Wow, maybe MoveOn is finally starting to "get it."

[garybeck]

We've seen MoveOn ignore the voting machine problem completely when we were begging them to email their "millions of members" about it. We've seen them make half-ass attempts at trying to raise awareness without appearing to be conspiracy theorists.

Today they launched a new petition drive. The text of the petition consists of one sentence:

We must act quickly to secure our elections with paper ballots and audits before November."

Not bad. Ditch the DREs and put audits on every opscan. When that happens, I'll feel like I can at least breathe again.

Here's the link. Let's all sign it.

http://pol.moveon.org/paper2008/

and a K&R wouldn't hurt :)

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

1. fifth r and first k n/t

[demnan]

2. Unfortunately it might be too little too late

n/t

[tridim]

5. It's been "too late" every election cycle since 2000..

I'll make anyone a bet that we'll see similar press releases 2 years and 4 years from now.

The only difference now is that Diebold seems to be collapsing. Maybe that'll change things, but I'm not holding my breath.

[papau]

3. move on has always been for "paper trails and audits" - but the left didn't find HR811 good enough

for 08.

So 08 will have nothing to stop vote fraud. The idea of a bill passing now that the GOP con job killed HR811 is wishful thinking.

[garybeck]

4. uh

I remember after the 04 election, we had several of "us" here in this forum and election rights groups trying to convince them to send an email to all their members about the voting machines and they wouldn't do it. We even had one person who had an "in" there and was in direct contact with Eli or Noah, I forget which.... And at one point they said they would do it but at the last minute they changed their mind. Since then there have been some emails referring to the voting machines but nothing pointed and direct like this. I know they are in favor, but this is the first time to my knowledge they have written to their entire list with a petition for paper ballots AND audits.

as you said, they have always been in favor of paper trails and audits. this is different. there's a big difference between paper trails and paper ballots.

[EFerrari]

7. I had a limited connection to one of their advisors in 2004.

Joan and Wes didn't want to hear about it.

Better late than never, I guess.

[KaryninMiami]

20. Boy do I remember that.. Michael Moore wasn't wanting to do much either as I recall.

We screamed, we yelled, we called, we wrote - we demanded and begged and pleaded for anyone and everyone to pay attention (as you well know). Andy is smiling about the NY Times story however- that's for sure and about MoveOn waking up, wherever he is (all though he's also probably saying- what the hell took them so long?) as are we.

[EFerrari]

22. My contact was a professor at Cal. He helped out when we fronted

MoveOn's book here on the West Coast. He's a much more patient person than I am and even he finally left them and started working with another org that does reg drives.

No one wanted to raise the forbidden idea that the election was dirty. THEY STILL DON'T. Even though the machines are being rejected, even though vote caging schemes are being outed, even though voter purges are being fingered, how many of the talking heads have even RAISED the question?

I haven't heard ONE of them do that. :shrug:

[papau]

8. As the real "change" is audits there is little dif between audits & paper anything - I grew

up with paper ballots - and GOP election theft using paper ballots.

HR811 was killed for no good reason - and now we do not have nationwide audits in 08

In 04 Move on did not have this (paper trail/audit) as a priority - post 04 they have.

But this is first "paper ballots plus audit" position - so DU should be happy -

[liam_laddie]

6. K&R, obviously

MoveOn seems to have had an epiphany. About time! Now if only Common Cause would be as definite.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

9. Move On should put some of their ad budget...

...into promoting a "paper ballot counted by hand only" initiative. The choice between this and the machines presented to the public similar to the way DUer Nicknameless did in this thread would be a no brainer:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=456594

As Mike Myers rightly stated many times in one of his SNL skits (the Scotsman): "If it's not Scottish, it's CRAP!!!"

[hwmnbn]

10. another K&R

[KaryninMiami]

11. Nothing like a NY Times cover story to knock them into reality - finally. Took them long enough!

We tried- we wrote, we called, we begged MoveOn to listen to us and to pay attention to the electronic voting machine fraud and as I recall, I think they might have appeased us with one mass eblast at one point to "express concern". Big deal. They have the biggest e-blast list on the planet (or did at that time) and did nothing to support our efforts to get the word out. So, yes- it's nice to see them finally seemingly on board. Too bad it took so long- we really needed them at the beginning stages but at least they appear to be "Getting It" now.

Too bad the rest of the corporate mainstream media (except for one or two CNN pieces and an occasional nod from MSNBC) hasn't done any investigative reporting on their own. Has anyone seen anything on t.v. following the NY Times cover story? I haven't seen anything yet and I've been watching and hoping someone would run with the story. We can only hope that enough people read the article who will take some sort of action in their local communities.

It's so ironic. Here we are all immersed in primary news yet no one is mentioning that it won't matter who wins the primaries or the nomination if our votes don't count or can't be counted or if we go through a repeat performance of the past 3 elections. Some states are indeed, switching to paper or paper ballot back-ups or opti-scan machines but not all and I'm not sure it's going to be enough. We really do have an "elephant in the room" and until the country wakes up about election fraud (and massive disenfranchisement) or there's a gigantic landslide that tops the one in 2006 (which gave us back the Congress but only by a small margine because of the rigging), that elephant will probably stay right where he is.

My feeling is if they rigged the machines before, they will do it again where they can and when they can and as Greg Palast pointed out, they started rigging 2008 years ago. The GOP is not going to simply let go of power easily in November so if people don't start to wake up pretty quickly and DEMAND verifiable elections, we could be inaugurating Huckabee as our next President. Or Romney or McCain or Guliani (or whomever the Repugs feel like putting in to replace King George).

[RuleOfNah]

16. Record 2008 Primary turnout vs fear that truth about voting machine fraud would keep voters home.

Record 2008 Primary turnout vs fear that truth about voting machine fraud would keep voters home.

I say turnout wins.

It is almost as if the voters showed up in droves to say

"CAN YOU COUNT OUR VOTES NOW?"

Due to neglect, the accuracy of the count remains in question. However, the physical presence of so many eager voters should make it clear that pulling the lever had better be enough to fix things this time around. Like the climate convention attendee quoted, "Lead or get out of the way.".

[PATRICK]

12. Done

Way too late and it WAS necessary for ALL advocacy democracy groups to actively UNITE on state crime #1. Years late and not enough yet.

[femrap]

13. Signed. K&R

What a relief here in Ohio...our new Dem SoS, Jennifer Brunner, is returning us to paper ballots. You have no idea how many Ohioans I talked to who said this would NEVER happen. But it has!

[Laelth]

14. k&r

signed and delivered.

:dem:

-Laelth

[liberalla]

15. done

:kick:

[stillcool]

17. done...

thanks...

[tavalon]

18. I did the petition, but damn, aren't they a day late and a dollar short!

[annabanana]

19. I thought I would never see the day!. . . n/t

[tom_paine]

21. K&R for it slowly dawning on people