Forum Post: Action Alert - Don't Let Repelicans Steal The Election
Posted 11 years ago on Sept. 14, 2012, 5:47 p.m. EST by ZenDogTroll
(13032)
from South Burlington, VT
This content is user submitted and not an official statement
Action Alert: Don't let Republicans steal the election for Mitt Romney
Ohio has emerged as the latest front in the Republican scheme to derail democracy by disenfranchising millions of voters. Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, a Republican, in a blatant partisan move to steal the election for Mitt Romney, is trying to put an end to early weekend voting before Election Day. This change in Ohio election practices specifically impacts minority and low income voters.1
It's not just Ohio. It's also Florida and Pennsylvania. Earlier this summer, CREDO Action members signed over 87,000 petitions and made over 1,600 phone calls urging Senator Patrick Leahy, the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to hold Congressional hearings on brazen Republican efforts to steal the 2012 presidential election in other key battle ground states like Florida and Pennsylvania. With Republicans showing no sign of slowing down their tenacious efforts to steal the election, we're escalating our call for Senator Leahy to hold hearings to investigate the GOP effort to suppress the votes of millions of voters in key battleground states across the country.
Tell the Senate Judiciary Committee: Hold emergency hearings on Republicans' schemes to steal the presidential election in key battleground states.
A prominent Ohio Republican state official has already openly admitted that Husted's efforts to shut down weekend voting would result in African Americans voters having a more difficult time voting.2 A federal district judge struck down Husted's effort to restrict early voting during the three days before the election, and after initially resisting that court order Husted backed down for the time being, pending appeal in higher court.3
But the crisis is not over. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit that will be reviewing the district court decision to strike down Husted's efforts to restrict early voting is "a Republican-leaning court with a history of partisan decisions benefiting the Republican Party."4
The situation in Ohio is crucial given its recent history in Presidential elections. In 2004 hundreds of thousands of predominantly minority and Democratic voters were disenfranchised on Election Day due to massive lines and "widespread electoral dysfunction."5 As Ari Berman reported in the Nation:
According to one survey, 174,000 Ohioans, 3 percent of the electorate, left their polling place without voting because of the interminable wait. (Bush won the state by only 118,000 votes).6
In response to the mess on Election Day in 2004, Ohio reformed its electoral process by adding early voting before Election Day, leading to a "much smoother experience" in 2008.7 The opportunity to vote early led to record turnout for African American and low income voters.
Now the Republicans in Ohio are working to disenfranchise thousands of those voters in racially diverse urban centers such as Columbus, Cincinnati and Cleveland. The restriction on weekend voting is specifically aimed at disrupting minority voters - for example, African-American churches historically rally their congregants to the voting booth on the Sunday before the election.8
Tell the Senate Judiciary Committee: Hold emergency hearings on Republicans' schemes to steal the presidential election in key battleground states.
The Republican elections officials in Ohio, along with their counterparts in Florida and Pennsylvania, should be trying to help more eligible voters participate in the democratic process, not disenfranchise minorities and the poor.
With Congress returning from summer recess this week, Senator Leahy needs to get the message from as many Americans as possible that it's not okay for Republican elections officials in Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio - or any other state -- to engage in systematic effort to disenfranchise U.S. citizens for the explicit purpose of swinging the election to Republican Mitt Romney in November.
Let's keep the pressure on Senator Leahy to hold a public hearing on the GOP war on voting today.
Thank you for standing up for the right to vote.
Action Alert: Don't let Republicans steal the election for Mitt Romney
- Aviva Shen and Adam Peck, "Ohio Limits Early Voting Hours In Democratic Counties, Expands In Republican Counties," ThinkProgess.com, August 10, 2012.
- Aviva Shen, "Ohio GOP Election Board Member: Our Voting Process Shouldn't Accommodate Black Voters," ThinkProgress.com, August 19, 2012.
