It's common to read that the United States has some of the worst run elections in the world.  The campaigns, which run for a few weeks in most places, last almost two years in America, sucking up enormous amounts of money and time that could be better used elsewhere.  The process itself is cumbersome and, as we see, remarkably open to fraud.  And that's where a BBC article from 2016 about Gabon's election comes in, for it describes with uncanny accuracy what's been happening in our contested states.

The Revolver came across the BCC's article about elections in Gabon.  It promised to educate readers about "Vote rigging: How to spot the tell-tale signs."  What makes the article notable is that we've seen many of these signs, or variations of them here, in America, since Tuesday morning.

The first sign is "too many voters," while the second sign is unusually high turnout in specific areas.

Watch the turnout figures — they can be a big giveaway.

You never get a 98% or 99% turnout in an honest election. You just don't.

[snip]

Even where the turnout is within the bounds of possibility, if the figure is wildly different from the turnout elsewhere, it serves as a warning.

It's true there's a dispute about whether Wisconsin had an 89% voter turnout.  Conservative sites reported this news on Wednesday, but left-leaning "fact-checkers" insist that this is false.  Jack Cashill has a good summary.

While it's unclear if our turnout was excessive, we sure have an excessive number of registered voters, with each excess registration an invitation to fraud.  Thus, we know we have 353 counties with 1.8 million more registered voters than eligible citizens.  Judicial Watch, which did the study, was able to study only states that make registration information available, so it's reasonable to believe that the problem is endemic across America.

Moreover, back in 2017, the U.S. had 3.5 million more registered voters than live adults.  Additionally, multiple states sent ballots or absentee ballots to every registered voter, thanks to the Wuhan virus.  We can, therefore, say with almost complete certainty that there are more votes than voters.

The third sign is large numbers of invalid votes.  Again, this election has been rife with invalid votes.

The fourth sign — the reconciliation of paper ballots to votes — is not an issue (yet).

The fifth sign — "results that don't match" — is an issue.  This occurs when officials change results after they count the votes.  The way to stop that is to allow poll-watchers from all parties to witness the count.  In Pennsylvania and Michigan, Republican poll-watchers have been driven off the scene, which should be taken as prima facie evidence of results that won't match the polls.

And then there's the sixth sign: "delay in announcing results."  It can't be a coincidence that many of those states that are most desperate for a Biden win are proving to be incapable of getting their votes counted.  Every time we think they're done, they suddenly announce that they found new votes (usually for Biden).  It is four days after the election, and the swing states are still incapable of counting the votes.  Instead, they're doing what we invariably see in close races: the counters keep counting until a Democrat wins.

This election is a scandal.  No matter the outcome, half the country will be certain that it was cheated out of a fair election.  This is how countries collapse.

The Supreme Court would be wise to mandate a new vote just for the presidency, with clear, strict rules that, if not followed, will instantly invalidate any ballots from the polling station violating the rules.  There's no reason we can't be at least as honest and efficient as a third-world country.

Image: In-person voting in Virginia.  YouTube screen grab.