Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News THURSDAY 8/18/05

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Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News THURSDAY 8/18/05

All members welcome and encouraged to participate.

Please post Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News on this thread.

If you can:

1. Post stories and announcements you find on the web.

2. Post stories using the "Election Fraud and Reform News Sources" listed here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x371233

3. Re-post stories and announcements you find on DU, providing a link to the original thread with thanks to the Original Poster, too.

4. Start a discussion thread by re-posting a story you see on this thread.

If you want to know how post "News Banners" or other images, go here:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=371233#371391



All previous daily threads are available here:
http://www.independentmediasource.com/DU_archives/du_2004erd_el_ref_fr_thr_calenders.htm

Please

"Recommend"

for the Greatest Page (it's the link just below). Atlanta Journal Constitution: Tens of Thousands March Supporting Voting Rights Act

CLICK HERE to get quick access to Election Results and Discussion Forum on your “Latest” page.

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1. DUer Produces Major Election Fraud CD--The best videos & documents!

GET THIS CD. It has a great collection of election fraud videos. The intent is to have those who see it make at least three copies to distribute to friends. It’s available through bit .torrent downloads now and directly and from Solarbus.Org’s Election Justice Center. Just terrific stuff, the videos, articles, everything. You’re wondering why you have not seen the broadcast quality videos on TV? Shocking, isn’t it.

DU 2004 ERD Poster Garybeck’s Solarbus Election Justice Center Releases Major CD with All You Need to Start an “Orange Revolution” in America.

Multimedia CD "the truth about the 2004 Election: Why we must not get over it"

Garybeck took his time to assemble the best single collection of election fraud materials available. The goal of the collection is to have the CD distributed from those involved in the movement to those with marginal knowledge or an open mind. Downloading or receiving the CD is accompanied by a pledge to distribute a copy to three people and ask them to do the same.

Recently, the CD became available through bit .torrent for those capable of using that free download service. There is no charge for the download.


Click here to see the 700 mb of videos and documents on this amazing resource.

http://www.solarbus.org/election/cd/test/videos.html

Available on .bit torrent for down loading

http://electiontheft.net/electiontruthCD/


CLICK HERE to get quick access to Election Results and Discussion Forum on your “Latest” page.

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2. MO: Is this Franklin County Doing it Right?

MO: Is this Franklin County Doing it Right?

This Missouri County chose optical scan over touch screen voting because the lack of a “paper trail” contributed to fears of fraud. Does the county Board of Elections know if their Diebolds have a chip installed to give the recording/counting process instructions? This is the next level of inquiry since optical scan machines are computers, not just simple tabulators.

County Preparing For Voting Reforms

By Kip Christianson -Missourian Staff Writer
08/17/2005
Franklin County is making excellent progress in its effort to comply with sweeping election reforms enacted by the federal government following the 2000 presidential election. The Help America Vote Act (HAVA) requires numerous changes at the polls, including the elimination of punch card voting, increased handicapped-accessibility at polling places, and second chance voting.

The deadline for most provisions is Jan. 1, 2006. The county has worked closely with Secretary of State Robin Carnahan to make sure it is compliant

<snip>

Rather than punching a card, voters will fill in an oval to indicate a vote. The voter will then take the card to a machine in the polling place and insert it.

The machine will spit the card back out if an over-vote is made. An example of an over-vote would be voting for more than one candidate. The voter would then be allowed to cast another vote and the first would not count. This is called second-chance voting, one of the reforms of HAVA.

<snip>

"There was no voter verifiable paper trail available when we looked at it," Door said. "I didn't have confidence in it. The governor wants a paper trail just like the county clerks do."

The lack of a paper trail in other states using touch screen voting has led to allegations of voter fraud.

CLICK HERE to get quick access to Election Results and Discussion Forum on your “Latest” page.

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3. Berkeley, CA: How Many Diebolds to Screw Up an Election?

Good local reporting on Schwarzenneger Scty of State trying to make Diebold look “good”…well, look “less bad.” This is what we need at the local level, smart journalists with inquiring minds on election fraud.

Commentary: How Many Diebolds to Screw Up an Election?

