TONIGHT: Nightline to cover OH election "irregularities" (ABC)

[Amaryllis]

Another 2000?

Jan. 19, 2005 — There are critics who believe that voting irregularities in Ohio on Election Day cost John Kerry the presidency. On the eve of President Bush's second inauguration, Nightline weighs in on the debate.

* Related: Ohio Finds Possible Double Votes, Counts

http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/

[The Backlash Cometh]

1. Someone posted earlier that Koppel will not be supporting our

side. Basically, the show will conclude the blogs are filled with nothing but conspiracy theorist.

[Nothing Without Hope]

4. Yeah, that sounds about right...

...it is so very appropriate that he still looks like Alfred E. Newman on the old Mad Magazine comic books. "What, Me Worry?"

[Nothing Without Hope]

2. Without watching, I can predict what will be pronounced as fact

...and that will be that the exit poll "glitches" have all been explained away, that the voter suppression tactics are soooo sad but not the Repub Party's fault (really-really!!!) and will go away before the next election, that anyone who thinks the election was stolen is just a disruptive tin-foil-hat nutcase,
that all will be well,
that Big Brother still knows best,
Sleeeeeeeeep.....

[sabra]

3. Here we go...

fingers crossed?

[Alizaryn]

5. All we can do is hope

[KingoftheJungle]

12. Hope is for fools, stop hoping and start fighting the propaganda

The purpose of this show is obvious with it's timing, they are trying to discredit the entire movement before we launch the full investigation. Stop wishing for the MSM to be sympathetic to our cause, it is owned and controlled by the same brotherhood that rigged the votes in the first place. Our job is to keep the pressure on and keep digging for the truth, that is how we defeat propaganada.

[Alizaryn]

14. Yup, I agree with you BUT I'll not loose hope either..

[Der Blaue Engel]

16. Hope is not for fools

Tell it to Ghandi.

We may never get the MSM to report the truth, but hope is part of continuing the fight. Hope is what makes people keep the pressure on and keep digging for the truth.

I see no benefit in trashing people's hopes.

Many of us here hoped Boxer would challenge the Ohio vote. Many others said "stop hoping, fools." Boxer challenged the Ohio vote.

Many of us here hoped Kerry and Boxer would vote no on confirming Condoleeza Rice. Many others told us we were fools again, and told us to stop hoping. Kerry and Boxer voted no on confirming Condoleeza Rice.

So what is the purpose of telling people they are fools for having hope?

[KingoftheJungle]

20. I was referring to the hope that some good will come of the Dateline

I'm sorry, but having hope in the MSM is foolish when they are a critical part of the facist elite. I will never give up hope in our counter-movement, we WILL win.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

6. "Did George W. Bush steal the election? " Koppel n/t

[Nothing Without Hope]

10. That makes it clear that his whole shtick will be to say NO.

No way they can do anything else, not their integrity hasn't been sold along with their souls long ago

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

13. You're right........

[Nothing Without Hope]

23. Remember that wonderful Gandhi quote that has been going around here

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
They were ignoring us completely -- not a breath about the election fraud for weeks. Now they are trying to laugh at us, but the fact that so much effort is being spent on it shows that they are moving toward the fighting stage. That is progress.

For further cheering, I recommend this thread, where a lot of people sort of co-discover that the MSM really don't have much input into their lives anymore.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2970623
We've moved on from the corrupted MSM to the internet, and I believe that will be the key to reclaiming democracy in this country.

Really, what else was he going to say, a corporate puppet on the eve of the Second Coronation? Try not to be too distressed. They wouldn't have been worried enough to produce that program if there weren't cause.

Peace.

[NationalEnquirer]

32. It will be a whitewash, thats for sure. n/t

[Alizaryn]

7. Is not starting well

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

8. Conspiracy theories............

:puke:

[genieroze]

9. Like I expect these * whores to be objective. Just more apologists

for the * crime family.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

11. The reporter is speaking with a snide tone in his voice.

[The Backlash Cometh]

27. Well, just to be fair, I haven't watched Koppel in years.

These idiot rightests are on the wrong side of history. Even if they attempt to rewrite history their way, there will be history books in other countries that will disagree with them.

[Digit]

15. This piece of reporting is just going to support their position that * won

What a bunch of horse poop.

[Wabbajack]

17. A little LATE aren't they

[wakemewhenitsover]

18. Let's remember "voting irregularities" is a euphemism...

If someone steals your car, is that a driving irregularity?

[Atman]

19. Nightline concludes: It happens all the time. No problem

*Sigh*

After giving lots of airtime to a democratic pollster saying "get over it," and completely glossing over/ignoring the Ohio travesty, the show instead focuses on "it happens all the time," and concludes that Kennedy -- democrat John Fitzgerald Kennedy -- probably got in because of a stolen election in Chicago.

So...no problem. Happens all the time. Kennedy did it, too.

Nothing to see here, move along Sonny.

The theft is complete. Fuck 'em all.

[The Backlash Cometh]

28. Corruption is acceptable, eh? Well, explains a lot.

[buddysmellgood]

21. This is going to be painful

[KaliTracy]

22. this is just an attempt to put the Conyers investigation "to bed"

Unless they have HIM on, this is all moot. I can't believe Blackwell called those who questioned that day silly. His Job Description says he is supposed to investigate election issues and questions of fraud, etc. NOT sweep it under some rug saying "nope, there's nothing here." I don't have TV, so I am not watching it. Just needed to vent.

