Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News, Monday 07/21/08

[tbyg52]

Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News, Monday 07/21/08

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[tbyg52]

1. States nt

[tbyg52]

7. AL: Chapman to speak about voter fraud

(Yes, she really means *voter* fraud.)

Secretary of State Beth Chapman will speak about voter fraud and voter education in Lowndes County on Tuesday.

Chapman will speak to a meeting of the Lowndes Citizens United for Action at 5:30 p.m. in the ballroom of the Hayneville office complex on Tuskeena Street in Hayneville. The event is open to the public.

Lowndes Citizens United for Action is a non-profit community organization that primarily targets environmental justice issues, but is also involved with local and state government issues such as voter education.

(A little) more:
http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080721/NEWS/80721019

[tbyg52]

39. Chapman creates new voting program for veterans

Secretary of State Beth Chapman has announced a new initiative entitled Veterans Who Vote.

Chapman created the Veterans Who Vote Program to partner with the Veterans of Foreign Wars to recruit veterans to register voters, work at the polls, and be poll watchers for the November General Election.

She made the announcement in Birmingham during a homecoming celebration for National Guard Soldiers, C-Company, 1-167th Infantry out of Cullman returning from a one year tour in Iraq.

“Veterans have fought to provide our right to vote, protect our right to vote and now they have an opportunity to help preserve our right to vote by being a part of the process” Chapman stated. “There is no one better to trust managing and watching the polling places where we vote than the ones who fought for our right to vote” she concluded.

More:
http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080721/NEWS/80721012

[tbyg52]

9. AL: Scary Politics in Alabama: How the GOP Framed Gov. Don Siegelman

Once a popular governor of Alabama, Siegelman was framed in a crooked trial and sent to prison by the corrupt Bush administration.

Editor's Note: The following chapter is from "Loser Take All: Election Fraud and the Subversion of Democracy, 2000-2008," (IG Publishing, 2008), edited by Mark Crispin Miller.

On Election Day 2002, the Alabama governorship seemed all but certain to be delivered to the Democratic incumbent, Don Siegelman. In a largely Republican state, the popular Siegelman had been the only person in Alabama history to hold all of the state's highest offices, having served as Attorney General, Secretary of State, Lieutenant Governor and finally, as Governor. When the polls closed on election night, and the votes were being counted, it seemed increasingly apparent that Governor Siegelman had been victorious in his re-election bid against the Republican challenger, Bob Riley. But, sometime in the middle of the night, a single county changed everything, and by the next morning, Alabamians awoke to find that Riley was their new governor.

According to CNN, the confusion over who the actual winner was stemmed from what appeared to be two different sets of numbers coming in from Baldwin County:

More:
http://www.alternet.org/democracy/92158/?ses=872d984a688a9f461cdcbcfaf1bbe608

[tbyg52]

12. OR: Group alleges petitions were forged

A union-funded watchdog group has asked the state to investigate whether signatures on initiative petitions circulated by conservative activists were forged.

Meanwhile, the conservative activists have gone to federal court to try to force the state to ease or overturn new restrictions.

The complaint filed by the watchdog group Our Oregon alleges that at least four signatures, including of Ellen Clay, of Keizer, were forged on current election-cycle petitions.

More:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008063320_initiative21m.html

[tbyg52]

14. HI: Activists Sue to Protect the Vote

We filed a lawsuit on July 14, 2008, asking the Court to order the Hawaii Chief Elections Officer to stop using telephone lines or the internet for transmitting ballot counts and election results for final tabulation until such time as administrative rules can be legally promulgated in accordance with Hawaii Administrative Law, Chapter 91, HRS, and all other laws can also be legally followed.

Hart InterCivic (Hart) of Austin, Texas, has the contract to conduct elections for the State of Hawaii. They write the software and design the hardware and it is top secret. No one can inspect it because it is "proprietary property." They claim the version they are using has been inspected by an independent testing agency (ITA) on the mainland. But we don't know if what they inspected is the same as what is actually used here in Hawaii. We must blindly trust them to be honest.

Each voting machine at the precincts has a memory card with votes on it. After the polls close on election day, the current procedure is to forward all memory cards to the county count center (8th floor of the Maui County Building for Maui) and hand them to the Hart technician who then "reads" them into the Hart tabulator (a laptop in 2006). The laptop is connected to a telephone line and the vote count files are then supposedly transmitted directly to the State count center using a wide area network (WAN). WAN's use the internet. We believe the transmission method is either by email with files attached or file transfer protocol (FTP).

More:
http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?d14e8357-cf00-4d60-9aa1-13460f23de0a

[tbyg52]

16. FL: Get Ready For Optical-Scan Voting

The old lever machines are long gone. We all know what happened with the punch cards and hanging chads. And now the touch-screen machines are relics, too.

Get ready for optical-scan voting.

Voters next month will use Hillsborough's new $6 million optical scan voting system, previously used locally only in a Plant City municipal election.

The shift comes as a result of a contested 2006 Sarasota County congressional race. Touch-screen machines were used but didn't record all the votes cast. That prompted the state Legislature to pass a law last year requiring any county using touch-screen machines to switch to optical scanners by July 1.

The optical system will provide a ballot paper trail.

