Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News Monday 6/13/05

Everyone is encouraged to participate.

If you can:

1. Post stories and announcements you find on the web.

2. Post stories using the "Election Fraud and Reform News Sources" listed here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x371233

3. Re-post stories and announcements you find on DU, providing a link to the original thread with thanks to the Original Poster, too.

4. Start a discussion thread by re-posting a story you see on this thread.



Link to previous Election Reform, Fraud, & Related News: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x376705


:hi: All previous daily threads are available here: http://www.independentmediasource.com/DU_archives/du_2004erd_el_ref_fr_thr_calenders.htm

Plans For BRAD BLOG BLOGATHON & FUNDRAISER Revealed!

A BradBlog Exclusive From Our Friend STEVE

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot


All right Bradbloggers, you asked for it (I think), so here it is: THE FIRST ANNUAL BRAD BLOG BLOGATHON & FUNDRAISER! This will be an event entirely conceived, planned and produced by at least “6 or 7” of us Bradbloggers. We’re sending the ubiquitous Mr. Friedman on vacation during the event to keep him out of our hair.

WHY: To hear from and interact with some of the important people in the Progressive movement AND to raise as much hard cash as humanly possible for the dedicated and deserving proprietor of this blogsite (while embarrassing him just a little in the process)!

WHEN: Friday, July 8th through Monday, July 11th, as follows:

Friday, 7/8/05, starting at 3pm PDT (6pm EDT) with featured activities lasting until 9pm PDT (12midnight EDT);

Saturday, 7/9/05, with featured activities lasting from 8am PDT to 4pm PDT (11am EDT to 7pm EDT) (plan is to interrupt activities for The Brad Show);

Sunday, 7/10/05, with featured activities lasting from 8am PDT to 8pmPDT (11am EDT to 11pm EDT);

Monday, 7/11/05, with featured activities starting at 8am PDT (11am EDT) and Blogathon ending at 6pmPDT (9pm EDT).

WHERE: At www.BradBlog.com and moderated by that all around gentleman and bon vivant, Mr. Winter Patriot, who has expressed a willingness to reveal his secret identity to anybody who contributes $1,000 or more to the event!

GUEST BLOGGERS: We have commitments from Larisa Alexandrovna, David Cobb, Clint Curtis, Bob Koehler, Winter Patriot and Andy Stephenson for “live” guest blogging. We are also working on another potentially very exciting “live” guest blogger and expect to have at least one more “live” guest blogger in addition to those named or pending. We have 8 potential “live” guest blog time slots so we’re asking for preferences for filling the remaining spot or spots from anyone who has an opinion.

-snip/more-

http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00001457.htm

Oakland Tribune

State likely to overlook Diebold flaws

Officials expected to OK voting system despite problems on tests

By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER

Article Last Updated: 06/10/2005

In less than a week, state officials are poised to approve a new Diebold electronic-voting system that several large counties, including Alameda, want to use.
But the system showed problems in security, protection of voter privacy and printing of a paper trail during testing this spring.

State elections authorities have obscured the full nature of those problems by blacking out parts of test reports that have been released under the state Public Records Act and declaring other documents too full of Diebold "trade secrets" for public release.

During tests in late April and early May, a chief feature of Diebold's new computerized voting machine — the ability to print out voters' electronic choices so they could be verified and, if needed, recounted — performed so poorly that the state's testing consultant concluded "this version is not ready for use in an election."

-snip/more-

http://www.insidebayarea.com/oaklandtribune/localnews/ci_2794436


Thanks to RBHam for posting the GD discussion:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3845413

HeraldNet

Published: Sunday, June 12, 2005

County ponders voting options

The County Council must decide whether to upgrade current voting machines or go to mail-only ballots.

By Jerry Cornfield
Herald Writer

EVERETT - Snohomish County must spend $1 million to make its touch-screen voting machines comply with a new state law, or it could save the money by switching to all-mail elections, according to a report that County Council members will review on Monday.

The analysis was prepared by county election officials. The council will discuss the report at a committee meeting at 1:30 p.m. Monday. No action is expected. A public hearing will be held later in the month.

Council members are facing a decision because of two new state laws.

One allows counties to switch to mail ballot elections on a majority vote of the County Council. The other requires the county to equip its electronic voting machines with devices that provide a paper record for voters to review before submitting their choices. The law takes effect Jan. 1.

-snip/more-

http://www.heraldnet.com/stories/05/06/12/100loc_vote001.cfm

Vote-recount probe raises some issues

County attorney questions accuracy of tab machines

Nedra Lindsey

The Arizona Republic

Jun. 12, 2005 12:00 AM

A Maricopa County Attorney's Office investigation has revealed inaccuracies and problems associated with a controversial vote recount that decided a race for the state House.

The investigation has yielded no charges, but a May 5 letter from Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas to Larry Pickard, chairman of the Maricopa County Republican Committee, raises questions about the recount, particularly the voting machines used to help decide the Sept. 7 District 20 primary race.

The letter, obtained by The Arizona Republic, says the County Elections Department was "seriously concerned" about the accuracy of vote-counting machines used to tally ballots during the recount. Two optical-scan voting machines used during the primary were not used for the general election, and the county's election office is considering changing the voting-machine supplier.

