 | ||||||||||||
| ||||||||||||
|
« Best Month Ever | Main | Subtance Versus Style » October 1, 2004Voter Fraud: Is Ohio Ground Zero?
After nine months of intense voter-registration efforts focused on Franklin County, the number of people signed up to cast ballots in the Nov. 2 election has surpassed U.S. Census estimates of those eligible.Meanwhile, also in Ohio, a criminal investigation is under way in Lake and Summit counties into thousands of registration forms turned in with fake names or forged signatures. And in Franklin County, dozens of falsified forms discovered in May resulted in the indictment of one voter-registration worker. I See Dead People America Coming Together is an organization backed by billionaire George Soros, who has donated millions to liberal and left-wing organizations dedicated to defeating George W. Bush. Reports the Cleveland Plain Dealer: There are other apparent irregularities in Lake County, like dozens of people on one street who filed for absentee ballots. "Like one entire neighborhood that says it's going to be out of town on Election Day?" [Lake County Elections Board Director Jan] Clair asked. "That seems more than a little strange, so we're going out to have a talk with some people."You can't talk to dead people. Ohio appears to be ground zero of the Left's attempt to steal the election. Posted in Voter Fraud
| Linked By |
Please support HobbsOnline by doing your online shopping at Amazon.com Comments
You can't talk to dead people. Heh. Imagine John Edward working the audience: "I see a woman in a red dress, she's voting for Kerry...." Posted by: Michael Chaney at October 1, 2004 11:14 AMBill, have you contacted a public interest law group to represent the municpalities involved against the tax exempt organizations whose conduct is causing them to incur extra expenses to work on these phony registrations? Posted by: Clarice at October 1, 2004 06:39 PMWith the NAACP involved, maybe we can invoke the RICO act. Posted by: Jakemeister at October 1, 2004 08:28 PMVoter registration procedures have changed in the last 10 or so years. Today you have motor voter rules and internet applications that are very generic as opposed to state specific. When I started registering people to vote in TN in the early 1980s, and nearly every state back then had similar laws, there was this question on the form. In fact it nearly the last question. "Have you ever been registered to vote before?" If you checked Yes you had to fill out the last page of the form which was a cancellation of voter registration. This was reguired because TN, and nearly every state, reasoned that you were registering to vote in a TN county you should cancel your voter registration in previous place of registration. Very simple. It is the law to only vote once. So TN required that the voter, if registered before, needed to cancel their old registration. In fact if one did not completely fill out the cancellation page one's voter application was rejected. The burden was on the voter to list where he was registered before and the country registrar would send that information to his old place of registration so he or she could be taken off the polls. The motor voter bill and HAVA have affectively eliminated this safeguard. TN requires a Social security number to register, but each county keeps its own registration information. I do not believe that counties supply that information to the state and certainly do not to other states so they can eliminate depublicate registrations. So the voter rolls grow and grow. In Michigan today there are 6,916,000 registered voters out of a Voting age population of 7,358,000. Thats over 93% of the eligible people are registered. Thats impossible. In 1976 in Michigan the number of registered versus Voting age population was 83%. We have a ten % increase, but turn-out numbers have dropped. In 1976 in Michigan 59.40 % of people of voting voted. In 2000 58.20% of the people of voting age voted. There was a huge increase in registration, but the % of people eligible to vote and actually voting dropped. Long story short. There are a hugh number of voters who need to be purged off the list of registered voters. I believe that most of it just the result of people moving from county to another and re-registering. Some applicants are fraulalent as shown in articles that you highlight.