More:
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2008/jul/21/me-yes-i-scan-voting-is-safer-on-paper/

[tbyg52]

21. Manual recounts out in close elections

With the ghosts of the 2000 presidential election bedlam still haunting the state, Gov. Charlie Crist pushed lawmakers last year to require that all voting machines leave a ‘’paper trail’’ that would lay to rest concerns about votes being accurately counted.

Dee Brown, supervisor of elections for Marion County, and Wesley Wilcox, assistant supervisor of elections, check on electronic voter identification machines on Jan. 11.

‘’If there’s a need for a recount, I think it’s important that we have something to recount,’’ Crist said last year as the state junked touch screen voting machines that did not leave paper records of individual votes.

But as the state heads into what is expected to be a record-setting year for voter turnout, Florida law does not allow for every ballot to be counted in case of a close election.

More:
http://www.ocala.com/article/20080721/NEWS/213185086/1025/NEWS&title=Manual_recounts_out_in_close_elections

[tbyg52]

22. GA: Photo ID hassle puts one mom's vote on ice

Until I read her opinion column, I didn't know Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel was looking for a voter harmed by the photo ID requirement (" 'Partisan bullying' unfounded in state photo ID requirement," @issue, July 28).

My 73-year-old mother is one.

After moving to Georgia from Florida, we attempted to obtain a Georgia ID. Based on the then-published requirements on the Department of Motor Vehicles Web site, we gathered proof of her new address (bank statement), birth certificate and valid Florida driver's license. At the DMV, we where told that as of May, the secretary of state required her marriage certificate because the name on her birth certificate did not match her driver's license. They would accept a passport with her married name, something she has never applied for.

The harm:

More:
http://www.ajc.com/opinion/content/opinion/stories/2008/07/21/votinged_0721_2DOT.html

[tbyg52]

25. NY: Counties worry about voting machine change

Bugs in new voting machines, difficulties getting storage-space funding and general anxiety about changing a system that's been around more than a century are problems counties face as the state continues its long march toward compliance with a federal voting-rights law.

With about seven weeks to go until the Sept. 9 primary and 14 months until decades-old mechanical lever voting machines become history, there are some nervous county election commissioners, according to state officials.

Others, however, are not concerned they will fall behind schedule.

More:
http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080721/NEWS01/807210333/1002/NEWS

[tbyg52]

28. CA: Uncle Sam needs you - for a polling place

Schools, churches, public halls, businesses and private residences all can be suitable polling places during an election - and the Nevada County Elections Office is looking for new recruits.

It's a great way to participate in the community, advertise your presence and meet your neighbors, and the elections office provides all the training necessary in time for the Nov. 4 general election.

New polling places particularly are needed in the areas of Lake Wildwood, Smartsville, Chicago Park and Alta Sierra.

Potential polling places need to be accessible for voters with disabilities, have enough space to set up several voting booths, electronic voting equipment and tables and chairs.

More:
http://www.theunion.com/article/20080721/NEWS/125151557/1058/SPORTS&parentprofile=-1

[tbyg52]

29. NC: voting group says expanded early voting needed

An election reform group says local officials must hire more staff and open more early voting sites or people will face long lines in November.

Democracy North Carolina said Monday that between 700,000 and 1 million more people could cast ballots than the 3.5 million who voted in 2004.

(A little) more:
http://www.dailycomet.com/article/20080721/APN/807210999

[tbyg52]

32. AL: Voting Rights Forum set for people with disabilities

There could be disabled people in Dallas County intimidated by the voting process or unaware of their ability to vote.

That is the biggest concern of William Bowman, president of the Visually Impaired People Organization Inc.

Bowman, through VIP, has scheduled a Voting Rights Forum for people with disabilities Wednesday at 10 a.m. at the YMCA of Selma-Dallas County.

The forum will emphasize the use of the AutoMARK machine, which uses a touch screen and audio system to help people with disabilities vote independently.

More:
http://www.selmatimesjournal.com/news/2008/jul/21/voting-rights-forum-set-people-disabilities/

[tbyg52]

33. CA: Latino groups unite to launch voter registration drive

"Buoyed by a surge of political interest among immigrants and youth, nine national Latino organizations Friday announced a joint effort to register as many as 2 million new voters as presidential candidates from both parties vie for their community's increasingly influential support," writes the L.A. Times' Teresa Watanabe.

"The $5-million nonpartisan voter registration effort, announced at a national Latino forum in downtown Los Angeles, comes amid an unprecedented campaign by community organizations and Spanish-language media to boost Latino civic participation -- and two new reports showing signs of success."

"The U.S. government last week reported that the number of Mexican immigrants who became citizens last year swelled by 50%, with hundreds of thousands more in line to process their naturalization applications."

"Community leaders Friday expressed even more excitement about a new study by the Texas-based William C. Velasquez Institute, a nonpartisan public policy and research organization that found more than 1 million Latinos had registered to vote during this primary season, including 500,000 in California and Texas."

More:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/laplaza/2008/07/latino-groups-u.html

[tbyg52]

36. FL: Fines Target Non Profit Groups

Groups hosting voter registration drives could soon become subject to stricter penalties for turning in applications late or not at all. As Whitney Ray tells us, non-profit groups could be hit with thousands of dollars in fines.

