http://www.aclu.org/refusetosurrender/
http://www.aclu.org/refusetosurrender/
Tuesday, November 30, 2004
Take ACLU pledge : Refuse to surrender your Freedom
Join the ACLU in Refusing to Surrender your Freedom
http://www.aclu.org/refusetosurrender/
http://www.aclu.org/refusetosurrender/
http://www.aclu.org/refusetosurrender/
http://www.aclu.org/refusetosurrender/
moveon petition to investigate the vote
http://www.moveon.org/investigatethevote/
"
Questions are swirling around whether the election was conducted honestly or not. We need to know -- was it or wasn't it?
If people were wrongly prevented from voting, or if legitimate votes were mis-counted or not counted at all, we need to know so the wrongdoers can be held accountable, and to help prevent this from happening again.
"
http://www.moveon.org/investigatethevote/
"
Questions are swirling around whether the election was conducted honestly or not. We need to know -- was it or wasn't it?
If people were wrongly prevented from voting, or if legitimate votes were mis-counted or not counted at all, we need to know so the wrongdoers can be held accountable, and to help prevent this from happening again.
"
http://www.moveon.org/investigatethevote/
Monday, November 29, 2004
Are you skeptical?
Would you like to believe that all is well in the good ole' U.S.A.? Would you like to think that we're sending our boys "over there" to spread freedom? Would you like to believe that our government is of, for and by us? Would you like to believe that the persons who are in charge of our government have nothing but the preservation of our freedom, our constitution, our lives, liberty and pursuit of happiness as their top priorities?
Well, so would I.
But I don't.
I urge you to speak out. This is not the time to stand by idly. Write a letter to your newspaper. Here are some points of contact:
St. Petersburg Times, Florida
http://www.sptimes.com/letters/
PetitionOnline.com
http://www.petitiononline.com/
New York Times
letters@nytimes.com
USA Today
editor@usatoday.com
Washington Post
letters@washpost.com
Here's some additional research I recommend:
http://www.cannonfire.blogspot.com/
Well, so would I.
But I don't.
I urge you to speak out. This is not the time to stand by idly. Write a letter to your newspaper. Here are some points of contact:
St. Petersburg Times, Florida
http://www.sptimes.com/letters/
PetitionOnline.com
http://www.petitiononline.com/
New York Times
letters@nytimes.com
USA Today
editor@usatoday.com
Washington Post
letters@washpost.com
Here's some additional research I recommend:
http://www.cannonfire.blogspot.com/
...we see the mainstream media still ignoring the largest story out there, the potential theft of a presidential election.
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4478
"
by Anthony Wade
Silence. That is all we continue to hear from our media. There was a time in America when the media would actually practice journalism. They would investigate. They would corroborate. They would scrutinize. In modern day America , this must be proving to be too daunting for our faux media. It seems to be easier to create news, based on what is fed to them. It must be far simpler to just accept what the administration says, instead of actually digging a little to find out if the facts coincide. The problem is that the American people deserve better. They deserve the truth, not parroting of created news stories. Votergate 2004 continues to swell all around us, yet the silence remains deafening. It is beyond silent, it is insulting
...
"
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4478
"
by Anthony Wade
Silence. That is all we continue to hear from our media. There was a time in America when the media would actually practice journalism. They would investigate. They would corroborate. They would scrutinize. In modern day America , this must be proving to be too daunting for our faux media. It seems to be easier to create news, based on what is fed to them. It must be far simpler to just accept what the administration says, instead of actually digging a little to find out if the facts coincide. The problem is that the American people deserve better. They deserve the truth, not parroting of created news stories. Votergate 2004 continues to swell all around us, yet the silence remains deafening. It is beyond silent, it is insulting
...
"
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4478
A Petition to Congress requesting an investigation into the Presidential Election of 2004
http://www.petitiononline.com/uselect/petition.html
"
To: United States Congress
TO: All members of the Congress of the United States of America; all Senators and Members of the House of Representatives
A Petition to immediately and without delay open a joint investigation into potential wrongdoing in the Presidential Election of 2004, specifically to investigate the potential of voting machine manipulation or purposeful malfunction, especially electronic voting machines manufactured and supplied by Diebold, Inc.; Electronic Systems & Software (ES & S); Sequoia Voting Systems, and others, and also to identify and investigate all allegations of improper conduct by election officials, workers, observers, challengers and operatives and employees of both major parties concerning the voting process including intimidation, dissemination of improper information, manipulation of registration records, improper handling of actual voting ballots and, in general, any and all potential improprieties which could have led to improper or inaccurate election results.
Such inquiries should not be limited to any particular state, precinct or district but strive to examine the voting process in any and all areas in which there is even the slightest indication of impropriety, but especially in the states of Florida, Ohio, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Nevada, New Mexico, Iowa, Arkansas, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota, Texas and New Hampshire, and not limit such investigation, and expand such investigations to cover Senatorial races as well, especially those in Kentucky, Florida and South Dakota.
We, the undersigned, request that our elected representatives act in accordance with the Constitution of the United States of America in a legal, impartial and expedient manner for an open hearing before the people of the United States and if such wrongdoing, illegal practices, manipulation of voting records or processes is of such a nature to indicate egregious or extensive tampering, alteration or misappropriation of the voting process that the violators be brought to justice and remedies, potentially including a nationwide audit, recall, recount or new election be imposed by your bodies.
We feel it is our patriotic duty to request such action from you, our elected officials, and your duty to respond in a responsible manner.
Sincerely,
The Undersigned
"
http://www.petitiononline.com/uselect/petition.html
"
To: United States Congress
TO: All members of the Congress of the United States of America; all Senators and Members of the House of Representatives
A Petition to immediately and without delay open a joint investigation into potential wrongdoing in the Presidential Election of 2004, specifically to investigate the potential of voting machine manipulation or purposeful malfunction, especially electronic voting machines manufactured and supplied by Diebold, Inc.; Electronic Systems & Software (ES & S); Sequoia Voting Systems, and others, and also to identify and investigate all allegations of improper conduct by election officials, workers, observers, challengers and operatives and employees of both major parties concerning the voting process including intimidation, dissemination of improper information, manipulation of registration records, improper handling of actual voting ballots and, in general, any and all potential improprieties which could have led to improper or inaccurate election results.
Such inquiries should not be limited to any particular state, precinct or district but strive to examine the voting process in any and all areas in which there is even the slightest indication of impropriety, but especially in the states of Florida, Ohio, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, West Virginia, Nevada, New Mexico, Iowa, Arkansas, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota, Texas and New Hampshire, and not limit such investigation, and expand such investigations to cover Senatorial races as well, especially those in Kentucky, Florida and South Dakota.
We, the undersigned, request that our elected representatives act in accordance with the Constitution of the United States of America in a legal, impartial and expedient manner for an open hearing before the people of the United States and if such wrongdoing, illegal practices, manipulation of voting records or processes is of such a nature to indicate egregious or extensive tampering, alteration or misappropriation of the voting process that the violators be brought to justice and remedies, potentially including a nationwide audit, recall, recount or new election be imposed by your bodies.
We feel it is our patriotic duty to request such action from you, our elected officials, and your duty to respond in a responsible manner.
Sincerely,
The Undersigned
"
http://www.petitiononline.com/uselect/petition.html
We demand clean elections.
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4306
"
Why signing the Petition to Congress requesting an investigation into the Presidential Election of 2004 is vitally important
Rick Gagliano | November 13, 2004
While the media overlooks the obvious - that six Congressmen have called for a GAO investigation into electronic voting, that Ralph Nader has initiated a recount in New Hampshire, that the Green and Libertarian candidates are pushing forward with plans for an Ohio recount, that Bev Harris at BlackBoxVoting.org has filed a massive Freedom of Information Act request - the petition, started less than a week ago and already having garnered the support of 35,000 signers, may be America’s best hope discovering just exactly what went wrong on November 2nd.
The recounts are well-intentioned, but they may fail. The GAO investigation may take months even to get started and there’s no guarantee that it will result in full blown Congressional hearings. The FOIA requests will provide information - actual data on voting, but has no prosecutorial power.
For those reasons and others, that is why I wrote the petition in the first place and directed it to the full Congress. The petition (included below) calls for a complete and sweeping investigation and doesn’t stop at just electronic voting, but asks Congress to examine what went on before the election as well - to seek information relating to registration problems, disinformation, long lines at the polls, intimidation, and other tactics that were implicitly designed to keep people from voting.
The petition also names many states individually, in addition to Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania, where many suspect tampering, but also in other states where odd discrepancies between exit polls and actual votes occurred and where voting patterns suddenly changed direction as the nation watched.
I was especially attuned to potential fraud in this election. I had been keeping up on electronic voting during the six months before the election and suspected that there would be tampering and that it may be difficult to detect. On election night itself, I paid attention to reports from Cleveland and elsewhere of long lines at the polls, computer glitches and other assorted oddities. But mostly I was paying attention to the projections by the networks. Early on, the race between Bush and Kerry was said to be "too close to call" in states that we’re even the so-called "battlegrounds" - Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and later, Missouri, Arkansas, Nevada and New Mexico. I was also shocked to watch the Kentucky Congressional race turn around, from a slim, but comfortable lead for challenger Democratic Daniel Mongiardo to an eventual victory for incumbent Jim Bunning. From 7:30 pm to the final tally there was a 5% swing in the vote. Bunning won by 2%.
When I finally went to bed on election night, the presidential race was still in doubt, but my suspicions over the propriety of the entire process were growing. On Wednesday, November 3, Kerry conceded and the nation breathed a collective sigh of either relief or exasperation.
