Finally, real proof of rigged elections. How long until we take action, America? - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

archetypal fool · 05-25-2007, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Article

LINK

The Future of America Has Been Stolen
By Jeff Diehl
May 24th, 2007

Investigative reporter Greg Palast says 4.5 million votes will be shoplifted in 2008, thanks largely to the “Rove-bots” that have been placed in the Justice Department following the U.S. Attorney firings. Being the guy who uncovered the voter “purge lists” of 2000 that disenfranchised black voters, he’s worth listening to, even if the mainstream press chooses not to.

This time around, he claims to have 500 emails that the House subpoenaed and Karl Rove claims were deleted forever. They prove definitively, says Palast, that the Justice Department is infested with operatives taking orders from Rove to steal upcoming elections for Republicans and permanently alter the Department.

The “clownocracy” of Bush and Rove is criminal and even evil in its attempts to steal past and future elections, according to Palast, and can only be stopped if “Democrats…find their souls and find their balls.”

In an updated new version of his best-selling book, Armed Madhouse, Palast lays out the case for the future theft of the presidency, along with lots of other Executive malfeasance. I chatted with him about the role of the Justice Department in this scheme, and what it means for the viability of our “democracy.”

JEFF DIEHL: First off, the “lost” emails. I guess you’re confident those 500 emails aren’t themselves a hoax? Considering the source? [John Wooden, the man behind the spoof site, whitehouse.org, forwarded them on to Palast after someone accidentally sent them to Wooden’s georgewbush.org domain.]

GREG PALAST: Oddly, the GOP verified their authenticity to BBC. I almost fell over dead when they did that.

JD: How did they do that exactly?

GP: We asked them on camera. They did not deny they were the party’s internal emails — just disagreed what the “caging” lists were. Saying, for example, they were “donor” lists. Men in homeless shelters?

Remember, there’s no First Amendment in England. I’m wrong, I’m sued, I’m broke, I’m toast.

JD: Let’s move on to former Justice Department counsel (and Regent University graduate) Monica Goodling’s recent testimony in front of the House Judiciary Committee, since it’s so fresh…

GP: The blondeling underling of the Police State. The lady was trying to tell us something important, but the dim bulbs of the U.S. press and the committee dolts wouldn’t listen. She began by accusing her bosses of perjury. The issue was her allegation that they knew all about “caging.” And no one asked her one damn question about it. Like what is “caging” and why would they commit perjury to cover it up?

JD: Rep. Linda Sanchez (D-CA) asked, and Goodling said, “It has to do with direct mail.”

GP: And that was it. D’oh! It’s not about “direct mail.” Direct mail has to do with Victoria’s Secret and stuff like that. This was all about stealing the 2004 — and 2008 — elections. That’s why she wanted immunity. She was afraid it would all unravel, the caging game…but she had nothing to fear.

JD: Well, it is a direct mail term, but it’s also a voter supression term. Do no senators know that, not even Committee Chair John Conyers?

GP: Conyers knows — and he knows me. He’s keeping his powder dry. The others are clueless.

Caging works like this. Hundreds of thousands of Black and Hispanic voters were sent letters — do not forward. Letters returned as undeliverable (”caged”) were used as evidence the voter didn’t live at their registered address. The GOP goons challenged these voters’ right to cast ballots — and their votes were lost.

But whose letters were caged? Here’s where the game turns to deep evil. They targeted Black students on vacation, homeless men — and you’ll love this — Black soldiers sent overseas. They weren’t living at their home voting address because they were shivering under a Humvee in Falluja.

JD: As you put it in regard to election rigging, 2000 was about “purge lists,” 2004 was about “caging,” and 2008 will be about “verification.” Can you briefly explain the difference between these?

GP: Sure. In 2000, I cracked the computer disks (CD-ROMs then) from Katherine Harris’ office showing 56,000 names of voters “purged” from voter rolls as felons who aren’t allowed to vote. In fact, every one — every one — was an innocent voter, though most were guilty of VWB — Voting While Black. That was the 2000 “purge.”

In 2004, it was nearly identical. Except, instead of calling voters “felons,” they called them “suspect” voters, fraudulently using a false voting address. The effect was the same: the voter would lose their registration; or their vote on election day when they showed to vote; or, in the case of soldiers, their absentee ballot would be challenged and tossed.

JD: You claim the reason for Democrat inaction in election scandals is because of racism, that the white caucus is bigger than the black caucus. But don’t Democrats gain by making sure black people are enfranchised?

GP: Which Democrats? The huge purge and block of voters in Georgia [were done by] reptiles like Zell Miller in control of the Georgia Democratic Party. There’s an awful lot of Democrats who would not win primaries if dark-skinned citizens could just vote any time they pleased.

JD: My mind goes back to Conyers. What did you mean earlier by “keeping his powder dry?”

GP: We talk. ‘Nuff said.

JD: Fair enough. So you’re working also with former U.S. Attorney for New Mexico, David Iglesias, yes?

GP: Claro que si.

JD: I was watching Chris Matthews’ TV show — “Softball,” as you’ve called it — and he asked Iglesias what his long term plans were — if he was writing a book. Iglesias indicated that he was, and also, that he wanted a TV show similar to Matthews’ at some point, and seemed to be totally serious. Given that Iglesias has been willing to go “along with the game” in the past, are you concerned that his recent turn might be motivated by opportunism?

GP: I don’t care if he’s motivated by a love of Barbie dolls. He’s been pushed by the Rove-bots to expose the game. I’ll take it anyway I can get it — the facts, ma’am.

JD: Do you have a wide-angle view of the current Administration’s strategy with the Justice Department, and if so, give us the summary. Is it about election theft, or is it mostly about stocking the lake for future conservative judge appointments?

GP: Yes. First, it’s elections. They don’t want the voters making any foolish choices. Specifically, while the attention’s been focused 100% on the firings, no one is talking about the hirings. That’s what Goodling was trying to get across.

The key: at the Pearl Harbor Day massacre, they replaced one of the prosecutors with Rove-bots, a sleeper cell of anti-Constitutional saboteurs who will explode in 2008, led by the new prosecutor for Arkansas, Tim Griffin.

JD: Talk a little bit about the relevance of Tim Griffin — the perp who became prosecutor — and Arkansas in 2008.

GP: It was Griffin who directed the “caging” ops for the GOP. Caging, by the way, is illegal. Law Professor Bobby Kennedy pointed out it violates the Voting Rights Act of 1965 — and I’d add, as a former racketeering investigator, mail fraud statutes. So Griffin’s a felon — now U.S. Attorney.

JD: Is Kennedy still actively publicizing this?

GP: Yes. The incriminating email is reproduced right in Armed Madhouse. That’s why Griffin and Goodling were high-fiving over the fact that no one’s picked up the investigations of that “British reporter” Palast.

The key thing is, Griffin is not just “involved,” he is directing the scheme. His denial was confidential — had to be subpoenaed. Remember, as Goodling testified, the line of the Bushies is that Griffin had nothing to do with caging.

JD: So is Congress eventually going to get to all this? Is that the end game with the Justice Department investigation?

GP: No, Congress won’t do squat. Did anyone do anything about the felon purge? It went backwards: Bush signed the Help America Vote Act. God forbid.

I was also presented with this video, in which Greg Palast and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. speak about teh state of affairs. Palast speaks about the stolen elections, both past and upcoming, the mechanics behind them, and how they tied into the illegal firings of the 8 US attorneys. Then Kennedy speaks about the problems with the country, stemming directly from a corporate owned news and media organization. The video is an hour long, but it's very informative and electrifying.
_________________________

I realize that this tread might step in some of the footsteps of this thread, but I don't think this would be a progressive post, as it goes into a tangent.
_________________________

Every day I wake up and I don't think it's possible to hate this administration more than I already do, but, alas, every day brings more and more disgust. They're using, and will continue to use, slimy and illegal tactics to erase votes, and these were probably the reason 2004 went the way it did.

And yet, no news organization has taken up this spicy meatball, and so, once again, the general public will continue to have no idea of what is happening in their government. I'm so disillusioned right now; even though the evidence of the stolen elections, like the disenfranchised black voters, has been out for some time, there is no public outrage. There is no will among the people to set things right and get these crooks and lairs out of the White House and out of power.

And so I ask, when will things change? I know that's an abstract question, and no-one here has an answer (except for 2008, if we're lucky), but where's this threshold that must be crossed before the American people start to wake up and see this administration for what it is? Furthermore, at what point will things get heavy enough that those of us who already see what's going on will take action? Obviously, defecating on the constitution, suspending habeas corpus, condoning and using torture, routing millions of dollars towards already millionaire ass-holes, dunking the US into an illegal war, and preparing to expand the war into another country solely for oil and war profiteering, lying to congress, and being in complete denial of the state of affairs--is not enough to get the ball rolling.

The fastest way to get things started would be to take control of a major influential news station (e.g, Fox), a la V for Vendetta. But that's not going to happen. So what can we do to spread awareness? Obviously, the internet isn't working fast enough. Printing is too expensive and spreading the text across America would take millions of dollars, and thousands of peoples working in conjunction. The news stations aren't going to help us. Our politicians aren't going to help us, and those who try to speak up will get deafeningly silence in the airwaves.

What can we do?

Willravel · 05-25-2007, 01:24 PM

I still think things won't change until people's lives are directly and negatively effected in a MAJOR way.

host · 05-25-2007, 02:30 PM

Hmmm...what could Greg Palast possibly be talking about? Could it be...that a political party with no populist platform....a party that offers no remedy, or even a discussion of the dilemma of a United States where the percentage of wealth controlled by the least wealthy half of the population....150 million people has declined to just 2-1/2 percent, while the top one percent...just 3 million people, controls 33 percent of the total wealth, and the next 9 percent, about 27 million people, controls 37 percent of the total wealth....no answers in response to 45 million folks in the US without any health insurance coverage...could not possibly be "winning" elections by attracting the most legitimate votes?

