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DNC and Voter Suppression
An anonymous reader points to this Drudge Report story about an election day manual specifying aggressive tactics to be used in the event of any election problems. While Drudge says the Democrats are planning to "declare voter intimidation -- even if none exists", that's not what the manual says.
Isn't it enough that most of our politicians are lawyers, now we're going to have them deciding the outcome of the elections as well. Even Tricky Dick Nixon conceded in 1960 rather than send the country down such a slippery slope.
What's worse? Being overly-proactive in being ready to resist voter fraud or actively engaging in it?
And the Drudge Report? C'mon! Can I get my conspiracy theory about TWA Flight 800 posted as a story?
Maybe politics.slashdot.org is one giant piece of flamebait. Is there no room left for rational discussion?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
that slashdot links to a story from Drudge.
...oh nevermind
Thank god its...
That man tried to kill mah Daddy
How can this even remotely be called "voter intimidation"? Who is being encouraged or pressured not to vote? This looks like nothing more than the DNC calling on all citizens to raise a hue and cry whenever they experience vote fraud.
And I hate to be the one to break the story, but Drudge isn't he most reliable of sources...
If this is true, it makes sense. The country wasn't ready for the last electoral debacle and it caught many by surprise. In this case pre-emption may just be a good thing. Especially in states with E-Voting.
Question everything. Don't trust anyone. Damn, I'm beginning to sound like Fox Mulder.
"In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act!" -- George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair)
not like your bias shows or anything. Why don't you also mention the 4-5 DNC voter fraud articles referenced in your previous post today?
/. subscriber, I'd cancel today.
If I was a paying
BC
What it IS is fraud; the whole notion of the "pre-emptive strike" is to allege voter intimidation even when there is none.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
So what's your idea of good journalism? CBS?
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
The problem, some casual readers might think this is a professional news site and not realize its a news & gossip site from a man (Matt Drudge) with right wing view.
If you go over to Drudge.com You can read the Drudge Retort, a counter view from the left side.
I read many blog/news/gossip sites, but I like to know the views of the editors and owners. Would you blindly trust everything you read on the Internet? Most sites are not non-partisan, they lean and have viewpoints which cloud true reporting of the issues.
True non-partisan sites like Factcheck.org and Spinsanity.org have cleared up a some "Sound bites" from both sides. Why can't I get a news channel like this?
-
Partisan
Slashdot used to have a technical slant. now it is becoming a political rant.
I don't mind seeing stories about how the diebold voting machines are crap, as they are computers.
But i don't care about how the Republicans or Democrats are going to cheat, because they are both doing the same thing so it should be a zero sum cancellation of votes.
Aren't there any good new OSS or security holes that we can talk about?!
It seems like words are clearly being twisted here.
I read the page in question as calling for hardcore supporters to proactively spread the word about election fraud that can and has occurred in the past, so as to minimize its effect should it occurr again, with a DNC slant of course, but what do you expect?
This shouldn't be a real concern. It can be seen as being properly prepared. At worst it's the equivalent of blitzing supporters with exaggerated one-liners for why you must vote for their party.
Ho-humm.
What the memo said is that they should pre-emptively raise claims of voter fraud even if there wasn't any evidence yet.
This isn't a story about voter suppression its a story about the Dem's trying to get results they don't like tossed out by the courts. Much the way they handle news and facts they don't like.
To call this voter suppression is to detract from the story and render it a straw man.
That isn't an unreasonable interpretation of what the manual is advising as a practical matter. It says ""If no signs of intimidation techniques have emerged yet, launch a pre-emptive strike," and then urges a P.R. offensive which would include getting civil rights leaders to denounce tactics of which there are "NO SIGNS" - that sounds to me like "complain about voter intimidation even though there are "no signs" that it exists.
Republicans and Democrats don't trust each other for good reason. Republicans think that Democrats stuff the ballot box with fraudulent votes... dead people, illegal aliens, people voting in multiple times in different jurisdictions etc. THERE IS A LOT OF TRUTH TO THIS.
Democrats for their part think that Republicans try to suppress turnout. For instance by putting out false information about voting requirements and locations and excessive challenges to the validity of voters. THERE IS A LOT OF TRUTH TO THIS.
The two types of bad behavior have a certain synergy... Everything that Republicans do about their legitimate fear of fraud is seen as further instances confirming Democrats legitimate fear of suppression and vice versa. For instance: Republicans convinced there is fraud going on (which is often true) are excessive in their efforts to purge the polls, those challenges are seen by Democrats as intimidation (which it often is), the more Democrats complain and insist on laws that prevent purging the rolls the more Republicans are convinced that the fix is in. Around and around it goes.