Voter registration drives may be the most convenient way to sign up to vote, but they could also be risky. The Florida Secretary of State is drafting rules for stricter penalties and deadlines for groups that host registration drives.

“We have had times in the past where some of these drives have turned in the applications after Election Day or have turned them in with bad information,” said Jennifer Davis, a spokeswoman with the Secretary of State.

More:
http://www.flanews.com/?p=2340

[tbyg52]

41. NM: Election groups want probe of missing ballots

Attorney General Gary King's office is investigating what happened to 182 ballots that are missing from the June primary election.

Phil Sisneros, a spokesman for the attorney general, said Monday there was an investigation but he could not provide any details. Previously, the attorney general's office would only say the matter was under review.

Two election reform groups—Verified Voting New Mexico and United Voters of New Mexico—called Monday for a thorough investigation into the missing ballots. They said that was necessary to maintain voter confidence in the fairness of elections, particularly with the state preparing for a general election in November in which New Mexico is likely to be critical in the outcome of the presidential race.

More:
http://www.lcsun-news.com/ci_9949842

[tbyg52]

43. MS: Voters soon to receive cards for verification

Voters registered in Madison County will soon receive verification cards as part of a campaign to clean the county's voter rolls.

County officials have agreed to spend more than $59,000 on efforts to purge what many think to be an inflated list of registered voters.

It's the first step that must be taken to purge people from the rolls, according to the National Voting Rights Act, but typically cards are mailed only to specific inactive voters, not a whole county.

The effort could be the first of its kind in Mississippi, and Madison County could be used as a model for similar projects across the state.

More:
http://www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080721/NEWS/807210334/1001/news

[tbyg52]

48. AZ: 'Fixed' AZ Election Detailed in Letter to State AG

Arizona's election watchdog group, Audit AZ, went to the state Attorney General in its efforts to learn the truth about Pima County's 2006 RTA (Regional Transportation Authority) election. Attorney Bill Risner handed Arizona AG Terry Goddard a letter detailing the evidence suggesting that the RTA election was flipped. The clearly written letter is accompanied by dozens of documents as well as video links to depositions and testimony from the 2007 court case Risner won for the Pima County Democratic Party. As a result of that case, every political party in the county has access to Diebold's database files, recording how voters voted, from previous and future elections.

In May, 2007, on the heels of questions about the results of the '06 RTA election following polls and previous elections in which similar initiatives were rejected by voters, the Arizona Attorney General's office launched a criminal investigation into the RTA election. The software quality assurance firm, iBeta, was given computer databases to look over which indicated the vote counting might have been tampered with. Though iBeta saw instances of possible tampering, it decided they were simply the result of "human error." Using tortured logic, iBeta said the signs of possible tampering were evidence that there was actually no tampering, since anyone who knew how to manipulate the data would also know how to cover their computer tracks and leave no evidence behind.

More:
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6198

[tbyg52]

2. National nt

[tbyg52]

8. Election Day Could Be A Doozy, Experts Say

With millions of new voters heading to the polls this November and many states introducing new voting technologies, election officials and voting monitors say they fear the combination is likely to create long lines, stressed-out poll workers and late tallies on Election Day.

At least 11 states, including Florida, will use new voting equipment as the nation shifts away from touch-screen machines and to the paper ballots of optical scanners, which will be used by more than 55 percent of voters. About half of all voters will use machines unlike the ones they used in the last presidential election, experts say, and more than half of the states will use new statewide databases to verify voter registration.

With Sen. Barack Obama's candidacy expected to attract many new voters who may never have encountered a voting machine, voting experts and election officials say they are worried that the system may buckle under the increased strain.

"I'm concerned about the weak spots," said Rosemary E. Rodriguez, the chairwoman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, which oversees voting. "So much depends on whether there will be enough poll workers, whether they are trained enough and whether their state and county election directors give them contingency plans and resources to handle the unexpected."

More:
http://www2.tbo.com/content/2008/jul/21/me-election-day-could-be-a-doozy-experts-say/

[tbyg52]

18. Officials highlight voting concerns

Millions of new voters and the introduction of new voting technologies for the US presidential election will lead to long queues, stressed workers and late results in November, US election officials said.

Rosemary E Rodriguez, chairwoman of the US Election Assistance Commission which oversees voting, said she was concerned about "weak spots" after a study revealed poorly designed ballots continue to plague US elections.

More than three billion US dollars (£1.5bn) has been set aside by Congress to resolve the issues caused by the "dimpled chads" of the 2000 election, which prompted fears of an "impending constitutional crisis" and led to the start of George Bush's presidency, but the study found serious problems remain.

It revealed that problems with confusing paper ballots in 2002, absentee ballots in 2004 and touch-screen ballots in 2006 led thousands of voters to skip over key races or make mistakes that invalidated their votes.

