Every Vote Counts?

I think I am smarter than a majority of Americans.  Now before you go thinking that I am being conceited, let me first say that you are also smarter than a majority of Americans……if you voted for Mitt Romney.

However, just because I think I am smarter than a majority of Americans, that doesn’t give me the right to control how the rest of America votes or take away their right to vote.

Sadly, this is exactly what many elitists in Washington and in politics around the country DO think.  They think they know what is best for our country or at least what is best for their agenda, so they are systematically taking away the rights of citizens by either rigging elections or by out-right fraud in some of the nation’s most hotly contested races.  At least that is what it looks like.

Two rising stars in the Republican Party, straight talking Allen West and new to the game Mia Love, were both the favorites to win their congressional races.  In the last poll conducted for the Allen West campaign, he was leading his competitor by whopping 11 points.  At one point in Mia Love’s race she was also leading her opponent by 11 points.  But when the votes started coming in on election night we could all see that something wasn’t right.

Mia Love ended up losing her race by a mere 2,700 votes and, although, she hasn’t conceded, the chance of her winning the race doesn’t look good.

Personally, I was closely watching the Allen West race because he is my congressional candidate.  I had volunteered for his campaign and even appeared on camera for him on a get out the vote video, so when the vote count started scrolling across the bottom of the screen, I was dumbfounded.

Allen West and his competitor, Patrick Murphy, were neck and neck all night long.  Still, West led most of the night by at least a 1,000 votes until just after midnight when a sudden shift showed Patrick Murphy up by 2,000+ votes.

To some that may not seem that odd but to me it seemed very odd.  I had seen the West to Murphy sign ratio in people’s yards, I had seen the West to Murphy bumper sticker ratio, and I had seen the huge get out the vote effort for Allen West – all of which pointed to landslide win by West.  So when I saw that not only was the race close but suddenly West was losing – I literally went into shock.

Thankfully, West did not concede the race but rather started the legal proceedings to get a recount and good thing he did because after the election many people could see that something had gone very awry.

There were many issues on election night in St. Lucie County: their website was down, memory cards failed and polling location doors were locked during vote tabulation (which is against Florida statute).  And strangest of all, West was winning until a “recount” was done on election night and then suddenly Murphy was winning–with a vote shift of almost 4,000 votes.  

So you would think that with all the evidence of severe issues, the Supervisor of Elections for St. Lucie County would gladly, willingly, do a recount. Well, think again.

Although, Gertrude Walker, the Supervisor of Elections for St. Lucie County, pretended to cooperate at one point and agreed to a full recount of all early votes, she suddenly changed her mind on the “recount” day and said they would only recount 3 of the 7 days of early voting.

Why? Your guess is as good as mine.

If they really wanted to run an open and honest election, why would they “cherry pick” certain dates to recount?  How is that type of behavior going to prove anything except dishonesty? Well, it didn’t and it won’t.  What it did show was that this election was not honest and that many, many questions needed to be answered.

However, questions were not answered, and this week Patrick Murphy headed to Washington for his new congressional member orientation.

If the voice of the voter is knowingly silenced by deceptive and unlawful practices, what is the point of an election? If there are no real elections, then we are no longer a democracy, and if we are no longer a democracy, then what are we?

As American citizens we cannot stand by and let this type of tyranny prevail.  If we don’t stand up for our right to vote and for our right to an honest election, then we might as well kiss our freedom goodbye – if it isn’t already gone.