NY Times Editorial - The New Hampshire Phone Scam

[L. Coyote]

Editorial - The New Hampshire Phone Scam
Published: September 17, 2007
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/17/opinion/17mon3.html?_r=3&th=&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&emc=th&adxnnlx=1190181487-s73WEoGxVT+34CCA2ekubA

On Election Day in 2002, when New Hampshire voters were going to the polls in a hotly contested Senate race, the phone lines in Democratic get-out-the-vote offices were jammed. The executive director of the New Hampshire Republican Party pleaded guilty to phone harassment charges, but there has never been an adequate investigation of reports that the White House may have been involved.

Paul Hodes, a New Hampshire congressman, is asking the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee to investigate. It should conduct the searching inquiry that the Justice Department has not.

The Bush administration has spent a lot of time talking about mythical cases of voter fraud and election improprieties, but the New Hampshire phone jamming case was the real thing. Republican operatives hired an Idaho telemarketing firm to jam the lines to prevent people who needed help in voting from getting through. The scheme was a direct attack on American democracy.

After the guilty plea from its executive director, the New Hampshire Republican Party paid to settle a civil lawsuit filed by the state’s Democrats. There is reason to believe, however, that the phone jamming ploy may have been coordinated out of the White House. ..........

[Stephanie]

1. K&R

very impt

[ClassWarrior]

2. And again...

NGU.

[ClassWarrior]

6. .

[The Backlash Cometh]

3. Is this the first time this story is getting out in the mainstream press?

That's the real story right there.

[malaise]

4. Shocking indeed

Where was the NYT all this time?

[Senator]

10. Waiting for someone to be...

...literally shocked over stolen elections?

---

[Kolesar]

13. Maybe this is news because Congressman Paul Hodes just asked for the investigation...eom

[deminks]

5. Holy smoking gun, Batman.

Democrats say there were 22 phone calls between New Hampshire Republican officials and the White House Office of Political Affairs on election night and early the next morning.

(snip)

He reports that according to one of the defense lawyers, the attorney general personally had to sign off on all actions in the case, an extraordinary rule that would slow things down considerably.

(snip)

According to Mr. Hodes, the only F.B.I. agent assigned to the case was told that she could not pursue leads to Washington.

(snip)

[MissWaverly]

18. you have to remember this is about Republican wrongdoing

aw, shucks, just shows what nice fellas they are to Republicans, of course.

[PinkyisBlue]

7. Phew--I smell a turd blossom all over this.

This phone-jamming scandal occurred in the Senate race of John Sununu (R) vs. Jeanne Shaheen (D), a very close race. Had this incident not occurred, who's to say Shaheen wouldn't have won the election?

And Shaheen has just agreed to run for Senate in 2008, again against Sununu. New Hampshire has had it with the Iraq War and the Bush misadministration, and Shaheen will likely win the election. The Repubs. know they can't win without cheating. This really needs to be thoroughly investigated.

[L. Coyote]

12. A lot of elections stink, Gore 2000, GA, AL 2002, OH, FL, NM 2004

and it is all coming out, albeit like a herd of turtles.

[L. Coyote]

8. 30 POSTS in DU Archive: TPM: NH Rep. Paul Hodes (D-NH) Pushes for ... Investigation

about 30 posts here:

TPM: NH Rep. Paul Hodes (D-NH) Pushes for Phone Jamming Investigation
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1750605

[me b zola]

9. k&r

[loudsue]

11. What DUers have known all along. K/R n/t

:kick:

[tom_paine]

14. Six years later, the Bushie culprits still walk free...

Where have I heard that before?

OF COURSE it was coordinated out of the Amerikan Imperial Palace. Not that there is a single person willing to INVESTIGATE AND FIND OUT.

More felonies performed right out in the open with neon arrows pointing at Bushies, who no one has the guts to really go after. So these supposed "felonies" are legal, right?

Well, when the "right" people do them, they are legal, don'tcha' know?

[L. Coyote]

15. Except the one's doing time and snitching on the others. More to jail, rest assured

[tom_paine]

16. Just like Abu Grahib. A few lowly "privates" are sacrificed to the mob.

But none of the chain of command which authorized and coordinated it, and that is who I am talking about.

And if We The People don't start asserting the Rule of Law on these Bushies, then we will deserve to have lost our country, which may already have occurred.

[L. Coyote]

17. It is more like, if we get rid of them, then we still have to buy it back.

They didn't just empty the treasury, they gave us a huge deficit to pay off.