The document doesn't say to make false allegations of intimidation. What it says is that in jurisdictions where intimidation and misinformation has happened in the past be proactive. It says to make sure that the media reports on the past unethical activities so that people are both watching out for it and aware of their rights as voters.
Chris Kuivenhoven is a thief, beware
Oh, sorry. I forgot I was on /.
.jpg posted has NOTHING about claiming intimidation where it does not exist.
Anyway, the
NOTHING.
It's all about making sure everyone (particularaly minorities who have been targetted in the past) knows the past attempts so that if they are attempted again they will not work.
But if this manual is real, I have to say that I am ashamed to be associated with whoever wrote it or intended to follow it.
Don't worry. I'm sure they feel the same way about people who won't read the material and, instead, listen to what other, biased, sources say about it.
It said people should pre-emptively issue a press release reviewing the past Republican tactics.
It said people should pre-emptively issue a press release quoting other people denouncing such tactics.
It said people should pre-emptively prime people with talking points for the media.
It said people should pre-emptively express their concern.
It said people should pre-emptively warn newspapers about false or misleading ads.
Hmmm, nothing at all about what you said it said.
Seems that you've lied.
Your analogy would be accurate, except that there are sufficient past cases of Republican interference.
You have no evidence that GodHead ever beat his wife nor that anyone in his family ever beat their wives. Nor that anyone he knows ever beat their wives.
Yet there are sufficient examples of past Republican problems. So saying that people should be watching for CURRENT Republican problems is just fine. (and prudent)
The destruction of voter registration cards is CRIMINAL, and worthy of no lesser punishment than death.
So, if you witnessed someone destroying a voter registration card, what reason would they have not to kill you?
You are completely correct in what the document says.
/.). Spin is about emotion.
.jpg be, in any way, interpreted to mean "make false accusations"? No.
What it actually says.
The words printed upon it and what those words mean.
BUT! That has nothing to do with the attempts to spin it by various people (as seen here on
Could the posted
So people will say that it says that anyway and hope that other, less intelligent, people react emotionally and will not bother reading the material dispassionately.
That's politics. It's just like religion. For many people, it is part and parcel of their religion.
I guess you missed the following in your thorough reading of the manual. "If no signs of intimidation have emerged yet, launch a "pre-emptive strike"
.jpg)
.jpg in full. In no place does it say what you claimed it said.
No, I read that. And then I read the actions recommended. And they're short so I won't have to "summarize" them like you did. (Strange how your "summary" uses more words than were on that
If you bother to read the rest, it basically says that, if there is no evidence that voters were intimidated, do everything you can to "suggest" that they were.
Nope, it says (and I quote):
2. If no signs of intimidation have emerged yet, launch a "pre-emptive strike" (particularly well-suited to states in which there[sic] techniques have been tried in the past).
- Issue a press release
i. Reviewing Republican tactic used in the past in your area or state
ii. Quoting party/minority/civil rights leadership as denouncing tactics that discourage people from voting
- Prime minority leadership to discuss the issue in the media; provide talking points
- Place stories in which minority leadership expresses concern about the threat of intimidation tactics
- Warn local newspapers not to accept advertising that is not properly disclaimed or that contains false warnings about voting requirements and/or about what will happen at the polls
Nothing at all about, as you claim, "if there is no evidence that voters were intimidated, do everything you can to "suggest" that they were."
If you have evidence to the contrary, bring it to the table.
I did. I quoted the
But that's not unusual for Bush supports to do. :)
:D
After that "pre-emptive strike" comment, it give two very specific examples of what to do.
Neither of those examples matches what you claim. But it's not surprising that a Bush supporter would have to lie about the facts.
* Democrats claim Bush will reinstate the draft. Despite two bills introduced by Democrats, Bush absolutely claims that no draft will be done, even going as far as to explain that the draft would be contrary for their plans for better trained, more mobile army.
* It was Democrats, not Republicans, who actively lynched blacks in the South for voting, who instituted poll taxes and reading requirements. Republicans are the ones who fought them and instituted federal rules on who is and is not allowed to vote, and prosecuted the lynchings by the Democrat Ku Klux Klan. (Yes, that's right, most KKK members were democrats!)
