Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News, Monday 03/31/08

[tbyg52]

Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News, Monday 03/31/08

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[tbyg52]

1. States nt

[tbyg52]

6. TX: Texas Prosecutes Little Old Ladies for Voter Fraud

Willie Ray was a 69-year-old African-American City Council member from Texarkana who wanted her granddaughter, Jamillah Johnson, to learn about civil rights and voting during the 2004 presidential election. The pair helped homebound seniors citizens get absentee ballots, and once they were filled out, put them in the mail.

Fort Worth's Gloria Meeks, 69, was a church-going, community activist who proudly ran a phone bank and helped homebound elderly people like Parthenia McDonald, 79, to vote by mail. McDonald, whose mailbox was two blocks away from her home (she recently died), called Meeks "an angel" for helping her, a friend of both women said.

And until he recently moved out of state, Walter Hinojosa, a retired school teacher and labor organizer from Austin, was another Democratic Party volunteer who helped elderly and disabled people vote by getting them absentee ballots and mailing them.

Today, Ray and Johnson have criminal records for breaking Texas election law and faced travel restrictions during a six-month probation. Gloria Meeks is in a nursing home after having a stroke, prompted in part, her friends say, by state police who investigated her -- including spying on Meeks while she bathed -- and then questioned her about helping McDonald and others to vote. Hinojosa, meanwhile, has left Texas.

More:
http://www.alternet.org/democracy/80589/

[tbyg52]

9. OH: Dispatch smear campaign against Brunner is about delivering Ohio to the GOP

The Columbus Dispatch is in the middle of its most blatant editorial propaganda campaign since the questioning of the late Columbus School Board member Bill Moss' sanity in a front page article.

Their new target is Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner. The capitol city's daily monopoly and political bludgeon for the multimillionaire Wolfe family's real agenda is ensuring that the Republican Party control Ohio's Apportionment Board after the 2010 census. The party that controls apportionment gerrymanders the state.

The Wolfe family has not allowed a Democrat to be endorsed for President since the re-election of Woodrow Wilson in 1916. In that campaign, the Wolfe's pro-German sentiments won out over their time-honored role as Republican operatives.

The Republican Party believes that Brunner is the most politically vulnerable of the five-member Apportionment Board. The Secretary of State serves along with the Governor, the State Auditor and two members of the state legislature – one from each party by law. Do the math. Brunner's a Dem, so is Governor Strickland. Mary Taylor, the Auditor, is a Republican. It's now 3-2 for the Dems.

More:
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0803/S00470.htm

[tbyg52]

11. OH: Brunner Breaks" Traditional Partisan Arrangement" In BOE Director Votes:

Ohio GOP (And Ohio Media) Remain Silent

snip

. . . she endorsed the appointments of two Republicans as directors despite certain traditional arrangements.

The secretary acknowledged that traditionally, the director position in the split party arrangement goes to the person of the same party as the secretary of state but determined "it should not be the sole, determining factor in compelling an exchange of the roles...," her office reported.

Ms. Brunner said in letters to the panels that with the 2008 presidential elections looming, the boards need "to move forward in a cooperative and bipartisan manner to insure the effective and efficient administration of elections in 2008 and beyond."

They've been calling her a partisan for 4 months! They even used a trumped up lawsuit in their campaign to attack her as partisan!

She does this and no one reports it?

More:
http://www.progressohio.org/page/community/post/daveharding/C329

[tbyg52]

12. PA: State of Denial, Part 1

snip

With fifty-one of its most populous counties still voting on completely paperless Direct Record Electronic machines, Pennsylvania remains one of the last twelve states to have passed no law requiring every vote to be backed up with a voter-verified paper record or ballot.

Time and time again Pennsylvania has had to replace failed electronic voting machines, bailing out counties and vendors at taxpayer expense. Pennsylvania has been plagued with a rash of problems caused by failures of paperless, unverifiable voting machines. These problems ranged from extremely high levels of undervotes (indicating a large number of voters are not having their votes counted), to faulty programming and ballot preparation, to outright loss of votes due to machines being set up improperly on Election Day.