More:
http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5hzsmVnBH3-EsZrWrLMmXpz1BWQxg

[tbyg52]

19. Brennan Center Publishes Study of Bad Ballot Design Problems

The Brennan Center has published a 77-page report “Better Ballots” that criticizes badly designed ballots. The Report got this publicity in USA Today. The study finds these problems: (1) splitting candidates for the same office onto different pages or columns; (2) placing different contests on the same touch screen; (3) placing response options on both sides of candidates names; (4) using “complete the arrow” instead of “fill the oval” response options; (5) leaving columns or rows for disqualified candidates; (6) inconsistency in format and style; (7) not using shading to help voters differentiate between voting tasks; (8) not using bold text to help voters differentiate between voting tasks; (9) not writing short, simple instructions; (10) placing instructions far from related actions; (11) not informing voters how to correct paper ballots; (12) failing to effectively warn voters of undervotes in touch screen systems; (13) publishing sample ballots different from actual ballots. To see a pdf of the report, see here.

Link (the above is all that's there, unless someone has commented):
http://www.ballot-access.org/2008/07/21/brennan-center-publishes-study-of-bad-ballot-design-problems/

[tbyg52]

20. Study: Poor ballot designs still affect U.S. election

Poorly designed ballots continue to plague U.S. elections, even after Congress set aside $3 billion to overhaul voting systems to prevent a recurrence of the flawed Florida ballots that deadlocked the 2000 presidential race, a study out today concludes.

Problems with confusing paper ballots in 2002, absentee ballots in 2004 and touch-screen ballots in 2006 led thousands of voters to skip over key races or make mistakes that invalidated their votes, according to the study by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law.

"In the big election meltdowns … where thousands of votes were lost, ballot design was the primary cause," says Lawrence Norden of the Brennan Center.

More (plus comments):
http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=5414755&page=1

[tbyg52]

23. VA Secretary Peake Urged to Stop Blocking Voter Registration

Today, leading voting rights groups called on James B. Peake, Secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), to reverse a recent decision that prohibits VA offices and facilities from offering voter registration and potentially registering tens of thousands of veterans.

American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), Common Cause, Demos and the League of Women Voters urged Secretary Peake to approve future state requests to allow voter registration at VA agencies and offices. This would be a reversal of his ruling on a May 1, 2008, request byCalifornia Secretary of State Debra Bowen that he agree to the designation of VA sites in her state as voter registration agencies, as permitted under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA).Connecticut Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz made a similar request on July 2, 2008.

More:
http://newsblaze.com/story/2008072104030600021.pnw/topstory.html

[tbyg52]

24. Voter drives verboten at V.A. hospital

Utah Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert has agreed to co-sign a letter to Congress asking for a review of a recent Department of Veterans Affairs rule barring voter registration drives at V.A. facilities.

That means veterans confined to V.A. hospitals or nursing homes cannot be contacted at those facilities by independent groups trying to register voters.

Belinda Karabatsos, manager of volunteer services at the V.A. medical center in Salt Lake City, says that in response to that new rule, the medical center is training some volunteers to assist patients in registering to vote - if they ask. There will be no proactive registration drives, she said.

More:
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_9944785

[tbyg52]

30. Concrete evidence indicating fraudulent manipulation of prior U.S. elections

is emerging in Ohio and Georgia

Most of us who have worked on election integrity since 2003 were aware of the highly suspicious 2002 election results in Georgia's senate and gubernatorial races - the surprise upsets were well outside the margin of random poll error. These upsets occurred immediately after the Diebold paperless DREs were first implemented in GA.

Some of us recall the reports by the first whistle blower from Georgia who reported that he was told to help install uncertified software patches on the Diebold DREs in GA at the last minute prior to the 2002 election, without the knowledge of the GA Secretary of State or other officials, but with the knowledge of Britt Williams, GA's voting system evaluator/administrator.

We did a lot of analyses and report writing that showed that Ohio's
2004 presidential exit poll discrepancies were much more consistent with vote fraud than with exit poll response bias, in contrast to claims by the media and exit pollsters.

But not until now has there been hard evidence available to back up what we suspected all along.

More:
http://freepage.twoday.net/stories/5070264/

[tbyg52]

44. House defeats paper ballot funding

The House rejected a bill last week that would have funded the purchase of paper ballots as a backup to electronic voting systems for the upcoming election.

The bill would have directed the Election Assistance Commission to establish a program to make the grants in time for the November vote.

Aviel Rubin, a professor of computer science at the University of Maryland and longtime skeptic of electronic voting, said he was disappointed by the House.

“It’s a real missed opportunity,” he said. “I just hope we won’t be sorry in November.”

More:
http://www.fcw.com/online/news/153178-1.html

[UncountedMary]

57. Why Diebold's Disreputable Distinction is Dead On Deserved

Note from David Earnhardt, "Uncounted" filmmaker: Each week until the election we will release a clip from UNCOUNTED because now, more than ever, people need to see stories that will motivate them to stand up and help save our democracy. Please spread these clips around - to the bleary-eyed and the overworked and the uninspired and the skeptical. This week we offer the David v. Goliath story of Bruce Funk, whose whistleblowing helped give Diebold their well-deserved reputation.

WEEK 3: Why Diebold's Disreputable Distinction is Dead On Deserved

Watch Bruce Funk's Story

Ex-Emory County, Utah County Clerk, Bruce Funk, is the kind of man you wish was your grandfather - soft-spoken, kind, and able to recognize what has been called "the nuclear bomb of security flaws" in Diebold's electronic voting machines.

