Why It Matters (Republican strategy to claim that "voting by minority groups is rife with fraud")

[ProSense]

Why It Matters

One more point to make on these pre-election seminars put on by the Republican National Lawyers Association: The RNLA has been putting on these kinds of seminars for a while.

They held a national election law conference in St, Louis back in the summer of 2008, for example, that included John Ashcroft and Trevor Potter, the former FEC chairman who was then general counsel for John McCain's presidential campaign.

Back in 2006, Karl Rove addressed the RNLA and thanked it for its efforts to protect the "integrity of the ballot." Rove, who has long been at the center of whipping up hysteria over "voting fraud" among minority voters, told the group: "We have in some parts of the country, I'm afraid to say, beginning to look like we have elections like the ones run in countries where the guys in charge are colonels in mirrored sunglasses, it's a real problem."

As we now know, Rove was using his White House perch at the time to push for federal prosecutions of alleged "voter fraud" cases. When the U.S. attorney in New Mexico, David Iglesias, refused to go along, he was removed from office by President Bush, at Rove's behest.

You can't understand what's happening in this election cycle without understanding that we're a decade or more into a long-term Republican strategy to plant the seed that voting by minority groups is rife with fraud. At one point that effort led to the sacking of U.S. attorneys in the darkest episode for the U.S. Justice Department since Watergate. But that hasn't stopped it.

Karl Rove squeals: I Am No Threat to Democracy



Edited to clarify title.

[SpiralHawk]

1. Guys in Mirrored Glasses = Republicons

The PROJECTION strategery is Standard Opperating Procedure for Republicons against America.

[kestrel91316]

2. Them damn minorities ain't sposed to vote. It's fraud when they do.

[nxylas]

4. It's downright unconstitutional

The amendments that allow them to vote were never properly ratified, you know, just like every other constitutional amendment that conservatives disapprove of (which is basically all of them except the 2nd and 10th).

[niceypoo]

3. Rove enjoys impunity

Why is this sociopath allowed to hijack our national elections repeatedly?

[OHdem10]

5. This is getting old, Republicans. No matter how you slice dice

or cut there is a truth. You Republicans know that
truth. There are more Dems than Republicans. Granted
your party is much better at keeping your members interested
and getting to the polls. I am sorry, but stop the
whining. You cast minorities to side and use divisive
tactics to try to get white voters. So don't be
throwing out this same old same old excuse. The truth
is there are more Democrats than Republicans Registered
at the Polls. Trying to cast a pale on every election
by saying Minorities cheat in some way is driving us weary.
So weary More Minorities show up. Just because more
minorities show up to be counted, does not mean they are
doing anything wrong. This excuse is tiring.