-snip-

During the Sept. 23 hearing, Lisa Hauser, the attorney for Orlich, argued that the new results were not attributed to markers and gel pens, but rather to a machine that did not work properly. A machine registered a variance in reading votes of up to 18 percent, Hauser said.

-snip/more-

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/local/articles/0612machines12.html

June 12, 2005

GettysbergII Reports

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x377678

Dean blasts GOP over voting rights
Support for 1965 law must be first step to court blacks, he says

By Brendan McCarthy and Jeff Zeleny
Tribune staff reporters
Published June 13, 2005


Until President Bush and top Republicans reaffirm their support for the Voting Rights Act, they should stop courting black voters and showing up in black churches, Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean said Sunday.

Dean, speaking in Chicago at a Rainbow/PUSH Coalition conference, also labeled the Fox News Channel a propaganda machine and sharply criticized the Republican Party, which he said has yet to support reauthorizing certain provisions of the Voting Rights Act that expire in 2007.

"I think it's hypocritical for the Republicans to pretend to reach out to the African-American community unless they say they are going to reauthorize what gave the African-American community political power," Dean said in an interview. "I'd love to have the president say whether he's going to reauthorize the Voting Rights Act."

After barely registering a double-digit showing among black voters nationally in last fall's election, the Republican Party has intensified its efforts to recruit African-American supporters. Chairman Ken Mehlman is engineering the party's most aggressive outreach to black voters, frequently speaking in churches and to community groups in an effort to improve the party's performance before the 2006 mid-term elections and the 2008 presidential race.

Dean said Republicans should not "pretend" to be genuinely interested in courting African-Americans until the party makes a clear statement on the Voting Rights Act.



More: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0506130160jun13,1,6181033.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed

Election Reform Bid Seeks to Create Voter's Paper Trail

(CNSNews.com) - A new attempt at election reform would force poll workers to produce a paper confirmation for each person casting a machine ballot. "This is about ensuring that every vote counts and is counted," said Patrick Eddington, press secretary to U.S. Rep. Rush Holt, a New Jersey Democrat.


Each of the nation's last two presidential elections has resulted in Democratic allegations that Republicans manipulated the voting in key states - Florida in 2000, Ohio in 2004.


Holt's bill, would amend the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) of 2002, which does not currently require paper verification of a person's vote.


"This bill has a lot of bi-partisan support," Eddington told Cybercast News Service. Actually, the bill has 132 Democratic and only 3 Republican co-sponsors (Rep. Thomas Petri of Wisconsin, Rep. Tom Davis of Virginia and Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma), but Eddington pointed out that in addition to the House Republican sponsorship, similar legislation has been passed in 19 state legislatures and proposed in another 16.


More: http://www.townhall.com/news/politics/200506/POL20050613a.shtml

Counters can help fix vote errors, Wolfe says

By: Bob Darden and Kyle Martin, Staff Writers

06/12/2005

A Republican officeholder says the discovery of 200 additional votes after the release of the initial vote count in last week's mayoral election in Greenwood is easy to explain.

Sheriel Perkins, a Democrat, initially was believed to have beaten Harry Smith, the Republican incumbent. However, after errors were found, including a 200-vote undercount in heavily Republican Ward 2, the vote figures were adjusted, and Smith finished six votes ahead.

Perkins, who would have been the city's first African-American mayor as well as its first female mayor, has not announced whether she plans to challenge the certified results.

-snip-

Phil Wolfe, the Republican Leflore County supervisor from District 1, said discrepancies such as those that occurred in Ward 2 - where poll workers initially recorded 628 votes for Smith on one of the voting machines instead of 828 actual votes - become apparent when the number of names on the precinct's signature books are compared against the "public counter" on each voting machine. "It is important to keep up with how many people have voted during the day," he said.

-snip/more-

http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=14681394&BRD=1838&PAG=461&dept_id=104621&rfi=6

Sunday, June 12, 2005 - Page updated at 12:00 AM

GOP disregards vote discrepancy

More ballots than voters?

Republicans, who made much of that and other 2004 election discrepancies in their unsuccessful court bid to unseat Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire, found themselves with the same problem at their King County convention in Bellevue yesterday.

In the 9th District, 436 voting delegates were seated — but tellers counted 444 ballots, including one abstention, in the contest between Steve Hammond and Reagan Dunn to become the party's official choice for the King County Council in the fall elections.

How did they reconcile the difference? They didn't.

-snip/more-

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2002331387_gopside12m.html

Go to the link for the video.

Edwards speaks at Rainbow PUSH;

Clinton and Kerry are no-shows


By Hosea Sanders
June 13, 2005 — Senator John Edwards addressed the Rainbow/PUSH convention on Monday. This is day three of the civil rights group's 34th annual convention at the Sheraton Hotel in downtown Chicago.


Some of the main topics are the voting rights amendments.

It is no secret the biggest star in the Democratic Party is still former president Bill Clinton. He was supposed to be here Monday, but reporters were told he had an emergency and could not make it. That made for some very, very disappointed people.