Consider that, in 2000, we were told that republicans, Bush-Cheney won the popular vote in the state of Florida by about 500 votes, over the rival democratic candidates, Gore-Leiberman. Bush-Cheney had "help", though:
...the flawed history of state of Florida felon "voter purge lists", from Oct., 2004. There is much more info at the link:
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...0&postcount=55

....but here are excerpts of two main supporting points from the link, above:

Quote:

Florida is one of six states that permanently strip voting rights to felons for life unless they petition to have them restored. One election-law expert who usually represents Democrats said the release of the list will rekindle the debate over disenfranchising voters. <a href="http://www.sptimes.com/2004/07/02/State/Felon_voters_list_mad.shtml">http://www.sptimes.com/2004/07/02/State/Felon_voters_list_mad.shtml</a>

Quote:

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/07/12/felons/
Florida scraps list of suspected felons barred from voting

Monday, July 12, 2004 Posted: 3:59 PM EDT (1959 GMT)

(CNN) -- Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood has decided to scrap a list that was intended to keep more than 47,000 suspected felons from voting in November.

Florida Gov. Jeb Bush agreed with the decision, his spokesman said Monday.

"The list will not be used," said Jacob DiPietre, a spokesman for Bush, whose state proved key to his brother's victory four years ago.

Hood decided over the weekend to dump the list, which was created by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, after <h3>news stories pointed out that the list included only 61 Hispanic names, DiPietre said.

The state's large Cuban population tends to vote Republican.......</h3>

Quote:

http://web.archive.org/web/200408111...db0e300e7.html

Jeb's defiance makes case for automatic clemency

Palm Beach Post Editorial
Thursday, July 29, 2004

Gov. Bush is attacking the judiciary with way more than the usual Republican rhetoric. This time, he's resorted to outright defiance.

The governor couldn't have picked a more revealing way to display his anti-court venom than by spurning the July 14 opinion of the 1st District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee. The court told the state that it must help felons fill out a form needed to win back the right to vote after serving prison time. Rather than follow the court's dictate, Gov. Bush eliminated the form.

That's the kind of inexcusable defiance that makes Florida the focal point for national anxiety over the upcoming presidential election. Secretary of State Glenda Hood, who was appointed by Gov. Bush and reports to him, already has gone too far in defending an indefensible list of nearly 48,000 ex-felons who may or may not have been banned from voting. Fueling the conspiracy theories that Ms. Hood says are groundless, nearly half the names on the list belonged to African-Americans, who tend to vote for Democrats. Fewer than 100 belonged to Hispanics, who vote more often for Republicans than blacks do. Both parties are making strong appeals to Hispanic voters.

More than 50,000 felons were released from Florida prisons last year. About 85 percent must apply to get clemency. A year ago, the court found that about 125,000 inmates who completed their terms between 1992 and 2001 -- out of as many as 700,000 -- had not been properly notified of their right to clemency. Gov. Bush can't call the appellate court's ruling judicial activism. The court didn't make the law; the state did. Here is the wording: "The authorized agent (of the state) shall assist the offender in completing these forms... before the offender is discharged from supervision." The court "interpreted" that to mean the state must "assist the offender."

The governor whined that the form duplicates electronic filing methods and did away with the form. But the governor's plan doesn't order the Department of Correction to help inmates file electronically before they are discharged. Instead, it promises only that the state will put a notice in the mail. Rather than help people as they are about to leave custody, the state proposes tracking these transient residents after they leave. Additionally, the state is finding flaws in its central voter database, which lists all Florida voters. The errors on that list compounded the difficulty of screening out felons.

The long-term solution is for Floridians to change the state constitution to automatically restore voting rights of felons. Florida is one of seven states, including Mississippi and Alabama, that do not grant automatic clemency. State legislators chose to offer voters an amendment requiring parental notice of abortions, not one that would lift the Civil War-era ban on voting rights. The ban makes Florida look racist and uninterested in democracy. The governor's actions make him appear to be complicit.

Quote:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programme...ht/3956129.stm
Last Updated: Tuesday, 26 October, 2004, 17:06 GMT 18:06 UK
E-mail this to a friend Printable version
New Florida vote scandal feared

By Greg Palast
Reporting for Newsnight

A secret document obtained from inside Bush campaign headquarters in Florida suggests a plan - possibly in violation of US law - to disrupt voting in the state's African-American voting districts, a BBC Newsnight investigation reveals.

Election supervisor Ion Sancho believes some voters are being intimidated
Two e-mails, prepared for the executive director of the Bush campaign in Florida and the campaign's national research director in Washington DC, contain a 15-page so-called "caging list". ....

Quote:

http://www.gregpalast.com/bushs-new-...ey-a-criminal/

Bush’s New US Attorney a Criminal?
Published March 13th, 2007 in Articles

BBC Television had exposed 2004 voter attack scheme by appointee Griffin, a Rove aide.
Black soldiers and the homeless targeted.
by Greg Palast

There’s only one thing worse than sacking an honest prosecutor. That’s replacing an honest prosecutor with a criminal.

There was one big hoohah in Washington yesterday as House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers pulled down the pants on George Bush’s firing of US Attorneys to expose a scheme to punish prosecutors who wouldn’t bend to political pressure.

But the Committee missed a big one: Timothy Griffin, Karl Rove’s assistant, the President’s pick as US Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Griffin, according to BBC Television, was the hidden hand behind a scheme to wipe out the voting rights of 70,000 citizens prior to the 2004 election.

Key voters on Griffin’s hit list: Black soldiers and homeless men and women. Nice guy, eh? Naughty or nice, however, is not the issue. Targeting voters where race is a factor is a felony crime under the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

In October 2004, our investigations team at BBC Newsnight received a series of astonishing emails from Mr. Griffin, then Research Director for the Republican National Committee. He didn’t mean to send them to us. They were highly confidential memos meant only for RNC honchos.

However, Griffin made a wee mistake. Instead of sending the emails — potential evidence of a crime — to email addresses ending with the domain name “@GeorgeWBush.com” he sent them to “@GeorgeWBush.ORG.” A website run by prankster John Wooden who owns “GeorgeWBush.org.” When Wooden got the treasure trove of Rove-ian ravings, he sent them to us.

And we dug in, decoding, and mapping the voters on what Griffin called, “Caging” lists, spreadsheets with 70,000 names of voters marked for challenge. Overwhelmingly, these were Black and Hispanic voters from Democratic precincts.

The Griffin scheme was sickly brilliant. We learned that the RNC sent first-class letters to new voters in minority precincts marked, “Do not forward.” Several sheets contained nothing but soldiers, other sheets, homeless shelters. Targets included the Jacksonville Naval Air Station in Florida and that city’s State Street Rescue Mission. Another target, Edward Waters College, a school for African-Americans.

If these voters were not currently at their home voting address, they were tagged as “suspect” and their registration wiped out or their ballot challenged and not counted. Of course, these ‘cages’ captured thousands of students, the homeless and those in the military though they are legitimate voters.
We telephoned those on the hit list, including one Randall Prausa. His wife admitted he wasn’t living at his voting address: Randall was a soldier shipped overseas.....

Quote:

http://www.arktimes.com/Articles/pri...c-7aaa4efa6a3a
Published 12/28/2006

End around

Senators question U.S. attorney appointment.

J. Timothy Griffin was sworn in as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas on Dec. 20, less than a week after his appointment prompted unusual public expressions of outrage from both of the state’s U.S. senators.

The outrage stems from the way Griffin was appointed. Instead of following the normal process, which would involve a presidential nomination and confirmation by the U.S. Senate, the Bush administration utilized a provision in the 2005 reauthorization of the Patriot Act that allows the attorney general to appoint an “interim U.S. attorney” without Senate confirmation. Therefore, Griffin, 38, will serve as interim U.S. attorney until he is formally nominated or replaced by the president.

Interim appointments are usually made to fill vacancies, but Griffin was named to the U.S. attorney post on Dec. 15, while it was still occupied by Bud Cummins.

Cummins resigned on Dec. 20......

..........U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln said, “Clearly, the president and his administration are aware of the difficulty it would take to get Tim Griffin confirmed through the normal process, and therefore chose to circumvent it in order to name him as interim U.S. attorney. This decision denied the Senate the opportunity to carefully consider and evaluate Mr. Griffin’s qualifications and denied the American people the transparency the standard nomination process provides.”

“The White House worked very hard to get him this job and keep him from going under oath and answer questions about his political life,” Teague added. “We’re not saying there should not be a process to name an interim position, but it should be done in good faith that a permanent replacement will be named at some point. The White House has indicated to the senator that Tim Griffin is their person, so the question is, if he is their person, why not nominate him? It’s an effort to keep him from going under oath.”.............

The 2004 BBC reporting and the emails accidentally sent to www.georgewbush.org:

Quote:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programme...ht/3956129.stm
Last Updated: Tuesday, 26 October, 2004, 17:06 GMT 18:06 UK
E-mail this to a friend Printable version
New Florida vote scandal feared

By Greg Palast
Reporting for Newsnight

A secret document obtained from inside Bush campaign headquarters in Florida suggests a plan - possibly in violation of US law - to disrupt voting in the state's African-American voting districts, a BBC Newsnight investigation reveals.

Election supervisor Ion Sancho believes some voters are being intimidated
Two e-mails, prepared for the executive director of the Bush campaign in Florida and the campaign's national research director in Washington DC, contain a 15-page so-called "caging list". ....

Quote:

http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/pb...30/-1/Help0530
http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.d...YT02/704120590

Article published Apr 12, 2007
In 5-Year Effort, Scant Evidence of Voter Fraud
ERIC LIPTON AND IAN URBINA

WASHINGTON, April 11 — Five years after the Bush administration began a crackdown on voter fraud, the Justice Department has turned up virtually no evidence of any organized effort to skew federal elections, according to court records and interviews.

Although Republican activists have repeatedly said fraud is so widespread that it has corrupted the political process and, possibly, cost the party election victories, about 120 people have been charged and 86 convicted as of last year.

Most of those charged have been Democrats, voting records show. Many of those charged by the Justice Department appear to have mistakenly filled out registration forms or misunderstood eligibility rules, a review of court records and interviews with prosecutors and defense lawyers show.....