- Ryan J. Reilly, "Ohio Secretary Of State Backs Down On Early Voting," TalkingPointsMemo.com, September 7, 2012.
- Ian Millhiser, "BREAKING: Federal Court Strikes Down Ohio Law Restricting Early Voting," ThinkProgress.com, August 31, 2012.
- Ari Berman, Ohio Early Voting Cutbacks Disenfranchise Minority Voters," The Nation, August 8, 2012.
- Ibid.
- Ibid.
- Gene Demby, "Black Pastors Group Criticizes Ohio For New Rules That Limit Early Voting," HuffingtonPost.com, August 14, 2012.
.
You can stand up for the right of African Americans to vote - or you can be a putz. That is entirely up to you.
.
Protecting early voting isn't enough. We need to make election day a national holiday.
[Removed]
You know Zen, there was once some talk about tying one's drivers licence to voting. You don't vote and your license is revoked for x amount of time. That would surely have gotten a big turnout at the polls. But then nothing came of it and it died away.
There surely has to be some way to force a bigger turnout at the polls during national elections. I'm convinced that if there were big turnouts that the (R)s would be defeated every single time, since they are such extremist far-right conse(r)eligious zealots that reasonable centrists would vote sanely and put them out to pasture most of the time (at least that would be my guess).
[Removed]
The fact that people have a SSN and still have to regsiter is total bullshit as well. Tax the fuckin shit out of em, but make them fill out forms for access to the booths. Total bullshit.
Good point
If there are still voting machine computers without a REAL paper audit trail - we will lose
A computer programmer can do amazing things
I wonder who programs & builds these machines
[Removed]
Is there really some threat of Bain & co controlled E voting machines? Have you heard this.?
This guy testifies that it can easily be done.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4aKOhbbK9E&feature=youtube_gdata_player
We are doomed.
Yeah. Whether it's pencil and paper, computers, or counting stones from a bag, election fraud goes back a long, long way. Every election cycle the power-elite get more and more slick at getting away with it. Anytime they don't get away with it you can just count yourself lucky.
I don't feel real lucky.
Don't lose hope. As of this moment, things look promising.
http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/2012/romney-vs-obama-electoral-map#map
Huff post & other electoral maps as well as many polls show that the battleground states are still with Pres Obama.
We will see. At this time and through next week Pres Obama is supposed to be gaining momentum. So we'll be watching.
[ from a computer programmer with decades of experience]
Three steps to winning the election
[Removed]
The cheating is the only real threat to beating the right wing wackos.
And you believe that the US GOVERNMENT which consists of both Republicans AND Democrats-liberals and conservatives-would actually allow such a scenario to take place and FINANCE it? That there aren't MASSIVE backup protocols in place?
Or are you trying to convince everyone that computer programmers haven't been studied and observed and trailed by the CIA and the FBI for years? Ever been to DEF CON? The idea that "all the hackers" vote the same way or are all in one political party is hilariously naive.
Do you know ANYTHING about Diebold? or Chuck Hagel's election? ANYTHING ?
Heard of Al Franken?
"If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines"
by Thom Hartmann
Maybe Nebraska Republican Chuck Hagel honestly won two US Senate elections. Maybe it's true that the citizens of Georgia simply decided that incumbent Democratic Senator Max Cleland, a wildly popular war veteran who lost three limbs in Vietnam, was, as his successful Republican challenger suggested in his campaign ads, too unpatriotic to remain in the Senate. Maybe George W. Bush, Alabama's new Republican governor Bob Riley, and a small but congressionally decisive handful of other long-shot Republican candidates really did win those states where conventional wisdom and straw polls showed them losing in the last few election cycles.
Perhaps, after a half-century of fine-tuning exit polling to such a science that it's now sometimes used to verify how clean elections are in Third World countries, it really did suddenly become inaccurate in the United States in the past six years and just won't work here anymore. Perhaps it's just a coincidence that the sudden rise of inaccurate exit polls happened around the same time corporate-programmed, computer-controlled, modem-capable voting machines began recording and tabulating ballots. But if any of this is true, there's not much of a paper trail from the voters' hand to prove it.
