox News, the Drudge Report, and talk radio. ABC and the rest of the networks cannot resist covering the Republican-created controversy: "Are Obama partisans from ACORN stealing the election?" Voices of reason are drowned out in the ear-splitting din of aggressive white male angst. The media frame their vigilantism as if it were a legitimate "revolt" with legitimate "issues" but it is designed solely to threaten Democratic voters and spread chaos. Voters are challenged and photo identification is demanded. Tens of thousands of blacks, Latinos, and young people discover only upon arriving at the polling places that they have been purged from the voter rolls due to arcane tricks and technicalities. The "Polo-Shirts" march in a disciplined cadence around polling places making sure that anyone barred from voting will be barred for good. Scuffles and fistfights break out that are loudly blamed on black people and ACORN workers.
Twelve hours earlier, on the evening of November 3rd, and with the discipline of a military special operation, dozens of strange unmarked planes fly into small regional airports and into private landing fields inside swing districts. Highly trained professionals from an ultra-secret personnel detail tucked deep inside the Department of Homeland Security and answerable only to Dick Cheney swing into action. These federal agents, who comprise a special unit called the "Rapid Domestic Response Team" (RDRT) and comprised of many members from privatized outfits like Blackwater and Dyncorps, wearing business suits and dark glasses, with transmitters in their ears, fan out to the targeted districts and precincts with military efficiency. The agents are armed with duplicate ballot boxes stuffed with the exact number of "ballots" to win each district by a credibly narrow margin. These ballot boxes are also tailored to correspond perfectly with each county's distinct vote counting system complete with the appropriate forged signatures and documentation. They also possess high-tech computer equipment provided by the Republican-controlled companies that run the electronic voting machines. The technology allows them to change the electronic vote tally with a few punches on the keyboard of their laptops. They professionally set in motion the stunning results of the election of 2008: A very narrow Electoral College victory for the Republican ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin.
It Can't Happen Here
John McCain and Sarah Palin take their oaths of office. Within days of giving his inaugural address, President McCain's skin cancer returns, incapacitating him for a time while he undergoes medical treatment. Vice President Palin assumes the president's duties consistent with the 25th Amendment to the Constitution. While President Palin is in power, it is learned that Al Qaeda terrorists have acquired a suit case nuclear weapon from a rogue element of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).
President Palin does not "blink."
She orders air strikes against areas of Pakistan where U.S. intelligence believes the transfer of the weapon took place. Suddenly, a U.S. military installation in Iraq is blown to bits by a small atomic device widely believed to be the weapon the CIA had feared fell into Al Qaeda's hands.
President Palin again does not "blink."
She demands the nuclear codes and the "football." She brings Pastor Thomas Muthee and some of the Wasilla Assembly of God members with her into the "bunker" and begins to pray, trancelike, as is her custom. Revelations come to her that she has been thrust into this powerful position because it is God's will. And if she does not "blink" and launches a good portion of the American nuclear arsenal in the direction of the infidels in the Middle East Jesus Christ himself will return. President Palin serenely understands now that her power to destroy the world is part of God's plan. Because of her goodness and righteousness she is integral to bringing about the Second Coming, which leads her to launch more nuclear missiles in the direction of the "terrorists."
And we all live happily ever after.
--Joseph A. Palermo