Rekna · 05-25-2007, 03:07 PM

If you want to everyone in the US to see something it isn't really that hard. Video tape yourself doing something insanely stupid and then put a link to what you want them to read afterwards.... Gotta love America....

Seaver · 05-25-2007, 03:10 PM

Or could this be another fraud with even less validity than the fake papers that got Dan Rather canned?

Willravel · 05-25-2007, 03:39 PM

Seaver, this should be enough evidence to convince even the most stubborn skeptic.

matthew330 · 05-25-2007, 03:54 PM

Based on the title of the thread, I view this as an admission that the hysteria regarding "rigged" elections over the past years was based on something less then "real" proof.

Call me a cynic, but I don't think there's anything "final" or "real" about the OP.....such is the life of my political counterparts. Lotta hate though. enjoy.

host · 05-25-2007, 03:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Seaver

Or could this be another fraud with even less validity than the fake papers that got Dan Rather canned?

Seaver, I'll let you in on a li'l secret. I've got friends who will never rest until the following is tied together in a "nice, neat, package" with a bow on top, that ends up proving, beyond a reasonable doubt, that this has been the most corrupt political party in an era of the most corrupt presidential administration, in the history of the United States.

I still don't think that you have even a clue of how far you are on the wrong side of the history of the political era we are living in, Seaver.

My friends are getting closer, time is on their side. Your smug tone in your last post indicates that they are not "there" yet. Time is on their side:

Quote:

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2004_...54612003710317
digby 9/19/2004 08:08:00 AM Comment (0) | Trackback (0)

Saturday, September 18, 2004

Voting Integrity

In case anybody's wondering about the integrity of the voting systems in Georgia, they can relax. The elections board members have looked into it and have found nothing at all to worry about:

Touch-screen opponents have alleged that Barnes' and Cleland's 2002 upset defeats are suspicious because of a last-minute fix to the machines.

[...]

To many people, the solution seems simple. Consumers go to a store and are given a receipt listing what they purchased. So why can't voting machines produce a similar piece of paper the state can use to ensure the integrity of elections?

[...]

"It really adds nothing to the system, [and] the people who think it will don't understand the history of voter fraud we've had with paper," she said.

Cox strongly defends electronic voting, calling Georgia's voting machines "the best solution available."

[...]

In October, the Fulton County Elections Board sent Cox a letter that asked pointed questions about the security of Georgia's voting machines. The state's largest county uses 2,975 machines. Harry MacDougald, a Republican board member, wrote the letter after hearing about Rubin's report.

Cox wrote a six-page response explaining the procedures in place to ensure the machines cannot be manipulated.

The Fulton board replied Dec. 1, telling Cox she had alleviated members' concerns.

"I feel reasonably comfortable," MacDougald said recently. "There's always a theoretical possibility [of tampering]. That can never be excluded, regardless of the voting technology. But the measures that were previously in place, with the new measures and technical fixes that are being made, bring the issue within a reasonable degree of security."

<h3>That Buckhead is a real renaissance man, isn't he? Where does he find the time to study typography and forensic document investigation on top of his legal work for the VRWC, serving on the local elections board and spending vast amounts of time on Freerepublic? Busy, busy, busy.</h3>

One thing I might warn everyone about on this voting technology issue. Be advised that if we win and it's close, the set-up has been put in place for Buckhead and his grubby little friends to rush online claiming that we stole the election. I have a hundred bucks riding on it. Projection has gone beyond a psychological diagnosis to an actual propaganda tool.

Monday, September 20, 2004

Rigged

Following up my post below on the new stepped up Justice department efforts to root out Democratic voters and throw out the votes of those who do manage to vote, Jeffrey Toobin has an article in the New Yorker on the same subject. Jesus, it's going to be tough to win this one even if we win this one. It's not just the voting machines:

On October 8, 2002, Attorney General Ashcroft stood before an invited audience in the Great Hall of the Justice Department to outline his vision of voting rights, in words that owed much to the rhetoric used by L.B.J. and Lincoln. “The right of citizens to vote and have their vote count is the cornerstone of our democracy—the necessary precondition of government of the people, by the people, and for the people,” Ashcroft told the group, which included several veteran civil-rights lawyers.

The Attorney General had come forward to launch the Voting Access and Integrity Initiative, whose name refers to the two main traditions in voting-rights law. Voter-access efforts, which have long been associated with Democrats, seek to remove barriers that discourage poor and minority voters; the Voting Rights Act itself is the paradigmatic voter-access policy. The voting-integrity movement, which has traditionally been favored by Republicans, targets fraud in the voting process, from voter registration to voting and ballot counting. Despite the title, Ashcroft’s proposal favored the “integrity” side of the ledger, mainly by assigning a federal prosecutor to watch for election crimes in each judicial district. These lawyers, Ashcroft said, would “deter and detect discrimination, prevent electoral corruption, and bring violators to justice.”

[...]

Von Spakovsky, a longtime activist in the voting-integrity cause, has emerged as the Administration’s chief operative on voting rights. Before going to Washington, he was a lawyer in private practice and a Republican appointee to the Fulton County Registration and Election Board, which runs elections in Atlanta. He belonged to the Federalist Society, a prominent organization of conservative lawyers, and had also joined the board of advisers of a lesser-known group called the Voting Integrity Project

The V.I.P. was founded by Deborah Phillips, a former county official of the Virginia Republican Party, as an organization devoted principally to fighting voting fraud and promoting voter education. In 1997, von Spakovsky wrote an article for the Georgia Public Policy Foundation, a conservative research group, that called for an aggressive campaign to “purge” the election rolls of felons. Within months of that article’s publication, the V.I.P. helped put von Spakovsky’s idea into action. Phillips met with the company that designed the process for the removal of alleged felons from the voting rolls in Florida, a process that led, notoriously, to the mistaken disenfranchisement of thousands of voters, most of them Democratic, before the 2000 election. (This year, Florida again tried to purge its voting rolls of felons, but the method was found to be so riddled with errors that it had to be abandoned.) During the thirty-six-day recount in Florida, von Spakovsky worked there as a volunteer for the Bush campaign. After the Inauguration, he was hired as an attorney in the Voting Section and was soon promoted to be counsel to the Assistant Attorney General, in what is known as the “front office” of the Civil Rights Division. In that position, von Spakovsky, who is forty-five years old, has become an important voice in the Voting Section. (Von Spakovsky, citing Justice Department policy, has also declined repeated requests to be interviewed.)

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2004/...-below-on.html

Well, I feel much better about these coming elections knowing that such a fair minded, non-partisan civil servant is working to ensure that all goes well.

In case anyone is wondering about the Voter Integrity project, it is another poisonous tentacle of the VRWC run by Helen Blackwell, wife of Morton Blackwell uber-conservative co-founder of the Moral Majority, recently renowned for the classy act of handing out purple band-aids at the Republican convention. (More on Blackwell at Democratic Veteran.)

I think it's also a good bet that Spakovsky is friends with the infamous Buckhead, fellow Atlanta republican elections board supervisor and federalist society clone.

Sometimes I think this whole VRWC could fit into a large jacuzzi.

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2007/...sometimes.html

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Hans Across America

by digby

Sometimes I feel as if I've been writing about the same things over and over again for years and it never adds up to anything. But in the case of this "voter fraud" issues, I have been concerned about what the Bush administration was up to for some time and it appears to be adding up to something quite huge. (Of course, I'm not the only one who was following this --- many people knew it was happening.)

Today, McClatchy has a <a href="http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/nation/17102317.htm?source=rss&channel=krwashington_nation">barn burner</a> of an article about the Bush administration's efforts to suppress the vote. It's no longer possible to argue with a straight face that they didn't use the power of the Justice Department for partisan reasons. The Bush administration has been pursuing phony voter fraud like it was a massive scourge, helping states enact all kinds of specious laws that only result in disenfranchising legitimate voters --- the kind who tend to vote Democratic. (I wonder why?)

Read the whole article and then come on back and we'll unpack just a tiny little piece of it, blog style.

Longtime readers will recall that way back when I wrote a bit about "Buckhead" the man who miraculously discovered in a few short moments that the kerning and fonts of the Dan Rather memos were "off" and put his "findings" up on Free Republic. You all know the results of his magnificent bit of internet sleuthing. In researching Buckhead, whose real name is Harry McDougal, I found out that in addition to being a member of the Federalist Society and someone who helped write anti-Clinton briefs for Kenneth Starr, he was a member of the Fulton County elections board which ruled that the extremely dubious Sonny Perdue and Saxby Chambliss wins in 2002 were perfectly a-ok. The guy got around.

It turned out that another interesting Republican fellow had previously been on that elections board by the name of Hans von Spakovsky, whom you just read about in that McClatchy piece. He was hired by the Bush Justice Department's civil right's division shortly after his stint down in Florida during the recount. Anyway, Von Spakovsky is not just another Atlanta lawyer. He had for years been involved with a GOP front group called the "Voter Integrity Project" (VIP) which was run by none other than Helen Blackwell, wife of notorious conservative operative Morton Blackwell. (Many of you will remember him as the guy who handed out the "purple heart" bandages at the 2004 GOP convention but he's actually much better known for years of running the dirty tricks school "The Leadership Institute" and is even credited with coining the name "Moral Majority." Let's just say he's been a playah in GOP circles for a long time --- and the VIP is one of his projects.

Salon published a piece on the Voter Integrity Project back in 2000:

VIP chairwoman of the board is Helen Blackwell, also the Virginia chairwoman of Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum, whose husband, Morton, serves as executive director of the conservative Council for National Policy. It took lumps for being partisan earlier this year from Slate writer Jeremy Derfner. "In fact, almost everything about the Voting Integrity Project makes you wonder. Though VIP's members assert that they are both independent and nonpartisan, the organization is essentially a conservative front," Derfner wrote.

VIP has vigorously opposed efforts to liberalize voting procedures -- railing against everything from Internet voting to Oregon's mail-in balloting to the Motor Voter bill. But it is VIP's involvement in partisan political fights that makes Democrats charge the group is a Republican front group.