By PETER TEICHNER
8/16/05

Call me stolen-elections-hypersensitive (see 2000, then 2004) but something happened last week that perked up my vote fraud antenna and makes me wonder why no one else I know of has picked up on it.
Two articles early last week, one by the Associated Press and one online by Guy Ashley of the Contra Costa Times, reported similar failure rates for Diebold AccuVote TSX voting machines equipped with printers during certification tests held in Stockton in late July.
On Saturday July 30, an Associated Press article stated that they had a failure rate of 10 percent and “Secretary of State Bruce McPherson said that was too high a risk and he notified company officials in a letter sent Wednesday.”

A few days later an online Contra Costa Times article by Guy Ashley reported that “McPherson said that Diebold machines showed a failure
rate of about 10 percent in the tests, due mostly to unexpected screen freezes and paper jams.”

But then on Wednesday Aug. 3, the Contra Costa Times reported that “Officials in McPherson’s office said 19 of 96 machines tested encountered problems including paper jams and screen freezes… ..” By my reckoning, 19 out of 96 constitutes about a 20 percent failure rate—double the 10 percent originally reported by Secretary of State McPherson and his office.

When I inquired about this of Times reporter Guy Ashley, he confirmed the numbers for me. He explained in an e-mail to me that he was told (presumably by an Alameda County official) that the 10 percent figure cited by AP was low and he should check with secretary of state’s office. He did and was told that 19 of 96 computers used in the testing did have problems.

I find it hard to believe that the Secretary of State McPherson, who happens to be a Republican, or his office would inadvertently fail to report accurately on this critically important voting rights issue which is all about accuracy of the vote count.


CLICK HERE to get quick access to Election Results and Discussion Forum on your “Latest” page.

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4. Manila, Philippines: “Roomful” of Evidence of Vote Padding

Maybe someday we’ll get to have investigations just like the Philippines! Or election fraud monitoring just like the Ukraine…we can always hope. Remember way back when Marcos was toppled and they had the first real election in the Philippines. People stood in lines for hours after serious terrorist threats to kill voters. These folks are serious about democracy.

‘Roomful’ of evidence of vote padding

THURSDAY |August 18, 2005 | PHILIPPINES

THE United Opposition yesterday said it has a "roomful" of evidence of the administration having prepared thousands of tampered copies of election returns in 2004 at the Horizon Hotel (formerly Byron Hotel) in Mandaluyong City.

The opposition said the tampered returns, containing pre-computed votes, were switched for ERs in selected provinces.
Rep. Alan Peter Cayetano (NP, Taguig-Pateros), along with colleagues in the minority, held a slide presentation at the minority’s office to show why the administration and its allies at the House would do everything to stop the presentation of evidence of election fraud by President Arroyo.

The opposition showed a picture of a room where mounds of tampered ERs were being kept but declined to say its location in the light of a raid conducted by combined military and police operatives on a house in San Mateo, Rizal.

The operatives seized election documents at the house rented by handwriting expert Segundo Tabayoyong which the opposition said would proveelection cheating.
Cayetano said prior to the elections, a "shadowy group" composed of people led by an administration congressman housed their vote-padding operation at the fifth floor of Horizon Hotel.

He did not name the congressman.

CLICK HERE to get quick access to Election Results and Discussion Forum on your “Latest” page.

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5. Honor “The Nashua Advocate” Day—Great Run During Hard Times

We all owe a debt of thanks to The Nashua Advocate for its great efforts in behalf of the Election Reform Movement. In fact, the Advocate helped start it. July 1, 2005, they announced that the publication was coming to an end. What a history: up to 25K individual visits a day, named as a “news” source by Google, linked all over the world…THANK YOU NASHUA ADVOCATE & founder SETH ABRAMSON

The Nashua Advocate: Save this article. It’s part of our history.

The Arc of History Bends Toward Justice: A Triumph of Grassroots Activism Against Dire and Unspeakable Odds -- The Boxer Rebellion, January 6th, 2005