* It was Democrats, not Republicans, who managed the counties where the voters were reportedly disenfranchised in Florida during the 2000 election scandal. The butterfly ballot was approved by democrat election officials. This claim was unsubstantiated because it didn't happen, yet they continue to insinuate it.
* It was Democrats, not Republicans, who want illegal aliens and non-citizens to vote. They impose the "don't ask, don't tell" policy for motor voters, where even the forms cannot state the requirements for voting.
* It is Democrats, not Republicans, who have told the elderly that if Bush is elected, their social security check would disappear. Newsflash: They are still getting their social security checks.
* When someone comes along and says, "Maybe we should purge the rolls of inactive or moved voters, or at least verify people's identity before they vote" it is Democrats, not Republicans, who scream bloody murder and say we are trying to disenfranchise voters.
I'll get modded down, and I know it, but those who browse at -1 will get to see the truth.
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
Drudge Report is right as often as Dan Rather, maybe even moreso. He broke the story on Monica Lewinski, when Dan wouldn't. He also broke the story on Juanita Broderick, a woman who was raped by Bill Clinton. He breaks a lot of stories that the major news outlets won't touch.
Casual readers are encouraged to consider the bias of Drudge.com by reading DrudgeReport.com and checking up on his stories. I have spent the time to follow a lot of his stories to excruciating details, and I have yet to find one that didn't pan out.
The flight 800 thing? How do you deny the testimony of witnesses that say they saw a missile strike the jet? How is reporting that NOT news?
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
render it a straw man.
Much the way you did in suggesting that the Democrats are the only party that seeks redress in the courts?
Funny, isn't it?
Bush makes bashing trial lawyers a near platform plank, and yet he's already set a raft of them loose. You have got to admire the balls behind the hypocrisy.
To be fair, Kerry has his own legal army as well; but then again, I think he's got a pretty good reason to be cautious.
At the rate we're going, we won't need to vote in 20 years. They'll just have a trial, with the winner take all.
I'm not tense. I'm just terribly, terribly, alert.
they are challenging because the nader supporterts (ie: republican groups) have been using fraudulent signatures to get him on the ballots. cite some proof otherwise or STFU.
we know already.
republicans are the spawn of lucifer himself and democrats are all budda.
republicans will burn in hell and democrats will get little stupas built over them.
come on, the are f^ckers on both sides of the aisle and in between. get over it and prosecute the criminals, whoever their golden god is.
always mosh clockwise
Earlier this week former employees of Sproul & Associates (operating under the name Voters Outreach of America), a firm hired by the Republican National Committee to register voters, told a Nevada TV station that their supervisors systematically tore up Democratic registrations.
The accusations are backed by physical evidence and appear credible. Officials have begun a criminal investigation into reports of similar actions by Sproul in Oregon.
Republicans claim, of course, that they did nothing wrong - and that besides, Democrats do it, too. But there haven't been any comparably credible accusations against Democratic voter-registration organizations. And there is a pattern of Republican efforts to disenfranchise Democrats, by any means possible.
Some of these, like the actions reported in Nevada, involve dirty tricks. For example, in 2002 the Republican Party in New Hampshire hired an Idaho company to paralyze Democratic get-out-the-vote efforts by jamming the party's phone banks.
But many efforts involve the abuse of power. For example, Ohio's secretary of state, a Republican, tried to use an archaic rule about paper quality to invalidate thousands of new, heavily Democratic registrations.
That attempt failed. But in Wisconsin, a Republican county executive insists that this year, when everyone expects a record turnout, Milwaukee will receive fewer ballots than it got in 2000 or 2002 - a recipe for chaos at polling places serving urban, mainly Democratic voters.
And Florida is the site of naked efforts to suppress Democratic votes, and the votes of blacks in particular.
Florida's secretary of state recently ruled that voter registrations would be deemed incomplete if those registering failed to check a box affirming their citizenship, even if they had signed an oath saying the same thing elsewhere on the form. Many counties are, sensibly, ignoring this ruling, but it's apparent that some officials have both used this rule and other technicalities to reject applications as incomplete, and delayed notifying would-be voters of problems with their applications until it was too late.
Whose applications get rejected? A Washington Post examination of rejected applications in Duval County found three times as many were from Democrats, compared with Republicans. It also found a strong tilt toward rejection of blacks' registrations.
The case of Florida's felon list - used by state officials, as in 2000, to try to wrongly disenfranchise thousands of blacks - has been widely reported. Less widely reported has been overwhelming evidence that the errors were deliberate.
