“The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.” Joseph Stalin
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With the election appearing to be breaking strongly in Obama’s direction, the newest worry among many democrats is voter fraud. Or in the case so far for this election season, voter purges.
For instance there is this story from Thursday’s Missoulian, which reports on attempted voter purges in Montana:
U.S. District Judge Donald Molloy issued a scathing order Wednesday lambasting the Montana Republican Party for challenging the registrations of thousands of Montana voters, but stopped short of an actual ruling in the case
[SNIP]
Molloy did not rule on the Democrats’ other arguments that the GOP effort violated federal election law, but scheduled a hearing on that matter next week.
However, the judge left little doubt about his thoughts on the voter challenges.
“The timing of these challenges is so transparent that it defies common sense to believe the purpose is anything but political chicanery,” Molloy wrote.
Elsewhere, the judge wrote that Jake Eaton, executive director of the Montana Republican Party focused his ostensible worry over voter fraud not on all Montanans, but only on those who live in predominantly Democratic-leaning locations, such as Missoula and Lewis and Clark counties, where the vast majority of the 6,000 challenged voters reside.
And NPR reports voter intimidation efforts in Philadelphia:
Fliers warning that people with outstanding warrants or unpaid parking tickets could be arrested if they show up at the polls on election day appeared recently in predominantly African-American neighborhoods of Philadelphia.
And then inside Higher Ed reports that students in Virginia are being erroneously warned that they cannot vote at their college location without risking losing scholarships, or making it impossible for their parents to claim them as dependents on income taxes (all of which is nonsense as the US Supreme Court has decided otherwise):
Last week, Virginia’s Montgomery County, home to Virginia Tech, issued a press release regarding proper protocol for college students registering to vote. In interviews with Inside Higher Ed Tuesday, it was described by turns as “unsubstantiated,” “chilling,” and (more generously) as not “incredibly encouraging or friendly.”
Meanwhile, as of yesterday, the McCain campaign has begun to push hard to try to tie Obama to voter fraud through the grass roots group, ACORN, reports the Boston Globe this morning.
Yesterday, RNC chief counsel Sean Cairncross called ACORN “a quasi-criminal organization” engaged in “a systematic effort to undermine the integrity of the election process nationwide.”
Marc Ambinder has this to say in the Atlantic about the ACORN issue.
Plus on Wednesday, the New York Times ran an article reporting that although many new voters have been registered this election season, in six important swing states, nearly twice as many voters have been purged from the rolls, as have been signed up. Many of those purges are, in fact, the new voters. And it appears, according to the NY Times, that tens of thousands of those purges—maybe more—may be completely Illegal.
The Times was quick to say that the purges do not “appear to be the result of election officials intentionally breaking rules, but are apparently the result of mistakes in the handling of the registrations and voter files as the states tried to comply with a 2002 federal law.”
However they also note that, because the democrats have been by far the most successful at registering new voters, the purges are likely to affect the democrats disproportionately.
The clips below suggest what kind of numbers we’re talking about:
In Michigan, some 33,000 voters were removed from the rolls in August, a figure that is far higher than the number of deaths in the state during the same period — about 7,100 — or the number of people who moved out of the state — about 4,400, according to data from the Postal Service.
In Colorado, some 37,000 people were removed from the rolls in the three weeks after July 21. During that time, about 5,100 people moved out of the state and about 2,400 died, according to postal data and death records.
In Louisiana, at least 18,000 people were dropped from the rolls in the five weeks after July 23. Over the same period, at least 1,600 people moved out of state and at least 3,300 died.
The secretaries of state in Michigan and Colorado did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for the Louisiana secretary of state said that about half of the numbers of the voters removed from the rolls were people who moved within the state or who died. The remaining 11,000 or so people seem to have been removed by local officials for other reasons that were not clear, the spokesman said.
For the record, the secretaries of state in Michigan, Colorado and Louisiana are all Republican.
Michigan’s Secretary of State, Terri Lynn Land, is listed on her official website as a longtime republican activist.
Colorado’s Secretary of State Mike Coffman is running for Congress, and the November 7 election will determine his fate.
Louisiana’s Jay Dardanne is also a Republican.
This does not mean those Secretaries of State are engaged in cheating. The Secretary of State in Nevada, another state that is challenging new voter registration, is a democrat.
Yet, with an election this hard fought and emotional, the specter of tens of thousands or possibly hundreds of thousands of people who have registered in good faith, yet are not able to vote—-is extremely troubling.
It is troubling, for example, that tens of thousands of voter challenges, similar to the ones shot down in Montana, are being fought in Ohio over minor clerical non-matches between the voter’s registration and the state’s database. (A middle name, or the lack of one, a typo, a recent move…and so on.)
The Ohio secretary of state, Jennifer Brunner, a Democrat, said in court papers that she believes the Republicans are seeking grounds to challenge voters and get them removed from the rolls.
Considering that in the past year the state received nearly 290,000 nonmatches, such a plan could have significant impact at the polls.
Amazing. Republicans are trying to clean up out-dated voter lists and Democrats are engaged in rempant and illegal voter registrations, finally being challenged in swing states. So, where does Celeste place the most blame? Figures.
When Democrats make it possible for people to vote who are dead or ineligible, they make all legal votes count less.
Well, when the Republicans try to correct a major flaw in elections with voter identification, what do Democrats say?
How can you argue with Democrats who are that irrational, as almost all of them are?
Terry Gross had a show on this topic on Wednesday – it included an interview with one of those federal attorneys who was fired (New Mexico) – it’s all pretty disturbing.