Until I read Ralph's explanation one thign had never dawned on me. Having been a life long resident of East Tennessee (except during military service), I am most likely registered to vote in two separate counties (Blount and Monroe). I originally registered to vote when I filled out my Selective Service forms at age 18. At age 29, we moved to Monroe County where I filled out the registration forms. I do not recall a cancellation form at all on this registration. Whoo-Hoo, I'm ready to move to Florida! =0 Posted by: Darrell at October 2, 2004 06:49 AMAren't voter rolls routinely purged of people who haven't voted in several years? Also, do Republicans engage in voter fraud? Posted by: SemiPundit at October 2, 2004 12:39 PMRepublican voter fraud? The words just do not sound right. I do recall a story from Blount county in TN in the 1880 election. The Vote in the county was 230 Garfield (Rep) and two for the Democrats. Well the republican election commission send in the total vote as 230 republican and zero for the democrat. AS was explained at time. "blount county only has one democrat and he must have voted twice. Obvious case of fraud so we threw both votes out". Serious look at history. The big city machines, mostly democrats at all, were the big election stealers. Believe me if there was election fraud from the republicans we would hear it. Now this leads in to the purging of the voter roles. This was common at one time. Now its called disinfranchment or voter suppression. (Read the civil rights commission report removing people from the rolls. Blacks are less likely to vote, move often, and there they are more likely to be purged. Obvious prejuidance so the practice has become political) Even when the state law requires it local authorities have to do it. Some refuse and others will only purge a voter if they can get a hold of them by mailing them a postcard. Posted by: Ralph at October 2, 2004 01:52 PM> Believe me if there was election fraud Haven't you already? What about the term "bring down the vote"? The blatantly discriminatory and illegal challenges to voters that are presumed to vote Democrat? The deliberately incorrect and misleading information given to voters in areas that traditionally vote Democrat? Hell, what about the electronic voting machines made by people who admit to being partisan Republicans, that are both insecure *and* that the makers are attempting to conceal the insecurities of instead of fixing them? And then there are the deliberate outright lies, like "Democrats want to ban the Bible!" paid for openly by the RNC - which, while not "election fraud" in the same sense as dissuading and disqualifying eligible voters, are still dishonest tactics. Oh, and the rabid pundits like Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulter (who, as they are rabid, are certainly not demonstrative of average Republicans) who actually advocate and give instructions on *how* to commit election fraud by registering in multiple places to get multiple votes, because they feel that electing Bush is more important than democracy or honesty. Oddly enough, your statements here about dead people being registered to vote (a travesty, certainly) are the first I've heard about pro-Democrat shenanigans - and the only thing you have to support this being pro-Democrat appears to be that nonpartisan organisations associated with Democrats are involved in some of the cases. There's no evidence that this is strictly a pro-Democrat ploy, although the circumstances tend to suggest it. My point? If you haven't heard about Republicans actively and in an official capacity performing election fraud, you haven't been watching or listening. It's gotten to the point where I, a traditionally conservative voter, see the words "Republican National Committee" and immediately wondering what they're lying about now, and how what they're saying or doing is supposed to mislead voters. John The instances this year that have been highlighted on this site and other locations have all been associated with Democratic friendly groups. A recent book by Hugh Hewlett details prior problems with Democrats in recent elections. Mailing letters with pictures of banned bibles on them is dumb, but not fraud. Mistakes are made just like in Minnesota when the Democratic party headsquarters gave bumper stickers that said "Bush/Cheney most unpopular world leaders since Hitler". Thats not fraud thats just dumb. I look forward to any articles or real instances that show republican suppression of black votes or any other questionable activity. Posted by: Ralph at October 2, 2004 03:55 PMDeliberate suppression of the rights of black people to vote, because they tend not to be Republicans: Or this one: http://www.freep.com/news/latestnews/pm20777_20040721.htm John Pappageorge [R-Troy] in the Detroit Free Press, remarking about Republican prospects in Michigan that “If we do not suppress the Detroit vote, we’re going to have a tough time in this election.” - apart from the inherent badness of *any* political candidate attempting to cause *fewer* people to vote, Detroit is 83% black. While I won't go so far as to say that all the Republicans engaging in voter deterrents are doing so