VIP sent investigators into largely black areas in Louisiana after Mary Landrieu's 1996 U.S. Senate victory over Republican Woody Jenkins.

"The VIP conducted its investigation over a 10-day period from December 26 through January 4, during which time they concentrated on the Orleans Parish voting activities," a VIP release says. "The VIP examined and independently verified substantial amounts of evidence gathered by the Jenkins campaign, as well as gathering its own evidence concerning vote buying, vote hauling and improprieties by elections officials tasked with protecting voting machines."

VIP chairwoman Helen Blackwell told the Senate Rules Committee, "Many claims of the Jenkins campaign have merit and should be investigated to the fullest extent of the law."

In a few short years, former VIP lawyer Von Spakovsky, who had made his name calling for voter roll purges in Georgia, was working in the Justice Department, with the full resources of the federal government behind him.

From the McClatchy article:

In late 2001, Ashcroft also hired three Republican political operatives to work in a secretive new unit in the division's Voting Rights Section. Rich said the unit, headed by unsuccessful Republican congressional candidate Mark Metcalf of Kentucky, bird-dogged the progress of the administration's Help America Vote Act (HAVA) and reviewed voting legislation in the states.

One member of the three-person political unit, former Georgia elections official and Republican activist Hans von Spakovsky, eventually took de facto control of the Voting Rights Section and used his position to advocate tougher voter ID laws, said former department lawyers who declined to be identified for fear of reprisals.

Those former employees said that Spakovsky helped state officials interpret the Help America Vote Act's confusing new minimum voter identification requirements. He also weighed in when the Voting Rights Act required department approval for any new ID law in 13 states with histories of racial discrimination.

In November 2004, Arizona residents passed Proposition 200, the toughest state voter ID law to date, which requires applicants to provide proof of citizenship and voters to produce a photo ID on Election Day. The Voting Rights Act state requires states to show that such laws wouldn't impede minorities from voting and gives the Justice Department 60 days to approve or oppose them.

Career voting rights specialists in the Justice Department soon discovered that more than 2,000 elderly Indians in Arizona lacked birth certificates, and they sought their superiors' approval to request more information from the state about other potential impacts on voters' rights. Spakovsky and Sheldon Bradshaw, the division's top deputy and a close friend of top Gonzales aide Kyle Sampson, a former Bush White House lawyer, denied the request, said one of the former department attorneys.

Jeffrey Toobin wrote an article back in 2004 about this subject which everyone who is following this case should read (or re-read) to see just how pervasive this "voter fraud" initiative was in the Bush Justice department. Karl Rove was almost certainly running it from the white house. But it was being pushed from throughout the Republican establishment that had recognized for years that they couldn't win fair and square. I think 2000 scared the hell out of them. If it hadn't been for Ralph Nader and Jebby and Poppy's political machines they would have lost that one and they had put everything they had into winning it.

So where is our friend Von Spakovsky now?

Saturday, December 17, 2005

President Bush nominated two controversial lawyers to the Federal Election Commission yesterday: Hans von Spakovsky who helped Georgia win approval of a disputed voter-identification law, and Robert D. Lenhard, who was part of a legal team that challenged the constitutionality of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law.

Von Spakovsky and Mason are Republican appointees, while Lenhard and Walther are Democratic picks for the bipartisan six-member commission.

In a letter to Senate Rules Committee Chairman Trent Lott (R-Miss.), Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) wrote that he is "extremely troubled" by the von Spakovsky nomination. Kennedy contends that von Spakovsky "may be at the heart of the political interference that is undermining the [Justice] Department's enforcement of federal civil laws."

Career Justice Department lawyers involved in a Georgia case said von Spakovsky pushed strongly for approval of a state program requiring voters to have photo identification. A team of staff lawyers that examined the case recommended 4 to 1 that the Georgia plan should be rejected because it would harm black voters; the recommendation was overruled by von Spakovsky and other senior officials in the Civil Rights Division.

Before working in the Justice Department, von Spakovsky was the Republican Party chairman in Fulton County, Ga., and served on the board of the Voter Integrity Project, which advocated regular purging of voter roles to prevent felons from casting ballots.

In a brief telephone interview, von Spakovsky played down his role in policy decisions in the Civil Rights Division. "I'm just a career lawyer who works in the front office of civil rights," he said. He noted that the department has rules against career lawyers talking to reporters.

That takes some gall, don't you think? He actually tried to pass himself off as a career lawyer for the justice department when he was nothing but a political hack from the moment he hit DC. Chutzpah doesn't even begin to describe it.

Bush gave him a recess appointment a month later. A couple of months after that, this came out

I'm sure everyone is aware by now that the recent study by the NY Times pretty much takes voter fraud off the table as anything but a partisan Republican tool for suppressing the Democratic vote:

Five years after the Bush administration began a crackdown on voter fraud, the Justice Department has turned up virtually no evidence of any organized effort to skew federal elections, according to court records and interviews.

Frankly you had to be something of an historical illiterate not to recognize from the beginning that these folks are up to the same tricks they've been using for decades. They tried mightily, with everything they had, the federal government, the Republican Lawyers Association, the country awash in patriotic paranoia, and they still couldn't prove this case --- even crookedly they couldn't do it. In fact, their insistence on finding it where there was none is what has caused their whole edifice to crumble.

Oh, and by the way, von Spakovsky has now been formally nominated by Bush to the FEC and will have to undergo Senate confirmation. Here's a blistering critique of his performace at the DOJ as well as his predictably awful tenure on the FEC from a former attoreny in the civil rights division. He concludes:

But even putting aside his controversial tenure at DOJ, von Spakovsky’s performance at the FEC over the last year independently raises questions of whether he is worthy of Senate confirmation. His comments at FEC meetings have often been caustic and extraneous to the issue at hand. He has consistently scoffed at the spirit of campaign finance laws, thumbing his nose at the law as he seeks to help create routes of circumvention. He even accuses those reformers who seek regulation of the role of money in our political process as attempting to take us back to the days of the Alien and Sedition Acts. This is an easy accusation to make, and von Spakovsky has employed it a number of times, and it certainly is easier to attack those he disagrees with rather than to explain principled reasons for his own actions.

The Senate Rules Committee hearings will begin soon. When they do, the American people have the right to know all the details of von Spakovsky’s roles in both the Texas and Georgia matters, and his handling of FEC matters as a recess appointee. That record, if compiled, will make the vote on his confirmation quite easy.

Let's hope so.

Quote:

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4591
BLOGGED BY Brad Friedman ON 5/23/2007

Says DAG Paul McNulty Withheld Knowledge of Tim Griffin's Involvement in Challenging Minority Voter Registration in 2004
Former Rove Aide Griffin Posted to U.S. Attorney Position in Arkansas...

From Monica Goodling's <a href="http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/docs/goodling-statement/">opening statement</a> to the U.S. House Judiciary Committee this morning [emphasis added]:
Despite my and others' best efforts, [Deputy Attorney General, Paul McNulty]'s public testimony was incomplete or inaccurate in a number of respects. As explained in more detail in my written remarks, I believe that the Deputy was not fully candid about his knowledge of White House involvement in the replacement decision, failed to disclose that he had some knowledge of the White House's interest in selecting Tim Griffin as Interim U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, inaccurately described the Department's internal assessment of the Parsky Commission, and failed to disclose that he had some knowledge of allegations that Tim Griffin had been involved in vote "caging" during his work on the President's 2004 campaign.

For the record, it's the practice of sending registered mail to minority voters, asking for a reply, and if one doesn't come back, the voter's right to vote is challenged either at the polls, or attempts are made to remove them from the voter rolls --- usually without their knowledge. Allegations have been made that this was done, based on race, in 2004, when registered letters were sent to the home addresses of African-Americans in Ohio, Florida and elsewhere. Most insidiously, letters were said to have been sent to U.S. troops who were away, serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, and thus did not (and could not) answer the registered mail. Their registrations were then reportedly challenged.

The RNC agreed to cease the practice in a 1986 consent decree in a court case brought after they had "tried to have 31,000 voters, most of them black, removed from the rolls in Louisiana when a party mailer was returned, " <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A7422-2004Oct28.html">according to the Washington Post.</a>

"The consent decrees that resulted prohibited the party from engaging in anti-fraud initiatives that target minorities or conduct mail campaigns to 'compile voter challenge lists.'"

Hopefully one of the Judiciary Committee Members will follow up on this, with either Goodling or in further interviews with McNulty or Griffin, who was Karl Rove's aide at the time, before he was later shoved into Bud Cummins' position as Arkansas U.S. Attorney.

UPDATE 2:45pm PT: The DoJ released a statement this afternoon from McNulty, in response to Goodling's testimony and her claims that his "public testimony was incomplete or inaccurate in a number of respects":
"I testified truthfully at the Feb. 6, 2007,- hearing based on what I knew at that time. Ms. Goodling's characterization of my testimony is wrong and not supported by the extensive record of documents and testimony already provided to Congress."

<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caging_list">More on Vote Caging Lists at Wikipedia.</a> The key details follow below...

Quote:

Direct Mail

Caging is a term of art in the direct mail industry. After a mailing is sent, caging is when information is processed that can be learned from the returns. A caging list is the compiled information that is transferred to the organization that hired the direct mail firm, in order for them to update their mailing lists and databases.

Voter suppression

Caging has also been used as a form of voter suppression. A political party challenges the validity of a voter's registration; for the voter's ballot to be counted, the voter must prove that their registration is valid.

Voters targeted by caging are often the most vulnerable: those who are unfamiliar with their rights under the law, and those who cannot spare the time, effort, and expense of proving that their registration is valid. Ultimately, caging works by dissuading a voter from casting a ballot, or by ensuring that they cast a provisional ballot, which is less likely to be counted.

With one type of caging, a political party sends registered mail to addresses of registered voters. If the mail is returned as undeliverable - because, for example, the voter refuses to sign for it, the voter isn't present for delivery, or the voter is homeless - the party uses that fact to challenge the registration, arguing that because the voter could not be reached at the address, the registration is fraudulent. It is this use of direct mail caging techniques to target voters which probably resulted in the application of the name to the political tactic.

