LATEST NEWS:
Nov 5:  The latest from Greg Palast
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/kerry_won_.php
Who really knows but ... its interesting.

Earlier: If this guy is right then Kerry started at about a million votes behind.
http://www.tompaine.com/articles/an_election_spoiled_rotten.php
Although he is controversial, I think Greg Palast is considered quite a good journalist.
--Ex-Pat Kiwi for VillagePRESS 

PREVIOUS STORIES.....

 As Bush was about to win a second term and the world gasps
Ex-Pat Kiwi in the States
Tells VillagePRESS how things are on US voting day:

   Right now its lunchtime at work on election day. There probably isn't all that much I can tell you
that you don't know already.
    There are no laws like in NZ against campaigning on the day so its all still on until the polls close. It all seems a bit uncivilised really.
    With the multiple time zones you get a last minutes begging for votes moving west across the country. Then they start announcing east coast results before lots of people in the west have voted. That may not matter so much this time because I think most of the swing states are at least
east of the centre. I think they start announcing exit poll results some time during the day.
    Something that seems plain silly but people seem to take notice of it is two very small communities (about 40 people in total) in Northern New Hampshire who voted last night at midnight and immediately count the votes. Bush won both of them and that's on the news this morning.
    I have no idea which way it could go. There are millions of people who think the country and the world are on the brink of disaster and Bush is the only person who has any chance of saving things now and electing Kerry is the most dangerous thing that could happen. Its going to be quite an event if Kerry wins.
    You probably know all this but the people don't really elect the president, the states do by sending their 'electoral college' members to Washington who then elect the president. In many states they are not legally bound to follow the election result in their home state so if the electoral college is 'hung' then I guess one of them changing their mind could swing it. The number of electoral college members a state has is proportional to its population but its a winner take all thing. Florida is quite big so whoever wins that by a small majority will probably win the election.
I'll let you know if anything interesting happens.

--Ex-Pat Kiwi for VillagePRESS 

Wednesday morning here (USA) and as you probably know, its not looking good for Kerry. Its come down to Ohio where Bush leads by about 140,000 with maybe 200,000 provisional votes still to count so unfortunately I think Kerry is clutching at straws. The republicans have increased their majority in both houses of congress and I just heard on the radio that Bush won more of the popular vote than any other president in history. I guess that last one doesn't mean much since the population is always increasing.
    On public radio (a bit like NZ's National Radio) they were saying that the gay marriage issue probably hurt Kerry quite a lot. The silly thing is that he wasn't even pushing gay marriage, he wanted to leave it up the states and wasn't in favour of amending the constitution to ban it nationwide as Bush wants to do. The amendment is unlikely succeed because I think it needs 2/3 vote in either the house or senate, I'm not sure which, and even now they don't have that majority. But, if the amendment did go ahead, it would be the first time something was added to the constitution actually restricting someone's rights rather than affirming them.
    So, I think it came down to Bush scaring people into thinking Kerry would be soft on the evil enemies, promising more tax cuts despite a record deficit and promising to keep marriage 'pure'. As someone on TV said, in one area it all comes down to God, Gays and Guns.
    The progressive people must be so disappointed especially since early last night it looked like Kerry was doing well and if you take any notice of exit polls, they were looking good for him too.
--Ex-Pat Kiwi for VillagePRESS 

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campaigning on the day ..seems a bit uncivilised really.