for racist reasons, I can point you to a few who openly *are* doing it for racist reasons, and I think you can make a very strong case that the policy *is* racially targeted because of the historical tendency of poor black people to not vote for tax cuts to rich white people. Posted by: John at October 3, 2004 12:18 AMAddendum: And I notice you didn't comment on the electronic voting machines made by a company run by admitted Republican partisans who are, according to internal documents, attempting to *conceal* security holes rather than close them, and whose CEO has stated in the past that any action is ethically justifiable if it allows Bush to be re-elected. I consider that on it's own to be deeply disheartening, and I consider the insistence on the use of these machines by the current administration *after* these revelations to be prima facie evidence of intent to falsify the election results. John Mr. Pappageorge did not alude to illegal suppression of the Black vote in Detroit. There are legal ways to reduce or not provide incentives to encourage people to vote. My language is as akward as his is because I want to avoid the suppression, but saying disincline people to vote is not proper englsh. In 2002 republicans tried to run again the city of Detroit in the governor's race. They said that the democratic candidate would be a tool of detroit's interest would not care about the rest of the state. bad mistake Detroit turned out big and democratic. So to the suppress that the vote in detroit in 2004 a republican would not say bad things about Detroit. State senator Pappageorge might even wear a I love Detroit button to suppress the Black vote. Certain politicians are lighting rods for turning out oppisition voters. To the suppress the vote in detroit I would not invite Jesse Helms to speak in Dearbon. It would encourage democrats in Detroit to vote. I would invite Arnold Terminator to Dearbon as it would not excite the oppisition. That's legal suppression of oppistion voters. All your links do not detail any illegal activity. Whenever one registers to vote there is a warning about its illegal to lie within intend to register or vote illegally. In TN thats the law that every voter registering must be aware of that. In fact that sign is posted, by law, at every voting location. Its illegal to try to cast a vote for anyone, but yourself. Cousin Joe may be sick, but you still cannot show up election day with his card and ID and try to vote for him. Thats not fair, but its the law. If republicans post those notices in Black precincts or hand them out to black voters its perfectly legal, dumb but legal. Doing that is a sure way to encourage black voters. It is also perfectly legal in TN for any candidate to have a poll watcher at the polls. If that watcher observes anything that arouses suspicion they can question it and the election officials have to judge the right or wrong of the situation. Perfectly legal, calling it other then that is incorrect. Louisville KY and Memphis TN (where I live) are similar. Both cities have large black populations. The black precincts in both cities have a hard time finding republican poll workers in those precincts. In KY and TN each party is entitled to have a Precinct registrar who judges the eligibility of each voter. One Demo and one Rep. These two workers can either live in that precinct or live someplace within the county. All the rest of precinct workers have to live in that precinct to work there. In Memphis we have about 90 precincts in which we cannot find a resident of that precinct to be the republican registrar. Most general elections we find a white republican to go to a black precinct in which no republican worker can be found. Perfectly legal. Same situation in Louisville. Yes in a few precincts Black democrats have been send to White precincts. The pay is $75.00 for 14 hours Some people see racist intend in this? How can you have a two party election without both parties represented at the polls. Come on lets be fair. The voting machine controvesy with Diebold is a urban myth. Its not a perfect machine, but Democratic election commissions are buying it all over the country. yes they can also provide a machine with a take home receipt, but people are reluctant to spend more money on it Dear John; Donald Correct on all counts except there was a story in the run up to last fall election in KY in the Lousville courier journal about white poll workers in black precincts. Amazing that the republican party would someone to actually want someone to represent the party on election day. Can you imagine if republicans ran elections without demos on hand. Perfectly legal. done all the time. In Florida in 2000 some people accused local police departments of suppressing the black vote when the car drove down a road by a polling station with lights flashing. Posted by: Ralph at October 3, 2004 07:30 PMThanks, Ralph, that must have been the URL I could not get. Ralph: > Mr. Pappageorge did not alude to illegal I didn't say illegal. I said dishonest, unethical, and otherwise disgusting. I find, again and again, attempts to cause people to *not* vote. To spread disinformation and falsehoods and to *outright, knowingly