With the election just eleven days away, you can bet it’s crunch time for the Kerry and Bush campaigns. The most heated campaign of my lifetime will soon come to an end, and America will decide which man will be leading us for the next four years. The war chests are being emptied, and the campaigns have gone into overdrive.

As I might have expected, the Democratic National Committee – in a stunning display of its confidence in John Kerry – is prepping itself to cheat. You don’t have to take my word for it, trust the documentary evidence.

The DNC has recently distributed its 66-page election day “mobilization plan” to dozens of state committees within the Democratic party. One of these states was Colorado, where this internal document was leaked to the Drudge Report, and later picked up by alarmingly few other news agencies. One section of it reads:

If no signs of intimidation techniques have emerged yet, launch a ‘pre-emptive strike’ (particularly well suited to states in which these techniques have been tried in the past).

a. Issue a press release

i. Reviewing Republican tactic [sic] used in the past in your area or state

ii. Quoting party/minority/civil rights leadership as denouncing tactics that discourage people from voting

b. Prime minority leadership to discuss the issue in the media; provide talking points.

c. Place stories in which minority leadership expresses concern about the threat of intimidation techniques

d. Warn local newspapers not to accept advertising that is not properly disclaimed or that contains false warnings about voting requirements and/or about what will happen at the polls.

It occurred to me that the document might not even be authentic. As much as it conforms to my pre-conceived ideas as to how the DNC actually operates, I didn’t believe that the Democrats would be stupid enough to put the policy in writing and distribute it nationwide. So I checked out what the Democrats had to say on the matter, and found that they didn’t even deny the authenticity of the document.

“We make no apologies for fighting these tactics by exposing the dirty tricks when they happen, and helping educate local officials and activists about past Republican tactics so they can prevent them from occurring this year,” responds Jano Cabrera, DNC Communications Director.

Sorry Jano, but I can read. It advocates a “pre-emptive strike” in states where “no signs of intimidation have emerged yet.” It has absolutely nothing to do with the “exposing dirty tricks when they happen,” and everything to do with fabricating dirty tricks when they don’t happen. I’ve always believed that this was the modus operandi of the Democrats but never before have I had such solid evidence.

If an election looks close, the first thing they do is to cry foul, even if no basis for such a claim exists. Second, they mobilize their all-too-willing media assets, and “place stories,” no matter how irrelevant. Third, they play the almighty race card; they drag out faux “civil rights leaders” and whisper in their ears what they should say to the media. They provide “talking points,” and generally exploit white guilt.

The DNC Web site claims that the excerpt quoted above is taken out of context and provides the entire section of the mobilization plan concerning voter intimidation. It was hardly exculpatory evidence. Check it out yourself, at www.democrats.org. The largest part of it outlines alleged voter intimidation techniques used by Republicans in the past. “Alleged” is the key word here.

The broader document explains what to do in the event of “expected voter intimidation;” keep in mind that the Democrats are already expecting it, whether it happens or not. They prescribe “Emphasizing a message of outrage, but designed to appeal to the broader community: ‘We thought this community was better than that,’ ‘We thought those days were behind us,’ ‘Nothing is more despicable than trying to deprive any American of the precious right to vote, the foundation of our democracy for which so many have sacrificed.'”

At least they’ve got their canned catchphrases ready. They advocate “Impugning the source of divisiveness – the GOP, the opposing candidate, whoever can credibly be said to be behind it.” Oh really? “Credibly be said to be behind it” in whose mind? It seems to me that the real “source of divisiveness” here is the DNC.

What was so beautifully demonstrated here is that Democrats are entirely too willing to believe that Republicans are guilty of voter intimidation. They don’t even have to wait until election day, they know it’s going to happen. They don’t have to prove it because it’s inevitable. It’s almost as if they think that all elections are tainted with voter intimidation, and lack of evidence to that extent only means that the Republicans got away with it. Therefore, no real evidence is needed before the Democrats leap into action in their own self-righteous crusade.

In a way, I’m guilty of the exact same thing as the DNC. The Democrats believe that they know exactly how the Republicans operate, to the extent that they can assume, without any type of evidence whatsoever, that the Republicans will try to suppress the vote.

I have my own preconceived notions. I believe that I know exactly how the Democrats operate: through scare-tactics, racial victimization and unfounded accusations, all focused through the cooperative liberal media establishment. The difference between the DNC and myself is that I have the evidence to prove it. They made the fatal mistake of making official policy out of what I already believed was their backroom game plan.

Then they got caught. Shame on you, Democrats.

Ben Duffy is a Collegian columnist.