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Yes,
Virginia, Democracy Involves Voting
When
is a democratic election not a democratic election?
When the U.S. government and/or the corporate media say it’s
not?
Sunday’s election in Spain, in which record numbers of voters
ousted the right-wing (and pro-Bush) Popular Party in favor
of the Socialist Workers Party (which opposed the U.S. invasion
of Iraq and Spain’s ongoing military presence there), has
rattled certain members of the world’s power elite, notably
the administrations of U.S. President George W. Bush and British
Prime Minister Tony Blair. It also has led to a characterization
of the election in the mainstream U.S. media not as an expression
of the people’s will but as a subversion of democracy by the
terrorists whose bombs killed 200 people last week in Madrid.
“Spain Grapples With Notion That Terrorism Trumped Democracy,”
asserted a New York Times headline yesterday (Wed.,
March 17). “Thus, Islamic extremists have good reason to interpret
the election results as proof that they can not only spread
fear among whole populations but also bring down governments
as well,” chimed in an Albany Times Union editorial
that appeared the same day.
A little historical perspective is in order: Our government—most
notably under Republican administrations—always has served
up plenty of rhetoric about democracy but often has been less-than-enthusiastic
about seeing it in practice, especially in countries of strategic
or economic interest where our influence and ability to plunder
are threatened when our ruthless despot friends can’t get
themselves reelected. Thus the democratically elected government
of Salvador Allende was overthrown in Chile in 1973; the Sandinista
government of Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua was never recognized
by the United States (or The New York Times), even
after the widely-hailed-as-democratic elections of 1984, and
eventually was hammered out of favor by a decade of economic
sabotage; and most recently, Haitian President Jean-Bertrand
Aristide apparently was kidnapped and thus removed from office
in a barely concealed, U.S.-engineered coup. These are just
a few highlights, and there is no end in sight; given enough
time, the Bush administration surely will find a way to undermine
the democratically elected government of President Hugo Chavez
of Venezuela.
If you haven’t noticed, the Republicans have brought their
disdain for the people’s will home with a vengeance these
last four years. Sure, they’ve always been opposed to such
pesky manifestations of democracy as voter registration (perhaps
because they would be oh-so-outnumbered if we ever approached
full registration of the eligible), but the past few years
have been truly remarkable—beginning with the obvious, the
nondemocratic “election” of Bush in 2000. Then we had the
California recall election, a skillfully planned and executed
Republican plot to take control of the strategically important
state shortly after voters had returned the admittedly unlikable
Gray Davis to office.
And there were dirty tricks aplenty during the 2002 elections,
notably in Minnesota; I won’t comment on the Wellstone plane
crash, of which we know relatively little, but I will comment
on the smear campaign orchestrated immediately after his funeral,
which the media overdramatized as an offensive political rally,
likely tipping the election to Norm Coleman. Finally, touch-screen
voting machines were in place in a number of states, at least
a few of which had surprise outcomes not foreseen by election-eve
polls. Fraud? Who knows, but Republican strategy these days
seems to go like this: If you’re not happy with the outcome
of a democratic election, just change it.
Can Bush and his posse change the outcome in Spain? Not likely,
in the near term—which is why, for now, they are trying to
cast the election as a dangerous case of terrorists having
their way with an entire nation, sabotaging democracy and
dictating the outcome of an election. And with the corporate
media’s help, they are doing just that. Which domino will
be next, frightened citizens wonder: Italy? England? The United
States? Never mind that it is not easy to predict how voters
might react to a preelection terrorist attack in any of those
countries (or whether Al Qaeda would prefer John Kerry to
George Bush); this analysis of the Spanish election is simplistic
and, ultimately, insulting to the concept of democracy.
For one thing, external events influence election outcomes
all the time—and are exploited by candidates for whatever
edge they might bring. Governments in power, as well as their
challengers, typically try to manipulate public opinion—not
always by legitimate means. In the now infamous “October Surprise”
episode of 1980, President Jimmy Carter may have attempted
to ensure his reelection by negotiating a last-minute release
of American hostages held in Iran; and George H.W. Bush, William
Casey, et al., may have thwarted that attempt and enhanced
Ronald Reagan’s chances by secretly negotiating with Iranians
in Paris to hold off any deal till after the election. It
is of no small consequence that outgoing Spanish Prime Minister
José Maria Aznar first attempted to exploit the Madrid bombings
to his party’s favor, both by suggesting that it justified
his alliance with Bush (who also sought to exploit it to justify
his “war on terror”) and by initially blaming the Basque separatists,
even after the evidence pointing toward Islamic fundamentalists
began to mount. To then despair publicly that the terrorists
sabotaged democracy is pure hypocrisy.
More important, the post-bombing actions of the government
deepened public hostility toward the government and its policy
on the Iraq war, which was already opposed by some 90 percent
of the Spanish populace. Reports from Spain suggest that Aznar’s
actions underscored the conviction of many Spaniards that
his support of the U.S. invasion had actually increased the
threat of terrorism at home. Voters’ apparent desire for a
safer Spain would make the analysis that they unwittingly
sided with terrorists paradoxical at best. Finally, the record
turnout Sunday may speak to long-simmering anger being forced
to the surface rather than a knee-jerk expression of fear;
variations of this sentiment are plentiful on the Internet
right now, and even the Times reported that many Spaniards
voted “not so much out of fear of terror as anger against
a government they saw as increasingly authoritarian, arrogant
and stubborn.” And finally, isn’t a surge in voter turnout,
by definition, an enhancement of the democratic process?
As one observer put it in a Web post, “Why is it that people
who claim to love democracy don’t trust the people to use
it?”
—Stephen
Leon
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Columns
& Opinions