But Senator John Edwards was on hand fueling the speculation that he may seek the party's nomination in 2008. He was an unsuccessful vice presidential nominee in 2004. He is crisscrossing the country, but says it is part of an effort to reenergize the party to fight for the poor.

...snip

Rev. Jackson and Sen. Edwards say they plan to meet with so-called impoverished people here in Chicago. They say that is part of a plan to awaken a sleeping giant, and that, of course, could translate into even more votes for the democrats the next time around.

Senator John Kerry was supposed to attend the convention as well, but he opted out citing what he called a scheduling conflict.


More: http://abclocal.go.com/wls/news/061305_ns_push_edwards.html


Again, video is at the link above.

Discussion here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x377814

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3851704
Yes, I know it is not exactly election reform but we can talk about it there!

Thanks to WilliamPitt for the post

TIME AND PLACE FIXED FOR THURSDAY RALLY - new info


1. TIME AND PLACE FIXED FOR THURSDAY RALLY

2. NEW BRITISH DOCUMENTS LEAKED

On Thursday June 16, 2005, Rep. John Conyers, Jr., Ranking Member of the House
Judiciary Committee, and other Congress Members will hold a hearing on the Downing
Street Minutes and related evidence of efforts to cook the books on pre-war
intelligence. (Time and place yet to be determined.)

Later on the same day at 5:00 p.m. ET in Lafayette Square Park, in front of the
White House, a large rally will support Congressman Conyers who plans to deliver to
the White House a letter addressed to President Bush and signed by over 500,000
Americans and at least 94 Congress Members. The letter asks the President to
respond to questions raised by the Downing Street Minutes.

Among those speaking at the hearings will be: Joe Wilson, Former Ambassador and WMD
Expert; Ray McGovern, 27-year CIA analyst who prepared regular Presidential
briefings during the Reagan administration; Cindy Sheehan, mother of fallen American
soldier; John Bonifaz, renowned constitutional lawyer and co-founder of
AfterDowningStreet.org.

Among those speaking at the rally will be: Congressman Conyers and various other
Congress Members, Cindy Sheehan of Gold Star Families for Peace, John Bonifaz of
AfterDowningStreet.org, Ray McGovern former CIA analyst, Medea Benjamin of Global
Exchange, Rev. Lennox Yearwood of Progressive Democrats of America, Stephen Cleghorn
of Military Families Speak Out. More information, and flyers promoting the rally,
are available at www.afterdowningstreet.org

Flyers to print, copy, and distribute widely:

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/downloads/rally.pdf

LOCAL RALLIES PLANNED AROUND COUNTRY

Supporters of this campaign are independently organizing rallies on Thursday at
locations around the country.

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/modules.php?op=modloa...

2. New Documents

AfterDowningStreet.org has made available additional secret documents leaked from
the British government.

http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/modules.php?op=modloa...

Statements from leaders of the AfterDowningStreet.org Coalition:

"The UK Iraq War documents provide a roadmap for U.S. investigators, the media and
Congress. Shame on them if they become complicit in the coverup and do not pursue
them. It is time to interview current and former intelligence officials about
whether they were asked to 'fix' the intelligence, whether intelligence was designed
to convince people to support the already planned war or whether intelligence was
intended to provide real information about whether Iraq was a threat. Public
opinion has turned against the war -- it is now safe to report the truth."

Kevin Zeese of Democracy Rising

"George Bush may think that his lone 'accountability moment' was last November's
election, but as these new documents show that he planned all along to invade Iraq
and lie as needed, his real 'accountability moment' may be yet to come -- in the
form of a House of Representatives Resolution of Inquiry into impeachable offenses.
That resolution cannot come to soon for Veterans For Peace or for the people of
Iraq, whose deaths and suffering demand justice.

Mike Ferner, Veterans for Peace

"Progressive Democrats of America (PDA) is committed to continue to organize at the
grassroots level with this coalition to demand Members of Congress introduce a
Resolution of Inquiry directing the House Judiciary Committee to launch a formal
investigation into whether sufficient grounds exist for the House of Representatives
to exercise its constitutional power to impeach George W. Bush. Citizens from
across the country will be on the ground in Washington DC this Thursday at the
hearing and rally to demonstrate their resolve."

Tim Carpenter, Director of PDA

"My son was killed and my family destroyed by a war in Iraq that was premeditated
and prefabricated. My son was killed by people in power who wanted this invasion and
occupation at all costs. Anyone who lied to us about this invasion should be
brought to justice. I am heart broken and devastated that my son was already a dead
man by July 2002, if not sooner. We didn't even know. We had no way of knowing that
our leaders were planning to engage in this massive subversion of the United States
Constitution. I urge every person in this country with courage and integrity to
rise up and demand that the truth be finally exposed to the light and that those in
power who are responsible, including the President of the United States, be held
accountable under the rule of law."

Cindy Sheehan, Gold Star Families for Peace

AfterDowningStreet.org is a rapidly growing coalition of veterans' groups, peace
groups, and political activist groups, which launched on May 26, 2005, a campaign to
urge the U.S. Congress to begin a formal investigation into whether President Bush
has committed impeachable offenses in connection with the Iraq war.