More:
http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2799&Itemid=113

[tbyg52]

13. MI: Judge makes right decision concerning party voting lists

snip

The judge struck down a portion of the legislation authorizing the January primary that made it a misdemeanor for anyone other than the two major parties to have access or use the preference lists. The suit was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of the Green Party of Michigan, the Libertarian Party of Michigan, the Reform Party of Michigan, the Metro Times and Winning Strategies, a political consulting firm.

"The state is not required to provide the party preference information to any party," Edmunds wrote. "When it chooses to do so, however, it may not provide the information only to the two major political parties."

We agree the state had no business being an agent for collecting valuable political information for two private organizations, the Democratic and Republican parties.

This is the latest in a series of embarrassing consequences of the state's ill-considered attempt to buck the national parties by moving Michigan's primary to an earlier date. The national Democratic Party stripped the state of all of its delegates to the August convention in Denver.

More:
http://www.hometownlife.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080330/NEWS18/803300607/1035

[tbyg52]

14. FL: Felons' Voting Requests Pile Up

Republican Gov. Charlie Crist went against his party a year ago and made it easier for felons to regain their voting rights. The process has been slow, however -- stirring controversy in a state expected to be closely fought in this fall's elections.

Florida's clemency board has restored voting rights to nearly 75,000 residents. But nearly 96,000 requests are pending, according to information through March 20. Activists say there might be an additional 400,000 people who have been rejected without explanation, making it impossible for them to be reinstated.

More:
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB120692447687975721-EN6zQhkYtRXw4iHF9EneXxh3YKM_20080429.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top

[tbyg52]

15. FL: Disaster looms again on Election Day in Florida

Is another Florida election disaster in the offing? Sadly, yes. Barely seven months before the presidential election and it is déjà vu all over again. How did we get here (again) and, more important, is there anything we can do to stop the train wreck?

First, to how we got here. It was politics, plain and simple. Promising that ''when Floridians cast ballots in an election at any level -- local, state or federal -- they can leave the polling place knowing that their vote has been counted and recorded and can be verified,'' in May 2007, Gov. Charlie Crist signed into law a bill that eliminated those pesky, paperless touchscreen voting machines and replaced them with allegedly more reliable, recountable ''optical-scan equipment that provides a paper trail.'' The same bill, which had the full support of both parties, also included a provision changing Florida's presidential primary to the last Tuesday in January and another provision allowing candidates seeking federal office to retain their existing public office (namely, the governorship), at the time of qualifying for the federal office.

Sound like a horse trade? Yes -- at the expense of Florida's voters.

More:
http://www.miamiherald.com/851/story/476926.html

[tbyg52]

17. ID: Ada County Drops Punch Cards

Voters will notice a change at the polls when casting their ballot in the May primary.

Ada County has finally ditched punch card ballots in favor of a new optical scan system.

Some say it's about time.

"We were the only state still using punch card ballots," said JoMeta Spencer, an elections supervisor.

Many states dumped their punch cards after Florida's 2000 presidential election scandal raised doubts about dimpled ballots and hanging chads.

But not Ada County, which had never encountered that.

More:
http://www.fox12news.com/Global/story.asp?S=8089725&nav=menu439_2

[tbyg52]

19. OH: Crossover Voting A Problem in Ohio

snip

An investigation by the Columbus Dispatch revealed wide variances in how counties handled crossover voters during the March 4 primary election. Crossover voters are those who switch party affiliations, temporarily in many cases, to vote in another party’s primary. During this election, it appears that a large number of normally Republican voters crossed over to vote in the Democratic Party primary — but some Democrats crossed over, too.

Some counties asked no questions of those seeking to cast crossover ballots. Others, including Cuyahoga County, demanded that such voters sign forms pledging support to their “new” party.

More:
http://www.theintelligencer.net/page/content.detail/id/507737.html

[tbyg52]

21. WV: Poll workers can't tell independents they have ballot choice

snip

Carper takes issue with the state prohibiting poll workers from advising independent voters of their options when they come into the polling place. Workers will be instructed to hand an independent voter a nonpartisan ballot, unless he or she requests a partisan one.

The thought behind the restriction is that it would quell any accusation of poll workers favoring a party.

