All this happened one sticky day in August 2002. On Election Day, some ten weeks later, the official outcome of the vote baffled everyone: Senator Max Cleland, a Democrat whom polls showed had been leading his opponent, Saxby Chambliss, by five points, lost by seven points. In the race for governor, Democrat Roy Barnes, who had been leading Republican Sonny Perdue by eleven points, lost by five. Both losses were inexplicable, and Cleland's was especially poignant. A war veteran and triple amputee, Cleland was quite popular in Georgia, whereas Chambliss was unknown—and a chickenhawk to boot, a "bad knee" having kept him out of Vietnam. Chambliss's attack ads had cast Cleland as a traitor, because he had voted against establishing the Department of Homeland Security. And now the people of the Peach State had apparently been swayed by their fear of terrorism into believing that those ads were right.

That year there were other such anomalies, induced, perhaps, by what some wags called "Diebold magic," as the company's product figured heavily in those other states where far-right candidates won upset victories: Colorado, where Republican Wayne Allard, down by nine points against Democrat Tom Strickland, won by five points; and New Hampshire, where Republican John Sununu, down by one point against Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, won by four points.

As odd as such reversals seemed, and as conspicuous a role as Diebold evidently played in them, there were no calls for inquiry, as it was easier to say that "terrorism"—or maybe "family values"—had simply grabbed the voters' hearts and minds in Georgia, Colorado and New Hampshire. (Diebold, in fact, had no hand in Republican Norm Coleman's startling victory over Walter Mondale in Minnesota—the born-again New Jerseyite having trailed the favorite son by five points, then winning suddenly by three.) Thus did the Bush Republicans take back the Senate, thereby canceling out the Democratic edge enabled briefly by Jim Jeffords's controversial exit from the GOP.

SAVING OUR DEMOCRACY—We must delve into the recent past, not to quibble over ancient numbers but to find out where we really are today. For what happened in some states four years ago, and in most states two years ago, is still happening now, and in more states than ever: a vast, complex and incremental process of mass disenfranchisement—which is, in fact, the only way the Bush Republicans could ever get "elected," as their program is not conservative but radical, irrational, apocalyptic: i.e., unacceptable to most Americans, liberals and true conservatives alike.

This is why they've gerrymandered Texas and (less visibly) Virginia—and also why they've packed the Supreme Court with comrades disinclined to outlaw gerrymandering (unless it's Democrats who try it). This is why they are dead-set against repealing state laws disenfranchising ex-felons—and also why they've used the "war on drugs" to jail as many likely Democrats as possible. (This would also help explain the post-Katrina diaspora, and especially the out-of-state internment of over 70,000 Louisianans.) And this is why the Bush Republicans push e-voting machines in every state, and program them to flip votes cast by Democrats into votes "cast" for Republicans, and systematically provide too few machines to Democratic precincts, and keep on arbitrarily removing Democrats from voter rolls, and "challenge" would-be voters at the polls, and simply throw out countless ballots of all kinds, and spread disinformation on Election Day. These are just some of the devices that were used not only in Ohio to ensure Bush/Cheney's "re-election," but in every state where they could pull it off—on both coasts, in the Midwest, and throughout the South.

In the next issue of the Spectator, I'll elaborate on the GOP's two likeliest moves in November's mid-term elections. For now, we must do all we can to make everyone aware of what's been going down—and, most important, what is now at stake. As the press and the Democrats have failed to call for any actual reform of the election system, Bush and Co. are now in a superb position to retain their legislative power, regardless of how people vote (or try to vote).

We need a massive turnout in November—but not because it will put Democrats in power. We need the biggest turnout ever, as a protest on behalf of free and fair elections in America. Such a turnout will make it that much harder for the Bush Republicans to spin their victory as legitimate. (This is why the GOP in several states, including Maryland and Colorado, is urging people to vote absentee next month: to make the opposition appear that much smaller.) But more important, such a turnout will prepare people for the crucial fight to come—the effort to save our democracy.

If we get millions out to vote, without informing them they may well "lose" anyway, the blow will devastate them, just as Kerry's abrupt concession did in 2004. It took two years to get Americans mobilized again. If Bush and his allies steal the next election, we won't have years to start resisting. The resistance must start on Day One, just as in Ukraine and Mexico; and so the people must be ready for the fight—and so they need to know enough to wage it, and to win it.

Mark Crispin Miller has authored many books, including Cruel and Unusual: Bush/Cheney's New World Order and The Bush Dyslexicon, and is a professor of culture and communication at New York University.