On the day of the election, when the voter arrives at the poll and requests a ballot, an operative of the party challenges the validity of their registration.

While the challenge process is prescribed by law, the use of broad, partisan challenges is controversial. For example, in the United States Presidential Election of 2004, the Republican Party employed this process to challenge the validity of tens of thousands of voter registrations in contested states like Florida, Nevada, Ohio, and Wisconsin. The Republican Party argued that the challenges were necessary to combat widespread voter fraud. The Democratic Party countered that the challenges were tantamount to voter suppression, and further argued that the Republican Party had targeted voter registrations on the basis of the race of the voter, in violation of federal law.

Examples of political caging

From the Washington Post: "In 1981, the Republican National Committee sent letters to predominantly black neighborhoods in New Jersey, and when 45,000 letters were returned as undeliverable, the committee compiled a challenge list to remove those voters from the rolls. The RNC sent off-duty law enforcement officials to the polls and hung posters in heavily black neighborhoods warning that violating election laws is a crime.

The Washington Post continues: "In 1986, the RNC tried to have 31,000 voters, most of them black, removed from the rolls in Louisiana when a party mailer was returned. The consent decrees that resulted prohibited the party from engaging in anti-fraud initiatives that target minorities or conduct mail campaigns to 'compile voter challenge lists.'"

In October 2004, the BBC Newsnight program reported on an alleged so-called "caging list" maintained by the George W. Bush campaign that suggested that they may be planning possibly illegal disruption of African American voting in Jacksonville, Florida.

The BBC reports that it has obtained a document from George W. Bush's Florida campaign headquarters, inadvertently e-mailed to the parody website GeorgeWBush.org, containing a list of 1,886 names and addresses of voters in largely African-American and Democratic areas of Jacksonville. Democratic Party officials allege that the document is a "caging list" that the Bush campaign intends to use to issue mass challenges to African-American voters, in violation of federal law.

While Florida statutory law allows the parties to challenge voters at the polls, this practice is not allowed if the challenges appear to be race-based.

The list appears to have come to light because of what appear to be e-mails accidentally addressed by Republican campaigners to the georgewbush.org anti-Bush site instead of the georgewbush.com Bush campaign site. The e-mails had the subject line "Re: Caging" and contained Microsoft Excel spreadsheet file attachments called "Caging.xls" and "Caging-1.xls".

References

1. Palast, Greg (June 2006) African-American Voters Scrubbed by Secret GOP Hit List, Democracy Now!
2. Emails published on georgewbush.org

Sources

* "10 Most Important Things About Direct Mail"
* Anne-Marie Cusac. "Bullies at the Voting Booth."
* Andrew Welsh-Huggins. "Voter Registrations Challenged in Ohio." Associated Press. October 28, 2004.

Quote:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6356977/site/newsweek/
WEB EXCLUSIVE
By Michael Isikoff
Newsweek
Updated: 10:29 a.m. ET Oct 29, 2004

Oct. 28 - A last-minute endorsement of President George W. Bush by a hastily formed coalition of Arab-Americans was coordinated in part by a registered lobbyist for the Libyan regime of Col. Muammar Kaddafi—a government formally branded by the State Department as a state sponsor of terrorism.....

.......While Phares told NEWSWEEK he only asked Hudome to advise him on press strategy, Hudome said she actually did much more than that. “When he [Phares] sent it to me, I told him this was way, way too long and had too much mishmash,” Hudome said. “I rewrote the press release and told him you need to have these points.”

Although Phares insisted his organization has no formal connection to the Bush-Cheney campaign, Hudome’s e-mail exchanges with Phares were copied to Jafar Karim, a top Bush-Cheney campaign official who serves as “national coalitions director.” He did not return a telephone call and e-mail request for comment today.

“Walid, attached is the press release. Please fill in your contact number, letter head, etc. Also I need city and states to show geographical diversity," reads an Oct. 23 email—written all in upper case—from Hudome to Phares. Leave the last page as talkers for those who will be called by the press. Please let me know of approval ASAP so I can help you distribute to the press," Hudome’s email continues.

In another Oct. 25 e-mail, in which Karim was also copied, Hudome said she had used Google to search for information about the prospective signatories of the Bush endorsement and advised that one of them, an Arab-American activist in Virginia, should not be included “for the reasons we discussed.”

Hudome then continued: “Remember this: We do not want to do anything that might harm the President’s chances of re-election by exposing him to any controversy. If you have doubts about these names—perhaps we don’t need to do this press release.”

The e-mails were posted this week, without comment and without any reference to Hudome’s role as Libyan lobbyist, on the Web site of GeorgeWBush.org, an anti-Bush site that tries to imitate the look of the official Bush campaign Web site—GeorgeWBush.com—but laces it with material lampooning the president, such as links to spoof organizations like Billionaires for Bush and Pleasure Boat Captains for Truth.

Phares inadvertently sent e-mails meant for Karim, the Bush campaign official, to the wrong e-mail address by typing in GeorgeWBush.org. The anti-Bush site said the e-mails, along with many others directed to the Bush campaign, wound up in a “catch all” e-mailbox—the contents of which it gleefully shared with its readers this week. “It was sort of a trap,” said Phares.

The emails sent to georgewbush.org by mistake, are the same ones that:

Quote:

http://thinkprogress.org/2007/04/11/...-house-emails/
White House Claims It Lost RNC Emails

“The White House said Wednesday it had mishandled Republican Party-sponsored e-mail accounts used by nearly two dozen presidential aides, resulting in the loss of an undetermined number of e-mails concerning official White House business.”

White House spokesman Scott Stanzel “could not say what had been lost, and said the White House is working to recover as many as they can. The White House has now shut off employees’ ability to delete e-mails on the separate accounts, and is briefing staffers on how to better make determinations about when — and when not — to use them, Stanzel said.”

UPDATE: The Politico has more details:

This is a big problem for the White House, and Waxman said it raised ’serious legal and security concerns’ about the e-mail related activities of Bush administration aides.

Waxman’s staff are supposed to meet with RNC officials on Thursday about the “rnchq” and “gwb.43″ e-mail accounts, which some White House officials, like Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove, use for authorized political work. Waxman suspects that White House aides were using the accounts to evade presidential record-keeping requirements.

The Politico also reports that the White House held a private briefing on the situation for some reporters, who relayed the message, “it’s really bad for the White House.”

Such a small group of thugs to do so much damage to such a large and powerful nation's political system. What are the odds that MacDougal, aka "Buckhead" would be the one to "discover" the kerning inconsistency in the "Dan Rather memoes" that discredited the type font of the memoes...they were not originals from the 1970's.....but not the actual information contained in the memoes, and protected us from the truth about Bush's Vietnam era guard "service"?

What are the odds that the white house "lost" the damning emails or that many of them, revealing the illegal RNC "caging" conspiracy to suppress the election 2004 vote, are preserved by BBC News Night? What are the odds that Bush and Cheney were ever legitimately elected?

Stay effing tuned!

archetypal fool · 05-25-2007, 04:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by matthew330

Based on the title of the thread, I view this as an admission that the hysteria regarding "rigged" elections over the past years was based on something less then "real" proof.

Call me a cynic, but I don't think there's anything "final" or "real" about the OP.....such is the life of my political counterparts. Lotta hate though. enjoy.

I didn't mean to imply that the former proof was anything less than "real" proof. It's just that now we have the emails from Rove himself* which specifically lay the plans out. This is damning evidence, and it sure as hell is "final" and "real". The Bush administration deserves to he hated for all the shit they've done. They've lied to America, and removed (among many others) the right to vote from people. Minorities, no less.

How can you possibly rationalize this positively?

*You know, the thousand emails which mysteriously "disappeared" when they were asked for? We have 500 of them now. Who knows what more evidence against these criminals can be found in the other 500...

host · 05-25-2007, 04:25 PM

Take heart, archetypal fool.....

....those who deny the ever growing body of evidence have only the response that "this cannot be happening". They offer no excuses, no rationale for the long history of republican party vote suppression and race baiting, and they seem indifferent to the SCOTUS appointing "their president" in 2000, his brother's role in suppressing the Florida opposition vote, the Abramoff scandal, an illegal preemptive invasion and occupation of another country, secret warrantless wire tapping, torture, rendition, suspension of habeus corpus, the suppression of the 2004 vote....12 hours long voting lines in Ohio....The CNP's role in the republican party and in the president's administration, or the suspension of the DOJ civil rights enforcement division, false prosecution of voters and organizers, etc.....

....so this is just one more detail for them to dismiss, and you are one more target to attempt to make "silly looking". That's what they do...because that's all they
ve got. Certainly supporting Bush Cheney and the RNC, knowing what know, is not something a reasonable person could do, without attempting to justify how they can do it....

matthew330 · 05-25-2007, 04:36 PM

"I've got friends who will never rest until the following is tied together in a "nice, neat, package" with a bow on top, that ends up proving, beyond a reasonable doubt, that this has been the most corrupt political party in an era of the most corrupt presidential administration, in the history of the United States."

....and which internet forums aren't they resting on?

"Time is on their side:"

I believe you.

doubleaught · 05-25-2007, 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

Seaver, this should be enough evidence to convince even the most stubborn skeptic.

I apologize in advance for adding little intellectual thought to this thread, but I just have let out a HOLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK after reading that article. Thanks for the link and I hope we as a nation can pull our shit together and have a fair election in the future.

archetypal fool · 05-25-2007, 05:32 PM

Since you enjoyed the read, I'm sure you'll enjoy the video I posted above as well. When you have an hour to spare, give the video a try.

Willravel · 05-25-2007, 05:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by doubleaught

I apologize in advance for adding little intellectual thought to this thread, but I just have let out a HOLY SHIT WHAT THE FUCK after reading that article. Thanks for the link and I hope we as a nation can pull our shit together and have a fair election in the future.

Thanks, and I'm glad you read it. To me, it's conclusive.

