James O'Keefe

“Voter fraud” is a right-wing obsession used to justify restrictive ballot access-limiting measures that are actually designed to suppress turnout among people who tend to vote for Democrats. It does not and cannot exist in anything approaching a large enough scale to affect an election, and even isolated incidents of fraud prove difficult for right-wingers to dredge up to prove that their concerns have merit. Dozens of people have spent years tirelessly attempting to prove that organized “voter fraud” is a real thing and all they have ever managed to prove is that sometimes lazy volunteers make fake registration forms, sometimes former felons mistakenly vote despite being disenfranchised, and sometimes people double-vote. There is nothing remotely resembling coordinated voter fraud, carried out with the intention of stealing an election, taking place anywhere in the United States. Those who sincerely believe that there is are deluded, though most of the people who constantly crow about it don’t sincerely believe in it; they just want to make it harder for blacks and Latinos and poor people to vote.

So O’Keefe, whose modus operandi is “create the corruption you wish to see in the world,” tried to get some ballots in New Hampshire using the names of recently deceased people. And it might’ve worked in a couple of places. Though not all the places. At one polling place his partner was stopped by a kindly old poll worker, and then he ran away.

O’Keefe has pretty clearly violated the law and TPM reports that a federal prosecutor is reviewing his video. But at least he finally proved that voter fraud is a very real threat, and one that could lead to upward of a couple of phony ballots being cast in a statewide primary election, depending on how many registered voters died quite recently. As we all know, once you prove that something is hypothetically possible, it is a factual certainty that ACORN has done it.

And now O’Keefe might finally get that felony conviction that he avoided last time. Fingers crossed.

Thanks to Scott Olsen, the Iraq vet and victim of brutal police overreaction at Occupy Oakland, for showing the many forms that fighting for one’s country can take. We’re especially thankful that he’s recovering from the coma induced by a tear gas canister fired directly at his head, and is well enough to give public statements.

Thanks to retired Police Capt. Ray Lewis, who participated in Occupy Wall Street in full uniform, and was arrested for his participation. As stories of police brutality spread, Lewis reminds us that most cops are fellow members of the 99 percent, working hard to stay afloat in an increasingly class-segregated nation. Most of them aren’t happy being seen as serving the interests of the oligarchy, and where there’s abuse, it’s generally the result of poor training and misguided priorities from the top, not the rank-and-file.

Thanks to Diane Ravitch, and other school reform critics like Dana Goldstein, for adding desperately needed perspective and balance to the school reform debate, a debate in which one side receives what could charitably be referred to as the lion’s share of favorable press coverage and philanthropic support. Their needling forces school reform advocates and foes alike to examine their assumptions and strengthen their arguments, and they sometimes end up causing even dilettante education policy gurus like Steven Brill to see that the seductive claims made by technocrat reformers tend to be overstated. Better, smarter policy debates are enough of a rarity that we should all be thankful for anyone who can manage to produce them.

Thanks to Wael Ghonim for putting aside his very good job with Google to put his life on the line for freedom and liberty for his people in Egypt. Lots of tech entrepreneurs and engineers talk of changing the world; few of them spend weeks in custody as political prisoners for their efforts. Wael Ghonim was instrumental in organizing the popular revolt that toppled a dictatorial regime,

Thanks to Nick Davies, who, along with Guardian investigative correspondent Amelia Hill and others at the Guardian, has been relentlessly exposing News Corps’s criminal news-gathering practices in the U.K. Reporting on the misdeeds of the powerful — and News Corp is hugely powerful, especially in Great Britain — is the best reporting there is, and the investigations and arrests that have resulted from Davies and Hill’s reporting will change the culture of the international media industry for the better. We’ll be especially thankful if News Corp shareholders force the giant conglomerate into more responsible corporate management.

Thanks to Elizabeth Warren for perfectly articulating the liberal ideal of the social contract. One good senator may be limited in how much she can achieve, but if she wins and inspires more like her to follow — and imitate her unapologetic rhetoric of fairness — we’ll have even more to be thankful for.

Thanks to Sree Sreenivasan, dean of the Columbia School of Journalism, for making a mockery of dishonest bully James O’Keefe. O’Keefe’s only power comes from other media outlets taking him seriously. In one hilarious video, Sreenivasan showed why O’Keefe’s a joke.