After years of vehemently denying that it even exists to the extent of editorializing that it is a myth, the New York Times has finally acknowledged that voter fraud exists...in Afghanistan.
Yes, the Times finally goes into detail exposing voter fraud in Afghanistan while continuing to deny it exists right here in the U.S.A.. One might hope the Times could devote even a tenth as much effort investigating voter fraud in this country as they did in Afghanistan but don't hold your breath. Before we turn to the Times' Afghan voter fraud exposé, let us keep it in proper perspective by first taking a look at the NYT editorial denial that what they claim is rampant in Afghanistan barely even exists in America:
...There is almost no voting fraud in America. And none of the lawmakers who claim there is have ever been able to document any but the most isolated cases. The only reason Republicans are passing these laws is to give themselves a political edge by suppressing Democratic votes.
Got that? Voter fraud, according to the Times, is just a myth perpetrated by those evil Republicans out to suppress Democrat votes. And if you hadn't figured that out from the editorial, then the unsubtle title clues you in, The Myth of Voter Fraud. Okay, now that you have been properly educated by the Times that NO voter fraud exists in America, let us go to the land where they claim it does exist with this headline, Voting Fraud Hangs Stubbornly Over Afghan Elections, With Runoff Likely:
KABUL, Afghanistan — Ahmed Zia proudly recalled how he voted in the Afghan presidential election on April 5, for the first time in his 18 years.
Then he voted for the second time, a little later that day, casting an illegal additional ballot in the same box...
GASP! Voting fraud? But I thought that was only a "myth." Oh, wait. That's right. It is only a myth in America. In Afghanistan it is "safe" for the Times to report on it so proceed:
What could conceivably shift the final balance is how fraudulent votes are handled, and how many of the votes counted so far are thrown out. The results will not be official until the Electoral Complaints Commission rules on 746 claims of serious fraud in the presidential race, which could affect as many as a million votes, although the likely total is closer to half a million.
Election officials have refused to specify how many votes are at stake in the complaints process. But just in the western city of Herat, an Abdullah stronghold, 80,000 votes have been quarantined on suspicion of fraud, officials there said.
Try to quarantine votes here in the States on suspicion of fraud and the Times would be among the first to denounce it as "voter suppression." However, in Afghanistan the Times takes a True The Vote stance:
In the last presidential election, in 2009, voters in some areas were rounded up by armed warlords and herded to the polls, where the votes they cast were checked to make sure of their obedience. In other areas, entire voting districts returned thousands of votes with 100 percent of the ballots marked for a single candidate, even though all the voting places in those districts were closed because of security threats.
Wow! 100 percent of the ballots in some voting districts marked for a single candidate? That sounds just like some precincts in Philadelphia and Cleveland in 2012 that marked 100 percent of their ballots for a certain candidate. Of course, those wanting to investigate the latter would probably be denounced by the New York Times as Voter Fraud Vigilantes.