lie* to people in an attempt to influence their vote and, more dangerously, to cause them to be unable or unwilling to vote. > The voting machine controvesy with The evidence, trivially available from a web search and never, to my knowledge, having been even slightly discredited, suggests otherwise. Donald: Especially if you're too stupid to know how cut and paste work. This is a COMPUTER. Visiting those links, all of which work perfectly, shouldn't take you more than about six keystrokes. And you're right, I dug them up quickly. The fact that you're unwilling to read them and follow the statements therein, all of which are true regardless of whose web page they're on, tells me more about you than anything else. > leads me to believe that you are simply Hardly. I'm certainly in disagreement with you, and Ralph, and most of the rest of the people here, I think - but that doesn't change that I hold what are traditionally "conservative" beliefs on economic and foreign policy, and in local elections (Canadian, not American) tend to vote conservatively. I'm in favour of civil rights being preserved and of freedom to observe and practice whatever religion floats your ark, as it were, and quite frankly were you to give me John McCain and eliminate my worries about the dishonest practices that seem to be in place without reaction (and hence with tacit support) from above by the Republican party, I'd take him over John Kerry any day. At the same time, I see all kinds of *dis*honest electioneering on one side of the argument, down south, and very little (none at all, in fact, until the statements in this original post) on the other. I see a Democratic candidate whose policies are more fiscally conservative than the Republican's. I see a Republican candidate wasting time on a Constitutional Amendment to continue discrimination against a harmless minority, who tells us that God speaks to him and wants him to do these things, who seems unwilling to rethink his initial position on any issue regardless of evidence, and who openly supports policies, practices, and people who are, frankly, terrifying. Case in point, the "Extraordinary Rendition" clauses of Section 3032 and 3033 of H.R. 10, the “9/11 Recommendations Implementation Act of 2004” So, yeah, I'm not exactly you're standard audience around here - I only found this post through a link from a friend's site, but I've stuck around because I was surprised to see the statement that implied that Republican partisan dishonesty, and felt I had a few things to add to the discussion. This was never meant to become an argument on Bush-Kerry, because I realise how utterly futile most of those are. All I wanted to accomplish was to maybe give an answer to the statement "Republican voter fraud? The words just do not sound right." In the end, actually, *I've* gotten an explanation here about exactly what Ralph meant by that. Ralph, I still find the term "bring down the vote" rings dangerously, and I disagree with you when you state that the specific targeting of largely black ridings is not racist. I also think that "perfectly legal" is not a good excuse for dishonesty - it's perfectly legal for politicians to tell outright lies. Fox News sued and got a Florida State court ruling that deliberately broadcasting false and misleading stories was not illegal - that doesn't make it *right* to do so. Posted by: John at October 3, 2004 08:22 PMJohn Somehow my word perfectly legal has now been redefined as dishonest. Here in TN in the last twenty years that has been not one case of a republican denying a minority voter a legal right to vote. None. Look it up. AS a matter of fact every election commission in TN is composed of 3 democrats and 2 republicans. Not one legal voter has been denied his/her right to vote here. You are confusing tactics and strategies with dishonesty. I am still wondering if you have a problem with a republican working at poll in a minority precinct where 9 democrats are working at same time? Posted by: Ralph at October 3, 2004 09:26 PMNo, I wasn't redefining your word. I was misunderstanding your use of "fraud" to include unethical actions as well as illegal ones - a colloquial use, not a literal one. This was my mistake, and I will happily concede that I am not aware of any illegal tactics being officially resorted to be any side, and that I was not using the definition of "fraud" that you intended. As well, I'm not "confusing" tactics and strategy with dishonesty. The two are not opposites - one can follow a strategy and remain honest, or follow a strategy and be dishonest. Lying to voters is dishonest. Intimidating voters is dishonest. Attempting to convince voters to not vote as opposed to voting intelligently is certainly undemocratic, and usually done by dishonest methods. A strategy that involves these things may, in fact, work, but it is still dishonest. > I am still wondering if you have a That alone, no. If they're challenging, say, every black voter (but no white voters) or every voter here (but no voters in other areas) then it most definitely appears that they're abusing the principle behind checking voters. If their actions while working at the polling station are causing