The next one isn't looking good, btw. That's why I'm hoping Obama or Clinton can gather 2/3 or more of the vote so even cheating they lose.

archetypal fool · 05-29-2007, 05:26 PM

By the way, here are the leaked emails, for all to see.

http://2004.georgewbush.org/deadletteroffice/index.asp

reconmike · 05-30-2007, 05:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

Thanks, and I'm glad you read it. To me, it's conclusive.

The next one isn't looking good, btw. That's why I'm hoping Obama or Clinton can gather 2/3 or more of the vote so even cheating they lose.

Maybe Democrats should dig up good ole Richard Daley so you dems have a guaranteed victory just like JFK.

Willravel · 05-30-2007, 05:42 PM

If a Dem was ever as corrupt as the people who rigged the election, they'd receive as much of my scorn (if not more). I've never been, am not, nor will I probably ever be a Democrat. Don't confuse the liberal label with the Democrat label. They're not interchangeable.

Recon, are you going to refute any of the information posted in here? Normally, wolves tend to attack their prey head on, not cut and run from confrontation.

mr_alleycat · 06-03-2007, 08:44 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

Maybe Democrats should dig up good ole Richard Daley so you dems have a guaranteed victory just like JFK.

That was 1960, this is 47 years later, and we are talking local elections to.

"GP: Sure. In 2000, I cracked the computer disks (CD-ROMs then) from Katherine Harris’ office showing 56,000 names of voters “purged” from voter rolls as felons who aren’t allowed to vote. In fact, every one — every one — was an innocent voter"

He should have said: Out of the 84,000 on the "purged list" 56,000 protested their status, and were found unjustly "purged".
That would leave thousands that didn't protest for whatever reason.
If you have some time read the Civil Rights Commission's report on their investigation of the 2000 Florida election.
The subcontractor's rep said "we were told to use nick names, switch first and last name, (this would mean if your name was John Thomas, Thomas John, and Tom John would be purged to.
One county official said of the 3,000+ names given him to check, he found around 700 that were correct, just by checking birth dates and middle names. Of the subcontractor's 84000+ "purge list", state law enforcement's was just over three thousand.

dc_dux · 06-04-2007, 10:03 AM

I dont know if all the facts on the Florida voter purge (and other recent questionable voter suppresion tactics in other states) will ever be resolved through the legal process. Too much plausible deniability by those at the top. At best, rank and file staff will take the hit.

In the meantime, Congress can focus on prevention of future voter intimidation and suppression. The Senate is starting this week with a hearing in a Judiciary subcommittee on on “Prevention of Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation in Federal Elections” to explore ways to prevent occurenced like these in the past:

* Shortly before the 1990 midterm Federal elections, 125,000 voters in North Carolina received postcards providing false information about voter eligibility and a warning about criminal penalties for voter fraud. Ninety-seven percent of the voters who received postcards were African American.

* In 2004, Native American voters in South Dakota were prevented from voting after they did not provide photographic identification upon request, despite the fact that they were not required to present such identification in order to vote under State or Federal law.

* In the 2006 midterm election, 14,000 Latino voters in Orange County, California received mailings from the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, warning them in Spanish that `if you are an immigrant, voting in a federal election is a crime that can result in incarceration...'. In fact, an immigrant who is a naturalized citizen of the United States has the same right to vote as any other citizen.

* In the same 2006 election, some Virginia voters received automated phone messages falsely warning them that the `Virginia Elections Commission' had determined they were ineligible to vote and that they would face severe criminal penalties if they tried to cast a ballot.

* In 2006 in Maryland, certain candidates for Governor and United States Senator distributed fliers in predominantly African-American neighborhoods falsely claiming that the candidates had been endorsed by their opponents' party and by prominent figures who had actually endorsed the opponents of the candidates.

In both the Senate and the House, the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act of 2007 has been introduced to address these types of voter suppression tactics.

Both Houses are also considering legisation to require uniformty in voting standards for federal elections.... the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2007.

Both the "Deceptive Practices" bills and the "Voter Confidence" bills already have majority Dem support and should have floor votes before the fall.

We'll see where the Republicans stand on these bills.

host · 06-04-2007, 10:22 AM

If it was just a matter of a sore and slightly bloodied rectum, it might be possible to just "move on". However the damage done to the country by permitting the resident to occupy the white house twice, after two stolen elections, speaks for itself.

Quote:

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4631
VIDEO: Shrum Says Gore Won 2000 Presidential Election, Joked Beforehand About Bush Getting Caught Cheating in Florida

Hapless Democratic strategist Bob Shrum's comments on this morning's Meet The Press are fascinating in their own right but have added resonance considering U.S. House candidate <a href="http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4574">John Russell's Guest Post early today</a>, concerning last November's Florida elections. Shrum believes (and allegedly Gore too) that Gore won Florida and the 2000 election. He also tells an interesting story about Gore joking about Bush getting caught cheating the day before the election. Cheating, elections, Florida, seems like an epidemic.

Quote:

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/014450.php
(June 04, 2007 -- 11:36 AM EST // link)

Last week we noted that supporters of former Gov. Don Siegelman (D) of Alabama have come forward with an affidavit from a GOP lawyer who says she was on a conference call in which Karl Rove was implicated in getting the Justice Department to prosecute Siegelman. Here's the <a href="http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/014416.php">story</a> and here's the <a href="http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/docs/rove-affidavit/">affidavit</a>.
-- Josh Marshall

dc_dux · 06-04-2007, 10:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

If it was just a matter of a sore and slightly bloodied rectum, it might be possible to just "move on". However the damage done to the country by permitting the resident to occupy the white house twice, after two stolen elections, speaks for itself.

Host..I am not suggesting abandoning the search for the truth and the prosecution of those involved if actions were illegal. I just dont believe Bush or Cheney will ever be implicated...perhaps Rove if his former staff people are given immunity.

So...at the same time...we can and should "move on" to prevent it from happening again.

In addition to the Senate hearing on "voter intimidation" (cited above) scheduled for Thurs, another Senate Judiciary subcommittee is holding a hearing tommorow on "preserving prosecutorial independence".

Would these hearings have occurred last year under a Republican Congress?

mr_alleycat · 06-05-2007, 04:53 AM

dc_dux,
Oh they may have had hearings, but they would have been held in the basement.

reconmike · 06-05-2007, 05:28 AM

[QUOTE=mr_alleycat]That was 1960, this is 47 years later, and we are talking local elections to.

QUOTE]

Well according to the threads title, "finally real proof of rigged elections"
in 1960 JFK was elected president because of Daley's fraud, ballot stuffing, dead people voting.

Quote:

John F. Kennedy:
Kennedy's election in 1960 over Nixon involved heavy fraud in Illinois and Texas. (If Nixon had won those two states, he would have won presidency.) As examples of ballot box stuffing: In Texas's Angelina County, in one precinct, only 86 people voted yet the final tally was 147 for Kennedy, 24 for Nixon; in Fannin County the 4895 registered voters cast 6138 votes (75% for Kennedy). Discarded spoiled ballots were to be placed by Texas law in "ballot box 4" for later re-examination, but many counties (e.g. Fort Bend County, which had a huge 16% spoilage rate, topping even the worst Florida 2000 County) just discarded them, and did not store them, making any biased discarding decisions uncorrectable and unprovable. The 100%-Democrat Texas Election Board refused to conduct a recount, so game over.

Kennedy carried Illinois by 8858 votes thanks to a 456,312-vote advantage in Chicago, whose precincts reported their totals remarkably late. (Compare this with Kennedy's nationwide victory margin of 118,574.) The "turnout" in Daley-machine Chicago was a spectacular 89%. This contrasts with the nationwide turnout of 63%. It also contrasts with the fact that in the 11 presidential elections during 1960-2000, totalling 550 statewide contests, not once did any state ever exceed 1964 Utah's 78.4% turnout, and the states with the largest-% turnout were always rural (namely North and South Dakota, Utah, Minnesota, and Maine), not urban.

In 1992 mob boss Sam Giancana's nephew and brother wrote a book ["Double Cross: The Explosive, Inside Story of the Mobster Who Controlled America," Warner books] again recounting how Giancana had rigged the Cook County vote for Kennedy as part of a deal, and further stating that when Kennedy reneged on the deal, Giancana had him assassinated. (They claimed they had heard this directly from Giancana himself who also noted "Richard Nixon and Lyndon Johnson knew about the whole damn thing." The book also linked Giancana to a total of 7 US Presidents.) Giancana and Kennedy both shared Judith Campbell Exner as mistress.

Circuit Court Judge Thomas Kluczynski, a Daley machine loyalist, dismissed Republican lawsuits, for which Kennedy rewarded him by appointment to the federal bench. Recounts were generally blocked by Daley cronies, but special prosecutor (a Democrat!) Morris Wexler found that the simultaneous IL Attorney General race had been massively corrupted to defeat Adamowski (8875 extra Adamowski votes were found during a partial recount, i.e. exceeding the Kennedy-Nixon margin) and embarked on 667 prosecutions, but the Daley machine trumped that by getting a judge to dismiss all the charges en masse, and game over. During the 1960 election, 176 out of 180 positions on the Board of Election Commissioners were Daley Democrats. In 1962, after an election judge confessed to witnessing vote tampering in Chicago's 28th ward, three precinct workers pled guilty and served short jail terms. Reporter Earl Mazo, visiting the Chicago address where 56 Kennedy voters "lived," found an abandoned demolished house. He also found a cemetary where all the tombstone names were registered voters. In Ward 27, Precinct 27, the 376 voters cast 397 votes; In the 15th precinct of ward 2, Kennedy beat Nixon 74-to-3 but only 22 people were registered to vote.

Following Kennedy's election, he appointed his brother Bobby (who would seem to be somewhat underqualified, e.g. he'd never argued a case in a courtroom) US attorney general, and Bobby shut down all federal investigations into voting fraud.