Carper believes the state should at least permit signage on the doors of polling places to inform independents about the options.

"If that's not done, you're going to have voters mighty unhappy if they find out later that they've been disenfranchised," Carper said. "I think there ought to be some attempt to do that. What's wrong with letting people know what their rights are?"

More:
http://www.dailymail.com/News/Kanawha/200803310196

[tbyg52]

24. TX: Dallas to adopt electronic campaign finance filing system

Dallas City Hall plans to implement an electronic campaign finance filing system for political candidates, shedding its status as one of the nation’s few remaining major cities still collecting such information using ink and paper.

Beginning as soon as July, Dallas politicians and political candidates would be expected to file their donation and expenditure reports using computer software, which City Hall is still developing, City Secretary Deborah Watkins said.

The ultimate benefit of such a system is that “it allows an individual to sort and search information more easily than our current system,” Ms. Watkins said.

More:
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/040108dnbmetcampaignfile.1ad8fb99.html

[tbyg52]

2. National nt

[tbyg52]

8. Whistleblower: Voting Machine Company Lied to Election Officials About Reliability of Machines

snip

According to the complaint filed in the lawsuit, Singer worked as a computer technician for Hart from 2001 to early 2004 when he says he resigned due to the company's fraudulent acts and misrepresentations.

Among the claims he makes:

• Hart didn't completely alpha test its software and didn't beta test its software at all.

• Hart created a "dummy" machine to undergo certification testing in Ohio because he says its standard system configuration would not have passed certification. Hart then didn't upgrade its standard system to match the system that passed certification.

• The Ohio certification requirements mandated that voting machines be able to produce a certain kind of report that the Hart machine couldn't produce. So Singer says Hart created a dummy report by hand and told certification officials that it came from the voting system.

More:
http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2801&Itemid=51

[tbyg52]

10. Election Officials Still Hampered by Paper Ballot Shortages

It’s a simple question with no simple answer: Why do polling places across America keep running out of ballots when it’s no secret that this contentious primary season keeps breaking voter turnout records? For one, even the best-made plans have gone awry; officials in state after state have ordered more ballots, only to see turnouts exceed their most ambitious estimates.

Some states — California, for example — extended registration deadlines, in part to give would-be voters more time to sign up for the first Democratic presidential nomination race between a black man and a woman.

But some election officials say those extensions have necessitated a form of fortune telling when it comes to deciding how many ballots to order.

Not helping is the fact that ballot printing is a highly specialized field with a limited number of companies willing to take on the heavily monitored and time-consuming burden of producing and delivering voting cards. Price per ballot can range from 20 cents to more than $1, depending on complexity. Lead times for printing can range from months to weeks to days, depending on circumstances, including the proximity of Election Day.

More:
http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/03/30/election-officials-still-hampered-by-paper-ballot-shortages/

[tbyg52]

18. Congress Examines States’ Failure to Follow National Voter Registration Act

The House Committee on Administration’s Subcommittee on Elections will hold a hearing to examine state compliance with a federal law—the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA)—that requires states to provide voter registration services to public assistance clients at 2 pm on April 1 in Room 1320 of the Longworth Building. The hearing responds to recent reports by advocates that many states are failing to comply with the NVRA and that the Justice Department is failing to enforce the law.

According to the nonpartisan voting rights organizations Project Vote and Demos, substantial evidence indicates low-income Americans in California, Missouri, Arizona, Florida, Ohio, New Mexico, and Colorado are systematically being denied the opportunity to register to vote. Their analysis shows that while most states are offering voter registration at departments of motor vehicles as required by the NVRA, many states are failing to offer citizens the opportunity to register at public assistance agencies, such as Food Stamp or Medicaid offices. Registration rates at public assistance agencies dropped 79 percent from 1996 to 2006. The result is that low-income Americans continue to be under-represented at the polls on Election Day, despite Congressional efforts to the contrary.

More:
http://www.votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2800&Itemid=26

[tbyg52]

22. ASQ Quality Report Offers Solutions to Error-Proof Voting Machines

From the "fixing the problem the wrong way" department.....