http://nashuaadvocate.blogspot.com/

News From The U.S. Election Reform Movement

Thursday, January 06, 2005
By ADVOCATE STAFF
A warm breeze filtered through the hallowed halls of Congress, and gathered itself into a heady rush of hot air in the well of the U.S. House of Representatives, as Republicans from all corners of the country rose in support of several vital constitutional principles, among them the following: that poor folks in the cities of the nation should wait fifteen to twenty times longer to vote than well-to-do folks in the suburbs; that the nation's electoral mechanism should be governed by antiquated technicalities involving the weight of a piece of paper and which street a voter happens to live on; that voting machines and other electronic voting equipment in America should be programmed with privately-held proprietary codes and not publicly-disseminated and easily-analyzed software; that such machines should record votes in an untraceable fashion, without even so much paper trail as an automatic-teller machine; that poor folks should make do with outdated, malfunction-prone voting equipment when their communities find they can't afford the top-of-the-line, nearly foolproof equipment purchased by well-to-do communities; that critical election decisions such as the placement of voting machines should be executed by high-ranking officials in the respective major parties' campaigns; and, above all, that the power to elect a President is not a vested right in America, but a privilege which can be lightly and easily lost through mistake, error, bias, prejudice, ignorance, or even willful deceit.

It was a great day to be an American.

CLICK HERE to get quick access to Election Results and Discussion Forum on your “Latest” page.

[GuvWurld]

6. Kicked/Recommended (eom)

[MelissaB]

7. Conyers urges the Kerry-Edwards campaign not to drop Ohio recount

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2016491

From that post:

Busy Day Supporting Cindy, Treasongate, Making Every Vote Count

An unusually busy day for August, but with all of the GOP abuses, there never seems to be a shortage of things to post about.

First, as the top entry of the Conyersblog indicates, today we launched our effort to enlist at least 1000 individuals to write their local papers supporting the efforts of Cindy Sheehan to meet with the president. With Rush Limbaugh and others in the right wing moving into full a full scale Plaming of Cindy, I think it is important we show our support however we can. Just go to my web site to compose and email and have it sent, and to use the various resources in my new Crawford Action Center. And don't forget to ask your friends and family to write also.

Second, as indicated last evening, today Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) and I wrote to the Justice Department Inspector General, asking him to review whether former AG Aschroft violated ethical requirements in initially supervising an investigation into alleged misconduct by Karl Rove -- his friend and political ally -- regarding the outing of Valerie Plame. Rawstory has the full text of the letter. I was interviewed about this development by Tony Trupiano this afternoon, and will speak to the issue on the Amy Goodman show on Radio Pacifica tomorrow. I will try to get you the audio links to these interviews as soon as possible.

Third, today I wrote to the Kerry-Edwards campaign, urging them not to drop out of the Ohio recount case. The case is at a crucial juncture, and while we know the case will not alter the outcome of the election, their involvement is needed to allow us to establish important legal principles and precedents that will help insure that every vote is counted in future elections. The Ohio Election Fraud Blog has the letter.

So it was a busy day even before I learned that according to Rasmussen, Bush has hit a new low in his popularity, and that for the first time in history, a sitting Governor in Ohio was indicted on criminal charges.


Blogged by JC on 08.17.05 @ 09:56 PM ET


Link: http://www.conyersblog.us/

[MelissaB]

8. Discussion also

here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x389496

[paineinthearse]

9. Make Every Vote Count

Ha! I heard that somewhere before.

Where/when was that? I remember....November 3, wee hours. Anybody have a link to the full speech, to insure I am not takint it out of context?

[FogerRox]

10. Kick and recommended

[kster]

16. kick.nt

[MelissaB]

11. **Action Alert** Email from PDA about Kerry/Edwards recount case

Dear Friends,

We have learned that the Kerry/Edwards campaign is preparing to withdraw from the Ohio recount case, which is pending in federal court. This move comes as Federal Judge Carr in Toledo prepares to hold a status conference on August 30 on this case, along with two other pending voting rights cases.

When most others stood aside, PDA stood for voting rights and untainted elections in Ohio and in the halls of Congress. We stood to make sure that every vote counts. We have continued to fight together without slowing down.

Yesterday, Congressman John Conyers, Jr. issued a letter to Senators Kerry and Edwards urging that they not withdraw from this case. Here is a link to the letter:

http://fairnessbybeckerman.blogspot.com/2005/08/congressman-conyers-urges-kerry-and.html

The National Voting Rights Institute and its general counsel John Bonifaz, a PDA National Advisory Board Member, represent 2004 presidential candidates David Cobb and Michael Badnarik in their request for a meaningful recount of the 2004 Ohio presidential vote. During the recount last December, NVRI and its clients documented extensive irregularities in the way county boards of election conducted the recount. This included evidence that the Triad corporation had tampered with voting machines prior to the start of the recount, as well as evidence the county election officials had directly violated rules and procedures so as to avoid a full hand count of the ballots.