In the aftermath of the election, stories began to pop up on the internet. Some of the made valid claims, others were hysterical and without merit. Still others began to examine how the election was won or lost, depending on perspective. By Sunday night, I had seen enough articles on the internet to convince me that there was at least enough REASONABLE DOUBT into the fairness of the election. Even though the mainstream press was in denial and had not even begun to report on most of the allegations being circulated, and had dismissed the glaring discrepancies between the exit polls and the final count with a glib consensus that "the polls were wrong," without any evidence on which to make that claim.
I worded the petition in such a way as to call attention to all aspects of the voting process and made it clear that the entire Congress needed to look into these allegations and get to the truth.
This petition also instructs Congress to bring any violators to justice and to provide appropriate remedies, which could include a nationwide audit, recount, recall or new election. The Congress is empowered with sweeping authority to investigate and bring criminal charges. They have at their disposal the Depatment of Justice, the FBI, the GAO in addition to subpoena powers and their own investigative tools.
Since that time over 35,000 concerned Americans have signed, but we need more exposure and more signatories. Not a single mainstream journalist has so much as mentioned the petition, though I have continually, throughout the past week, written articles and updates and sent emails to various news organizations as, I’m sure, did many others.
Time is growing short. A copy of the petition and the names of the signers must be delivered to Congress reasonably before December 7, the date by which states must determine any controversy relating to the appointment of electors. The electors will meet and the vote will be final a week after that on December 13.
That is why I have set a target date of December 2nd for delivery of the petition to Congress. It gives them a number of days to respond and also may raise enough doubt that the electors determine that there is indeed sufficient controversy to delay their vote until issues are resolved.
Please join me and other honest, concerned Americans in this effort to compel Congressional action, investigate the election in open hearings and take back our nation. This petition may be our last, best hope.
Much work needs to be done. Awareness of the existence of the petition needs to be at a much higher level. The printing of the petition and list of names needs to be printed and transported to Washington, D. C. The host of the petition, petitiononline.com, has conveyed costs to me for printing and they assure me that it will be professional and legally valid. These costs, must be paid, and while they are not overwhelming, I cannot bear them myself, though I gladly would if able. Of course, additional copies directed at every Senator and Member of the House - even though these could be simply the petition itself and the names by reference - will take time, effort and money to distribute properly.
But most importantly, more people must sign the petition.
Congress needs to know that the American people will not stand for lies, injustice and fraud in any aspect of our government. We must show, by force of numbers, that we will not sit idly by and have our rights abridged, trampled and destroyed.
I am not affiliated with any party. I am a citizen of the United States of America and proud of it. I did not write and post this petition for any kind of personal gain. I have no agenda other than to find the truth about what really happened on, before and after election day. These are dangerous times for America and we need to be courageous, righteous and above all, united.
Rick Gagliano
Downtown Magazine, Rochester, NY
dtmagazine.com
"
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4306
"
Why signing the Petition to Congress requesting an investigation into the Presidential Election of 2004 is vitally important
Rick Gagliano | November 13, 2004
While the media overlooks the obvious - that six Congressmen have called for a GAO investigation into electronic voting, that Ralph Nader has initiated a recount in New Hampshire, that the Green and Libertarian candidates are pushing forward with plans for an Ohio recount, that Bev Harris at BlackBoxVoting.org has filed a massive Freedom of Information Act request - the petition, started less than a week ago and already having garnered the support of 35,000 signers, may be America’s best hope discovering just exactly what went wrong on November 2nd.
The recounts are well-intentioned, but they may fail. The GAO investigation may take months even to get started and there’s no guarantee that it will result in full blown Congressional hearings. The FOIA requests will provide information - actual data on voting, but has no prosecutorial power.
For those reasons and others, that is why I wrote the petition in the first place and directed it to the full Congress. The petition (included below) calls for a complete and sweeping investigation and doesn’t stop at just electronic voting, but asks Congress to examine what went on before the election as well - to seek information relating to registration problems, disinformation, long lines at the polls, intimidation, and other tactics that were implicitly designed to keep people from voting.
The petition also names many states individually, in addition to Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania, where many suspect tampering, but also in other states where odd discrepancies between exit polls and actual votes occurred and where voting patterns suddenly changed direction as the nation watched.
I was especially attuned to potential fraud in this election. I had been keeping up on electronic voting during the six months before the election and suspected that there would be tampering and that it may be difficult to detect. On election night itself, I paid attention to reports from Cleveland and elsewhere of long lines at the polls, computer glitches and other assorted oddities. But mostly I was paying attention to the projections by the networks. Early on, the race between Bush and Kerry was said to be "too close to call" in states that we’re even the so-called "battlegrounds" - Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and later, Missouri, Arkansas, Nevada and New Mexico. I was also shocked to watch the Kentucky Congressional race turn around, from a slim, but comfortable lead for challenger Democratic Daniel Mongiardo to an eventual victory for incumbent Jim Bunning. From 7:30 pm to the final tally there was a 5% swing in the vote. Bunning won by 2%.
When I finally went to bed on election night, the presidential race was still in doubt, but my suspicions over the propriety of the entire process were growing. On Wednesday, November 3, Kerry conceded and the nation breathed a collective sigh of either relief or exasperation.
In the aftermath of the election, stories began to pop up on the internet. Some of the made valid claims, others were hysterical and without merit. Still others began to examine how the election was won or lost, depending on perspective. By Sunday night, I had seen enough articles on the internet to convince me that there was at least enough REASONABLE DOUBT into the fairness of the election. Even though the mainstream press was in denial and had not even begun to report on most of the allegations being circulated, and had dismissed the glaring discrepancies between the exit polls and the final count with a glib consensus that "the polls were wrong," without any evidence on which to make that claim.
I worded the petition in such a way as to call attention to all aspects of the voting process and made it clear that the entire Congress needed to look into these allegations and get to the truth.
This petition also instructs Congress to bring any violators to justice and to provide appropriate remedies, which could include a nationwide audit, recount, recall or new election. The Congress is empowered with sweeping authority to investigate and bring criminal charges. They have at their disposal the Depatment of Justice, the FBI, the GAO in addition to subpoena powers and their own investigative tools.
Since that time over 35,000 concerned Americans have signed, but we need more exposure and more signatories. Not a single mainstream journalist has so much as mentioned the petition, though I have continually, throughout the past week, written articles and updates and sent emails to various news organizations as, I’m sure, did many others.
Time is growing short. A copy of the petition and the names of the signers must be delivered to Congress reasonably before December 7, the date by which states must determine any controversy relating to the appointment of electors. The electors will meet and the vote will be final a week after that on December 13.
That is why I have set a target date of December 2nd for delivery of the petition to Congress. It gives them a number of days to respond and also may raise enough doubt that the electors determine that there is indeed sufficient controversy to delay their vote until issues are resolved.
Please join me and other honest, concerned Americans in this effort to compel Congressional action, investigate the election in open hearings and take back our nation. This petition may be our last, best hope.
Much work needs to be done. Awareness of the existence of the petition needs to be at a much higher level. The printing of the petition and list of names needs to be printed and transported to Washington, D. C. The host of the petition, petitiononline.com, has conveyed costs to me for printing and they assure me that it will be professional and legally valid. These costs, must be paid, and while they are not overwhelming, I cannot bear them myself, though I gladly would if able. Of course, additional copies directed at every Senator and Member of the House - even though these could be simply the petition itself and the names by reference - will take time, effort and money to distribute properly.
But most importantly, more people must sign the petition.
Congress needs to know that the American people will not stand for lies, injustice and fraud in any aspect of our government. We must show, by force of numbers, that we will not sit idly by and have our rights abridged, trampled and destroyed.
I am not affiliated with any party. I am a citizen of the United States of America and proud of it. I did not write and post this petition for any kind of personal gain. I have no agenda other than to find the truth about what really happened on, before and after election day. These are dangerous times for America and we need to be courageous, righteous and above all, united.
Rick Gagliano
Downtown Magazine, Rochester, NY
dtmagazine.com
"
http://bellaciao.org/en/article.php3?id_article=4306
Sunday, November 28, 2004
Join us in petition and rallies against fraudulent election
http://www.petitiononline.com/rdb1104/petition.html
"
...
We call upon federal, state and local law enforcement officials to investigate these crimes against democracy, and to use their subpoena power and other investigatory tools to break the conspiracy of silence.
We respectfully request that should the evidence of direct and deliberate involvement in an attempt to mislead the American people into believing they had chosen a candidate who did not, in fact, legitimately secure the presidency, that the criminals who conspired should be charged with treason against the United States of America.
Further, we respectfully request that the provision in the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution on the disenfranchisement of citizens be invoked, so that states that deliberately prevented citizens from casting ballots for the presidency or deliberately miscounted or misreported those votes should lose representation in the U.S. Congress in proportion to the number of citizens disenfranchised.
"
http://www.petitiononline.com/rdb1104/petition.html
"
...
We call upon federal, state and local law enforcement officials to investigate these crimes against democracy, and to use their subpoena power and other investigatory tools to break the conspiracy of silence.
We respectfully request that should the evidence of direct and deliberate involvement in an attempt to mislead the American people into believing they had chosen a candidate who did not, in fact, legitimately secure the presidency, that the criminals who conspired should be charged with treason against the United States of America.
Further, we respectfully request that the provision in the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution on the disenfranchisement of citizens be invoked, so that states that deliberately prevented citizens from casting ballots for the presidency or deliberately miscounted or misreported those votes should lose representation in the U.S. Congress in proportion to the number of citizens disenfranchised.
"
http://www.petitiononline.com/rdb1104/petition.html
Saturday, November 27, 2004
Ukraine? What about U.S.?
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/112704D.shtml
"
Watching the newsreels of Ukrainians taking to the streets by the hundreds of thousands to protest an election they believe was fraudulent, one has to wonder what Americans are thinking and feeling.
...
What do Ukrainians know that Americans don't?
...
But what are the implications of ignoring electoral corruption?
...
Like the Ukrainians, some Americans predicted our election would be stolen and even outlined how it would be done.
...
