Gettin' "regular"

In case there's anybody who has been following this who remains unconvinced or otherwise believes any of the pan-blues outright false claims about the person they have called a cheater, a dictator, and an emperor, let's take a look at the vague, unsubstantiated accusations and outright lies which continue on page 7 of "Bulletgate":

[A blurry image of hands, flags, and signs reading yàn piào, or "recount"]

[PHOTO CAPTION:] Flags of the Republic of China, in tandem with protest signs demanding a recount of all votes.

The voting itself was marked with many documented irregularities that have led ordinary citizens to hold continuous large-scale protest rallies for days and nights on end. After weeks of political haggling, a recount is now in process. With one third of the voter registers reexamined by the end of May, 350,000 disputable votes turned up, far surpassing the margin of 29,000 votes in Chen's alleged electoral victory.

Let's begin at the beginning, shall we?

Picture this
Those signs that are being waved around by the protesters are mass-produced. I'll let you draw your own conclusions from that, but they don't say anything about recounting "all of the votes." For more details, re-read a post on this blog from April 2, 2004 "Would you like fries with that recount?" -- especially the part that says: "KMT-PFP alliance wants to examine only ballots cast in favor of Chen, Lu"!

It sure sounds to me like the pan-blues only wanted to count 50.2 percent of the votes.

Go on a high-fiber diet or somethin'!
There's nothin' "irregular" about these irregularities and nothin' "ordinary" about these "ordinary citizens."

Let's get some fiber in here to clear the bullshit out.

If these "irregularities" were "documented," why don't they quote any sources here? Is it because, like I described in Part 5 of my shootdown of "Bulletgate," the "documentation" to which they refer is actually the so-called "reporting" of KMT/China toe-lickers Mike Chinoy and William Pesek, Jr. as they echo the words the KMT feeds them?

Make mine an "extra-ordinary"
The "ordinary citizens" were rent-a-mobs brought to the protests by gangsters. These people hurled fire extinguishers and Molotov cocktails at riot police, destroyed electrical boxes near police headquarters, and used flagpoles to beat reporters covering the situation.

Political haggling at the bizarre bazaar
Every time an offer was made in an attempt to reasonably meet their outrageous requests which attempted to go outside the law, it was the pan-blues who balked like chickens -- over and over and over again. Go back to the post I wrote on April 2, 2004 ("Would you like fries with that recount?: Another day, another absurd shift in their requests") to read all about it.

Chen Shui-bian stated his approval of a recount just three days after the election, and formalized it within two weeks, it was the pan-blues who continued protesting, making rather "creative" demands along the way such as wanting to recount only the Chen-Lu ballots -- y'know, to be "fair" and all.

That is what prevented the Central Election Commission from approving a recount any sooner than it did.

Shoot first, ask questions later (Ouch!)
Before the recount was even over, the pan-blues were writing "Bulletgate." This sure makes it seem like they weren't very confident of the numbers coming out in their favor in the end.

If so, they were right about that. But even after the recount was over, the pan-blues still produced and distributed a document that said "a recount is now in process." That was an outright fucking lie.

If at first you don't succeed, cry, cry again
When the recount was finished, Chen still won. If the "disputable" votes had counted, it would have actually given him a greater margin of victory. Those 330,000 invalid ballots were actually invalid! (Damn those biased facts!)

You might have doubts as to why there were so many invalid ballots, but the answer is rather simple. Don't expect the pan-blues to tell you anything about it, though, because it knocks their argument on its ass before you can say "xuan jü wu xiao."

It partly has to do with a movement whose goal was to purposely create even more invalid ballots than they actually did!

A group called the "Millions of Invalid Votes Project" together with the "Alliance of Fairness and Justice" said that they were dissatisfied with politicians on both sides and wanted people to use this method to have their voices heard. I'd bet they never imagined that the wails of Lien Chan would drown them out completely.

Another element which contributed to the high number of invalid ballots was a change in the voting rules. Even though I knew about, a lot of people either didn't or simply forgot.

Instead of stamping the voting "chop" on the candidate's picture as they did previously, voters were now supposed to stamp the empty box above the picture. Old habits die hard, I suppose, and lots of people stamped the picture anyway. Many of the people who did so stamped Chen's picture. Despite being able to determine voter intent very clearly, those votes didn't count.

No, the pan-blues will never tell you that.

NEXT UP: Weebles wobble, but they don't fall down