The Job Description of the Secretary of State in Ohio: http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos /

The Duties on the Ohio Secretary of State website state:
Chief Elections Officer
As Ohio's chief election officer, Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell oversees the elections process and appoints the members of boards of elections in each of Ohio's 88 counties.

He supervises the administration of election laws; approves ballot language; reviews statewide initiative and referendum petitions, chairs the Ohio Ballot Board, which approves ballot language for statewide issues; canvasses votes for all elective state offices and issues; investigates election frauds and irregularities; trains election officials and reimburses counties for poll worker training costs. {emphasis mine}

The Elections Division compiles and maintains election statistics, political party records and other election-related records. Statewide candidates' campaign finance reports are filed with the office, together with the reports for state political action committees (PACs), state political parties and legislative caucus campaign committees.

The Secretary of State's office also licenses ministers to perform marriage; registers alien land; and issues apostilles, which are certifications verifying signatures on documents going out of the country.

All laws passed by the Ohio General Assembly, municipal charters, administrative rules adopted by agencies, and all executive orders issued by the Governor are filed with this office, as well.

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

30. If this was an honest "look, see" into claims of election fraud, Conyers

Boxer and Jackson should have been interviewed.

Instead they had soundbites and interviews with people unfamiliar to the American public,proving their point that this is a cause of "fringe" elements.....

[buddysmellgood]

24. HA. Mistofsky explains the flaw is that too many Kerry people voted and

then answered the exit polls.

[Fly by night]

25. Here's the letter I sent Ted Koppel before tonight's broadcast ...

... and I spoke with his senior producer by phone to make sure they knew it was coming. I told the producer what I said in the letter. They could begin to behave like competent, responsible patriotic American journalists or they could keep being crack whores for Karl Rove (well, I was a bit more polite.)
So here's my letter:
-------
To Ted Koppel:

Given how very dismissive ABC has been so far in its coverage of the 2004 election theft, I am concerned about how you will present the story tonight. Your promo for tonight's program already suggests that you will once again be dismissive. You do this at your own peril. According to Annenberg, approximately 30% of the American people now believe the 2004 election was stolen. That's a 50% increase in the number of people who hold that belief in just the past six weeks.

You only show your own uninformed, complacent, incredulous or perhaps (in the eyes of many Americans) co-conspiratorial position if you dismiss the evidence for the 2004 election theft. You must know by now that -- even though the corporate media is still holding back from releasing the full exit poll data (for what useful reason escapes us) -- the complete final national exit poll data (not the incomplete early "leaked" data your promo refers to) have already been released on-line by a New Zealand media organization who bought the complete data before Mitofsky stopped responding to requests for it. Those data have been analyzed and those analyses are now widely available. Maybe that's why 100 million Americans believe the election was stolen.

You must also know that the analyses of Dr. Steven Freeman of the University of Pennsylvania are based on the final exit poll data available to all of us directly off CNN at midnight on election day -- once again not the early data leaked on the Internet that your promo refers to. Dr. Freeman's analysis indicates that someone is twice as likely to win PowerBall with a single ticket than that the discrepency between the exit polls and the "reported" vote in just three states -- OH, FL and PA -- occurred by chance. Other analysts -- again using the complete state-level exit poll data (available on CNN at midnight on election night) put the likelihood that the discrepencies between the final exit polls and the "reported" vote in 16 states occurred by chance at 13.5 trillion to one.

Finally, another analysis by Dr. Freeman demonstrates the election theft without using exit poll data. Simply put, Freeman looked at people who voted in 2004 and distributed them according to their self-reported 2000 voting status and their 2004 voting decision within three categories:

1) 2000 Gore or Bush voters who voted for Kerry or Bush in 2004,
2) 2000 3rd party voters who voted in 2004 for Kerry or Bush, and
3) New voters in 2004.

These categories should include all voters for Kerry or Bush in 2004. With this analysis, Freeman has shown that approximately 4.3 million votes were switched from Kerry to Bush between the time the votes were cast and the time the votes were counted. Here's the table from one of the appendices to Dr. Freeman's paper (which is attached):

(Guys, I can't get the Freeman table to line up right in this post. I basically used a simplified version of Freeman's table 2.2 on page 24 in the appendix from his updated paper. Wish I could get it to line up because it is a KILLER table. Here's a link to the full paper and appendix: http://truthout.org/unexplainedexitpoll.pdf )

Suffice it to say, if Nightline does not include Dr. Freeman or another of the many reputable researchers whose work has documented the 2004 election theft in your broadcast tonight, your presentation will be incomplete. Further, if your program once again makes light of or dismisses the overwhelming evidence for the 2004 election theft, you will cement your status as a co-conspirator in this unprecedented rape of democracy.

Of course, ABC could always be the first network to release the complete exit poll data and reports to the American public. If you don't, what do you know and when did you know it? And one more question: just what are you knowingly hiding?

Assuredly, (me)

[EC]

26. MSM is not going to listen

but Oprah came on after Niteline, and made me start to think, maybe Jesse Jakeson should get on her show and do a whole show including history of disinfranchisement. She has quite a following...if we can't get white MSM to listen, maybe it's time to hit the black media...

[The Backlash Cometh]

29. I respect Jessie, but you need someone who hasn't closed off the

right because of bad personal decisions.

[Amaryllis]

31. That is a darn good idea....anyone have an Oprah connection? Maybe if

enough of us wrote to her and asked her? Wonder if we could get Chuck Herrin on with him...oh well, I can dream, can't I?
We got a senator to stand...miracles do happen.