What are the Dems doing to make sure the next election isn't stolen?

[Cyrano]

There are still many of us that think the 2002 and 2004 elections were rigged by lack of paper trails, voter intimidation, and the many other tactics the thugs use to cling to power.

But I haven't heard one word from any Democrat about fixing things before the next election. When are we going to get some leaders who start shrieking, ENOUGH.

Maybe Howard Dean is the guy if he gets elected to head up the DNC.

[pokercat999]

1. Can you spell N O T H I N G ? nt

[EVDebs]

6. Right on. If they keep going into bed with globalizing corporations

like the Repubs they'll have just as much $ in the banks like this time but fewer votes. Dems are being played for suckers and they just keep going along for the ride.

We'd like to see a little 'fight' for the people's interests...pretty please?

[theresistance]

2. Lets hope its not three in a row

Do you mean 2000?

[Boredtodeath]

3. It's ALREADY 3 in a row

2000 16,002 NEGATIVE votes for Al Gore in Volusia County, FL
2002 Georgia
2004 Need I say more?

[Cyrano]

4. I mean 2000, 2002 and 2004.

2000, we all know about. In 2002, there's no way even Georgians were stupid enough to vote out Max Cleland (as just one example). And this year, there were Diebold machines and ES&S machines in many more places than just Ohio.

Start counting up disenfranchised voters, in addition to machine programming that can't be proved, and there's little doubt that we've been fucked again.

[Hippo_Tron]

5. Win in a landslide

If it's too close to call it's close enough to steel. We can try to get voting reform passed but you know that there will always be some sort of loophole with the repukes in control of everything. We need to win in a landslide and get the white house and the justice department back before we can fix the voting machines.

[AndyTiedye]

7. We Can't Win With Less Than 70% of the Vote Now

Even then they might still be able to steal it, with the kind of control
over the media they have now.

We need the biggest landslide ever. Anything less and they'll steal it again.

[Hippo_Tron]

10. That's a little extreme

My point is that it can't come down to a one point race in one state like it has for the last two elections. We need to actually start competing again in places like Louisiana, Arkansas, West Virginia, Tennesee, Colorado. Places like Minnesota and Wisconsin that have progressive leanings need to stop being swing states and start being solid blue states. Voter fraud to the tune of being able to change millions of votes is not a problem yet. Voter fraud to the tune of being able to turn a one point race the other way is very possible, which is why we need a landslide.

[robbedvoter]

16. What is the maximum they can steal> 10% 30% 70%?

How do you know we didn't already win in a landslide since 2000?
The longer you guys stay clueless, the longer we have untill democracy returns. :argh:
The most idiotic meme: "close enough to steal"

[Hippo_Tron]

17. If Kerry's internal polls showed him 10 points up in Ohio...

He wouldn't have conceded. His internal polls showed exactly what every other poll showed, it was within the margin of error. I'd bet that Gore's internal polling showed a too close to call race in Florida as well. Once again, they can change a one point race by throwing away a few thousand ballots here and there and disenfranchising a few thousand African Americans and making them wait in long lines and maybe change a few thousand votes on the diebold machines (which are certified by dems and republicans in every county BTW). If Kerry had been up in Ohio by 5 million votes it wouldn't have been close enough to steel, if they had tried they would've been easily caught.

[rman]

8. They're not assuring transparent, verifiable elections.

The fundamental problem with the current implementation of e-voting is that a crucial part of the election system - the actual counting (how much more fundamental can it be?) - is in effect a trade-secret.
So it's not verifiable; anyone looking at it who is not under a non-disclosure agreement with the manufacturer could hurt the manufacturer's profit. Laws are such that hurting a corporation's profit isn't going to be tolerated.
Democracy is secondary to profit.

Either the rigging of the voting system needs to be un-done, or indeed the only way to win would be by means of a massive landslide, which will probably show up in the official statistics (and the MSM) as minor majority - if we're lucky.

[AndyTiedye]

9. Everything They Can, Which is Nothing

The Repub leadership has kept the Holt bill off the floor for 2 years
now, and they can keep it bottled up until the cows come home, even
if every Democrat in Congress lobbied for it full-time.

They don't care how many letters, phone calls, faxes, emails or whatever
they get from the people. They don't have to.

[journalist3072]

11. Stolen Elections

Unfortunately, Republicans have perfected the art of stealing elections.