legitimate voters to be uncomfortable, or intimidated, or are causing delays such that legitimate voters are being inconvenienced or, worse, turning away from the station, then I have a problem with that. And I have exactly the same problem with Democrats or Green Party or Libertarians doing exactly the same thing - my objection to the tactics is nonpartisan. I simply *don't see* reports of anyone but Republicans resorting to such tactics, and I've looked - and, while looking, I see a consistent pattern of Republicans engaging in this behaviour going back, as Donald put it, more than 40 years. Somehow, I think the principle has gotten lost along the way. Posted by: John at October 4, 2004 01:10 AMJohn, cut & paste never seems to work for me. Don't know why, but it is not stupidity. > it took me only a few minutes to check The thing is, you *didn't* check. I passed you quick links that, despite their sources, contained verifable information all compiled in one place. > If you had said Canadian Conservative in Quite possibly, but I think that's more because "conservative" in the USA has moved far, far right from where it was, say, 50 years ago, mostly on religious issues. The common pattern is to describe the new ultra-right movement as "neoconservative", while "traditionally conservative" was what I was using to express that I'm much more in favour of small government, individual freedom, free trade, equality of opportunity, and the proper role of government to be ensuring these things. If that means financial aid for students or welfare, or anti-monopoly investigations, so be it - but those should be kept as small in scope as they can while still maintaining the effectiveness and clarity of goal. I doubt, honestly, that this is so far away from what you believe on non-religious issues - but I often joke that an American politician on the far-right is a guy who thinks abortionists should be prosecuted for murder and that every schoolboy should have a handgun, and a ultra-right Canadian politician thinks that marijuana *shouldn't* be legalised. > The simple fact that you figure I find the RNC to consistently be verifiably lying to me in their material. I find consistent attempts to gloss over and obscure facts. I tend to find far fewer cases of such in the DNC material - and, in the one I linked to, their facts check out. They've got a spin on it, but *everyone* has a spin, and if you can't look at it and try to compensate for the spin, you're never going to get anywhere. > shows that you are truly one-sided in I try to look at both sides. I find it helps. Besides, if I were going to be trolling, I wouldn't go left. That's too easy to catch on to. *Real* trolls on blogs like this go ultra-right and just take Ann Coulter-like stances. Agree with you, extend your statement beyond what you intended into an area you never wanted it to go, and call you a traitor and anti-American if you say "But that's not what I meant!" Posted by: John at October 4, 2004 10:41 AMJOhn 40 years of tactics. I am 47 so I only a a feel for what has gone on in the last twenty years or so. My expirence has been done that lone white republicans working in all black precincts do not challedge, but one or two voters per election day. I myself only challedged one person. He was attempting to vote at a location in which he had lived for years. State law in TN is that when you move you must change your voter registration within a certain time period. The Black election judge agreeded with me and denied him that right to vote there. He had drivers license and other ID that did not reflect the address to which he was registered. Prior to 1996 every southern state had its election processes controlled by local and state democratic parties. Even today every TN election commission is 3-2 democratic. Now the freedom riders of 1964 to 1969 were all trying to register blacks to vote in the south. Blacks were also provided from voting in the south based on questions that had to be answered at the polls. All the southern states at the time of the freedom rides were controlled by the Democrats. All the Jim crow laws were written by democrats. I think you need to look up your history. Since the republicans have done better in the south, since 1980, elections are much more honest. The problems that Black voters use to have registering have ended. I do not know about the north, but here in Memphis the local chairman of the election has been black democrat for 20 years. Yes he also purchased some of those diebold machines that you wondered about Posted by: Ralph at October 4, 2004 12:13 PMJohn; I went back, again to all of your sites. Hey, it's a little late, but I got a new one for you about Republicans engaging in election fraud. http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/14/nevada.registration/index.html I even made it clicky for you. If anyone is still watching this thread, at least. Post a comment
Comments Policy: Your comment is subject to deletion if it is off-topic or includes foul language or personal attack. Readers, please email me if you find comments that include egregious violations of this policy. Comments may not post immediately - do not post twice!
|
|||||||||||