Unfortunately, no one had Bruce Funk's back and even though he blew the whistle and saved the 2006 election from a complete meltdown, he was treated as a pariah instead of a hero.

Citizen Funk, unfortunately, is rare bird. But imagine if he wasn't? Imagine if every county clerk and election commissioner followed his lead and made the integrity of our elections their number one priority. Imagine if they all realized that asking pertinent and thorough questions about the security of our voting equipment is part of the awesome responsiblity that is their job. Imagine if they didn't consider the fallout from doing the right thing.

Bruce Funk has every right to be a bitter man. Instead, he can't think of anything more important to do with his life than to continue to work to save our democracy.

See? Just like your grandfather...

Watch Bruce Funk's Story

SALT LAKE CITY UNCOUNTED SCREENING: September 3, 2008

Bruce Funk will be the special guest at a Salt Lake City screening of Uncounted hosted by the http://www.slcfilmcenter.org/">Salt Lake City Film Center at the Fort Douglas Post Theatre, University of Utah, on Wednesday, September 3, 2008 at 7 pm. Bruce will introduce the film and lead a post-film discussion.

[tbyg52]

3. Foreign nt

[tbyg52]

10. Kashmir: Geelani to Unmask Officilas Involved in Electoral Roll Fraud

Repeating his pledge to unmask government officials involved in irregularities in electoral rolls, the chairman of the Hurriyat (G), Syed Ali Shah Geelani, today reaffirmed his commitment to conduct the poll boycott campaign on the lines of a mass movement, vowing to grind the ambitions of pro-India parties into the dust.

Addressing a condolence meeting in Warpora, Sopore, Geelani said that people were scripting a saga of sacrifices every day, and no party or leader could take them in.
He said that the poll boycott campaign would continue with full force, and it would be conducted on the pattern of the agitation against the land transfer to the Shrine Board. “There is no difference between the NC, the Congress and the PDP, as all these parties want to cage Kashmiris in eternal slavery to India,” he said.

He said that the Hurriyat would go from locality to locality to create mass awareness, as making the election card a multi-purpose document and linking it with civil rights was an imperialistic gambit.
He said that non-state-subjects had been inducted into the electoral rolls on a large scale, and that India was implementing a long-term strategy of changing the demographic composition of the state.

More:
http://www.kashmirobserver.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=595:geelani-to-unmask-officilas-involved-in-electoral-roll-fraud&catid=50:localnews&Itemid=81

[tbyg52]

4. Blogs, Editorials, LTTEs, etc. nt

[tbyg52]

11. OR: The Initiative Process: A better way

It's initiative season again. The time when young people with clipboards approach us on the streets or at bus stops, or in front of post offices, to get our signatures on petitions for the ballot measures we may vote on in November.

From one point of view, the initiative process is a drag. Signature gatherers pester us, take our time, and can be gruff at times. As sometime signature gatherers ourselves, we can speak to the opposite side of that coin. Gathering signatures in the rain or heat, or knocking on the doors of sometimes hostile people, or fending off their menacing dogs, can be daunting. And the best public places to gather signatures (parking lots of large stores) are now off limits to petition circulators.

On the other hand, the initiative is a beautiful thing. It allows We the People to make laws, even amend our state constitution, and fix things that our Legislature is afraid or unwilling to fix. Oregonians have used the initiative more than the people of any other state, and we've used it for good causes: Women got the right to vote in Oregon via the initiative eight years before the U.S. Constitution was similarly amended. The 8-hour work day, the 40-hour work week and the nation's highest minimum wage were enacted by initiative.

More:
http://www.statesmanjournal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080721/OPINION/807210302/1049/OPINION

[tbyg52]

13. Please tooth fairy save us

snip

I've enjoyed my short time here on Capitol Hill Blue. I like writing my small blog, tried to join the staff as proof-reader or editor. It seems it's time for me to move on to other things. My comments and thoughts are no longer appropriate.

I finally got myself banned from CHB comments. My message of truth, justice, and freedom can't overcome the censor buttons or my own anger issues. I do get upset, I'm only human.

snip

Now I can't comment on stories. I guess I was warned, even though we were assured truth wouldn't be oppressed. How dare I take on the opposing view. I should have known better. People still believe in voting even though they lie about everything else. Diebold is such a trustworthy company. How could we ever question their results!

snip

Voting gets us no where today. It is a lie. It is a scam. Believing in it will bring about our demise. We might as well put our faith in the tooth fairy to save our Republic. That's how much voting will help us.

More:
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/cont/node/9639

[tbyg52]

15. Awww - Diebold didn't make the cut

That's my title - couldn't fit the real one plus how it related to Diebold....

Worst Company In America Final Death Match: Comcast VS Countrywide Home Loans

Well, folks. This one is for all the marbles and a beautiful lucky golden shit statue, suitable for display in the corporate headquarters of either Comcast or Countrywide (now Bank of America).

