The News & Observer (Raleig, NC)
Posted on October 6, 2004
By Michael Biesecker, Staff Writer
DURHAM -- Russian journalists quizzed Durham County Elections Director Mike Ashe about the mechanics of democracy Tuesday, asking pointed questions about possible ways to cheat.
The exchange was part of a nine-day visit to the Triangle sponsored by Duke University and the Library of Congress' Open World program.
The 15 television, radio and print reporters on the tour hail from every corner of the vast Russian Federation, a country where much of the media is controlled by the government and President Vladimir Putin. Putin, a former KGB spy, recently announced that his political party would now appoint most regional leaders rather than allow elections.
That climate might explain why some of the journalists, speaking through translators, expressed some surprise when Ashe told them that Meg Scott Phipps, the state's former agriculture commissioner, was sentenced to prison in March for accepting under-the-table cash contributions from businessmen seeking government contracts.
"A woman?" one reporter asked, skeptically, in Russian.
"Bad people come in all genders," Ashe, a retired Army paratrooper, replied. "There are always people, your country and mine, that try to beat the system."
Ashe also pointed out that it was the press, actively investigating Phipps and pushing law enforcement officials, that contributed to her undoing -- leading to a flurry of questions about what the media are allowed by the government to say about officeholders.
"Basically, a reporter can report anything they believe to be true," Ashe said, receiving nods of understanding as his words were translated. "If a reporter says something about me that I don't like, then it is up to me to prove in court that it is libel or slander."
The visit to the county Board of Elections follows tours of the Raleigh headquarters of U.S. Senate candidate Erskine Bowles and such local attractions as the Duke Homestead in Durham.
Ashe passed out ballots like those that will be used in the Nov. 2 general election for his visitors to take home as souvenirs and allowed the Russians to feed test ballots into one of the county's optical scan voting machines.
One woman asked what a translator described as a "very Russian" question -- if American voter turnout is low but enough ballots are printed for every voter, then what is to keep Ashe himself from filling out the unused ballots and feeding them into the machine?
The elections director smiled broadly, explaining some of the checks and balances in place to prevent such an occurrence.
"In any system, there is the potential for fraud," he said. "What you suggest, I could not do alone -- it would take the collusion of four or five people."
[Reprinted with Permission]