You'd think in an open democracy that the government - answerable to all its citizens rather than a handful of corporate officers and stockholders - would program, repair, and control the voting machines. You'd think the computers that handle our cherished ballots would be open and their software and programming available for public scrutiny. You'd think there would be a paper trail of the vote, which could be followed and audited if a there was evidence of voting fraud or if exit polls disagreed with computerized vote counts.
You'd be wrong.
The respected Washington, DC publication The Hill (www.thehill.com/news/012903/hagel.aspx) has confirmed that former conservative radio talk-show host and now Republican U.S. Senator Chuck Hagel was the head of, and continues to own part interest in, the company that owns the company that installed, programmed, and largely ran the voting machines that were used by most of the citizens of Nebraska.
Back when Hagel first ran there for the U.S. Senate in 1996, his company's computer-controlled voting machines showed he'd won stunning upsets in both the primaries and the general election. The Washington Post (1/13/1997) said Hagel's "Senate victory against an incumbent Democratic governor was the major Republican upset in the November election." According to Bev Harris of www.blackboxvoting.org, Hagel won virtually every demographic group, including many largely Black communities that had never before voted Republican. Hagel was the first Republican in 24 years to win a Senate seat in Nebraska.
Six years later Hagel ran again, this time against Democrat Charlie Matulka in 2002, and won in a landslide. As his hagel.senate.gov website says, Hagel "was re-elected to his second term in the United States Senate on November 5, 2002 with 83% of the vote. That represents the biggest political victory in the history of Nebraska."
What Hagel's website fails to disclose is that about 80 percent of those votes were counted by computer-controlled voting machines put in place by the company affiliated with Hagel. Built by that company. Programmed by that company.
"This is a big story, bigger than Watergate ever was," said Hagel's Democratic opponent in the 2002 Senate race, Charlie Matulka (www.lancastercountydemocrats.org/matulka.htm). "They say Hagel shocked the world, but he didn't shock me."
Is Matulka the sore loser the Hagel campaign paints him as, or is he democracy's proverbial canary in the mineshaft?
In Georgia, Democratic incumbent and war-hero Max Cleland was defeated by Saxby Chambliss, who'd avoided service in Vietnam with a "medical deferment" but ran his campaign on the theme that he was more patriotic than Cleland. While many in Georgia expected a big win by Cleland, the computerized voting machines said that Chambliss had won.
The BBC summed up Georgia voters' reaction in a 6 November 2002 headline: "GEORGIA UPSET STUNS DEMOCRATS." The BBC echoed the confusion of many Georgia voters when they wrote, "Mr. Cleland - an army veteran who lost three limbs in a grenade explosion during the Vietnam War - had long been considered 'untouchable' on questions of defense and national security."
Between them, Hagel and Chambliss' victories sealed Republican control of the Senate. Odds are both won fair and square, the American way, using huge piles of corporate money to carpet-bomb voters with television advertising. But either the appearance or the possibility of impropriety in an election casts a shadow over American democracy.
"The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which all other rights are protected," wrote Thomas Paine over 200 years ago. "To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery.."
That slavery, according to Hagel's last opponent Charlie Matulka, is at our doorstep.
"They can take over our country without firing a shot," Matulka said, "just by taking over our election systems."
Taking over our election systems? Is that really possible in the USA?
Bev Harris of www.talion.com and www.blackboxvoting.org has looked into the situation in depth and thinks Matulka may be on to something. The company tied to Hagel even threatened her with legal action when she went public about his company having built the machines that counted his landslide votes. (Her response was to put the law firm's threat letter on her website and send a press release to 4000 editors, inviting them to check it out.