The battle which must be fought is one to save representative democracy from the final death blow that will be dealt by ignoring the widespread electoral problems of the past two presidential elections.
...
We still cling to the myth that
...
we are permanently immune to tyranny
...
We ignore millennia of history demonstrating that powerpaths will pursue whatever schemes necessary to maintain power. Indeed, they typically usurp power incrementally, pushing the envelope and testing the boundaries.
...
Considering the relative ease with which the Bush administration stole the 2000 election, deceived the congress and American people, and impudently committed crimes against the international community, why wouldn't they take steps readily available to them (via Diebold, Jeb Bush, Kenneth Blackwell, et al.) to stay in power by stealing another election?
...
We can inundate Congress with demands for investigations.
...
We can pressure news media to stop marginalizing election reform efforts by telling us to move on.
...
Proprietary trade secrets of Diebold and ES&S must be smashed in the courts and the legislatures lest democracy be smashed in the wake of the incestuous marriage of right-wing government and corporate power[read: FASCISM].
...
[We must] demand uncompromising reforms to our electoral system before it becomes irrelevant. It would be an abandonment of principles and duties to country if we didn't. Indeed, it would be unpatriotic.
"
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/112704D.shtml
"
Watching the newsreels of Ukrainians taking to the streets by the hundreds of thousands to protest an election they believe was fraudulent, one has to wonder what Americans are thinking and feeling.
...
What do Ukrainians know that Americans don't?
...
But what are the implications of ignoring electoral corruption?
...
Like the Ukrainians, some Americans predicted our election would be stolen and even outlined how it would be done.
...
The battle which must be fought is one to save representative democracy from the final death blow that will be dealt by ignoring the widespread electoral problems of the past two presidential elections.
...
We still cling to the myth that
...
we are permanently immune to tyranny
...
We ignore millennia of history demonstrating that powerpaths will pursue whatever schemes necessary to maintain power. Indeed, they typically usurp power incrementally, pushing the envelope and testing the boundaries.
...
Considering the relative ease with which the Bush administration stole the 2000 election, deceived the congress and American people, and impudently committed crimes against the international community, why wouldn't they take steps readily available to them (via Diebold, Jeb Bush, Kenneth Blackwell, et al.) to stay in power by stealing another election?
...
We can inundate Congress with demands for investigations.
...
We can pressure news media to stop marginalizing election reform efforts by telling us to move on.
...
Proprietary trade secrets of Diebold and ES&S must be smashed in the courts and the legislatures lest democracy be smashed in the wake of the incestuous marriage of right-wing government and corporate power[read: FASCISM].
...
[We must] demand uncompromising reforms to our electoral system before it becomes irrelevant. It would be an abandonment of principles and duties to country if we didn't. Indeed, it would be unpatriotic.
"
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/112704D.shtml
Help audit the election
http://www.blackboxvoting.org needs volunteers to do research, data entry and number crunching.
Where Is The Airplane...That Crashed into Pentagon???
Where Is The Airplane...That Crashed into Pentagon???
Click on the below website and watch this film (http://www.freedomunderground.org/memoryhole/pentagon.php#Main )...do it quickly as it has been pulled off several websites already ... and YOU'LL SEE WHY! At the end of the film click on HOME
(or go to http://www.pentagonstrike.co.uk/)for more comments.
What do you think? Maybe it's worth asking some questions?
Click on the below website and watch this film (http://www.freedomunderground.org/memoryhole/pentagon.php#Main )...do it quickly as it has been pulled off several websites already ... and YOU'LL SEE WHY! At the end of the film click on HOME
(or go to http://www.pentagonstrike.co.uk/)for more comments.
What do you think? Maybe it's worth asking some questions?
"It's not over until it's over."
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/112204A.shtml
"
Blackwell, who oversaw the election in Ohio, also served as co-chair of the Ohio Bush-Cheney reelection campaign.
...
all of the so-called "anomalies" in the voting results favor Bush.
"
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/112204A.shtml
"
Blackwell, who oversaw the election in Ohio, also served as co-chair of the Ohio Bush-Cheney reelection campaign.
...
all of the so-called "anomalies" in the voting results favor Bush.
"
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/112204A.shtml
Tuesday, November 23, 2004
Become a Paid Activist
Spread the word! Gain your freedom!
Become a self-employed book distributor, marketing "Just Say NO to Fascism: A Fable".
Your investment is $33.00 or less, up to what you determine. $33.00 gets you 5 copies of the book, which we recommend you market to individuals, coffee-shops, activist groups, retail-stores, bookstores, mail-order, others you determine, for $12.15 each plus shipping and tax.
This means that you procure the books at a 54% discount, which can translate into a 54% commission! It means you practically DOUBLE YOUR MONEY.
We are looking for volume movers who can help us bypass the corporatist press, but you are welcome to participate at any level.
Interested? Get started!
Go to http://www.justsaynotofascism.com/indyreps.html and SPREAD the WORD!
Become a self-employed book distributor, marketing "Just Say NO to Fascism: A Fable".
Your investment is $33.00 or less, up to what you determine. $33.00 gets you 5 copies of the book, which we recommend you market to individuals, coffee-shops, activist groups, retail-stores, bookstores, mail-order, others you determine, for $12.15 each plus shipping and tax.
This means that you procure the books at a 54% discount, which can translate into a 54% commission! It means you practically DOUBLE YOUR MONEY.
We are looking for volume movers who can help us bypass the corporatist press, but you are welcome to participate at any level.
Interested? Get started!
Go to http://www.justsaynotofascism.com/indyreps.html and SPREAD the WORD!
Stupidity Kills / Monopolized Media
http://www.thenation.com/thebeat/index.mhtml?bid=1&pid=2026
"
The best question asked in the aftermath of the 2004 US election came from a British newspaper, The Daily Mirror, which inquired over a picture of George W. Bush, "How can 59,054,087 be so dumb?
...
is it really appropriate to compare the United States in 2004 with a warped media market like South Africa during apartheid days?
Actually, the comparison may be a bit unfair to South African media in the apartheid era
...
Years of consolidation and bottom-line pressures have forced even once responsible media to allow entertainment and commercial values to supersede civic and democratic values when making news decisions.
...
a lot of Americans voted for George W. Bush on November 2 on the basis of wrong assumptions.
...
a lot of what Americans know is wrong.
...
only 31 percent of Bush supporters recognized that the majority of people in the world opposed the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq.
...
Only 9 percent of Bush backers correctly assumed that Kerry was the world's choice.
...
72 percent of Bush supporters continue to believe that Iraq had actual WMD (47 percent) or a major program for developing them (25 percent)
...
75 percent of Bush supporters continue to believe that Iraq was providing substantial support to al Qaeda
...
tendency of Bush supporters to ignore dissonant information
...
good citizens who consume American media come away with dramatic misconceptions
...
Fox warps facts intentionally
...
CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, USA Today, the New York Times and the Washington Post
...
fed the American people an inaccurate picture
...
without aggressively and consistently challenging
...
misstatements of fact
...
taken as a whole, US media--with its obsessive focus on John Kerry's Vietnam record, its neglect of fundamental economic and environmental issues and its stenographic repetition of even the most absurd claims by the president and vice president--warped the debate in 2004.
...
Some of those 59,054,087 Bush voters may have been dumb.
But a far better explanation for the election result is summed up by the Weekly Guardian's observation that, "Maybe it's the papers they're reading."
"
http://www.thenation.com/thebeat/index.mhtml?bid=1&pid=2026
"
The best question asked in the aftermath of the 2004 US election came from a British newspaper, The Daily Mirror, which inquired over a picture of George W. Bush, "How can 59,054,087 be so dumb?
...
is it really appropriate to compare the United States in 2004 with a warped media market like South Africa during apartheid days?
Actually, the comparison may be a bit unfair to South African media in the apartheid era
...
Years of consolidation and bottom-line pressures have forced even once responsible media to allow entertainment and commercial values to supersede civic and democratic values when making news decisions.
...
a lot of Americans voted for George W. Bush on November 2 on the basis of wrong assumptions.
...
a lot of what Americans know is wrong.
...
only 31 percent of Bush supporters recognized that the majority of people in the world opposed the Bush administration's decision to invade Iraq.
...
Only 9 percent of Bush backers correctly assumed that Kerry was the world's choice.
...
72 percent of Bush supporters continue to believe that Iraq had actual WMD (47 percent) or a major program for developing them (25 percent)
...
75 percent of Bush supporters continue to believe that Iraq was providing substantial support to al Qaeda
...
tendency of Bush supporters to ignore dissonant information
...
good citizens who consume American media come away with dramatic misconceptions
...
Fox warps facts intentionally
...
CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, USA Today, the New York Times and the Washington Post
...
fed the American people an inaccurate picture
...
without aggressively and consistently challenging
...
misstatements of fact
...
taken as a whole, US media--with its obsessive focus on John Kerry's Vietnam record, its neglect of fundamental economic and environmental issues and its stenographic repetition of even the most absurd claims by the president and vice president--warped the debate in 2004.
...
Some of those 59,054,087 Bush voters may have been dumb.
But a far better explanation for the election result is summed up by the Weekly Guardian's observation that, "Maybe it's the papers they're reading."
"
http://www.thenation.com/thebeat/index.mhtml?bid=1&pid=2026
Wednesday, November 17, 2004
Exit Democrat, Enter Green?
Did Kerry take a dive? Do you smell sell-out? It is very likely that many of us who voted for Kerry because he seemed to be the most likely way to get Bush out, will now migrate to the Green Party and work for genuine reform. Today the Green Party is actively working on the recounts. You can watch their progress, read "Mainstream" press articles ('xcuse me) about recount efforts and volunteer your support at http://www.votecobb.org/ There is still time but it is limited.
It's in your Face
Just Say No to Fascism.
