Dr. Joan Bushwell's Chimpanzee Refuge

Florida has been recognized for almost a decade as a grim laughingstock when it comes to the reliability of its state and federal voting results, a status that government officials are apparently bent on retaining at the expense of trivial issues such as accountability, fairness, and honesty — traits that long ago fled the region on a giddy cloud of freewheeling and deeply institutionalized political corruption.
On May 17, the American Civil Liberties Union recognized Kindra Muntz, president of the Sarasota Alliance for Fair Elections, for her role in helping to ensure that all Florida elections conducted using electronic voting machines be accompanied by rigorous audits and meaningful paper trails.

Now, you might think that this would be standard when something as important as political offices are at stake — especially given the state’s reputation. Heck, every time I use an ATM I get a paper receipt, and nearby cameras should be sufficient to help determine if the amount of money dispensed equals the amount the slip claims was spit out.
But if you think that public officials are not flat-out opposed to the slightest hints at accountability, you would be deluded. Read the story in the Loaf and see just how hard government officials have fought the very idea of being accountable to the people who may or may not have put them in office. People like Kathy Dent are shitbags and crooks or their mouthpieces and lackeys, and their lame protests (“We didn’t say that we…” “There was no criminal intent in…”) stink of the archetypal creationist claims along the lines “of no one has seen an ostrich evolve into a tapeworm, so it’s all a lie” or “no one has a film from 4004 B.C. proving creationism didn’t happen, ergo science is a farce.”
Mintz’s activism (gotta drop that word in there to rile up the wingers) helps offset the presence of wackaloon dirtball extraordinaire Katherine Harris, who lives here on Longboat Key. Harris was twice elected to Congress from this district, but is better known for her role in the 2000 presidential election festivities.
This post, by sheer accident, is fortuitously timed, as HBO is showing a documentary called Recount tonight at 9 p.m. Eastern time, and again at 1 a.m. Tuesday morning.