In late December, Cobb and Badnarik filed amended counterclaims in this case alleging the recount was not conducted in accordance with basic equal protection and due process guarantees under the US Constitution. At stake in this case today is whether the court will grant the plaintiffs declaratory judgment, setting forth the constitutional standard for how recounts should be conducted in future federal elections. This is a critical precedent to set for any future presidential or congressional election.

Please call/write/email Kerry today urging that he not withdraw and that he join Cobb and Badnarik's amended counterclaims on the way the recount was conducted. To contact Kerry/Edwards campaign office, go to:

http://www.johnkerry.com/contact/


In light of the upcoming August 30 hearing before Judge Carr, time is of the essence. If the proper precedent - of creating a constitutional standard as to how recounts should be conducted in regard to due process guarantees - is set in this case, it will help assure that future elections can and will be held without taint or improper interference. Kerry and Edwards must not back away from this all-important struggle. If they do, they will not only be abandoning all those who stood for them in the campaign and all those who fought for a fair counting of the votes, but they will also be abandoning the fight to make sure that elections in this country do not become the murky purview of corporations whose machines and managers cannot be trusted. Please contact them today and tell them to keep standing for the vote.

In peace and solidarity,

Tim Carpenter
http://www.pdamerica.org

P.S. Thank you again for all your work this week with the launch of the People's Petition for an IRAQ PEACE PROCESS. If you have not signed the petition please go to:


http://www.pdamerica.org/petition/iraq-withdraw-petition.php#here

The vigils last night were amazing. Thank you again for all your help and support.

Please continue to support this work by visiting https://www.pdamerica.org/donate.php and making a contribution.

[MelissaB]

12. Ohio governor fined $4,000 for ethics violations

Ohio governor fined $4,000 for ethics violations
Taft pleads no contest

Thursday, August 18, 2005; Posted: 1:47 p.m. EDT (17:47 GMT)


Ohio Gov. Bob Taft, left, appears Thursday in court with attorney William Meeks.


COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Gov. Bob Taft became the first Ohio governor found guilty of a crime Thursday as he pleaded no contest to charges that he broke state ethics law by failing to report golf outings and other gifts.

Taft told Franklin County Municipal Judge Mark Froehlich he chose not to plead guilty but was taking responsibility for ethics lapses.

The judge found him guilty and fined him the maximum $1,000 for each of four misdemeanor counts. As expected, no jail time was ordered; the charges had carried a maximum of six months on each count.

Taft, a great-grandson of President and later Chief Justice William Howard Taft, nodded as the charges were read, and his wife, Hope, sat behind him showing no emotion.

"The message is simply clear: no one is above the law in the state of Ohio, and even the governor can be charged and convicted of a criminal offense," the judge told Taft.


More: http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/08/18/ohio.governor.ap/index.html

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15. MelissaB, you rule. A picture is worth 1000 words. Taft redux!

An omen for the political progeny of illustrious forebearers.

[MelissaB]

13. RawStory: Citizens Request Recount in San Diego Mayoral Race

Exclusive: Citizens Request Recount in San Diego Mayoral Race

Miriam Raftery

"Enron by the Sea" shows strange electoral anomalies - a 4 percent shift - ODDS OF SUCH A DISCREPANCY OCCURRING BY CHANCE ALONE ARE LESS THAN 7/100 OF 1%, STATISTICIANS REVEAL.

San Diego Democratic mayoral candidate, Donna Frye, may have been robbed of her mayoral seat in the July 25 local election as citizens' audit parallel election vote shows shift of 4 percent, Raw Story has learned.

Frye, who served three years as a council woman in San Diego, California, previously ran as a write-in candidate in November 2004, but was deprived of San Diego's top seat due to the city's Registrar of Voters, Sally McPherson, blocking the count of 5,547 ballots on which voters had written Frye's name, yet failed to also fill in bubbles. The disputed ballots would have given Frye a victory by 3,439 votes.

Enron by the Sea

Republican Dick Murphy assumed the mayoral office as a result of the uncounted ballots, only to resign amid multiple scandals that have engulfed San Diego's City Council.

His successor, Acting Mayor Michael Zucchet, a Democrat, held office for less than a day before being indicted on charges of conspiracy, extortion and wire fraud related to accepting payments from a Las Vegas strip club operator in exchange for relaxing the City's "no touch" policy.