Unlike these radicons, WE do not LIE, CHEAT, STEAL or KILL in the name of God. Not in the name of Jesus. Not in our name.
Just Say No to Fascism.
The way out of this mess is the way we got into it: through the Market. AirAmericaRadio.com is proof of this. DemocracyNow.org is proof of this. Michael Moore is proof of this. There is now a super high demand for, and a low supply of, Truth. The past election is proof of this. The Market will, in natural migration, seek out new outlets and avenues, exposing the lies of the entrenched, established propaganda machine, at a profit. More and more Americans are beginning to realize that ANYONE who uses "MAINSTREAM media" as a yardstick for validity on ANY issue is living in a DREAM WORLD of DENIAL. This differential of supply versus demand represents an awesome opportunity for true American innovators and persons of integrity.
The result is going to be increasing rewards for witnesses, truth-detectives, journalistic bounty hunters and investigative reporters. Groups will begin to pool funds to support and reward people who produce and broadcast accurate information leading to the arrest and conviction of the criminal Tories who have hijacked our nation and are endangering our species; and recognition with support for those who work to restore the validity of our democracy. This is why a Free Press is a key element in the foundation of America. This is where a Free Press rescues a country from tyranny. The Free Press is a safeguard against exactly what is developing today.
This is why the Press must be wrenched from the clutches of monopolists. There must be broad anti-trust initiatives regarding our means of attaining information, before the American Dream is consumed in despair and destruction borne of ignorance.
Just say NO to Fascism dot Com. Seek out the Truth. They are LYING to you.
Then when enough of us begin to realize how simply it can be done, we will standardize and make voter-verifiable our elections nationwide. The process will become as accurate and traceable as all the other transactions we routinely make. To preserve domestic tranquility, we will effectively eliminate and prevent future doubt as to the validity of our elections.
Then we will return power over the elections, from dumb capital, to The People; by outlawing any and all campaign contributions. By anyone. By any entity. From or in Any location. We will enforce equitable press-time for all popularly nominated candidates, and prohibit the purchase of campaign advertisements, as a condition of continued licensure of news-outlets. This will ensure that our government is returned to control of true representatives of the people and not of dumb capital.
This is America, Remember? Of, By and For the People. Not dumb capital.
Just Say NO to Fascism.
Corporatist radicals are dividing us using stereotypes of yokels versus elitists. They are using socio-economic groups as scapegoats. This is the same scam these people's grandparents pulled with Germany in the 1930's: Control the press, Divide and then subdue the people. A Yale Bush acting like a Texas bubba is an echo of Sinclair Lewis's "It Can't happen Here". Huey Long once said that "If Fascism ever comes to America, it will come wrapped in an American flag".
Or a cowboy hat.
It's in your face.
Just Say NO to Fascism. Dot Com. Tell Somebody.
In this past election and for a generation leading up to it, the Corporatists used class-resentment in a giant bait-and-switch. They took the suspicion that we all hold: that the super-rich are running the country; and they effectively re-directed that suspicion against civil liberties groups, unions, anti-war demonstrators, educated and informed people in general: EVERY SYSTEM THAT WE CREATED IN ORDER TO PRESERVE AND PROTECT OURSELVES. For YEARS. They flim-flammed the country enough to convince people to vote against their own interests, to get that 3-percent margin (the lowest for a standing president since Truman): close enough to steal their second election while permitting less access to observers than do Venezuela or Kazakhstan.
Without even giving us a receipt.
Now they're doing purges of anyone who doesn't toe the party line, thus further stamping out any chance of productive discourse in our government.
Beware. Talk to someone.
You'd think we would have learned by now. Two anesthetized coups on our own soil. A bloody coup in Haiti. Watch Venezuela. But, we are the "United States of Amnesia", to quote Gore Vidal. Ask a twenty-something why we fought World War II.
Feel scammed?
Just Say No To Fascism dot Com.
Tell Somebody.
Boycott the Propaganda Machine. Support real journalists. Tell others that you do.
Just Say No to Fascism. We have the moral high ground. We don't Lie, Cheat, Steal or Kill in the name of God.
Take action for media and elections reform.
And join the ACLU.
-- Mark Frankenberg, www.JustSayNoToFascism.com
P.S. It's not the doctors. It's not the Lawyers. It's the Insurance Corporatists.
Unlike these radicons, WE do not LIE, CHEAT, STEAL or KILL in the name of God. Not in the name of Jesus. Not in our name.
Just Say No to Fascism.
The way out of this mess is the way we got into it: through the Market. AirAmericaRadio.com is proof of this. DemocracyNow.org is proof of this. Michael Moore is proof of this. There is now a super high demand for, and a low supply of, Truth. The past election is proof of this. The Market will, in natural migration, seek out new outlets and avenues, exposing the lies of the entrenched, established propaganda machine, at a profit. More and more Americans are beginning to realize that ANYONE who uses "MAINSTREAM media" as a yardstick for validity on ANY issue is living in a DREAM WORLD of DENIAL. This differential of supply versus demand represents an awesome opportunity for true American innovators and persons of integrity.
The result is going to be increasing rewards for witnesses, truth-detectives, journalistic bounty hunters and investigative reporters. Groups will begin to pool funds to support and reward people who produce and broadcast accurate information leading to the arrest and conviction of the criminal Tories who have hijacked our nation and are endangering our species; and recognition with support for those who work to restore the validity of our democracy. This is why a Free Press is a key element in the foundation of America. This is where a Free Press rescues a country from tyranny. The Free Press is a safeguard against exactly what is developing today.
This is why the Press must be wrenched from the clutches of monopolists. There must be broad anti-trust initiatives regarding our means of attaining information, before the American Dream is consumed in despair and destruction borne of ignorance.
Just say NO to Fascism dot Com. Seek out the Truth. They are LYING to you.
Then when enough of us begin to realize how simply it can be done, we will standardize and make voter-verifiable our elections nationwide. The process will become as accurate and traceable as all the other transactions we routinely make. To preserve domestic tranquility, we will effectively eliminate and prevent future doubt as to the validity of our elections.
Then we will return power over the elections, from dumb capital, to The People; by outlawing any and all campaign contributions. By anyone. By any entity. From or in Any location. We will enforce equitable press-time for all popularly nominated candidates, and prohibit the purchase of campaign advertisements, as a condition of continued licensure of news-outlets. This will ensure that our government is returned to control of true representatives of the people and not of dumb capital.
This is America, Remember? Of, By and For the People. Not dumb capital.
Just Say NO to Fascism.
Corporatist radicals are dividing us using stereotypes of yokels versus elitists. They are using socio-economic groups as scapegoats. This is the same scam these people's grandparents pulled with Germany in the 1930's: Control the press, Divide and then subdue the people. A Yale Bush acting like a Texas bubba is an echo of Sinclair Lewis's "It Can't happen Here". Huey Long once said that "If Fascism ever comes to America, it will come wrapped in an American flag".
Or a cowboy hat.
It's in your face.
Just Say NO to Fascism. Dot Com. Tell Somebody.
In this past election and for a generation leading up to it, the Corporatists used class-resentment in a giant bait-and-switch. They took the suspicion that we all hold: that the super-rich are running the country; and they effectively re-directed that suspicion against civil liberties groups, unions, anti-war demonstrators, educated and informed people in general: EVERY SYSTEM THAT WE CREATED IN ORDER TO PRESERVE AND PROTECT OURSELVES. For YEARS. They flim-flammed the country enough to convince people to vote against their own interests, to get that 3-percent margin (the lowest for a standing president since Truman): close enough to steal their second election while permitting less access to observers than do Venezuela or Kazakhstan.
Without even giving us a receipt.
Now they're doing purges of anyone who doesn't toe the party line, thus further stamping out any chance of productive discourse in our government.
Beware. Talk to someone.
You'd think we would have learned by now. Two anesthetized coups on our own soil. A bloody coup in Haiti. Watch Venezuela. But, we are the "United States of Amnesia", to quote Gore Vidal. Ask a twenty-something why we fought World War II.
Feel scammed?
Just Say No To Fascism dot Com.
Tell Somebody.
Boycott the Propaganda Machine. Support real journalists. Tell others that you do.
Just Say No to Fascism. We have the moral high ground. We don't Lie, Cheat, Steal or Kill in the name of God.
Take action for media and elections reform.
And join the ACLU.
-- Mark Frankenberg, www.JustSayNoToFascism.com
P.S. It's not the doctors. It's not the Lawyers. It's the Insurance Corporatists.
Wednesday, November 10, 2004
blackboxvoting.org contacts
Blackboxvoting.org website keeps going down. To help them out:
Donate. Mailing address is Black Box Voting, PO Box 25552, Seattle WA 98165.
E-mail crew@blackboxvoting.org
Media calls: 206-335-7747
Donate. Mailing address is Black Box Voting, PO Box 25552, Seattle WA 98165.
E-mail crew@blackboxvoting.org
Media calls: 206-335-7747
Tuesday, November 09, 2004
Recount! Subpoena! Kerry and Democrats Won!
Look. It's really very simple. You can pay your taxes through your computer or over the phone. You can buy anything through your computer or over the phone. You do the transaction and get a reciept or a confirmation number. There are countless ways to ensure anonymity.
Why shouldn't our elections be any different? We could reconcile our ballot online. And recount ourselves, if we wanted.
What do they take us for?
You know.. Fraudulent elections are a characteristic of Fascism. So is Militarism. Iraq is our Poland.
Remember, Stupidity Kills. It has and it will again. This is NOT the time to sit by quietly.
Why shouldn't our elections be any different? We could reconcile our ballot online. And recount ourselves, if we wanted.
What do they take us for?
You know.. Fraudulent elections are a characteristic of Fascism. So is Militarism. Iraq is our Poland.
Remember, Stupidity Kills. It has and it will again. This is NOT the time to sit by quietly.