While U.S. presidential candidates are busy touting the need for policy change, there is little debate that America’s voting process itself needs serious change. But a few key quality procedures could help restore voter confidence, says the latest Quality Report from the American Society for Quality (ASQ), the world’s leading authority on quality improvement.

While the error-prone punch card machines that produced the infamous hanging-chad fiasco in Florida in 2000 have been virtually eliminated, other problems are still evident. Voting machine malfunctions in this year’s primaries in California, New Jersey and South Carolina have already caused major havoc—machines failing to start on time or locking up mid-stream and not counting votes; paper-tape backups not matching vote totals from the machines; bad planning which led to a shortage of voting machines; and operator errors due to lack of proper training. So in this atmosphere of distrust and error-ridden elections, what can be done to improve the electronic voting processes?

“It’s very important for citizens to have as much trust in their voting systems as they have in their medical care systems or air travel,” says ASQ quality expert Liz Keim, a past president of ASQ. “So why not leverage some of the same basic tools that bring reliability to critical functions like medical care and air transport to solve quality problems that continue to plague our elections?” she asks.

More:
http://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/google/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsId=20080331005169&newsLang=en

[tbyg52]

3. Foreign nt

[tbyg52]

7. Zimbabwe Police on Standby Over Fears of Election Fraud

Zimbabwe security forces were on standby in opposition strongholds yesterday amid growing speculation that President Mugabe lost the weekend election but was still poised to declare victory.

More than 24 hours after polls closed, the Zimbabwe electoral Commission had yet to release a single result from any of the 9,000 stations where votes were cast for the president, parliament, and councilors.

"The delay in announcing these results is fuelling speculation that there could be something going on," the head of the Zimbabwe election Support network, Noel Kututwa, said.

More:
http://www2.nysun.com/article/73889

[tbyg52]

16. Zimbabwe: Kenya-style meltdown on the way

IT is now obvious that all is not well with the vote-counting process in Zimbabwe. The polls have been closed for well over 24 hours and only a handful of results have been released. The suspicion is growing that behind the scenes, the election’s outcome is being rigged by President Robert Mugabe, who stands to lose it all.

The circumstantial evidence that Mugabe anticipated a defeat is there for all to see.
Why else would he have:

- Barred foreign media (with the notable exception of the SABC. Fancy that) from covering the election;

More:
http://blogs.thetimes.co.za/hartley/2008/03/31/zimbabwe-kenya-style-meltdown-on-the-way/

[tbyg52]

25. Zimbabwe: Observation Team Plays Down Chances of Fraud

The chances of fraud in the presidential, legislative and autarchic elections held simultaneously last Saturday in Zimbabwe "can be set aside".

ANGOP learnt of the information in Harare from the co-ordinator for the electoral observation mission of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) for Zimbabwe, José Marcos Barrica.

The head of the SADC mission said that he based his affirmation on what was observed during the voting process, countrywide.

"We were at 16 polling stations. And what we saw, especially due to the presence of observers and political parties' officials, at least the main parties and candidates, who guaranteed us that everything was in order, we can say that if we analysed until the voting process, there were no reasons to think about fraud," stressed the official.

More:
http://allafrica.com/stories/200803311595.html

[tbyg52]

29. UK: Postal vote fraud fears

Soaring numbers of postal voters in the West Midlands today sparked fears the May local elections could be wide open to fraud.

Officials at Walsall forecast a surge of nearly 5,000 people voting by mail compared to last year’s figure of 15,000, while Wolverhampton, Sandwell and Dudley have each already recorded increases of around 2,000.

This will take numbers to 23,000 in Dudley, 21,000 in Sandwell, and 17,000 in Wolverhampton, with the deadline for applications still a fortnight away.

Wolverhampton City Council spokesman Tim Clark said: “The entire electoral register is based on trust. We are relient on people telling us the truth.”

Critics are worried about“ghost voters” being added to the roll when the head of a household invents people living at the address on official forms for the region’s electoral register.

More:
http://www.expressandstar.com/2008/03/31/postal-vote-fraud-fears/

[tbyg52]

4. Blogs, Editorials, LTTEs, etc. nt

[tbyg52]

20. Let’s Put the Vote Out of Its Misery and Start Over

As American Democratic Party officials scramble to figure out how to re-enfranchise the millions of Florida and Michigan voters they recently disenfranchised, the world yawns and changes the channel.