More: http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Citizens_Request_Recount_IN_SAN_DIEGO_MAYO_0818.html

[Algorem]

14. Chillicothe Democrat running vs. troubled Bob 'Abramoff' Ney (R-Crook)

Chillicothe Democrat challenges troubled Ney
Thursday, August 18, 2005

Washington - In a sign that Ohio Democrats plan to exploit Republican ethics scandals in the 2006 elections, Chillicothe Mayor Joseph Sulzer announced Wednesday that he is formally launching a campaign to defeat six-term Republican congressman Bob Ney.

The announcement by Sulzer, a former Democratic state representative, came less than a week after a federal grand jury in Florida indicted Jack Abramoff, a prominent Washington lobbyist whose ties to Ney and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay have come under scrutiny recently...

Sulzer, a lawyer, said GOP ethics problems in Columbus as well as Washington will be a major focus of his race.

"People are saying it's time for a change," he said in a telephone interview. "When you have one-party rule this is what happens and we've had one-party rule in Columbus for a long time and now we've had one-party rule in Washington, D.C. People get careless. They get arrogant."...

http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/news/112435759471541.xml&coll=2


http://www.chillicothegazette.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050817/NEWS01/50817003

Sulzer makes Congressional bid official
Democrat hopes to unseat Ney

Last year, Chillicothe Mayor Joe Sulzer was active in the Democratic presidential bid of Sen. John Kerry. Now, he wants to join Kerry on Capitol Hill...

...“If the people of Ohio send me to Washington to represent them, I will make creating jobs for Ohio workers, fiscal responsibility for the country, and taking care of our troops and veterans my top priorities,” Sulzer said at the press conference.

The three main themes of Sulzer’s announcement were fiscal responsiblity, getting U.S. troops out of Iraq and ethical behavior by Congress.

Sulzer is an Army veteran and served during the Vietnam War — from August 1967 to August 1968. He earned a bachelor's degree from Ohio University and was awarded a law degree by Capital University.



http://houseoflabor.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/8/16/143026/809

The Abramoff 6
By Ellen Miller | bio
From: Auction House


Jack Abramoff -- who got the best government that money can buy -- has always reminded me a little of Charlie Keating, the former operator of the failed Lincoln Savings & Loan. Keating raised more than $1.3 million for the campaigns and causes of five U.S. senators (dubbed "The Keating 5") in the late 1980s in an effort to thwart investigations of his S&L by federal bank officials. Keating once remarked "One question . . . had to do with whether my financial support in any way influenced several political figures to take up my cause. I want to say in the most forceful way I can: I certainly hope so." No doubt Abramoff would say the same thing in a candid moment.
And I also can't quite get out of my mind that the lawmakers associated with Keating founded themselves in some trouble as a result. Ethics Committee investigations ensued and ultimately four out of the five -- Sens Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.), Alan Cranston (D-Calif.), John Glenn (D-Ohio) and Don Riegle (D-Mich.) -- retired prematurely. The fifth -- Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) --became a champion of campaign finance reform...

* Michael Scanlon, former DeLay press aide, helped his partner, Jack Abramoff, in acquiring the floating casino company, SunCruz. He persuaded Ney to tout Adam Kidan in the Congressional Record. Ney made a floor statement in the House in October 2000, praising Kidan for his "renowned reputation for honesty and integrity." (Congressional Record, 10/26/00; Roll Call, 12/6/04)

* Abramoff represented the Tigua Tribe in Texas, who paid him $4.2 million in lobbying fees to help re-open their casinos, after losing their gaming license in Feb. 2002. Abramoff assured them he could help by having legislation attached to an election reform bill sponsored by Rep. Ney and Sen Chris Dodd. Abramoff and Ney assured the tribe that Dodd had agreed to attach the legislation onto the bill. Dodd claimed he did not know about the deal struck for the Tiguas between Abramoff and Ney until the night before the bill was to be voted on. (Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 3/23/05)...

[Time for change]

17. Here's a study I just posted

It compares vote switching from Kerry to Bush in swing states versus non-states. The rate (reported switches per voters using electronic machines) is 9 to 1 for swing states versus non-swing states:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x2020121

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18. ERD Support this Thread Please

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x4401317