Sign Safety
Some of us are putting "www.justsaynotofascism.com" on our cars and trucks. I believe that it is an excellent way for all of us to excercise our First Amendment right to Free Speech.
If you do begin "Signing" like I do, I urge you do be extra vigilant while driving. The range of responses from other drivers is unlimited. It is a good idea to never make eye-contact with other drivers, to "always leave yourself an out" by avoiding having other vehicles directly beside you, and to only use a nod and a smile, or nothing at all, in response to one thumb (or finger) salutes. Use increased following distance because people may drive closely behind you to read your message.
There is hope. We've survived for 228 years.
If you do begin "Signing" like I do, I urge you do be extra vigilant while driving. The range of responses from other drivers is unlimited. It is a good idea to never make eye-contact with other drivers, to "always leave yourself an out" by avoiding having other vehicles directly beside you, and to only use a nod and a smile, or nothing at all, in response to one thumb (or finger) salutes. Use increased following distance because people may drive closely behind you to read your message.
There is hope. We've survived for 228 years.
"None dare call it voter suppression and fraud"
http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/983
"
Bob Fitrakis
None dare call it voter suppression and fraud
November 7, 2004
Evidence is mounting that the 2004 presidential election was stolen in Ohio. Emerging revelations of voting irregularities coupled with well-documented Republican efforts at voter suppression prior to the election suggests that in a fair election Kerry would have won Ohio.
Democratic hopeful Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts conceded on November 3, based on preliminary postings by the highly partisan Republican Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell. These unofficial results showed Bush with 136,483 more votes than Kerry, although 155,428 provisional ballots, 92,672 “spoiled” ballots, additional overseas ballots, and some remaining absentee ballots remained uncounted.
The day after his concession, Kerry drew 3,893 votes closer to Bush when a computerized voting machine “glitch” was discovered in an Ohio precinct. A machine in ward 1B in the predominantly Republican Gahanna, Ohio, recorded 4,258 votes for George W. Bush when only 638 people cast votes at the New Life Church polling site. Buried on page A6 of the Columbus Dispatch, the story also reported that the voting machine recorded 0 votes in a race between Franklin County Commissioners Arlene Shoemaker and Paula Brooks. Franklin County Board of Elections Director Matt Damschroder told the Dispatch that the voting machine glitches were “why the results on election night are unofficial.”
The right-wing New Life Church voting glitch is interesting. Free Press reporter Marley Greiner has been tracking Blackwell’s relationship with far right-wing religious forces like Biblical America and Christian dominionist groups that want to establish theocratic religious rule in America. Blackwell was campaigning around the state with the Reverend Rod Parsley as part of a “Silent No More” tour in support of amending the Ohio Constitution to outlaw gay marriage, on the ballot as Issue One. Many mainstream commentators claim it was the widely popular Issue One amendment campaign that brought out Bush voters in record numbers in rural Ohio. Gay marriage was already outlawed by state statute, and six of the seven Ohio Supreme Court justices are Republicans.
The nonpartisan Citizen’s Alliance for Secure Elections (CASE) is investigating various other voting irregularities in Ohio, among them:
# In Auglaize County, a letter dated October 21 under the signature of Ken Nuss, the county’s former deputy director, alleges that Joe McGinnis, a former employee of Election Systems & Software (ES&S), violated election protocol with his unauthorized use of the county’s central tabulating computer that creates ballots and compiles election results. Nuss, who resigned on October 21, alleges that McGinnis was improperly granted access to the computer the weekend of October 16.
# In Miami County, with 100% of the precincts reporting at 9am EST Wednesday, Nov. 3, Bush had 20,807 votes (65.80%) and Kerry had 10,724 (33.92%). Miami reported 31,620 voters. Inexplicably, nearly 19,000 new ballots were added after all precincts reported, boosting Bush’s vote to 33,039 (65.77%) to Kerry’s 17,039 (33.92%). CASE is investigating why the percentage of the vote stayed exactly the same to three one-hundredths of a percentage point after nearly 19,000 new ballots were added. CASE members speculate that it’s either a long-shot coincidence with the last three digits remaining the same, or that someone had pre-set a database and programmed a voting machine to cough up a pre-set percentage of votes. Miami County uses an easily hackable optical scanner with the central counter provided by the Republican-linked vendor ES&S.
# In Warren County, administrators and election officials locked down the county administrative building and prohibited all independent election observers from watching the vote count. County officials cited “homeland security,” according to the Cincinnati Enquirer. WCPO-TV Channel 9 News Director Bob Morford told the Enquirer that he had “never seen anything like it.” Morford asserted that throwing the media and independent observers out of the centralized counting area under the guise of “homeland security” was a “red herring.” He said, “That’s something to put up when you don’t know what else to put up to keep us out.” In Warren County, Bush picked up an additional 12,000 votes over his 2000 election total.
# In Franklin County, where Franklin County Board of Elections Director Matt Damschroder is also the former Executive Director of the county’s Republican Party, the county Board of Elections building looked like a bunker. Scores of city buses blocked parking spaces on the street outside, numerous concrete barricades surrounded the parking lot, and a metal detector was stationed at the only entrance. A phalanx of armed deputy sheriffs swarmed the only site where provisional voters could cast a guaranteed ballot. The Columbus Dispatch confirmed an Election Day Free Press story that far fewer voting machines were present in predominantly black Democratic inner-city voting wards than in the recent primary election and the 2000 presidential election, with their lighter turnouts. The reduced number of machines caused voters to wait up to seven hours and wait an average of approximately three hours. One Republican Central Committee member told the Free Press that Damschroder held back as many as 2000 machines and dispersed many of the other machines to affluent suburbs in Franklin County.
# In rural Drake County, Kerry received 78 less votes than Al Gore in 2000, but Bush received 3000 more votes. Drake is the only county in Miami Valley where Kerry’s votes was less than Gore’s and where Bush’s vote rose dramatically.
Prior to the discovery of these irregularities, investigative reporter Greg Palast, who exposed the systematic disenfranchisement of Democratic voters in Florida in 2004, wrote an article entitled, “Kerry won.” Palast and numerous other observers point to the fact that the exit polls showed Kerry winning. Palast concludes that the exit polls were correct, but Kerry votes were far more likely to remain uncounted on election night.
Unofficial Ohio presidential results provided by the Secretary of State’s Office show 155,428 provisional ballots cast. Blackwell was all over the national news telling everyone who would listen that these ballots were randomly distributed and not disproportionately for Kerry. As former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani raved on national TV demanding Kerry’s concession, a basic analysis of the provisional ballots suggested that they were disproportionately for Kerry.
Historically, provisional ballots are far more likely to be cast by poor and minority voters, who live in the urban centers and move more often. Ohio has 88 counties, the vast majority of them rural. Kerry won 15 counties in Ohio, virtually all large urban centers. In those counties, 85,096 provisional ballots remain uncounted. Past elections point to the fact that these provisional ballots are hardly ever cast in the affluent, primarily Republican municipalities, but are overwhelmingly from the central city. Also, an additional 17,038 provisional ballots are from Hamilton County and Wood County. Bush won Hamilton with 53% of the vote and Wood County with 53.5%. Traditionally, the provisional ballots in Hamilton County come from Cincinnati and its poor central city areas. These are areas where John Kerry won handily on Election Day.
Thus, 102,134 of the provisional ballots, nearly two-thirds (65.7%) in all probability come from solidly pro-Kerry areas and are most likely cast by pro-Kerry supporters such as African Americans and the poor. These fit the same socio-economic demographics and racial profiles of voters targeted by the GOP for challenges in Ohio.
Palast also points to the 92,672 so-called “spoiled” ballots in Ohio that have yet to be counted, and may never be tallied. The most famous spoiled ballots were the 2004 Florida punch cards that could not be machine read, but when looked at manually the voter’s intent could be determined. Expert statisticians who investigated spoilage in the 2000 election in Florida found that 54% of these discarded ballots were cast by blacks. In Ohio, most of the spoiled votes were lost through punch card ballots in 2004.
By Blackwell directing county Boards of Elections not to count the provisional ballots for 11 days, it benefited the Bush campaign since an immediate counting would have no doubt made the race tigher between Kerry and Bush, and perhaps prompted Kerry to request a recount. This would have the 92,672 discarded "spoiled" ballots that were also likely to favor Kerry.
Daniel Tokaji, Professor of Law at the Ohio State University College of Law commented: "One other point. Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell has reportedly said that provisional ballots won't be counted for 11 days. I'm not sure where he's getting this, but he may be relying on ORC 3505.32. This statute provides that the boards of election are to begin canvassing election returns between 11 and 15 days after the election and ‘continue the canvass daily until it is completed.’ Perhaps I'm missing something, but I don't see how this precludes provisional votes from being counted earlier than that, even if the canvass doesn't begin until the 11th day."
Spoiled ballots will only be counted if someone with standing, such as five Kerry electors or the Ohio Democratic Party, demands and legally qualifies for a recount. Thus, the exit polls may have been correct. A majority of people voted for Kerry in Ohio; but 250,000 votes were not counted, most favoring Kerry over Bush. If Kerry had won by even one vote in Ohio, he would be the next President of the United States.
Irregularities in other key battleground states have prompted three U.S. representatives to urgently request that the Comptroller General of the United States David Walker and the General Accounting Office “immediately undertake an investigation of the efficiency of voting machines and new technologies used in the 2004 election.” Tom Hartmann, in his post election article on CommonDreams.org (“Evidence mounts that the vote was hacked”), reminds readers that Bev Harris, who started blackboxvoting.org, showed Howard Dean how to hack a county “central tabulator” computer in 90 seconds live on CNBC.