Unfortunately for democracy, the vote is intangible, invisible, inaudible. If the vote were a person, we could clearly see that it has been bloodied beyond recognition and is gasping for breath on life support. Instead, corrupt systems beholden to moneyed interests supply it just enough air to prevent it from dying; barely maintaining the illusion that your voice and my voice count for something.

Most parents know that if you are going to threaten a punishment for misbehavior, you’d better be ready to follow up with that punishment when the misbehavior occurs. Why did the Democratic Party think it could threaten to disenfranchise millions of voters in Florida and Michigan because their state leaders decided to move up their primaries? Has disenfranchisement of voters become that passé?

More:
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/03/let%E2%80%99s-put-the-vote-out-of-its-misery-and-start-over/

[tbyg52]

27. Rezko Trial Highlights Need for Campaign Finance Reform

New York lost its governor to scandal; Illinois may not be far behind. The ongoing prosecution of Illinois real estate developer Antoin "Tony" Rezko, as the result of the Justice Department's Operation Board Game investigation, has been a source of much drama. But anyone who is familiar with Illinois's political contributions laws knows there's more to the scandal than meets the eye. The problem is not just what was allegedly illegal; the bigger issue is what is legal in Illinois.

All the hype aside, the Rezko scandal should bring into focus the clear failings of Illinois's campaign finance laws. As I pointed out in testimony submitted to the state legislature last year, Illinois is one of only three states that lacks any type of campaign contribution limits. This gives big donors the potential to buy an election by writing a single hefty check. Illinois also lacks pay-to-play restrictions which would curtail contributions from those seeking contracts with or permits from the state.

More:
http://www.alternet.org/rights/80588/

[tbyg52]

28. Ben Franklin's Worst Nightmare

The ground feels a little soft, but we're going to stand it.

Premise one: Having a fair election -- all votes counted, all who are eligible and want to vote allowed to vote -- is far, far more important, even in 2008, than who wins.

Premise two: Fair elections are not a given. They never have been, but things are worse now than ever before because of a perfect storm, you might say, of factors that have converged in the new millennium: officialdom's seduction by unsafe, high-tech voting systems; the seizure of power by a party of ruthless true believers who feel entitled to rule and will do anything to win; a polite, confused opposition party that won't make a stink about raw injustice; and an arrogantly complacent media embedded in the political and economic status quo.

The result: Benjamin Franklin's worst nightmare.

"Well, Doctor, what have we got -- a Republic or a Monarchy?"

"A Republic, if you can keep it."

More:
http://www.alternet.org/democracy/80827/

[tbyg52]

5. The Youth Vote nt

[tbyg52]

23. Why Are Non-college Voters Not Showing Up to Vote?

Over the last several weeks there have been numerous articles and studies that have highlighted that the youth vote (18-35) turnout is at an all time high. However, what's not being reported is that voters that do not have any college experience are not turning out to the polls. For example, on Super Tuesday 1 in 4 college educated youth turned out, while only 1 in 14 non college youth made it to the voting booth. (CIRCLE) The sad thing is that the people that most need to turn out to vote aren't doing so. Hopefully all the folks that talk S#$t on this page will get their people to turn out in November.

Comments:
http://blogs.sohh.com/hiphop4prez/2008/03/why_are_noncollege_voters_not.html

[tbyg52]

26. Student response to Presidential election

As Pennsylvania's primary approaches, College Democrats and Republicans try to determine which way Lehigh students will vote.

"The election will affect more people than may realize it," said Celinda Stanton, '11, vice president of College Democrats. "There are many pressing issues that people care about and hopefully will take to heart and head to the polls."

Stanton said Lehigh is traditionally apathetic toward presidential elections and politics in general, but now the campus is becoming more involved.

More:
http://media.www.thebrownandwhite.com/media/storage/paper1233/news/2008/04/01/News/Student.Response.To.Presidential.Election-3293180.shtml

[tbyg52]

30. That's all, folks! nt

[Kurovski]

31. Kick to the top.

Many thanks, tbyg52. :thumbsup: