Here We Go Again...

The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), the largest regional organization in the world with 55 participating nations, will monitor the U.S. election on Nov. 2. Members include Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Russia, Spain and the United States.

"OSCE members, including the United States, agreed in 1990 in Copenhagen to allow fellow members to observe elections in one another's countries," Mr. Kelly wrote. "Consistent with this commitment, the United States has already invited the OSCE's Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) to observe the November 2, 2004, presidential elections."

Actually I have no problem with this. It's this kind of thing that gets me riled up:

The Democrats who had pushed for U.N. involvement applauded the move, saying it may help avoid what they say was disenfranchisement of voters during the 2000 election in Florida and other states.

"This represents a step in the right direction toward ensuring that this year's elections are fair and transparent," said Rep. Barbara Lee, California Democrat. "I am pleased that the State Department responded by acting on this need for international monitors. We sincerely hope that the presence of the monitors will make certain that every person's voice is heard, every person's vote is counted."

She said that filmmaker Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" showed "that the 2000 presidential elections were rife with deception and fraud."

"Our elections certainly should be fair and free and transparent, and we know the last election was not," she added.

So now our elected leaders are getting their information from movie theaters. After all, why ask the Civil Rights Commission?

"The Civil Rights Division found no credible evidence in our investigations that Floridians were intentionally denied their right to vote during the November 2000 election," Assistant Attorney General Ralph Boyd wrote in a letter to Capitol Hill.

Two separate media recounts concluded that Mr. Bush carried Florida and, therefore, won the election. But Democrats, especially black leaders such as Jesse Jackson, continue to charge that blacks were disenfranchised and that Mr. Bush "stole" the election through a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

Thirteen Democrats in the House first sent a letter in July to U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan asking that the world body monitor the U.S. election. But under U.N. guidelines, the official written request for electoral assistance must come from a representative of the "member state" or "national electoral authorities" — meaning the Bush administration itself, not the legislature.

Translation: like many Florida voters, our august legislators cannot read instructions. They also may be unclear on the functions of the three branches of government.

The GOP-controlled House last month passed an amendment to a foreign-aid bill barring federal officials from using money to ask the United Nations to observe the Nov. 2 election. Rep. Steve Buyer, Indiana Republican and sponsor of the amendment, fiercely opposed U.N. participation.

Translation: Dang, that didn't work...

The Democrats then requested monitors through the State Department in a letter to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell.

"I am pleased that Secretary Powell is as committed as I am to a fair and democratic process," Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, Texas Democrat, said after the State Department announced it would allow observers. "The presence of monitors will assure Americans that America cares about their votes and it cares about its standing in the world."

The USofA... closely watched by human rights monitors to ensure that violations that never occurred don't happen again.

Because we care.

- Cassandra