Some cleanup of the Daley machine finally occurred in the early 1970s after the Chicago Tribune hatched a plan in 1972 to get 20 of its reporters to become precinct officials so they could see the machine from inside; this plan resulted in 40 indictments for election fraud. They observed countless cases of workers illegally helping voters and distributing partisan literature. Vote-buying including "chain voting" was done openly. Election observers were threatened with death. Others were simply refused permission to observe. The livelihood of the "precinct captains" was based on the votes they "delivered." They had quotas that differed in different precincts based on past history, and had to deliver quota or lose job. Counts were falsified. Democrat party bosses controlled all the election judge appointments. 82% of Republican election judges admitted they had been recruited and appointed by Democratic ward bosses.

You see this is nothing new in the US, it just hasn't come around when GWB was running, whether that makes it right or not is irrelevant, because all the Bush haters here like to pretend that he invented it, and the dems of yesteryear we all saints, especially Saint Johnny Boy.
So get over it it happens on both sides, like the dems giving cigarettes to bums to vote, buses for inner city people to vote as long as your going to vote dem that is.

(edit note) So to answer the question of the thread starter, "how long will it take america?" lets see its been well over 47 years of proof of election fraud and nothing has been done, could be another 47 years.

host · 06-05-2007, 08:53 AM

Reconmike, from lower on the same page that you posted from, but did not link:

Quote:

http://rangevoting.org/PresFraud.html
....George W. Bush:
Bush's victory over Gore in the 2000 election depended upon a number of fraudulent techniques in Florida (which he officially won by 537 votes), without which Gore would have won by tens of thousands of votes. Bush was aided by the fact that his brother Jeb was Florida Governor; his campaign co-chair Katherine Harris was the top Florida election-supervising official (secretary of state); and 4 of the 9 members of the US Supreme Court has been appointed by Bush's father (or when Bush senior was VP) – all 4 voted for Bush in the showdown, along with Justice Kennedy in the 5-4 decision. (7 of the 9 Supremes had been appointed by Republican presidents; the 2 others voted against Bush in the decision.)

(Bush also had won the Republican primary versus McCain by pulling ahead in Carolina with the aid of sudden closings of 21 of the 135 polls in Greenville County despite court order for them to stay open, which McCain & Campbell tagged as suspicious.)

We'll only mention a few techniques. (Some more.) Florida Blacks voted 93% for Gore, so a top goal of Bush's team was to stop blacks from voting or eliminate black votes from the count.

First, the famous Florida Felon's list. By Florida law, felons could not vote. Conveniently, 54% of the names on the "felon's list" were black, although the state as a whole was about 12% black. Over 300 "felons" on the "list" had printed conviction "dates" in the future (including as late as 2007) but that was of course just the tip of the iceberg. Tallahassee (Leon County) election supervisor Ion Sancho, after checking the 694 listed in his area, found only 33 were actually convicted criminals, an error rate of 95%! Madison County's elections supervisor Linda Howell refused the purge list after she found herself listed on it. DBT On-Line, the company which had been paid over 400 times the previous company's rate to prepare the list (and was awarded the contract with no competitive bidding), was specifically instructed not to perform rudimentary identifying checks (such as social security number matching – nor even listing these numbers) – but the race of every felon was explicitly listed. Consequently far more names were purged than the number listed, but only if they were people of the right race. Before the next election (2004) the news organization CNN requested to examine Florida's new and "corrected" felons list, but that request was denied. After they won that permission on 1 July 2004 in a lawsuit, the list – again with every one of the over 47,000 voters on it identified by race – was found, amazingly, to contain fewer than 0.1% Hispanics, in a state where nearly 1 in 5 residents is Hispanic. (The Hispanic vote was pro-Bush.) And the Miami Herald reported on July 2 that it found more than 2100 names erroneously included on the list because they had received clemency. (According to Jeb Bush, these things were "an oversight and mistake.")

Second, after Gore contested the election, the absentee ballots, especially the late ones, became crucial since they were the only class that had not yet been counted. Here's how the late-arriving absentee ballots got counted:
In pro-Bush counties: 530 accepted, 523 rejected and hence uncounted.
In pro-Gore counties: 150 accepted, 666 rejected.
If you were black in FL 2000, your chances of having your vote "spoiled" and hence uncounted was 10 times higher than if you were white – and that's assuming you hadn't already been purged by the felon list. This was due to systematic manipulation of voting machines in Florida counties and precincts on a precinct by precinct basis.

To learn more about US election fraud, we recommend Campbell's, Gumbel's, Feinberg's, Saltman's, and Palast's books.

We cannot do much about the 47 years old Kennedy election fraud, at this point, Reconmike....35 years ago, the Chicago Tribune seems to have exposed the corrupt political machine that caused it.

We can, however, investigate the corrupt, election stealing Bush administration currently still in office, and respond to evidence of law breaking with indictments, prosecutions, and impeachment investigations, and restore the DOJ to a voting rights enforcement agency, instead of a vote suppression arm of the republican party, as it seems to be, now.

reconmike · 06-05-2007, 10:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by host

Reconmike, from lower on the same page that you posted from, but did not link:

We cannot do much about the 47 years old Kennedy election fraud, at this point, Reconmike....35 years ago, the Chicago Tribune seems to have exposed the corrupt political machine that caused it.

We can, however, investigate the corrupt, election stealing Bush administration currently still in office, and respond to evidence of law breaking with indictments, prosecutions, and impeachment investigations, and restore the DOJ to a voting rights enforcement agency, instead of a vote suppression arm of the republican party, as it seems to be, now.

You are absolutly correct Host, I have yet to see an indictment, prosecution, or conviction in the alleged Bush election "stealing".

Once again I posted the Daley/JFK proven election rigging as a rebuttle to the threads starters headline, as the Bush questions are not the first time election
fraud has gone on, it wasn't fixed in 47 years why start now?

Oh never mind I see now it is because it is a republican under scrutiny.

mr_alleycat · 06-05-2007, 01:42 PM

Recon,
Don't you see with electronic voting machines, this kind of thing is more serious? I don't care who manufactured the machines, they are a threat to our society. It has been shown one person with access to one machine can bypass the event log, and infect many machines with no paper trail. Giving the election to whoever they chose, without leaving any footprints.

I refuse to use these machines, and the American people need to do the same. If we won't use them, they will have to replace them with something we would feel more confident using.

Willravel · 06-05-2007, 01:48 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by reconmike

You are absolutly correct Host, I have yet to see an indictment, prosecution, or conviction in the alleged Bush election "stealing".

So if someone is never indicted, they aren't guilty. Amazing logic. So if I go out and kill 26 people in cold blood and arrange the killings to lead to the wrong suspect and I am never indicted, I didn't kill anyone?

The_Jazz · 06-05-2007, 01:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

So if someone is never indicted, they aren't guilty. Amazing logic. So if I go out and kill 26 people in cold blood and arrange the killings to lead to the wrong suspect and I am never indicted, I didn't kill anyone?

No, they're still dead and you still did it, but you're not guilty in a strictly legal sense until a jury says you are.

Election fraud in an ancient crime. The Greeks did it. So did the Romans. So did the English. So do we. Wow, big surprise. Kennedy wasn't even the first beneficiary on the Presidential level - Tyler was, by some accounts at least.

That doesn't excuse it, make it better or make it right.

Voter fraud takes many forms, including ballot stuffing. The Klan intimidated Blacks for decades. Tamany Hall minted citizens in New York. Daley Sr. raised the dead. Cas Walker once took a gun to a polling station to make sure he won reelection. Boss Crump sold half of Memphis to keep himself in power. Mark Kirk's (R-IL) workers tore down some signs. Nixon broke into McGovern's headquarters even though he was almost out of sight in the polls.

dc_dux · 06-05-2007, 01:51 PM

Recon:

Here is an example of RNC officials found guilty of what could be described as voter suppresion....not the same as election fraud, but equally serious IMO:

Quote:

In October 2002, Charles McGee, executive director of the New Hampshire Republican Party, was mailed a Democratic flier that offered Election Day rides to the polls. The circular listed telephone numbers of party offices in five cities and towns.

"I paused and thought to myself, I might find out -- I might think of an idea of disrupting those operations," McGee later testified. A Marine Corps veteran, McGee approached the situation like a combat operation: "Eventually the idea coalesced into disrupting their phone lines . . . [it's] military common sense that if you can't communicate, you can't plan and organize."

When voting began Nov. 5, McGee's plan worked like a charm. For two crucial hours, an Idaho telecommunications firm tied up Democratic and union phone lines, bringing their get-out-the-vote plans to a halt. The effort helped John E. Sununu (R) win his Senate seat by 51 to 47 percent, a 19,151-vote margin.

McGee and two other participants -- Republican National Committee regional political director James Tobin and GOP consultant Allen Raymond-- have been found guilty of criminally violating federal communications law. Tobin will be sentenced today in U.S. District Court in Concord, N.H.

full article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...051601712.html

Did this illegal act make the difference in the 02 NH senatorial election.....probably not, but we will never know.

Willravel · 06-05-2007, 02:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by The_Jazz

No, they're still dead and you still did it, but you're not guilty in a strictly legal sense until a jury says you are.

...and none of us are jurors, so I think it's clear how we are using the term guilty. The election is still stolen and they still did it.

The_Jazz · 06-05-2007, 03:29 PM

Then considered it added to my list of other election frauds.

Willravel · 06-05-2007, 03:31 PM

Why vote?

archetypal fool · 06-05-2007, 05:58 PM

@reconmike

You can take my contempt for the Bush administration as a sign of hatred towards corrupt politicians, not republicans as a whole. I would feel the same contempt if a democrat had done it. In fact, I feel this same contempt for the Gore campaign, which tried to take recount of only the Florida counties which tended to vote mostly democrat, and disregard all the other ones. This is equally dispicable.

But, back on topic, nowhere did I even mention the damn words "democrat" or "republican" in my posts. Criticizing the Bush administration is not analogous to hating republicans; not for me, at least. Those of us who do hate republicans have their reasons, but that's a different topic entirely.

I'm too young to be competently informed about what has happened with the Kennedy elections, but I'll look into it; I had no idea they might've been rigged. Regardless, we're talking about people who are here, alive, now, and in the public eye. They are committing crimes, and just because others have in the past doesn't make it any less serious. It doesn't mean we shouldn't speak up and try to bring about action, especially when the internet makes it possible to report the truths which the MSM won't.