"I suspect they're getting ready to do this all across all the states," Matulka said in a January 30, 2003 interview. "God help us if Bush gets his touch screens all across the country," he added, "because they leave no paper trail. These corporations are taking over America, and they just about have control of our voting machines."
In the meantime, exit-polling organizations have quietly gone out of business, and the news arms of the huge multinational corporations that own our networks are suggesting the days of exit polls are over. Virtually none were reported in 2002, creating an odd and unsettling silence that caused unease for the many American voters who had come to view exit polls as proof of the integrity of their election systems.
As all this comes to light, many citizens and even a few politicians are wondering if it's a good idea for corporations to be so involved in the guts of our voting systems. The whole idea of a democratic republic was to create a common institution (the government itself) owned by its citizens, answerable to its citizens, and authorized to exist and continue existing solely "by the consent of the governed."
Prior to 1886 - when, law schools incorrectly tell law students, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that corporations are "persons" with equal protection and other "human rights" - it was illegal in most states for corporations to involve themselves in politics at all, much less to service the core mechanism of politics. And during the era of Teddy Roosevelt, who said, "There can be no effective control of corporations while their political activity remains," numerous additional laws were passed to restrain corporations from involvement in politics.
Wisconsin, for example, had a law that explicitly stated:
"No corporation doing business in this state shall pay or contribute, or offer consent or agree to pay or contribute, directly or indirectly, any money, property, free service of its officers or employees or thing of value to any political party, organization, committee or individual for any political purpose whatsoever, or for the purpose of influencing legislation of any kind, or to promote or defeat the candidacy of any person for nomination, appointment or election to any political office."
The penalty for violating that law was dissolution of the corporation, and "any officer, employee, agent or attorney or other representative of any corporation, acting for and in behalf of such corporation" would be subject to "imprisonment in the state prison for a period of not less than one nor more than five years" and a substantial fine.
However, the recent political trend has moved us in the opposite direction, with governments answerable to "We, The People" turning over administration of our commons to corporations answerable only to CEOs, boards, and stockholders. The result is the enrichment of corporations and the appearance that democracy in America has started to resemble its parody in banana republics.
But if America still is a democratic republic, then We, The People still own our government. And the way our ownership and management of our common government (and its assets) is asserted is through the vote.
On most levels, privatization is only a "small sin" against democracy. Turning a nation's or community's water, septic, roadway, prisons, airwaves, or health care commons over to private corporations has so far demonstrably degraded the quality of life for average citizens and enriched a few of the most powerful campaign contributors. But it hasn't been the end of democracy (although some wonder about what the FCC is preparing to do - but that's a separate story).
Many citizens believe, however, that turning the programming and maintenance of voting over to private, for-profit corporations, answerable only to their owners, officers, and stockholders, puts democracy itself at peril.
And, argues Charlie Matulka, for a former officer of one of those corporations to then place himself into an election without disclosing such an apparent conflict of interest is to create a parody of democracy.
Perhaps Matulka's been reading too many conspiracy theory tracts. Or maybe he's on to something. We won't know until a truly independent government agency looks into the matter.
Why yes, I know. Except that Thom Hartmann wrote that article in 2003.
A recent article from Thom's website indicates that George Soros is now the problem- http://www.thomhartmann.com/forum/2012/04/george-soros-will-control-your-votes-coming-presidential-election
The article on the Thom Hartmann site that you reference
[was not written by Thom Hartmann'()
It was written by a blogger!
The TH article- written by him - is from 2003 - and shows the Rs rigged the machines
Actually all it shows is that Hartmann really, really believes that. His allegations never went anywhere and there was no proof that he was right.
But I'm sure if the Democrats win then you'll be perfectly fine with the machines that were voted on.
proof - voting machine fraud
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T32eRtxEiRw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDbnzpXvTkQ
No. Videos of opinion. Clint Curtis has a very...er...um....strange history and NOTHING was ever proven.