The Diebold Corporation, which helped count the Ohio vote with e-voting machines and optical scan machines, is run by a notoriously pro-Republican CEO, Wally O’Dell. Last year O’Dell wrote a letter to Ohio Republican donors telling them that he is “committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the President next year.” O’Dell is a proud member of Bush’s Pioneer and Ranger team of major donors who visit the Crawford ranch. The other major election vote counting firm is ES&S, which is being investigated for allegedly having a machine that subtracted votes when the totals surpassed 32,000.
On Election Day, the Election Protection Coalition observers who covered 58 polling places in central Ohio, documented thousands of voter complaints over long lines and recorded numerous people leaving the polls for work or because they were elderly or handicapped and physically unable to wait for hours to vote. Professor James K. Galbraith, of the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin, wrote the following summary of Election Day in Ohio: “. . . I drove a young African-American voter, a charming business student, seven months pregnant, to her polling place at Finland Elementary School in south Columbus. We arrived in a squalling rain to find voters lined up outside for about a hundred yards. . . . The real problem was a grotesque shortage of voting machines.”
Ohio State University Law Professor Edward B. Foley told the New York Times, “When your lines get to two or three hours, it’s system failure.”
Other bizarre tactics emerged in the run-up to the election:
# Under an archaic Ohio law, both the Republican and Democratic Parties, or any slate of five candidates, may embed official election challengers inside polling places. The New York Times reported on Oct. 23 that the Republican Party intended to place thousands of lawyers and other GOP faithfuls inside the polls to challenge voters. Republican insiders confide here that the key goal was to jam lines and frustrate new voters. After two federal judges rejected the GOP challengers, Republicans got a favorable ruling from the Sixth Circuit, which allowed them to place challengers in Ohio polling places. Michael Beaver, Deputy State Commander with the Election Protection Coalition says, “We now believe that the challengers were a smokescreen to hide the real plan to orchestrate a machine shortage in Democratic wards.”
# The Republican Party sent letters challenging thousands of Franklin County registered voters who requested absentee ballots. Franklin County is home to Columbus, the state's largest city and its capitol. Though it is also home to Ohio State University, thousands of local students go to schools outside the county or state. The GOP targeted young voters for challenges. The GOP pre-challenged an estimated 35,000 voters and rented arenas in Cleveland and Columbus to conduct the challenges. The GOP sent registered letters to registered voters’ addresses and when they failed to pick up a letter from the Republican Party in primarily Democratic areas, they were challenged for fraud. A federal judge disallowed the challenges less than a week before the election.
# The Franklin County Board of Elections has called or written an undetermined number of voters who obtained absentee ballots, challenging their addresses. In at least one case, after a series of angry phone calls, the Board admitted there was nothing wrong with the address in question and re-instated voting rights. The voter in question was a registered Democrat. His wife, an independent at the same address, was not challenged. It is unclear how many others have been wrongly knocked out.
# Even if they are counted, Franklin County's absentee ballot forms are designed in ways strikingly reminiscent of those notorious butterfly ballots in the Florida 2000 presidential election. On Franklin County absentee ballot forms, Kerry is the third name on the list of presidential candidates on the left side of the ballot. But, the punch card is designed to fit in the middle, so the actual number you punch for Kerry is hole "4." If you mistakenly punch hole "3" you've just voted for Bush.
# Damschroder, Franklin County's right-wing Elections Director is insisting on e-voting machines that have malfunctioned in at least two Congressional elections. The machines have no paper trail and one subtracted 3% from former Rep. John Kasich’s and added 3% to Ed Brown, a six-point shift. The November issues of Popular Science and Popular Mechanics Magazines ran the following headlines on their covers, respectively: "E-vote emergency: And you thought dimpled chads were bad'" and "Could hackers tilt the election?" Vigorous protests against the paperless machines have been staged here, but many will be used, rendering a meaningful recount impossible.
# Twenty GOP-dominated Ohio counties have given wrong information to former felons about their voter eligibility. In Hamilton County, home of Cincinnati and the Republican Taft family, officials told numerous former felons that a judge had to sign off before they could vote, which is blatantly false.
# Franklin County, which normally cancels 2-300 registered voters a year for felony convictions, has sent at least 3,500 cancellation letters to both current felons and ex-felons whose convictions date back to 1998. The list includes numerous citizens who were charged with felonies but convicted only of misdemeanors.
# Republican Secretary of State Blackwell reversed a long-standing Ohio practice and is barring voters from casting provisional ballots within their county if they are registered to vote but there's been a mistake about where they are expected to cast their ballot. In this year's spring primaries, Blackwell allowed voters to cast provisional ballots by county, even if they were in the wrong precinct. But this fall, voters had to leave if they were in the wrong precinct and find their way to the right one even though they had waited in line two to three hours. Blackwell hopes to succeed Republican Bob Taft as governor, and has labored hard to install Diebold e-voting machines with no paper trail throughout Ohio. Blackwell is being widely compared to the infamous Katherine Harris, who handed Florida to George W. Bush in 2000 and was rewarded with a safe Congressional seat. Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones accused Blackwell of seeking “to disenfranchise the people of the state of Ohio.” Tubbs Jones pointed out that the 2000 census had caused massive redistricting, particularly within inner city precincts, which would lead to many people ending up at the wrong voting site.
# The October 22 Columbus Dispatch, which endorsed Bush, and WVKO Radio have both documented phone calls from people impersonating Franklin County Board of Elections workers and directing registered voters to different and incorrect polling sites. One individual was falsely told not to vote at the polling station across the street from his house, but at a "new" site, four miles away. Under Blackwell's new rules, such a vote would not be counted. Nor do the precinct locations make much sense in the inner city. Someone living on the northwest corner of Bryden and Wilson, instead of walking half a block to the polling site at Franklin Alternative School, must vote seven blocks northeast at the Model Neighborhood facility polling site. The previous polling site for the precinct was two blocks west before the Republicans consolidated several inner city polling places in the 1990s.
# In Cincinnati, some 105,000 voters were moved from active to inactive status within the last four years for not voting in the last two federal elections. This is not required under Ohio law, but is an option allowed and exercised by the Republican-dominated Hamilton County Board of Elections.
# Secretary of State Blackwell ruled that any voter registration form on other than 80-pound weight bond paper would not be accepted. This is an old law left over from pre-scanning days. Many voters who had registered on lighter paper, had their registration returned, even though the forms had been officially sanctioned by local election boards.
# On Election Day, fliers littered the inner city telling voters that Republicans were to vote on Tuesday and Democrats on Wednesday.
No Republican has ever won the presidency without carrying Ohio. The voting irregularities suggest that Bush is the first Republican President to win the presidency without winning the actual Ohio vote. Kerry won the vote in Ohio. The exit polls are correct. The mainstream media, instead of investigating the massive irregularities, are busy concocting theories as to how all the exit polls, the safeguards for fair elections, were all wrong on election night in the Buckeye State. None dare suggest voter suppression and fraud.
--
Bob Fitrakis is a Professor in the Social and Behavioral Sciences Department at Columbus State Community College. He has a Ph.D in Political Science and a J.D. from The Ohio State University Law School. He is the author of seven books, an investigative reporter, and Editor of the Columbus Free Press (freepress.org). He has won ten major investigative journalism awards including Best Coverage of Politics in Ohio from the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists. He served as an international election observer in the 1994 presidential elections in El Salvador and was the co-author and editor of the report to the United Nations. He served as legal advisor for eight polling locations on Columbus' Near East Side for the Election Protection Coalition.
"
http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/983
"
Bob Fitrakis
None dare call it voter suppression and fraud
November 7, 2004
Evidence is mounting that the 2004 presidential election was stolen in Ohio. Emerging revelations of voting irregularities coupled with well-documented Republican efforts at voter suppression prior to the election suggests that in a fair election Kerry would have won Ohio.
Democratic hopeful Senator John Kerry of Massachusetts conceded on November 3, based on preliminary postings by the highly partisan Republican Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell. These unofficial results showed Bush with 136,483 more votes than Kerry, although 155,428 provisional ballots, 92,672 “spoiled” ballots, additional overseas ballots, and some remaining absentee ballots remained uncounted.
The day after his concession, Kerry drew 3,893 votes closer to Bush when a computerized voting machine “glitch” was discovered in an Ohio precinct. A machine in ward 1B in the predominantly Republican Gahanna, Ohio, recorded 4,258 votes for George W. Bush when only 638 people cast votes at the New Life Church polling site. Buried on page A6 of the Columbus Dispatch, the story also reported that the voting machine recorded 0 votes in a race between Franklin County Commissioners Arlene Shoemaker and Paula Brooks. Franklin County Board of Elections Director Matt Damschroder told the Dispatch that the voting machine glitches were “why the results on election night are unofficial.”
The right-wing New Life Church voting glitch is interesting. Free Press reporter Marley Greiner has been tracking Blackwell’s relationship with far right-wing religious forces like Biblical America and Christian dominionist groups that want to establish theocratic religious rule in America. Blackwell was campaigning around the state with the Reverend Rod Parsley as part of a “Silent No More” tour in support of amending the Ohio Constitution to outlaw gay marriage, on the ballot as Issue One. Many mainstream commentators claim it was the widely popular Issue One amendment campaign that brought out Bush voters in record numbers in rural Ohio. Gay marriage was already outlawed by state statute, and six of the seven Ohio Supreme Court justices are Republicans.
The nonpartisan Citizen’s Alliance for Secure Elections (CASE) is investigating various other voting irregularities in Ohio, among them:
# In Auglaize County, a letter dated October 21 under the signature of Ken Nuss, the county’s former deputy director, alleges that Joe McGinnis, a former employee of Election Systems & Software (ES&S), violated election protocol with his unauthorized use of the county’s central tabulating computer that creates ballots and compiles election results. Nuss, who resigned on October 21, alleges that McGinnis was improperly granted access to the computer the weekend of October 16.
