Posted on 10/21/2004 4:27:38 AM PDT by Ginifer
Dan Harkins, a political activist in the vital swing state of Ohio, was excited when he first heard that the Guardian newspaper was recruiting readers to write to voters in his state in the hopes of giving foreigners a voice in the American election.
Yesterday, the first of about 14,000 Guardian readers' letters started arriving in the mailboxes of Clark County, Mr Harkins's home region - chosen by the British paper as a pivotal election district where President George W Bush and Senator John Kerry are neck and neck. Terry Brown Terry Brown with an anti-Bush letter sent to his soldier son from a Guardian reader
The first letters to be made public all urged Clark County voters to reject Mr Bush. As he watched the reaction of friends and neighbours, Mr Harkins was delighted.
He is the chairman of the Clark County Republican Party, and his neighbours' reaction was outrage. "It's hysterical," laughed Mr Harkins, showing off sheaves of incensed e-mails and notes from local voters.
The Republicans' delight compares with the gloom among local Democrats, who fear that "foreign interference" is hurting Mr Kerry.
Terry Brown had received a letter from a Scottish Guardian reader. The navy veteran and retired lorry builder was "offended" as he read the polite note, from Nicola Smith of West Lothian, with its denunciation of the Iraq war as a "farce", and closing plea to remove from power "the parties responsible for this war".
The Clark County press has not taken kindly to the letters
Mr Brown looked out at his front garden, decorated with a US flag on a tall pole, a giant carving of an American eagle and a wooden cross marked: "September 11, 2001".
"I feel very strongly that this was an invasion of my privacy," he said. "The right of my wife and myself to decide whom to vote for should not be affected by any other country. That was a freedom we fought for many years ago. It was 1776."
Ms Smith's letter was addressed to Mr Brown's son, Sean. Mr Brown opens the mail because his son is in the army in Missouri, pending a possible posting to Iraq.
"My son will have choice words to say about this that you can't print," said Mr Brown.
The young soldier's mother, Sarah, was indignant at the letter's talk of Iraq war casualties. "If our son has to go to Iraq, and is killed, it's something we are ready to sacrifice for freedom, and so is he." Mrs Brown suspected that the name "Nicola Smith" was false, and planned to take the envelope to her local post office for analysis of its markings.
Dan Harkins, the local Republican leader, says it has boosted Bush
Across town, Beverly Coale and her elderly mother, Thelma Arnold, received a letter from Neil Evans from Kent. Heeding the Guardian's pleas to "be courteous", he began gently: "Please act now to preserve your once-great name internationally. We know the majority of you didn't vote for Bush the first time around."
Less happily, Mr Evans concluded that another Bush victory would so anger the world that Americans would have to "put on a Canadian accent when travelling abroad". His tone so alarmed Ms Coale, a Kerry voter, that she feared the letter came from terrorists. "With so much going on today, you wonder about some of these groups," she said.
The readers' letters are being sent only to voters flagged as "undeclared" in the county's electoral roll, a public document the newspaper bought from local officials, then placed on the internet.
The Guardian says it chose Clark County not just because winning Ohio is vital to Mr Bush's hopes of victory, but because the rolls showed such a large number of undeclared voters - 54,000 not affiliated with either party.
But the newspaper misunderstood Ohio polling law, according to the county's elections supervisor, Linda Rosicka. Being "undeclared" on the roll means someone did not choose to vote in the last two party primaries, in which party candidates are chosen. "It doesn't have anything to do with being undecided," she said.
Many local Democrats expressed sympathy with the desire of British voters to have a say. That does not mean they are happy the letters are coming.
Particular gloom has been spread by letters to Clark County from chosen Left-wing celebrities, published on the Guardian website and widely read in Ohio.
Ken Loach, the film director, began his letter: "Friends, you have the chance to do the world a favour. Today, your country is reviled across continents as never before. You are seen as the greatest bully on earth."
Antonia Fraser, the historian, suggested: "If you back Kerry, you will be voting against a savage, militaristic foreign policy of pre-emptive killing, which has stained the great name of the US so hideously in recent times."
Bill Buscemi, a lifelong Democrat from Springfield, Ohio, said: "The Americans do end up electing a world leader, and it must be rather frustrating for Europeans that the choice rests in the hands of a few undecided voters in Clark County. But I doubt this is going to help the Democratic Party."
Across America, the Guardian project has sparked disdain from the Right, and dismay from Kerry campaigners. Coverage in the US media has stressed the risks of offending voters. Furious e-mails have reached the Guardian, such as this one from Texas, stating: "Real Americans aren't interested in your pansy-ass, tea-sipping opinions."
In Clark County, Mr Harkins, the local Republican chairman, has no doubt that the Guardian has helped him - and Mr Bush.
He showed figures from Republican polls, indicating that only four per cent of the county's voters were still undecided last week.
"This is a very competitive county, where the undecided vote is very small. What the Guardian has done is firm up the Republican base. What a gift."
--On April 19, 1775, we decided to express our opinion of what we think of people meddling in our affairs.
We can offer a refresher course for those who didn't quite get the message.
But we know the real truth (because Jimah Cahtah told us) that the Revolutionary war was a mistake.
Bow down to our masters the UN?
What cracks me up is the liberals complain about Pres. Bush's "arrogance." And now this? It isn't arrogant to have these foreigners lecturing U.S. voters? What planet do these people live on?
All hail the wisdom of the mighty Jimmah!
The team includes a French Communist and a former Soviet Communist. (I kid you not!)
I can understand what Sarah feels. My son just joined the army.
I'll have to steal that line my next time through. Take a tip from me, when they ask for the purpose of your visit, "wild, passionate sex" is not an answer that'll get you through the line any faster.
Here's the Guardian's wrap-up piece:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,1331922,00.html
I think we ought to set up a foundation to provide copies of the Declaration of Independence for every reader of the Guardian. In fact, for every "undecided" voter in America, too.
How many of you have read it lately? Read it. You'll learn a lot or remember a lot about why America is unique in the world.
Don't tread on me...
Well, the illegal aliens are voting. Why should you be bothered that now Brits are apparently joining in?? *rolling eyes*
Thank you Dolly for that little Mel Gibson, pick me up this morning. :-)
Well our side has many also. I will join a multi thousand briggade of 12K+ CONSERVATIVE poll watchers in OHIO on election days. If there is a FRench / Russian observer in with me,,, I take NO crap.
My little, loving contribution on a rainy day in NE Ohio
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