Hullabaloo

Saturday, October 27, 2012

 
Somali conspiracy in Ohio

by digby

So I'm guessing that if President Obama wins Ohio by a small margin, we're going to here a whole lot more about the alleged "vote fraud" that got him into office, based upon hysterical "evidence" like this from Human Events magazine:

Two volunteer poll workers at an Ohio voting station told Human Events that they observed van loads of Ohio residents born in Somalia — the state is home to the second-largest Somali population in the United States — being driven to the voting station and guided by Democratic interpreters on the voting process. No Republican interpreters were present, according to these volunteers.

While it’s not unusual for get-out-the-vote groups to help voters get to the polls, the volunteers who talked to Human Events observed a number of troubling and questionable activities.

A source, who wishes to remain anonymous, is a volunteer outside the Morse Road polling center. She has witnessed Somalis who cannot speak English come to the polling center. They are brought in groups, by van or bus. The Democrats hand them a slate card and say, “vote Brown all the way down.” Given that Sherrod Brown is the incumbent Democrat Senator in Ohio, one can assume that this is the reference.

Non-English speaking voters may use an interpreter. The interpreters are permitted by law to interpret for the individual voting; however, they are forbidden from influencing their vote in any way. Another source who also wishes to remain anonymous has seen Democrat interpreters show the non-English speaking Somalis how to vote the Democrat slate that they were handed outside. According to this second source, there are not any Republican Somali interpreters available.

The logical follow-up question is whether a non-English speaking person is an American citizen.

Of course it is. And there's absolutely no reason to believe any volunteer Republican poll worker without any evidence might be embellishing her tale at all.

It will be very interesting to see what the legal moves will be if any of these swing states are very close. But it almost doesn't matter. If Obama wins with anything other than a decisive victory in both the popular vote and the electoral college, we will see a collective right wing primal scream. They don't think he's legitimate in the first place, but to eke out a close victory when they already believe that many of "those people" are voting illegally is likely to provoke an emotional response.

This is why I very much doubt that we are going to see a chastened and reasonable GOP in the next congress. Their base is going to be wild with the belief that the election was stolen from them.

h/t to DJ

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digby 10/27/2012 12:30:00 PM