ED: Dems Focus on False Charges against Blackwell Disservice to Ohioans

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Democrats’ focus on false charges against Blackwell is disservice to Ohioans
Monday, July 24, 2006



Democrats’ constant carping about Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell’s handling of Ohio elections can be dismissed as politics as usual in an election year. But this whining undermines public trust in Ohio’s voting systems.

Responsible members of both parties know that Blackwell, Ohio’s top elections official and the GOP’s candidate for governor, didn’t fix the 2004 election and couldn’t fix this year’s vote even if he wanted to.

Blackwell has no reason to relinquish his election-oversight duties as secretary of state, a post he’ll vacate at the end of the year. All Ohio secretaries of state are partisan and some, including previous secretaries Sherrod Brown and Bob Taft, were politically ambitious, as is Blackwell. That doesn’t make voting processes corrupt, as some people have argued.

Blackwell issues directives on Ohio’s voting rules and procedures, but he doesn’t control the process. That’s done in the 88 counties by bipartisan boards and staff members. Each step is subject to bipartisan oversight: the programming of machines, the polling locations, Election Day interaction with voters, the tabulation and the recount, if necessary.

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http://www.dispatch.com/editorials-story.php?story=dispatch/2006/07/24/20060724-A6-00.html

[GrpCaptMandrake]

1. Jeepers!

And 2004 didn't "undermine public trust?"

Wow!

Can I write editorials, too? I think I could do every bit as good a job!

I might could even git me one o' them jurnzamalizm edumacations from the Draw Spunk Skool of Jurnamalizm!

[Febble]

2. Blackwell had a conflict of interest, period

It doesn't matter whether he fixed the election or he didn't, the fact that as secretary of state for elections he also held the role of co-chair of Bush's re-election campaign is what undermined trust in the election.

And the fact that he seems unable to see that makes it even worse.

[Demit]

3. I love how they walk their argument back & forth.

This editorial says "Blackwell made some bad decisions that invited suspicion of partisanship" but "backed down in the face of strong criticism." But it still asserts that Democrats have no justification for "carping" and "whining".

And the extrapolation that criticizing Blackwell is criticizing his staff and even "officials from both parties throughout the state" is trés lame. This piece reads like it was written by an intern who got an incomplete in Logic.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

4. "Responsible members"???

I guess "responsible" as in people were supposed to know to
use only #18 lb paper to register voters on,

even when Ohio newspapers had registration forms on their inserts.

Ohio was an utter wreck, and the buck stops at Kenneth
Blackwell's desk.

That is the problem with having a partisan, elected official
who is also a campaign manager - in charge of elections.

This is a pattern from state to state that has a partisan
SOS running things.

[yourout]

5. I think there is a law against putting "Blackwell" and "bipartisan" in...

the same article.

There is no way in hell that what happened in Ohio was not intentional.