It's been a long, difficult, and sometimes controversial road. In order to get to the final, Comcast defeated Menu Foods, The American Arbitration Association, Ticketmaster, Exxon, and Diebold. Countrywide took down Dish Network, Clear Channel, United Healthcare, Bank of America, and Walmart. Now, the choice is yours: Which company is the Worst Company in America?
Here's what a few of you had to say about these two companies:

More:
http://consumerist.com/5027169/worst-company-in-america-final-death-match-comcast-vs-countrywide-home-loans

[tbyg52]

17. Are we ready for Election 2008?

First came all the good news about the explosion of interest in Election 2008 -- skyrocketing registration, high primary turnout. Now come the darker warnings: is our patch-work national election system ready for an engaged electorate?

The New York Times spells out the possible voting problems in a cover story today. First there are big changes in voting technology:

At least 11 states will use new voting equipment as the nation shifts away from touch-screen machines and to the paper ballots of optical scanners, which will be used by more than 55 percent of voters.

About half of all voters will use machines unlike the ones they used in the last presidential election, experts say, and more than half of the states will use new statewide databases to verify voter registration.

More:
http://southernstudies.org/facingsouth/2008/07/are-we-ready-for-election-2008.asp

[tbyg52]

26. PA: Voting machines need to be replaced

The Centre County Board of Commissioners will vote tomorrow on whether the county will get new voting machines. These new optical scan machines will assure a concrete paper record of all votes cast, opposed to the records kept by the touch-screen machines currently in place.

The issue at hand is whether the county should lease and/or purchase these newer machines, which would cost the county at least $1 million. Commissioners who oppose the switch believe the current machines may not be the best available, but the touch-screens are still efficient, and it's not worth the cost to make the switch.

If the county wants to function effectively, accurate elections must be a priority, regardless of price.

In order to conduct accurate elections, accurate voting machines are a must.

More:
http://www.collegian.psu.edu/archive/2008/07/21/voting_machines_need_to_be_rep.aspx

[tbyg52]

31. Just a Chip Away From Stealing Your Vote

Are computerized voting machines a wide-open back door to massive voting fraud? The discussion has moved from the Internet to CNN, to UK newspapers, and the pages of The New York Times. People are cautiously beginning to connect the dots, and the picture that seems to be emerging is troubling.

"A defective computer chip in the county's optical scanner misread ballots Tuesday night and incorrectly tallied a landslide victory for Republicans," announced the Associated Press in a story on Nov. 7, just a few days after the 2002 election. The story added, "Democrats actually won by wide margins."

Republicans would have carried the day had not poll workers become suspicious when the computerized vote-reading machines said the Republican candidate was trouncing his incumbent Democratic opponent in the race for County Commissioner. The poll workers were close enough to the electorate -- they were part of the electorate -- to know their county overwhelmingly favored the Democratic incumbent.

A quick hand recount of the optical-scan ballots showed that the Democrat had indeed won, even though the computerized ballot-scanning machine kept giving the race to the Republican. The poll workers brought the discrepancy to the attention of the County Clerk, who notified the voting machine company.

More:
http://www.knowthelies.com/?q=node/2335

[tbyg52]

37. Restore the right of felons to vote

No single existing voting-rights inequity seems a starker injustice than the plight of people with felony convictions. These people, of course, aren't just murderers and muggers. Three out of every five felony convictions don't lead to jail time, and there's no clear line you have to cross to earn one.

Taking away the right to vote for life is analogous, some commentators have suggested, to the medieval practice of "civil death," where severe violations of society's social code led to complete loss of citizenship rights.

Contrary to popular belief, felony disenfranchisement laws are not part of the criminal justice system. Instead, they are state election laws, enacted by state legislatures and governors or hardwired into constitutions. Losing the right to vote after a felony conviction in Virginia is not in any way part of a criminal sentence -- it is a collateral consequence dictated by state law.

More:
http://www.roanoke.com/editorials/commentary/wb/170152

[tbyg52]

5. The Youth Vote nt

[tbyg52]

27. Young Voters Take the Reins in Election '08

Issue-Based VoteGopher.com, Created by Harvard Undergrads, Revamped & Re-Launched

The 2008 presidential campaign has already made one thing clear -- young voters aren't sitting this one out. A testament to this dynamic youth movement is VoteGopher.com: the ultimate election study guide. Focused on the issues and targeted at young voters, VoteGopher.com is back -- re-launched, revamped, and with several new features to help voters make an informed choice this November.

Originally released in October 2007 for the presidential primaries, VoteGopher has already been praised as "unusually extensive" by Adam Nagourney, Chief Political Correspondent for The New York Times, and described as "more comprehensive and lively than anything I've seen out there" by Maralee Schwartz, former National Political Editor of The Washington Post. The site is also listed on The New York Times' political blogroll and on Politico.com's Campus Politico homepage.

More:
http://newsblaze.com/story/2008072107031100016.pnw/topstory.html

[tbyg52]

34. Rock the Vote and Comcast Announce Partnership

to Encourage Young Americans to Register to Vote

Rock the Vote and Comcast Corporation, the nation's leading provider of entertainment, information and communications products and services, announced today at the Tri-Caucus Youth Summit in Washington, D.C., that they have entered into a multimedia partnership to encourage young Americans, ages 18-29, to register to vote. The Summit was hosted by the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute (CHCI), the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, Inc. (CBCF) and the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies (APAICS).