# In Miami County, with 100% of the precincts reporting at 9am EST Wednesday, Nov. 3, Bush had 20,807 votes (65.80%) and Kerry had 10,724 (33.92%). Miami reported 31,620 voters. Inexplicably, nearly 19,000 new ballots were added after all precincts reported, boosting Bush’s vote to 33,039 (65.77%) to Kerry’s 17,039 (33.92%). CASE is investigating why the percentage of the vote stayed exactly the same to three one-hundredths of a percentage point after nearly 19,000 new ballots were added. CASE members speculate that it’s either a long-shot coincidence with the last three digits remaining the same, or that someone had pre-set a database and programmed a voting machine to cough up a pre-set percentage of votes. Miami County uses an easily hackable optical scanner with the central counter provided by the Republican-linked vendor ES&S.
# In Warren County, administrators and election officials locked down the county administrative building and prohibited all independent election observers from watching the vote count. County officials cited “homeland security,” according to the Cincinnati Enquirer. WCPO-TV Channel 9 News Director Bob Morford told the Enquirer that he had “never seen anything like it.” Morford asserted that throwing the media and independent observers out of the centralized counting area under the guise of “homeland security” was a “red herring.” He said, “That’s something to put up when you don’t know what else to put up to keep us out.” In Warren County, Bush picked up an additional 12,000 votes over his 2000 election total.
# In Franklin County, where Franklin County Board of Elections Director Matt Damschroder is also the former Executive Director of the county’s Republican Party, the county Board of Elections building looked like a bunker. Scores of city buses blocked parking spaces on the street outside, numerous concrete barricades surrounded the parking lot, and a metal detector was stationed at the only entrance. A phalanx of armed deputy sheriffs swarmed the only site where provisional voters could cast a guaranteed ballot. The Columbus Dispatch confirmed an Election Day Free Press story that far fewer voting machines were present in predominantly black Democratic inner-city voting wards than in the recent primary election and the 2000 presidential election, with their lighter turnouts. The reduced number of machines caused voters to wait up to seven hours and wait an average of approximately three hours. One Republican Central Committee member told the Free Press that Damschroder held back as many as 2000 machines and dispersed many of the other machines to affluent suburbs in Franklin County.
# In rural Drake County, Kerry received 78 less votes than Al Gore in 2000, but Bush received 3000 more votes. Drake is the only county in Miami Valley where Kerry’s votes was less than Gore’s and where Bush’s vote rose dramatically.
Prior to the discovery of these irregularities, investigative reporter Greg Palast, who exposed the systematic disenfranchisement of Democratic voters in Florida in 2004, wrote an article entitled, “Kerry won.” Palast and numerous other observers point to the fact that the exit polls showed Kerry winning. Palast concludes that the exit polls were correct, but Kerry votes were far more likely to remain uncounted on election night.
Unofficial Ohio presidential results provided by the Secretary of State’s Office show 155,428 provisional ballots cast. Blackwell was all over the national news telling everyone who would listen that these ballots were randomly distributed and not disproportionately for Kerry. As former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani raved on national TV demanding Kerry’s concession, a basic analysis of the provisional ballots suggested that they were disproportionately for Kerry.
Historically, provisional ballots are far more likely to be cast by poor and minority voters, who live in the urban centers and move more often. Ohio has 88 counties, the vast majority of them rural. Kerry won 15 counties in Ohio, virtually all large urban centers. In those counties, 85,096 provisional ballots remain uncounted. Past elections point to the fact that these provisional ballots are hardly ever cast in the affluent, primarily Republican municipalities, but are overwhelmingly from the central city. Also, an additional 17,038 provisional ballots are from Hamilton County and Wood County. Bush won Hamilton with 53% of the vote and Wood County with 53.5%. Traditionally, the provisional ballots in Hamilton County come from Cincinnati and its poor central city areas. These are areas where John Kerry won handily on Election Day.
Thus, 102,134 of the provisional ballots, nearly two-thirds (65.7%) in all probability come from solidly pro-Kerry areas and are most likely cast by pro-Kerry supporters such as African Americans and the poor. These fit the same socio-economic demographics and racial profiles of voters targeted by the GOP for challenges in Ohio.
Palast also points to the 92,672 so-called “spoiled” ballots in Ohio that have yet to be counted, and may never be tallied. The most famous spoiled ballots were the 2004 Florida punch cards that could not be machine read, but when looked at manually the voter’s intent could be determined. Expert statisticians who investigated spoilage in the 2000 election in Florida found that 54% of these discarded ballots were cast by blacks. In Ohio, most of the spoiled votes were lost through punch card ballots in 2004.
By Blackwell directing county Boards of Elections not to count the provisional ballots for 11 days, it benefited the Bush campaign since an immediate counting would have no doubt made the race tigher between Kerry and Bush, and perhaps prompted Kerry to request a recount. This would have the 92,672 discarded "spoiled" ballots that were also likely to favor Kerry.
Daniel Tokaji, Professor of Law at the Ohio State University College of Law commented: "One other point. Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell has reportedly said that provisional ballots won't be counted for 11 days. I'm not sure where he's getting this, but he may be relying on ORC 3505.32. This statute provides that the boards of election are to begin canvassing election returns between 11 and 15 days after the election and ‘continue the canvass daily until it is completed.’ Perhaps I'm missing something, but I don't see how this precludes provisional votes from being counted earlier than that, even if the canvass doesn't begin until the 11th day."
Spoiled ballots will only be counted if someone with standing, such as five Kerry electors or the Ohio Democratic Party, demands and legally qualifies for a recount. Thus, the exit polls may have been correct. A majority of people voted for Kerry in Ohio; but 250,000 votes were not counted, most favoring Kerry over Bush. If Kerry had won by even one vote in Ohio, he would be the next President of the United States.
Irregularities in other key battleground states have prompted three U.S. representatives to urgently request that the Comptroller General of the United States David Walker and the General Accounting Office “immediately undertake an investigation of the efficiency of voting machines and new technologies used in the 2004 election.” Tom Hartmann, in his post election article on CommonDreams.org (“Evidence mounts that the vote was hacked”), reminds readers that Bev Harris, who started blackboxvoting.org, showed Howard Dean how to hack a county “central tabulator” computer in 90 seconds live on CNBC.
The Diebold Corporation, which helped count the Ohio vote with e-voting machines and optical scan machines, is run by a notoriously pro-Republican CEO, Wally O’Dell. Last year O’Dell wrote a letter to Ohio Republican donors telling them that he is “committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the President next year.” O’Dell is a proud member of Bush’s Pioneer and Ranger team of major donors who visit the Crawford ranch. The other major election vote counting firm is ES&S, which is being investigated for allegedly having a machine that subtracted votes when the totals surpassed 32,000.
On Election Day, the Election Protection Coalition observers who covered 58 polling places in central Ohio, documented thousands of voter complaints over long lines and recorded numerous people leaving the polls for work or because they were elderly or handicapped and physically unable to wait for hours to vote. Professor James K. Galbraith, of the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, Austin, wrote the following summary of Election Day in Ohio: “. . . I drove a young African-American voter, a charming business student, seven months pregnant, to her polling place at Finland Elementary School in south Columbus. We arrived in a squalling rain to find voters lined up outside for about a hundred yards. . . . The real problem was a grotesque shortage of voting machines.”
Ohio State University Law Professor Edward B. Foley told the New York Times, “When your lines get to two or three hours, it’s system failure.”
Other bizarre tactics emerged in the run-up to the election:
# Under an archaic Ohio law, both the Republican and Democratic Parties, or any slate of five candidates, may embed official election challengers inside polling places. The New York Times reported on Oct. 23 that the Republican Party intended to place thousands of lawyers and other GOP faithfuls inside the polls to challenge voters. Republican insiders confide here that the key goal was to jam lines and frustrate new voters. After two federal judges rejected the GOP challengers, Republicans got a favorable ruling from the Sixth Circuit, which allowed them to place challengers in Ohio polling places. Michael Beaver, Deputy State Commander with the Election Protection Coalition says, “We now believe that the challengers were a smokescreen to hide the real plan to orchestrate a machine shortage in Democratic wards.”
# The Republican Party sent letters challenging thousands of Franklin County registered voters who requested absentee ballots. Franklin County is home to Columbus, the state's largest city and its capitol. Though it is also home to Ohio State University, thousands of local students go to schools outside the county or state. The GOP targeted young voters for challenges. The GOP pre-challenged an estimated 35,000 voters and rented arenas in Cleveland and Columbus to conduct the challenges. The GOP sent registered letters to registered voters’ addresses and when they failed to pick up a letter from the Republican Party in primarily Democratic areas, they were challenged for fraud. A federal judge disallowed the challenges less than a week before the election.
# The Franklin County Board of Elections has called or written an undetermined number of voters who obtained absentee ballots, challenging their addresses. In at least one case, after a series of angry phone calls, the Board admitted there was nothing wrong with the address in question and re-instated voting rights. The voter in question was a registered Democrat. His wife, an independent at the same address, was not challenged. It is unclear how many others have been wrongly knocked out.
# Even if they are counted, Franklin County's absentee ballot forms are designed in ways strikingly reminiscent of those notorious butterfly ballots in the Florida 2000 presidential election. On Franklin County absentee ballot forms, Kerry is the third name on the list of presidential candidates on the left side of the ballot. But, the punch card is designed to fit in the middle, so the actual number you punch for Kerry is hole "4." If you mistakenly punch hole "3" you've just voted for Bush.
# Damschroder, Franklin County's right-wing Elections Director is insisting on e-voting machines that have malfunctioned in at least two Congressional elections. The machines have no paper trail and one subtracted 3% from former Rep. John Kasich’s and added 3% to Ed Brown, a six-point shift. The November issues of Popular Science and Popular Mechanics Magazines ran the following headlines on their covers, respectively: "E-vote emergency: And you thought dimpled chads were bad'" and "Could hackers tilt the election?" Vigorous protests against the paperless machines have been staged here, but many will be used, rendering a meaningful recount impossible.
