american democracy - the reality , a timeline

Fascinating . Frightening too. More proto fascist  (as gore vidal put it) than democratic and the leader of the "free world" .

and the  article from the Gaurdian adds more depth - another dimension.



We've come a long way from the days when women, blacks, immigrants, and pretty much anyone who wasn't a while male was kept from the polls. This timeline explores 200 years of efforts to restrict and expand the right to vote. (And for more on current efforts to disenfranchise voters, read about the 10 most common vote-blocking tricks.)



http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/11/timeline-history-voter-suppression



Well, as a student of closing societies, I can tell you that it is crazy to ask Americans to have pure faith that the system is incorruptible, and to ask them to just drop their votes into a black hole and trust in the Lord – orDiebold. If you look at weak democracies, the oligarchies that have taken undue control of them always seek to tamper with the vote. It is important for oligarchs to have elections to give their guy a veneer of legitimacy – and important for the vote always to turn out "their way". Indeed, something that is never reported in major news media here is that former President Carter's voting accountability organization sees America's system as relatively flawed and corrupted compared with the systems of many other nations. That is a situation that would typically bring observers from aid organizations like his to our polling places to help us count our vote. (See what happened to foreign poll observers in Miller's Harpers story who tried to watch the vote in America.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/nov/03/cure-america-corruptible-voting-system