In an article coming next week in Harper's, Greg Palast, who originally reported the story of the 2000 felon list, reveals that few of those wrongly purged from the voting rolls in 2000 are back on the voter lists. State officials have imposed Kafkaesque hurdles for voters trying to get back on the rolls. Depending on the county, those attempting to get their votes back have been required to seek clemency for crimes committed by others, or to go through quasi-judicial proceedings to prove that they are not felons with similar names.
And officials appear to be doing their best to make voting difficult for those blacks who do manage to register. Florida law requires local election officials to provide polling places where voters can cast early ballots. Duval County is providing only one such location, when other counties with similar voting populations are providing multiple sites. And in Duval and other counties the early voting sites are miles away from precincts with black majorities.
Next week, I'll address the question of whether the votes of Floridians with the wrong color skin will be fully counted if they are cast. Mr. Palast notes that in the 2000 election, almost 180,000 Florida votes were rejected because they were either blank or contained overvotes. Demographers from the U.S. Civil Rights Commission estimate that 54 percent of the spoiled ballots were cast b
Registration never made voter rolls (10/15/04)
Eighteen-year-old Michele Black won't let anything get in the way of her right to vote in the Nov. 2 general election.
Black tried to register to vote for the first time last month when a worker for a voter signup group approached her at Wal-Mart.
Black said she registered as a member of the Republican Party. She didn't know the name of the voter sign-up group. An official told her Wednesday that her voter registration never arrived.
Continued...
In Colorado
False registration is going to cause registrations that are legitimate to get thrown out, causing cries of voter disenfranchisement. If that's not encouraging vote fraud by deed, I don't know what is. And it's being done by a group that considers themselves to be champions of everyman. This group pays their employees to collect Democrat and unaffiliated registrations. Do you really think that every Republican registration is being turned in? Voter registration needs to be left out of the hands of these partisan groups - on BOTH sides.
I'm going to add this because I think it's important to get out the message, and I don't think that everyone will read to the bottom of the article:
A Colorado nonprofit has set up a hot line for voters who believe they've been unfairly turned away from the polls this election. The nonpartisan http://fairvotecolorado.org/ has assembled a team of six volunteer attorneys in Denver - and others in at least 12 outlying counties - to assist voters starting Monday, when early voting begins. They're reachable toll-free at 888-839-4301.
Colorado, a state which typically votes Republican, is extremely proactive as far as protecting voters rights on both sides. If your state doesn't have this sort of service, find out why!
Denver Isuzu Suzuki
Really. Did you bother to read it?
I still disagree. I think it is wrong to single out one group here, whether it be the dems or pubs.
It was put out by the DNC. Did that little tidbit pass you by?
I think it is very reasonable to make a broad statement saying to watch for any interference.
You would be correct if I said that or if any non-partisan organization/individual/whatever said that.
But it was put out by the DNC. Again, did you somehow manage to miss that little fact? It's only in the title of this story.
Your reasoning just expand the rift between the political parties.
Again, it was put out by a political party. The DNC specifically.
Did anyone notice the offsets of the text?
Wolfsheep: Political
I think they cobbled together pieces to show it was a Colorado manual with directives to immediately challenge votes. Either that, or a very bad printer! I put an analyzed photo on my political page.
Life is irony, and nothing ever goes as planned.
ACORN is misbehaving in Minnesota too.
Denver Isuzu Suzuki
This is rediculous. Please tell me where the manual says to "Declare voter suppression even if there is none"! It says that in states where voter suppression has, in the past, been a problem, the public should be made aware of it so that it can be stopped. Watch out! People are trying to ensure voter's rights! Oh no! Democracy!!
If there is no evidence of voter intimidation, why would you issue a press release saying that the Republicans have done stuff in the past and here are the things to look for etc.? Why would you start having leadership comment on it to the press? That's the kind of thing that you do when there IS evidence of voter intimidation, not when there IS NOT any evidence. Basically, if there isn't any evidence that the other side did anything wrong, just try to convince people that they "might have done it". Very Rove of them.
Think of it as a history lesson.
They are making the public aware of history so they are not doomed to repeat it.
That is a very legitimate goal.
"I'll have a Guinness, no wait, make that a Coors Light" -Grad student I work with, who shall remain anonymous...
OK, listen dude. It's a serious crime since it interferes with the exercise of democracy and government, even having a theoretical outcome of voting in some crazy that could change the law to put me to death for being too tall.
But it's never ever a capital crime. I'm against the death penalty for civilians, but even that is only used for murder.