Again, if the Democrats win, you'll be perfectly fine with the machines that were voted on-EVEN THOUGH YOU BELIEVE that those machines can be compromised. It wouldn't even cross your mind to question the results if the results turn out the way you want them to.
http://cosmiclog.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/10/18/14515701-report-sees-decline-in-voting-glitches-but-vote-by-mail-sparks-concern?lite
Since when did the election become a hot topic of occupy
Since if Romney is elected you can probably hang it up for Occupy (at least in the US). Zero chance for Glass-Steagall to be put back. Zero chance for Wall Street cleanup. Zero chance for repeal of Corporate personhood. With Obama, at least there might be some small chance if we are very lucky.
Skirting the law, has now become the GOP way of doing business.
Ignoring court orders?
Hell those are for the little people.
Gotta keep those liberals away from the booth.
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/10/18/1038521/despite-court-order-ohios-gop-election-chief-is-still-cutting-back-early-voting/
Didn't they used to call themselves the "law and order" party?
Not any more.
[Removed]
Now the are punctuating the suppression with Romoney/GOP endorsed voter intimidation.......
I repeat.......Romoney/GOP endorsed "intimidation!
If threatening to fire people for their vote isn't intimidation, what is?
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2012/10/18/1046021/walsh-intimidate-workers-romney/
Nothing is too low for an asshole.
[Removed]
That will depend on how effective the intimidation is.
[Removed]
i thought i heard early voting was being pushed by Romney and that it was helping him. That was on the news sometime ago. guess they changed their minds
also as a note they got the states wrong with the voter "suppression" law petition that comes up
Its being pushed by both parties here, and honestly is causing a lot of confusion.
yeah i was called by both parties thanking me for for getting my early voting ballot. weird times with this election
Cutting back early voting is bullshit.
So is appealing judges who decided that indef detaining AMERICANS is illegal.
Looks like we dont have a lot of options.
Bullshit how?
You offer a lot, with absolutely no proof, or explanations.
Just propaganda terms.
Oh yeah indef detention is related to suppressing the vote.
Reaching a bit?
At least this Pres has never used the indef det authority (only your boy Bush did),
And has beat back many repub efforts at suppressing the vote!
Signed and forwarded.
[Removed]
Signed and tweeted.
QE3 dropping, when it wasnt even needed, is all the proof you should need that the bankers favorite bullshitter is a lock for round two.
You put too much faith in the voting system. It's 100% controlled through public opinion through the media.
[Removed]
Well, then please explain your thoughts on it. This should be interesting.
Wake up. BoA and Wells contributed 20m to the DNC. And the banks just guaranteed 40B a month till the end of the year.
Why would they like Obama so much?
No one has gone to jail. The bombs are still dropping. A 1Trillion stimulus funded by goldman Sachs.
And most importantly....He still has everyone believing in him.
The last thing we need is the Fed printing more money. Unless you like screwing future generations.
This post should be flagged and removed.
[Removed]
He's just doing his job protecting republicans
[Removed]
[Removed]
[Removed]
[Removed]
just a mock up doll designed not to be taken seriously
to discredit poets and long hairs
That was a joke dude. And your boy Obama is pretty much a lock at this point, so I wouldnt worry too much about Mittens stealing it.
[Removed]
I do. And also think that making people register to begin with, and not allowing felons to vote, trump this issue by a very large margin. Much larger numbers of people screwed on election day.
But those two things have bipartisan support, so the media doesnt cover it, so no one talks about it.
And if they deem that ID's are needed, then ID's should be free. Otherwise it can be considered a poll tax.
Not only should they be free they should also make it easy to get.
Paranoid bullshit.
It is too late and the Rep have already stolen the election. Right now Romney stands at 51% and obama at 44% and he is sliding faster into the cesspool. Too bad, but the good news is, that four years with an absence of a leader soon we will have one again. Thanks again for your support of the GOP and the TP
Not according to this as of today