Today the Congress decides at 10am Pacific Time whether to accept the electors chosen in Ohio and the other states. Some feel, as this letter writer from truthout does: "If no Senators come forward to demand the investigation that the evidence requires, then the very Party that once produced the great social advances now systematically being destroyed by those who stole this election will itself start to dissolve. But that dissolution will have been self-initiated." Yesterday, Jesse Jackson said, “The anomalies in Ohio are greater than the anomalies in Florida in 2000," before making a last ditch appeal to Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid. Some Beltway insiders like this congressional staff member, quoted in today's Boston Globe, believe that ''We lost. We need to move on." The New York Times story today, Election Results to Be Certified, With Little Fuss From Kerry makes this claim, backed up by a quote from the GOP: "Such a debate could prove uncomfortable for Democrats, who do not want to be viewed as sore losers. But Republicans seemed eager for it. "They are really just trying to stir up their loony left," John Feehery, a spokesman for Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, said of the Democrats." Cliff Arnebeck, the Ohio attorney representing the challengers in court has this today, in an article in the Columbus Free Press: "Today, you are being asked to certify the reported votes of the Electoral College...on the basis of ...The faith-based neocon fallacy that vote counts do not have to be independently verified. This new "con" holds that facts may be overcome by assertions of faith by those in power. Thus, the Bush campaign co-chair for Ohio and Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell need not count 106,000 as yet uncounted Ohio ballots, because he has faith they would not make a difference in the reported 119,000 vote difference, even though these uncounted votes all are in areas of Ohio that demonstrated strong support for John Kerry, and because, as Secretary of State he has the power not to count them." John Conyers, who has been the leader in the Congress of the effort to investigate the Ohio vote, puts it this way, from the AP story, "Dem Lays Out Case Against Bush's Ohio Win": "We have found numerous, serious election irregularities in the Ohio presidential election. There are ample grounds for challenging the electors from the state of Ohio. In many cases these irregularities were caused by intentional misconduct and illegal behavior, much of it involving Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell, the co-chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign in Ohio." Bloggerman makes a prediction: "Nothing is in writing and daybreak is a long way away, but it appeared all but certain in early evening Wednesday that House Democrats had secured the support of up to half a dozen Senators to formally challenge the Electoral College slate from Ohio," from his latest post, "Challengers are go." Michael Moore breaks it down: "C'mon Senators! Especially you Democrats. Here is your one shining moment of courage. Will you allow the gavel to come down on our black members of Congress once again? Or will you stand up for their right to object? We will all be watching."- from his "Just One Senator... An Open Letter to the U.S. Senate." Because of the deafening silence from editorial pages all over the country, I forgot that they could support the challenge to the Ohio vote, until I read this, from The Capital Times in Madison, WI: "Don't certify Ohio results." Senator Feingold, are you listening?
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