RG, Actually one of the NPR links above is to one of those segments of Fresh Air. The David Eglesias segment, the one you’re talking about, was really creepy. I didn’t link to it, but you’re right, it’s very much worth hearing and very disturbing.
Here’s the link:
http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=13&prgDate=10-08-2008&view=storyview
Amazing? Hardly, considering the proof is there that the 2000 election was rigged. Thanks for the great round-up on a huge threat to the democratic process — Starbucks liberals can natter on about how the election is “already over” & that our guy won, but it’s time to rapel down those ivory walls & take a look at the reality of just how far the collective Republican beast will go to keep its soliders in power.
The 2000 election was rigged, huh? Have you been hanging around Cynthia McKinney or are you one of the nuts who believes RFK, Jr.?
The Democrats were too stupid to catch the error on the ballot proof sent to them.
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama’s last name is spelled “Osama” on hundreds of absentee ballots mailed out this week to voters in Rensselaer County. ”No question this is an honest mistake innocently done,” said Edward McDonough, the Democratic commissioner. ”We catch almost everything.”
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CLEVELAND – A man at the center of a voter-registration scandal told The Post yesterday he was given cash and cigarettes by aggressive ACORN activists in exchange for registering an astonishing 72 times, in apparent violation of Ohio laws.
“Sometimes, they come up and bribe me with a cigarette, or they’ll give me a dollar to sign up,” said Freddie Johnson, 19, who filled out 72 separate voter-registration cards over an 18-month period at the behest of the left-leaning Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.
I’ve seen the orange lights too Woody,
flying from one end of the horizon
impossibly fast.
but I ain’t never seen any little aliens.
yet.
What’s your point (Woody), Mr. American?
Palin & her Mr. were against the government, but now they’re all googly-eyed and awe struck at the overwhelming wonderfulness of John McCain, a shit-heel who epitomizes the corruption & deceitfulness of Washington?
Her transformation from secessionist revolutionary to lapbitch of the entrenched system is a truly wonderful thing, don’t you think Mr. American?
Gee, you’d think “a real American,” given the fascist leanings of this current administration, would be denouncing the Republican Party from the highest mountain tops, instead of endlessly reiterating how wonderful their latest effort at embalming the living dead is going to be as Prez.
By the way, Mr. American, what is a “real American?”
The phrase seems utterly meaningless to me, but maybe you can enlighten me.
One more thing Mr. American, over the last 40 years, Republicans have CEO-d the American corporation for 28 of them. If any party must lay claim to the deranged dysfunctional beastie America has become, I would say the Republicans have earned that honor.
How any “real American” could call themselves a Republican without expecting to be guffawed out of the room is quite beyond me.
Any “real American” that thinks the Republicans will change anything for the better is delusional to the point of needing serious medication and should probably be barred from voting due to such an enfeebled mental state.
Unintentional honesty from McCain?
“Across this country this is the agenda I have set before my fellow prisoners and the same standards of clarity and candor must now be applied to my opponent.”
Calling his supporters, “my fellow prisoners,” is quite an odd gaff for a political candidate.
Even for an ex-POW like McCain.
Maybe the facade of “The Power of USA Pride” is starting to crumble and old John is slipping into Ezra Pound-land.
LAKEVILLE, Minn. – The anger is getting raw at Republican rallies and John McCain is acting to tamp it down. McCain was booed by his own supporters Friday when, in an abrupt switch from raising questions about Barack Obama’s character, he described the Democrat as a “decent person and a person that you do not have to be scared of as president of the United States.”
A sense of grievance spilling into rage has gripped some GOP events this week as McCain supporters see his presidential campaign lag against Obama. Some in the audience are making it personal, against the Democrat. Shouts of “traitor,” “terrorist,” “treason,” “liar,” and even “off with his head” have rung from the crowd at McCain and Sarah Palin rallies, and gone unchallenged by them.
McCain changed his tone Friday when supporters at a town hall pressed him to be rougher on Obama. A voter said, “The people here in Minnesota want to see a real fight.” Another said Obama would lead the U.S. into socialism. Another said he did not want his unborn child raised in a country led by Obama.
“If you want a fight, we will fight,” McCain said. “But we will be respectful. I admire Sen. Obama and his accomplishments.” When people booed, he cut them off.
My son’s school is predominately Republican. In the spring, car radios harmonize in Rush Limbaughese. Recently, my son has been relaying a bit of the political “playground mythology” that he’s been hearing there.
“Obama once chased a baby till it died.’
“If Obama is elected he’ll kill all the babies.”
“If Obama is elected he’ll open the borders to terrorists.”
“John McCain really loves America.”
“I just love Sarah Palin.”
Now, I know this is just echoes of parental babble, filtered through 11 year old minds, but still, given the tone of the above quote, I have to wonder how far off the kids are in echoing mom and dad.
Probably not by much.
Americans are suckers. But it’s a process. kind of like rotting, while the predatory vultures compete for the rotting meat…
kind of.
People are fairly gullible and under the conditions that Americans have been subject to…
the ridiculous facade of consumerism and media pablam, the soul-crushing leadership of the Bushes…the criminal gang that has hijacked this country.
The grim future ahead.
The pendulum is swinging back on us, in the pit. And we are tied down, this is where we live. Our families are here, our friend’s…
But there will be no rescue from the blade or the walls that close in on us.
We are in the Pit.
The pendulum carries the sharp blade of Judgement…karma…design.