The End of Democracy in Ohio?

[phantom power]

They'll fix you. They fix everything.
--Robocop

HB3's most publicized provision will require positive identification before casting a vote. But it also opens voter registration activists to partisan prosecution, exempts electronic voting machines from public scrutiny, quintuples the cost of citizen-requested statewide recounts and makes it illegal to challenge a presidential vote count or, indeed, any federal election result in Ohio. When added to the recently passed HB1, which allows campaign financing to be dominated by the wealthy and by corporations, and along with a Rovian wish list of GOP attacks on the ballot box, democracy in Ohio could be all but over.

(...)

Those electronic machines will also be exempted from recounts by random sampling, even in close, disputed elections like those of 2000 and 2004.

http://www.alternet.org/rights/29292/

[ananda]

1. Umm

Will this pass court muster?

I see a lot of suits coming out of this,
and I believe the SC will ultimately have
to decide it.

Sue

[phantom power]

2. You mean the same Supreme Court that halted the 2000 recount?

[PDJane]

3. As I read this,

I am more and more pleased with the Canadian system. The ballots may be complex, but the counting is fair and anyone can vote, and recounts are done when necessary.

[darkmaestro019]

4. the more I read/hear about the Canadian system on the whole

the more desparately jealous of youse-guys I am. Lucky lucky you. In f911 when that girl says "What does that mean, indigent?" it makes me teary.

[Peace Patriot]

6. Canada: Paper ballots, hand-counted. And they do it in one day,

although speed should not even be a consideration--only accuracy, transparency and verfiability.

Let's get this done, compatriots!

Info/activism: www.votersunite.org, www.verifiedvoting.org, UScountvotes.org.

For what happened in 2004 with the exit polls: www.TruthIsAll.net, and

And for the GAO report on the horrendous insecurity of our election system in 2004:
Access to pdf: http://www.gao.gov/docsearch/abstract.php?rptno=GAO-05-956
Text only: http://www.gao.gov/htext/d05956.html

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One important action: Insist that the Democratic Party fund INDEPENDENT exit polls in '06 and '08. Write to Howard Dean. We have no verification tools. None! And this, with Bushite corporations intalling more and more electronic voting systems, with "TRADE SECRET," PROPRIETARY progamming code, and virtually no audit/recount controls, all over the country. We MUST have independent exit polls to challenge these machines.

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Throw Diebold and ES&S election theft machines into 'Boston Harbor' NOW!

[BanzaiBonnie]

5. How close?

is this to passing into law?

[phantom power]

7. I don't know. Just the fact that anybody wrote this bill...

is proof that our country is going off the rails.

[orion9941]

8. We have democracy in Ohio?

[Peace Patriot]

9. Democracy in Ohio will never be over-not as long as it lives in the hearts

of the people.

It took Nelson Mandela thirty years in prison, before he emerged and became the first black president of South Africa.

It took black Americans two hundreds of years to achieve full citizenship, with constant struggle.

Never, never, never give up on your right to vote! NEVER!

The dam will break. You will see. This kind of corruption and tyranny always destroys itself.

Meanwhile, vote in droves. Get everybody you can registered. Go for ONE HUNDRED PERCENT REGISTRATION. Hold community meetings and get it organized. Have voting lines the length of the state. Overwhelm the election theft machines and the vote suppression with your sheer numbers. Show them! SHOW the world what they are doing! And if they won't let somebody register, have them stand in line anyway, with a sign: "Denied the right to vote!"

Get creative! Get organized! Think big! Never, never, never, never, NEVER give up on your right to vote!

[Demeter]

10. I Think It's The Beginning of the End OF The GOP In Ohio

and many a fine state near you!