Finally, my thread was in the context of the current administration, since I only included...The current administration. That's why I only directed it towards the Bush administration. The administration has lied to get into office, so it could start/continue a frivolous war so that they could profit at the expense of innocent lives.

mr_alleycat · 06-08-2007, 09:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

Why vote?

Because between Inds, and their disheartened base, there was a reality check in 06.

Did that feel good?

It shouldn't

Willravel · 06-08-2007, 10:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mr_alleycat

Because between Inds, and their disheartened base, there was a reality check in 06.

Did that feel good?

It shouldn't

Ah, 2006. Instead of voting for monsters, people came out and voted for liars. They try once to cut war funding, then they move on to their own agendas. It seems, to me, as if those votes were AGAIN wasted. This time the election wasn't rigged, but it might as well have been. I'm still voting Green, and people call me nuts?

The point of this thread is action. If you're in school, bring a copy of these articles to class and start a debate. If you go to church, bring it up with your pastor or at the bible study. If you're in a book club, bring a book like this one and get people talking. Yes, everyone was convinced that Al Gore was whining, but he fucking won. I'd have raised hell and read everyone the riot act for not getting up off their asses and doing something. It's not too late to put Bush in jail.

mr_alleycat · 06-09-2007, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by willravel

Ah, 2006. Instead of voting for monsters, people came out and voted for liars. They try once to cut war funding, then they move on to their own agendas.

Yes they blew it, they should have moved sooner with the bill. That would have given them time to call a vote in an attempt to overturn Bush's veto. If it passed Gr8, if not, the shoe would be on the other foot.

05-25-2007, 03:10 PM	#5 (permalink)
Seaver Junkie Location: Fort Worth, TX	Or could this be another fraud with even less validity than the fake papers that got Dan Rather canned? __________________ "Smite the rocks with the rod of knowledge, and fountains of unstinted wealth will gush forth." - Ashbel Smith as he laid the first cornerstone of the University of Texas

05-25-2007, 04:25 PM	#10 (permalink)
host Banned	Take heart, archetypal fool..... ....those who deny the ever growing body of evidence have only the response that "this cannot be happening". They offer no excuses, no rationale for the long history of republican party vote suppression and race baiting, and they seem indifferent to the SCOTUS appointing "their president" in 2000, his brother's role in suppressing the Florida opposition vote, the Abramoff scandal, an illegal preemptive invasion and occupation of another country, secret warrantless wire tapping, torture, rendition, suspension of habeus corpus, the suppression of the 2004 vote....12 hours long voting lines in Ohio....The CNP's role in the republican party and in the president's administration, or the suspension of the DOJ civil rights enforcement division, false prosecution of voters and organizers, etc..... ....so this is just one more detail for them to dismiss, and you are one more target to attempt to make "silly looking". That's what they do...because that's all they ve got. Certainly supporting Bush Cheney and the RNC, knowing what know, is not something a reasonable person could do, without attempting to justify how they can do it.... Last edited by host; 05-25-2007 at 06:01 PM..

05-25-2007, 05:32 PM	#13 (permalink)
archetypal fool Crazy Location: Florida	Since you enjoyed the read, I'm sure you'll enjoy the video I posted above as well. When you have an hour to spare, give the video a try. __________________ I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours. But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to all of us, in all times and in all places. Music is the only means whereby we feel these emotions in their universality. ~H.A. Overstreet

05-29-2007, 05:26 PM	#15 (permalink)
archetypal fool Crazy Location: Florida	By the way, here are the leaked emails, for all to see. http://2004.georgewbush.org/deadletteroffice/index.asp __________________ I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours. But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to all of us, in all times and in all places. Music is the only means whereby we feel these emotions in their universality. ~H.A. Overstreet

06-04-2007, 10:03 AM	#19 (permalink)
dc_dux Location: Washington DC	I dont know if all the facts on the Florida voter purge (and other recent questionable voter suppresion tactics in other states) will ever be resolved through the legal process. Too much plausible deniability by those at the top. At best, rank and file staff will take the hit. In the meantime, Congress can focus on prevention of future voter intimidation and suppression. The Senate is starting this week with a hearing in a Judiciary subcommittee on on “Prevention of Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation in Federal Elections” to explore ways to prevent occurenced like these in the past: * Shortly before the 1990 midterm Federal elections, 125,000 voters in North Carolina received postcards providing false information about voter eligibility and a warning about criminal penalties for voter fraud. Ninety-seven percent of the voters who received postcards were African American. * In 2004, Native American voters in South Dakota were prevented from voting after they did not provide photographic identification upon request, despite the fact that they were not required to present such identification in order to vote under State or Federal law. * In the 2006 midterm election, 14,000 Latino voters in Orange County, California received mailings from the California Coalition for Immigration Reform, warning them in Spanish that `if you are an immigrant, voting in a federal election is a crime that can result in incarceration...'. In fact, an immigrant who is a naturalized citizen of the United States has the same right to vote as any other citizen. * In the same 2006 election, some Virginia voters received automated phone messages falsely warning them that the `Virginia Elections Commission' had determined they were ineligible to vote and that they would face severe criminal penalties if they tried to cast a ballot. * In 2006 in Maryland, certain candidates for Governor and United States Senator distributed fliers in predominantly African-American neighborhoods falsely claiming that the candidates had been endorsed by their opponents' party and by prominent figures who had actually endorsed the opponents of the candidates. In both the Senate and the House, the Deceptive Practices and Voter Intimidation Prevention Act of 2007 has been introduced to address these types of voter suppression tactics. Both Houses are also considering legisation to require uniformty in voting standards for federal elections.... the Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2007. Both the "Deceptive Practices" bills and the "Voter Confidence" bills already have majority Dem support and should have floor votes before the fall. We'll see where the Republicans stand on these bills. __________________ "The perfect is the enemy of the good." ~ Voltaire Last edited by dc_dux; 06-04-2007 at 10:08 AM..

05-25-2007, 01:24 PM	#2 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	I still think things won't change until people's lives are directly and negatively effected in a MAJOR way.

05-25-2007, 03:07 PM	#4 (permalink)
Rekna Junkie	If you want to everyone in the US to see something it isn't really that hard. Video tape yourself doing something insanely stupid and then put a link to what you want them to read afterwards.... Gotta love America....

05-25-2007, 03:39 PM	#6 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Seaver, this should be enough evidence to convince even the most stubborn skeptic.

05-25-2007, 03:54 PM	#7 (permalink)
matthew330 Banned	Based on the title of the thread, I view this as an admission that the hysteria regarding "rigged" elections over the past years was based on something less then "real" proof. Call me a cynic, but I don't think there's anything "final" or "real" about the OP.....such is the life of my political counterparts. Lotta hate though. enjoy.

05-25-2007, 04:36 PM	#11 (permalink)
matthew330 Banned	"I've got friends who will never rest until the following is tied together in a "nice, neat, package" with a bow on top, that ends up proving, beyond a reasonable doubt, that this has been the most corrupt political party in an era of the most corrupt presidential administration, in the history of the United States." ....and which internet forums aren't they resting on? "Time is on their side:" I believe you.

05-30-2007, 05:42 PM	#17 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	If a Dem was ever as corrupt as the people who rigged the election, they'd receive as much of my scorn (if not more). I've never been, am not, nor will I probably ever be a Democrat. Don't confuse the liberal label with the Democrat label. They're not interchangeable. Recon, are you going to refute any of the information posted in here? Normally, wolves tend to attack their prey head on, not cut and run from confrontation.

06-05-2007, 04:53 AM	#22 (permalink)
mr_alleycat Upright	dc_dux, Oh they may have had hearings, but they would have been held in the basement.

06-05-2007, 01:42 PM	#26 (permalink)
mr_alleycat Upright	Recon, Don't you see with electronic voting machines, this kind of thing is more serious? I don't care who manufactured the machines, they are a threat to our society. It has been shown one person with access to one machine can bypass the event log, and infect many machines with no paper trail. Giving the election to whoever they chose, without leaving any footprints. I refuse to use these machines, and the American people need to do the same. If we won't use them, they will have to replace them with something we would feel more confident using.

06-05-2007, 03:29 PM	#31 (permalink)
The_Jazz Asshole Administrator Location: Chicago	Then considered it added to my list of other election frauds. __________________ "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." - B. Franklin "There ought to be limits to freedom." - George W. Bush "We have met the enemy and he is us." - Pogo

06-05-2007, 03:31 PM	#32 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Why vote?

06-05-2007, 05:58 PM	#33 (permalink)
archetypal fool Crazy Location: Florida	@reconmike You can take my contempt for the Bush administration as a sign of hatred towards corrupt politicians, not republicans as a whole. I would feel the same contempt if a democrat had done it. In fact, I feel this same contempt for the Gore campaign, which tried to take recount of only the Florida counties which tended to vote mostly democrat, and disregard all the other ones. This is equally dispicable. But, back on topic, nowhere did I even mention the damn words "democrat" or "republican" in my posts. Criticizing the Bush administration is not analogous to hating republicans; not for me, at least. Those of us who do hate republicans have their reasons, but that's a different topic entirely. I'm too young to be competently informed about what has happened with the Kennedy elections, but I'll look into it; I had no idea they might've been rigged. Regardless, we're talking about people who are here, alive, now, and in the public eye. They are committing crimes, and just because others have in the past doesn't make it any less serious. It doesn't mean we shouldn't speak up and try to bring about action, especially when the internet makes it possible to report the truths which the MSM won't. Finally, my thread was in the context of the current administration, since I only included...The current administration. That's why I only directed it towards the Bush administration. The administration has lied to get into office, so it could start/continue a frivolous war so that they could profit at the expense of innocent lives. __________________ I have my own particular sorrows, loves, delights; and you have yours. But sorrow, gladness, yearning, hope, love, belong to all of us, in all times and in all places. Music is the only means whereby we feel these emotions in their universality. ~H.A. Overstreet Last edited by archetypal fool; 06-05-2007 at 06:02 PM..