In 2004, I was a volunteer for MoveOn in Ann Arbor, MI. My job on
> Election Day was to be at the polls all day and check off the voters
> we'd contacted who came out to vote. I wore a red vest and hat so
> people would recognize me; we'd told them to check in with "the guy in
> the red hat and vest" after they'd voted.
>
> There was a Republican operative at the polls most of that day too; a
> short grumpy-looking woman. She had a difficult job; Ann Arbor is a
> liberal place and the polls were very busy. Her main task was to
> prowl the lines of voters and make anyone wearing Kerry sticker or
> button remove it. She would grab the election official and drag him
> over to the offending Kerry supporter and make him tell them that
> campaigning at a polling place was not allowed.
>
> I thought this was somewhat odd. These were voters, not campaign
> operatives; there was no attempt by any of the button-wearers to
> persuade others. They were merely waiting in line to vote. Wasn't
> this suppression of free speech? The authorities said, "no", and
> everyone complied.
>
> As I watched the returns that night, and dealt with my disappointment,
> I pondered the tactic I seen this grumpy woman employ. I think what
> she was suppressing was not excessive campaigning or undue influence
> by political operatives, but an awareness by Democrats of just how
> many of us there were in Ann Arbor and how few Bush supporters. If we
> didn't realize how strong we were, we would be less inclined to
> question an adverse result. Happily, through our efforts, Michigan
> went for Kerry. Unfortunately, it wasn't needed by Bush; he had Ohio.
>
> There are many ways to steal an election, but the lesson of the Orange
> Revolution in Ukraine is none of them work when the people do not
> believe the official (and falsified) result. If an administration is
> going to fix an election, it is essential that they establish
> plausible deniability - "There was massive urban turnout in the
> cities, but an even greater surge of rural evangelical Christians who
> were concerned about Moral Issues and worried about homosexuality".
> Were there reports of clogged polling places in the country-side? No.
> Was there an unprecedented mobilization of Democrats in 2004? -
> Absolutely. Were there significantly more Evangelical Christians
> voting for Bush in 2000 than in 2004? - doubtful. Were there issues
> in Ohio with electronic voting machines, specious terrorism watch
> reports during vote counting, long lines in Democratic-leaning
> precincts, shenanigans involving voter registration paper weight
> guidelines, absurd provisional ballot regulations? - Yes. Were any of
> these incidents investigated? - Alas, no. Yet, the spin was just
> plausible enough. Apparently, we lost by a hair.
>
> So, what is to prevent another disappointing but plausible result -
> another undocumented and unobserved surge in "value voters" too shy to
> answer exit polls - another "squeaker" where "just enough" neocons are
> reelected to prevent the investigations we need to put things right?
> There are more unverifiable electronic voting machines in place than
> ever before, despite the efforts of concerned citizens around the
> county. "All politics are local" they will say; "voters liked their
> congressmen". We are already being primed for this message.
>
> We must believe we have won, but the media will not tell us we have.
> In these days when Fox "News" is actively spewing 'runaway bride'
> distractions and blatant propagandistic falsehoods and ABC airs "The
> Path to 9/11" without commercial breaks but full of fabricated
> slanders, we cannot trust the media to police the fairness of the
> election. We must do so ourselves.
>
> My idea: Wear Blue. If all who vote against the administration show
> up at the polls wearing blue - blue jeans, blue shirts, blue hats,
> blue suits, blue sweater, anything blue - and all who do so observe
> the numbers of their fellow citizens who are wearing blue, then the
> essential plausibility of a "squeaker" election will be belied.
>
> Election coverage in recent years has given us an advantage; it has
> given us the color blue. Democratic-leaning areas are called "Blue
> States"; the South and West are known as Red States. This fact has
> not escaped fearful Republican incumbents. Today, Republicans are
> consciously printing lawn signs in only blue and white. They know
> their party is unpopular, and they hope that people will not remember
> that they voted in lock step. But, they are not blue; we are.
>
> If, in all our "get out the vote" efforts we add two requests: 1. wear
> something blue to the polls, and 2. look around and see how many other
> are wearing blue too; we can make "blue" work for us the way the
> "orange" worked for Ukraine. Both are easy requests. People will
> doubtless have plenty of time to observe their neighbors as they wait
> to vote; and everyone has a blue garment in their wardrobe.
>
> What can Karl Rove do to counter this? He can try to copy it and have
> his gang show up in red. Not only would this be lame copycatism, it
> would be foolish. The president and the congress are both wildly
> unpopular - people beyond the "hard core 30%" are not willing to stand
> up for him even though they might still vote Republican. He could
> tell his gang to wear blue too, thus confusing the issue. Then
> everyone shows up in blue and we win too. Universal blue would only
> reinforce our strength, since the objective is to show how numerous we
> are. "We wore blue too!" rings hollow and doesn't have the power
> needed to create plausible deniability. Furthermore, they can't stop
> us. People may back down when told to remove campaign materials in
> the face of local election ordinances, but we know we have the right
> to wear blue. The Republican election monitors may be able to prevent
> stickers or campaign buttons, but they won't dare say that one must
> remove one's pants or shirt to enter the polling place.
>
> "Wear Blue" lets people be involved in an easy, non-threatening way.
> People appreciate being asked to do things that do not cost them
> special effort, pain or money. Everyone has a pair of jeans or a blue
> shirt. But, people who are tired or uncomfortable with our country's
> course need to know that they are not alone in wanting a change.
>
> The right is so vocal and vicious in their attacks specifically
> because they wish to discourage dissent. Critics of administration
> policy are accused of "aiding and abetting" the terrorists - the
> charge of treason is implicit in the language. I wrote a sarcastic
> letter to the editor in 2004 about the Yale yearbook photo of Bush
> caught committing a rugby penalty and got hate mail sent to my home.
> The message was clear - they hated me and they knew where I lived.
> The fact that the letter was irrational and badly spelled was not
> reassuring; irrational angry people do unpredictable dangerous things.
> A person wearing blue, on the other hand, has their own cover; they
> can claim ignorance and coincidence if threatened. People wear blue
> clothes all the time, after all.
>
> We must win this election. Moreover, we must "know" that we've won
> before Karl Rove and Fox news tell us we're wrong. We must see for
> ourselves how strong we are, so when the unverifiable results from the
> machines with proprietary software and no paper trail say that we lost
> again, we don't believe them because we saw differently. We must feel
> that we've won before the results are announced. Remember, Gore was
> winning before Bush's cousin called Florida and the election for him
> from the Fox news room.
>
> Democratic populism works when the vast majority of the population
> realize they are in the majority. It was this realization that was
> the downfall of Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines. It was this
> realization the toppled the regimes of Eastern Europe. We can create
> our own "Orange Revolution" even with crooked machines and a lackey
> press against us, but we must show ourselves that we've won. We must
> "wear blue".
>
> So, in your last minute "get out the vote" efforts, seal the
> conversation with "Wear Blue". "Wear Blue" yourselves - every day
> from now until the election. I have (without attracting notice from
> those I have not told), and it has not been difficult. Create the
> conditions where we know we have won, and the election will be greatly
> more difficult to steal. We are in the majority. The people are with
> us as never before. Gerrymandering has made the Republicans
> vulnerable in too many districts to make it a small, quiet matter to
> fix the result, especially if they do not have plausible deniability
> on their side.
>
> Thank you for your time and attention.
>
> Peter Christian
> Citizen, patriot, liberal, Democrat.