# Twenty GOP-dominated Ohio counties have given wrong information to former felons about their voter eligibility. In Hamilton County, home of Cincinnati and the Republican Taft family, officials told numerous former felons that a judge had to sign off before they could vote, which is blatantly false.
# Franklin County, which normally cancels 2-300 registered voters a year for felony convictions, has sent at least 3,500 cancellation letters to both current felons and ex-felons whose convictions date back to 1998. The list includes numerous citizens who were charged with felonies but convicted only of misdemeanors.
# Republican Secretary of State Blackwell reversed a long-standing Ohio practice and is barring voters from casting provisional ballots within their county if they are registered to vote but there's been a mistake about where they are expected to cast their ballot. In this year's spring primaries, Blackwell allowed voters to cast provisional ballots by county, even if they were in the wrong precinct. But this fall, voters had to leave if they were in the wrong precinct and find their way to the right one even though they had waited in line two to three hours. Blackwell hopes to succeed Republican Bob Taft as governor, and has labored hard to install Diebold e-voting machines with no paper trail throughout Ohio. Blackwell is being widely compared to the infamous Katherine Harris, who handed Florida to George W. Bush in 2000 and was rewarded with a safe Congressional seat. Representative Stephanie Tubbs Jones accused Blackwell of seeking “to disenfranchise the people of the state of Ohio.” Tubbs Jones pointed out that the 2000 census had caused massive redistricting, particularly within inner city precincts, which would lead to many people ending up at the wrong voting site.
# The October 22 Columbus Dispatch, which endorsed Bush, and WVKO Radio have both documented phone calls from people impersonating Franklin County Board of Elections workers and directing registered voters to different and incorrect polling sites. One individual was falsely told not to vote at the polling station across the street from his house, but at a "new" site, four miles away. Under Blackwell's new rules, such a vote would not be counted. Nor do the precinct locations make much sense in the inner city. Someone living on the northwest corner of Bryden and Wilson, instead of walking half a block to the polling site at Franklin Alternative School, must vote seven blocks northeast at the Model Neighborhood facility polling site. The previous polling site for the precinct was two blocks west before the Republicans consolidated several inner city polling places in the 1990s.
# In Cincinnati, some 105,000 voters were moved from active to inactive status within the last four years for not voting in the last two federal elections. This is not required under Ohio law, but is an option allowed and exercised by the Republican-dominated Hamilton County Board of Elections.
# Secretary of State Blackwell ruled that any voter registration form on other than 80-pound weight bond paper would not be accepted. This is an old law left over from pre-scanning days. Many voters who had registered on lighter paper, had their registration returned, even though the forms had been officially sanctioned by local election boards.
# On Election Day, fliers littered the inner city telling voters that Republicans were to vote on Tuesday and Democrats on Wednesday.
No Republican has ever won the presidency without carrying Ohio. The voting irregularities suggest that Bush is the first Republican President to win the presidency without winning the actual Ohio vote. Kerry won the vote in Ohio. The exit polls are correct. The mainstream media, instead of investigating the massive irregularities, are busy concocting theories as to how all the exit polls, the safeguards for fair elections, were all wrong on election night in the Buckeye State. None dare suggest voter suppression and fraud.
--
Bob Fitrakis is a Professor in the Social and Behavioral Sciences Department at Columbus State Community College. He has a Ph.D in Political Science and a J.D. from The Ohio State University Law School. He is the author of seven books, an investigative reporter, and Editor of the Columbus Free Press (freepress.org). He has won ten major investigative journalism awards including Best Coverage of Politics in Ohio from the Ohio Society of Professional Journalists. He served as an international election observer in the 1994 presidential elections in El Salvador and was the co-author and editor of the report to the United Nations. He served as legal advisor for eight polling locations on Columbus' Near East Side for the Election Protection Coalition.
"
http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2004/983
"Why do they Hate Us?"
On Election Day, I listened to Rush Limbaugh (Holding my nose) for a couple minutes. I can't listen for more than a couple minutes at a time because blatant lies generally anger me. He imitated a caller wondering "Why do they Hate Us", to which he replied "I don't CARE why they hate us", in his Fred Flinstone, wannabe dictator tone.
If you wonder "why do they hate us" there are some explanations in this book:
Available at
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=1576753018
If you wonder "why do they hate us" there are some explanations in this book:
Available at
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=1576753018
Sunday, November 07, 2004
Was the Election a Scam?
Let's find out!
On Election Day, Greg Palast (who wrote "The Best Democracy Money Can buy", which details the Florida felon-purge fiasco in the 2000 election) said that if this time the vote came within 3 percentage points, "Call the Cops". It's time.
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
This organization was instrumental in exposing offshore ownership of some of our voting technology, the vulnerability of much of it, and the blatant conflict of interest concerning Diebold, Inc. and Ohio. Before the election.
As we speak, Black Box Voting is conducting the "most massive Freedom of Information action in history".
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
Remember Watergate? I would volunteer that the stakes are somewhat higher today.
On Election Day, Greg Palast (who wrote "The Best Democracy Money Can buy", which details the Florida felon-purge fiasco in the 2000 election) said that if this time the vote came within 3 percentage points, "Call the Cops". It's time.
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
This organization was instrumental in exposing offshore ownership of some of our voting technology, the vulnerability of much of it, and the blatant conflict of interest concerning Diebold, Inc. and Ohio. Before the election.
As we speak, Black Box Voting is conducting the "most massive Freedom of Information action in history".
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
Remember Watergate? I would volunteer that the stakes are somewhat higher today.
Bush, Rove, Schwarzenneger Nazi association
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1006-08.htm
"
George W. Bush's grandfather helped finance the Nazi Party. Karl Rove's grandfather allegedly helped run the Nazi Party, and helped build the Birkenau Death Camp. Arnold Schwarzenegger's Austrian father volunteered for the infamous Nazi SA and became a ranking officer.
"
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1006-08.htm
"
George W. Bush's grandfather helped finance the Nazi Party. Karl Rove's grandfather allegedly helped run the Nazi Party, and helped build the Birkenau Death Camp. Arnold Schwarzenegger's Austrian father volunteered for the infamous Nazi SA and became a ranking officer.
"
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/1006-08.htm
Friday, November 05, 2004
These folks helped during the McCarthy era Too:
"The re-election of George W. Bush, whose administration has shown a profound
disregard for fundamental rights, means our work is now more essential than ever.
The fact is, without a vigorous, spirited movement for freedom, their
unrelenting assault on civil liberties could change the face of our democracy."
I strongly urge you to join the ACLU.
disregard for fundamental rights, means our work is now more essential than ever.
The fact is, without a vigorous, spirited movement for freedom, their
unrelenting assault on civil liberties could change the face of our democracy."
I strongly urge you to join the ACLU.
Wednesday, November 03, 2004
You Get what They Paid For
The republic is sick. It has devolved into empire, and now theocracy, just like Rome did.
We expected Ohio to go wrong since the CEO of Diebold, inc. said he'd hand the Ohio vote to Bush.
We expected things like the computer-bug in Florida electronic voting machines yesterday, that made it necessary for some voters to select Kerry repeatedly to override an apparently erroneous resulting Bush vote (then walk away without a reciept). We suspect that many Bush votes likely resulted from that alone, thus in part explaining huge differences in official election results,from the exit polls.
We sensed a faint odor when such progressives as Ralph Nader, Howard Dean, Dennis Kucinich and Al Sharpton were effectively neutralized and silenced.
So now, You get the manufactured consent that the moneyed interests paid for.
My God, help us.
In the future, My God willing, there will be a standardized, voter-reconcilable elections system.
In the future, My God willing, there will be a de-corporatization of all political parties through the complete prohibition of private campaign finance.
In the future, My God willing, our Press will be returned to the service of the public good, as determined by an effective FCC, monitored and controlled by a legislative branch once again truly representative of the people of the United States.
In the future, My God willing, there will be myriads of investigative journalists like Greg Palast, Michael Moore, Seymour Hersh and Amy Goodman, to shine the light of truth and scatter or destroy the vermin of corruption and injustice.
In the future, My God willing, no longer will lying, cheating and stealing be the accepted means for securing power and influence over others; and that benevolence will prevail.
We respectfully ask our President and Commander in Chief, our senators and representatives, and our judges, to honor their oaths of office and thus preserve justice, liberty, and the Constitution of the United States.
We expected Ohio to go wrong since the CEO of Diebold, inc. said he'd hand the Ohio vote to Bush.
We expected things like the computer-bug in Florida electronic voting machines yesterday, that made it necessary for some voters to select Kerry repeatedly to override an apparently erroneous resulting Bush vote (then walk away without a reciept). We suspect that many Bush votes likely resulted from that alone, thus in part explaining huge differences in official election results,from the exit polls.
We sensed a faint odor when such progressives as Ralph Nader, Howard Dean, Dennis Kucinich and Al Sharpton were effectively neutralized and silenced.
So now, You get the manufactured consent that the moneyed interests paid for.
My God, help us.
In the future, My God willing, there will be a standardized, voter-reconcilable elections system.
In the future, My God willing, there will be a de-corporatization of all political parties through the complete prohibition of private campaign finance.
In the future, My God willing, our Press will be returned to the service of the public good, as determined by an effective FCC, monitored and controlled by a legislative branch once again truly representative of the people of the United States.
In the future, My God willing, there will be myriads of investigative journalists like Greg Palast, Michael Moore, Seymour Hersh and Amy Goodman, to shine the light of truth and scatter or destroy the vermin of corruption and injustice.
In the future, My God willing, no longer will lying, cheating and stealing be the accepted means for securing power and influence over others; and that benevolence will prevail.
We respectfully ask our President and Commander in Chief, our senators and representatives, and our judges, to honor their oaths of office and thus preserve justice, liberty, and the Constitution of the United States.
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