The partnership between Rock the Vote (RTV) and Comcast will include a series of co-branded Public Service Announcements and Internet outreach on Comcast's family of networks, including E! Networks, VERSUS, The Golf Channel, TV One, FearNet, Comcast SportsNet networks, PBS Kids Sprout, CN8 and G4. Comcast and RTV will be registering young Americans online through these networks' websites as well as at Comcast.net, OurTimetoVote.com, the Comcast voter outreach resource, and Comcast Latino, the Spanish language website at Terra.com. All websites will be using RTV's innovative, easy-to-use online voter registration tool.

More:
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/rock-vote-comcast-announce-partnership/story.aspx?guid=%7BF0ADBD3D-BBE2-492E-973F-EF39E7D9D9AB%7D&dist=hppr

[tbyg52]

40. Rock the Vote: Still relevant after all these years?

Rock the Vote, the organization that made such a splash in the 1992 Presidential race, using celebrity-studded PSAs and TV specials to try to reverse the trend of declining youth voter turnout, is still at it. Much like the aging rockers that spread its message, the group is working hard to keep up with the times, using its rockthevote.com website and partnerships with social networks like MySpace, YouTube and Flickr to reach out to American's youth.

This month it is running a contest on MySpace for bands called DemROCKracy. (Sadly, there is no RepubROCKin counterpart.) The winner gets a chance to play at the Democratic National Convention in Denver, not a bad gig for a young band.

As for actually rocking the Vote, the organization has yet to surpass the impact it had in 1992, when Rock the Vote was a household name across the country, and drew attention to an important civic issue. That year, thanks to Rock the Vote's efforts and numerous other factors, youth voter turnout actually increased for the first time since 1972.

More:
http://ohmygov.com/blogs/general_news/archive/2008/07/18/rock-the-vote-still-relevant-after-all-these-years.aspx

[tbyg52]

35. Va. sees surge in young voters

Virginia is seeing a surge in voter registration among 18- to 25-year-olds.

The Virginia State Board of Elections says the number of 18- to 25-year-old voters has increased by 10 percent in the past year. As of last week, there were 569,817 registered voters in that age group.

(A little) more:
http://www.wtop.com/?nid=25&sid=1443947

[tbyg52]

38. More young Virginians are registering, but will they vote?

The pool of 18- to 25-year-olds signing up to vote in this year’s presidential election is growing at twice the rate of all Virginia voters, according state election officials.

The surge in young registrants, which experts attribute to heightened interest in national politics, means that the group of voters 25 and younger in the state has grown 10 percent in the past year, while the growth in the entire voter pool has increased 5 percent, according to the Virginia State Board of Elections.

The young voters make up only a slightly larger portion this year of Virginia’s 4.7 million registered voters – an estimated 11 percent of all voters a year ago and 12 percent today. As of last week, 569,817 registered voters in the commonwealth are under 26 years old.

More:
http://hamptonroads.com/2008/07/more-young-virginians-are-registering-will-they-vote

[tbyg52]

42. In Youth Organizing, the Old Becomes New Again

Update: This post has been updated in response to the comment by Jesse Kocher to more accurately represent the relationships and roles of Driving Votes, Swing Semester, and Swing the State. Thanks to Jesse for the clarifications.

In 2004, Democratic politics witnessed a boom in youth organizing. Young people created dozens of new institutions that pioneered non-traditional methods for engaging their peers on and offline. Drinking clubs that maintained political interest and moved people slowly into political activism, road trips to swing states, peer to peer voter registration and candidate fundraising at small live music events, the list goes on and on.

These were not always the best and most efficient organizations on the block, but they identified and filled a vacuum in progressive youth politics that was not filled by traditional organizations like the PIRGs and the College Democrats. They pioneered new tactics, changed the way that many political activists thought about organizing, and they engaged many young voters that would not otherwise become involved in politics, helping to drive 4.3 million new young voters to the polls in 2004.

As often happens in progressive politics, the amount of money available to these organizations declined drastically after the election. Some organizations struggled and managed to survive. Others limped along until they could no longer be sustained. People moved on to other jobs. Sometimes in politics, sometimes not.

More:
http://www.thenation.com/blogs/passingthrough/337741

[tbyg52]

47. Student Web Site Focuses on Election Issues

Put a few politically motivated Harvard undergrads in a room together and what will they come up with?

In the case of rising Harvard junior Will Ruben, and some friends, the product was a comprehensive election issue Web site, maintained entirely by students, called VoteGopher.com (Well, actually it’s VoteGopher 2.0)

The “ultimate election study guide,” as the VoteGopher team calls their site, first went online last fall in time for the presidential primaries, and now it has been revised and updated for the general election.

The site is aimed at younger voters, whose interest in this election has been greater than any other contest in years, and features 25 issue pages comparing the candidates’ positions side-by-side with text and video. It covers everything from terrorism and homeland security to abortion and stem cell research. The site is non-partisan, and the content is original and written by the students.

More:
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/21/student-web-site-focuses-on-election-issues/

[tbyg52]

6. Campaign Finance nt

[tbyg52]

45. Opinion: Election 2008 finally lays bare campaign finance mess

Sen. Barack Obama received a lot of flack for withdrawing from public financing for the general election, and rightfully so.

His change of heart on campaign financing highlighted why we hate politicians who always find ways around the rules to benefit themselves.
However, these things don't happen in a vacuum.

The recent reports filed with the Federal Election Commission from Sen. John McCain and his various “Victory Committees” point out why Obama did what he did.
Federal law says you can only give $2,300 to any presidential candidate for the general election. But McCain's campaign has found a loophole that allows them to take donations up to $70,000, by splitting them up among his Victory committees and the Republican National Committee.

So while Obama was collecting hundreds of thousands of small donations averaging only $68 apiece, the McCain camp was picking up huge checks from the usual suspects hoping to get another president in the White House who will do their bidding.

More:
http://www.nevadaappeal.com/article/20080720/OPINION/838201692/1061/HEALTH&parentprofile=-1

[tbyg52]

46. CA: State officials let off the hook for some campaign law violations

Since a shift in enforcement policy last year, more than a dozen elected state officials, including leaders of the Legislature and Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown, have been quietly let off the hook for some violations of campaign finance laws, receiving warning letters instead of publicly announced fines.

After he took the reins of the Fair Political Practices Commission last year, former legislator Ross Johnson said he was shifting the agency's focus to have prosecutors settle with warnings cases that they deemed minor and inadvertent. The shift enables the agency to concentrate on more serious violators, Johnson said.

That makes sense to some government experts, including John J. Pitney Jr., a professor of politics at Claremont McKenna College.

"If you spend all your time going after minnows," Pitney said, "you won't be able to go after any whales."

More:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/politics/cal/la-me-ethics21-2008jul21,0,7350480.story

[tbyg52]

49. Clinton's Debt Reveals Flaws in Campaign Finance Laws

The latest FEC filings reveal that Hillary Clinton's campaign owed more than $25 million in debt as of June 30. The problem is not quite as bad as that initial price tag would suggest, as about $13 million of the $25 million in debt is owed to Clinton herself. Under federal finance law, Clinton will not be able to recoup more than $250,000 of that money once the convention occurs and her campaign is officially terminated.

Nevertheless, the other half of the debt -- about $12 million -- takes the form of accounts payable owed to individual vendors. A substantial amount of that ($5.3 million) is owed to Mark Penn's consulting firm, and another million-plus to other pollsters and consultants. But there are also more mundane sorts of expenses. Approximately $2.0 million is owed to event-staging companies such as caterers, equipment rental firms and lighting companies. Another $1.2 million is owed to printers, and $0.5 million to phone banking companies. Almost all of the companies in these categories are small businesses. The Clinton campaign also has about half a million dollars in unpaid phone bills owed to AT&T and Verizon, and $230,000 in uncompensated travel expenses to campaign staff.


More:
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/07/clintons-debt-reveals-flaws-in-campaign.html

[tbyg52]

50. McCain’s newly filed campaign finance reports released

The Republic Presidential hopeful Senator John McCain filed his latest campaigning finance report. Wall Street and energy interests have contributed towards McCain’s funds though it lags behind the funds raised by his rival Senator Obama.

(A little) more:
http://news.dcealumni.com/3348/mccain%E2%80%99s-newly-filed-campaign-finance-reports-released/

[tbyg52]

51. MO: Campaign finance tactics, new law shun voters’ view

Missouri Sen. Chris Koster is certainly not alone in working the system that allows politicians to get around state limits on individual donations to political campaigns.

The Democratic candidate for attorney general appears to be one of the more ingenious, however, in funneling money through political committees, which aren’t subject to state limits, into his war chest.

But no candidates will have to worry about limits after the Aug. 5 primary election.

Gov. Matt Blunt just signed a bill that removes Missouri’s individual donation limits of $1,350 for statewide offices, $675 for state Senate races and $325 for House races. It goes into effect Aug. 28.

The new law means unfettered fund-raising for the November general election. It’s going to be a wild ride for voters with nothing to stop wealthy contributors from pumping thousands of dollars into the campaigns of favored candidates.

More:
http://www.kansascity.com/340/story/704922.html

[tbyg52]

52. 'Toon

(Not that I think this tells the whole story, but it's relevant to the topic.)

http://politicalhumor.about.com/od/barackobama/ig/Barack-Obama-Cartoons/Obama-Change.-3Je.-3Je.htm

[tbyg52]

53. WV: CALA: Backers of campaign finance bill hypocrites

It looks like the contentious election season of 2004 has not been forgotten four years later -- and its legacy is still causing controversy.

The group West Virginia Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse is furious with the recent passage and subsequent gubernatorial signing of a campaign finance disclosure law that would require groups that spend more than $5,000 on advertisements to reveal their financial backers.

Millions of dollars were spent on a hotly contested Supreme Court race in 2004, and proponents of the law says the recently passed version clarifies a 2005 election reform law passed in response.

"Those pushing this new law, where were they four years ago?" said CALA executive director Steve Cohen, who worked as Justice Brent Benjamin's campaign manager in 2004.

More:
http://www.wvrecord.com/news/213785-cala-backers-of-campaign-finance-bill-hypocrites

[tbyg52]

54. That's all, folks!

Three rec's for the news down, two (at least ;) ) to go....!

[EFerrari]

55. Thank you!

:hi:

[tbyg52]

56. Thanks for the thanks!

Gee, only six rec's? I wonder if it was something I said.... ;)