“Don’t mistake Americans for their government.”

I have made this statement frequently on stage in Canada and Europe this past year. Paul Reickhoff is the veteran of the Iraq invasion who gave the rebuttal to Bush’s last State of the Union address. Walking into Paul’s rented office space on Broadway one rainy spring day, I saw the soldier sitting at his desk with a headset phone, surrounded by young volunteers assembling his website for Operation Truth. Oh my God, this is their country…

Call me stupid, but it’s taken a while to set in. These were not people discussing George W.’s stupidity from the advantaged position of distance, or analyzing ‘voting trends of a gullible electorate.’ These were folks whose presidency had been hijacked, whose economic future was being dismantled in front of their eyes, and whose international image was being sullied by an illegal war. Those present were all candidates for the draft-those two words Paul said everyone in the military knew was coming, and no one outside was saying.

Canadians know them as the folks who grew up without nationalized healthcare, a static minimum wage, and no international news… And now, as of November 2, 2004, we and the world accept that Americans (not submissively, but actively-and in record numbers) joined with their hijackers, deciding to bow down and worship a shrinking status quo, hypnotized by neo-fascist ideology, queer-bashing, race-baiting, and history’s largest transfer of wealth from public to private interest.

Dick Cheney took the podium Nov. 3 and welcomed “the man who took the greatest number of popular votes of any presidential candidate in history…”

Question: How do you steal an election, preside over the worst security disaster in national history, tank the economy, start an illegal war, have a net job loss under your leadership, not know the difference between Switzerland and Sweden, never meet once with the NAACP, lose all three debates and… win the popular vote?

Answer: you don’t.

Please suffer a brief personal story.

While we were assembling the GAS CD [Ed: Chris spearheaded this double-CD project to raise funds for the legal defense of protesters arrested at the Summit of the Americas in Quebec City] in 2001, Carlos Guiliani was murdered by Italian police at the Genoa protests. Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis, who had written the liner notes, were in Argentina.

I had to scrutinize footage of the murder, and insert a paragraph that would keep with Naomi and Avi’s style. I watched the footage over and over-the Jeep driving straight into the crowd, the boy in jeans and t-shirt who picks up the fire extinguisher, the gun that shoots him in the head, the Jeep that runs back and forth over his body before speeding off. The severity of the subject matter, and the weight of editing in Avi and Naomi’s absence made me careful to say the least.

A week later I received a bulletin from a respected lefty news source headlined, “Genoa Martyr a Hoax.” Signed by world leaders and activists, the report exposed that Carlos was actually pouring gasoline around the Jeep, while off-camera, another masked villain was ready to blow the whole scene sky-high. It was a good ten minutes before I received an e-mail to ignore any propaganda coming from the hijacked server.

During those ten minutes, my heart was racing. I had somehow mistaken what I had seen with my own eyes-the credibility of the entire project was shot, as the album had already gone to print… The independent media source was not reliable… I felt insane.

But back to matters at hand. The voter intimidation techniques have been impressive. Getting a completely non-legislatable distraction about marriage rights on 11 state ballots was a fantastic strategy. Evangelists seem to be driving nice cars these days, and conservative bootlicks have great hindsight about Joseph Lieberman being the only real choice for the Democrats this year.

Everyday folks, journalists, students, and hunting enthusiasts… no one stood in the rain for nine hours to vote in the status quo. Those were Diebold vote counters in 30 counties in Florida last Tuesday. Diebold CEO Wally O’Dell promised to ‘deliver Ohio’ for George Bush at a Republican fundraiser this year. The 2002 Senate elections, courtesy of black box voting, included ‘phantom voting,’ negative vote counts, missing computer cartridges, and machines going offline for hours at a time. And of course, no paper trails.

My wish is not to rant, or to further burden heavy hearts, but to give love to all those despondent and shocked, and thanks to all those souls who work tirelessly to bring truth to their corner of life. Those were real people in voting lines last Tuesday, that was really 80,000 people in the October streets of Wisconsin, those are really American soldiers who refused their mission last month-and they were really offered Humvees without armour and e-mail voting.

The casualness with which Bush was allowed to fake his way through the debates is evidence enough of the confidence his team had in a sophisticated system, in place not only to deliver him to the Oval Office, but to deflate public will and give legitimacy to a criminal administration.

Bush’s supporters can lay claim to his base and his mess. A great many people have been manipulated, and finally, people’s votes have been manipulated.

There was a strange silence to the Internet in the first hours of November 3. Those newsgroups and watchdogs that had been publishing non-stop for the past four years were mute.

Were we all insane?

Not this time. Real numbers are coming in about counties tallying more Republican votes than there were registered voters, and exit polls being reversed three times over by computer results. An Associated Press Radio News feed report detailed how Bush was informed of his defeat early in the evening by Karen Hughes.

All’s quiet on the digital front, but not for long. Why take it from me? I’m just a musician. Get something to eat, hang out with some nice people, listen to music, get some rest. Then maybe try to remember what you were thinking to yourself a week ago.

P.S. The truth may be all that’s uncovered, but the future will live on it. Meanwhile, note that Rudolf Giuliani has adopted the open casket look made popular by Dick Cheney and Karl Rove.

P.P.S. Kate says: Sorry, CB. My worst fear is that Americans actually voted Bush into office. The real question is why, despite all evidence to the contrary, Americans would vote for something that is so clearly not in the best interests of their well-being. Clearly, fear works.

I say this being deeply suspicious of: electronic voting machines; the discouraging of demographically-selected voter blocks; the antiquated Electoral College; the limiting two-party system; the length of the campaigns themselves; this despicable, contemptuous incumbent and future administration… all of which I suspect deeply undermine the great democratic experiment, which I champion and value deeply…

It doesn’t look good, but I hate to speculate. I reserve further judgment until… a couple of weeks from now. I’m considering moving to Finland, or staying here to continue to fight the good fight, alongside my shining, hopeful, committed colleagues.

PPPS: CB, your original PS is dirty fighting.