Look at it like this:

1. Corporate business whores who make the voting machines and its software are in the GOP's pockets

2. Partisan Secretaries of State (i.e. Katherine Harris and Ken Blackwell) serve as the people who oversee their state's elections, and at the same time serve as the state chamapaign chairman for the Republican nominee.

3. The Republicans have also shown they know how to slow down the process on election day so Democratic voters get fustrated and leave.

So as long as we continue to let these things happen, we will continue to "lose," even when we haven't really lost.

[Been Fishing]

12. Something I got today from Barbara Boxer

Thank you for writing to express your
concerns about the electoral process.

I thought that you would be interested in
the following statement, which I made on the
floor of the United States Senate on January 6:

For most of us in the Senate and the House, we have
spent our lives fighting for things we believe in always
fighting to make our nation better.

We have fought for social justice. We have fought for
economic justice. We have fought for environmental
justice. We have fought for criminal justice.

Now we must add a new fight the fight for electoral
justice.

Every citizen of this country who is registered to vote
should be guaranteed that their vote matters, that their
vote is counted, and that in the voting booth of their
community, their vote has as much weight as the vote of
any Senator, any Congressperson, any President, any
cabinet member, or any CEO of any Fortune 500
corporation.

I am sure that every one of my colleagues Democrat,
Republican, and Independent agrees with that
statement. That in the voting booth, every one is equal.

So now it seems to me that under the Constitution of the
United States, which guarantees the right to vote, we
must ask:

Why did voters in Ohio wait hours in the rain to vote?
Why were voters at Kenyon College, for example, made
to wait in line until nearly 4 a.m. to vote because there
were only two machines for 1300 voters?

Why did poor and predominantly African-American
communities have disproportionately long waits?

Why in Franklin County did election officials only use
2,798 machines when they said they needed 5,000? Why
did they hold back 68 machines in warehouses? Why
were 42 of those machines in predominantly African-
American districts?

Why did, in the Columbus area alone, an estimated 5,000
to 10,000 voters leave polling places, out of frustration,
without having voted? How many more never bothered
to vote after they heard about this?

Why is it when 638 people voted at a precinct in Franklin
County, a voting machine awarded 4,258 extra votes to
George Bush? Thankfully, they fixed it but how many
other votes did the computers get wrong?

Why did Franklin County officials reduce the number of
electronic voting machines in downtown precincts, while
adding them in the suburbs? This also led to long lines.

In Cleveland, why were there thousands of provisional
ballots disqualified after poll workers gave faulty
instructions to voters?

Because of this, and voting irregularities in so many other
places, I am joining with Congresswoman Stephanie
Tubbs Jones to cast the light of truth on a flawed system
which must be fixed now.

Our democracy is the centerpiece of who we are as a
nation. And it is the fondest hope of all Americans that
we can help bring democracy to every corner of the
world.

As we try to do that, and as we are shedding the blood of
our military to this end, we must realize that we lose so
much credibility when our own electoral system needs so
much improvement.

Yet, in the past four years, this Congress has not done
everything it should to give confidence to all of our
people their votes matter.

After passing the Help America Vote Act, nothing more
was done.

A year ago, Senators Graham, Clinton and I introduced
legislation that would have required that electronic voting
systems
provide a paper record to verify a vote. That paper trail would
be stored in a secure ballot box and invaluable in case of a
recount.

There is no reason why the Senate should not have taken up and
passed that bill. At the very least, a hearing should have been
held. But it never happened.

Before I close, I want to thank my colleague from the House,
Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones.

Her letter to me asking for my intervention was substantive and
compelling.

As I wrote to her, I was particularly moved by her point that it
is
virtually impossible to get official House consideration of the
whole issue of election reform, including these irregularities.

The Congresswoman has tremendous respect in her state of Ohio,
which is at the center of this fight.

Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones was a judge for 10 years.
She was a prosecutor for 8 years. She was inducted into the
Women's Hall of Fame in 2002.

I am proud to stand with her in filing this objection.




Sincerely,


Barbara Boxer
United States Senator

[proudbluestater]

13. One word, CONYERS

Still working on it!

[marcologico]

14. Kerry sent out an email Jan. 5 outlining a plan to investigate and reform

state election operations and asking everyone to write to Hastert and Frist and ask for investigations of voting irregularities in the 2004 election.

Would anybody like a link?

[Vidar]

15. There are 10 bills pending. Conyers, Boxere, Tubbs-Jones & the

CBC are doing a lot. Not sure about the rest of the dems though.