A Smelly Rat In Waukesha County

Waukesha County, Wisconsin sits astride their 8^th Senate District, the only district that failed to elect, as predicted in the polls, a Democrat, Sandy Pasch, over the Republican incumbent whose seat was challenged in yesterday’s recall election. Six senate seats were up for a vote, with three of them looking good for Democrats.

Sandy Pasch, however will not be going to Madison to replace Alberta Darling very probably because a big smelly rat exists in Waukesha county government. A rat in the person of the county elections clerk. An elections clerk that makes Florida’s former Secretary of State, Katherine Harris, look like a paragon of vote integrity.

It was in Waukesha County, it may be recalled, that suddenly “found” 14,000 votes for State Supreme Court Justice David Prosser, a Republican, last April.

It was also Waukesha County that reported a 97% voter turnout in the 2004 presidential election.

It was also Waukesha County that has 99.5% of its eligible voters actually registered to vote.

It was also Waukesha County that ended, in that county anyway, a statewide effort to conduct exit polls last night.

But with all of that, Democrats in Waukesha County are not going to go to the mat over this. Here is what Waukesha County Democratic Chair Mike Tate is quoted as saying:

"On Tuesday night, Wisconsin spoke loud and clear with the recall of two entrenched Republicans. This is an accomplishment of historic proportions that I do not wish to be overshadowed by statements regarding results in the 8th Senate District.”

And that, friends and neighbors, is why Waukesha County has had these voting irregularities for what is now 7 years. And that is why they will into the future.

McDonald’s Employees Get Political Advice with Their Paychecks

This midterm election is the craziest one I’ve seen in years, or really, maybe ever. All you hear is about the shenanigans being pulled by Republicans as they seek to bring about the rout that they are promising.

Seeking it by any means possible.

Like how Teabaggers have been seen posing as poll watchers but do all they can to harass voters before, during and after casting their early vote.

Like how Republicans are leafleting cars parked at or near polling locations in minority neighborhoods advising them not to vote a straight Democratic ticket because the voting machines have been rigged to vote a Republican straight ticket.

And this is just what we hear about in the news. Imagine what the truly stealthy tricksters are managing to pull off. Democracy as we knew it is truly going to H E Double Hockey sticks in a handbasket.

And this is just what we are hearing in Texas.

Now, come to find out, if you are a McDonalds employee in Ohio, you may get a little something extra in your paycheck envelope this week. If you work in one of Paul Seigfried’s franchises that is.

And we’re not talking about a little something extra on the check itself, we’re talking about a letter to his employees, with a McDonalds logo on it, asking them to vote for Republicans in the upcoming election.

He also enclosed a campaign flyer for Jim Renacci who is running for congress in Ohio’s 16th congressional district.

The language wasn’t even pleasant. As a matter of fact, it was just a little threatening. Take a look:

“If the right people are elected we will be able to continue with raises and benefits at or above our present levels. If others are elected we will not. The following candidates are the ones we believe will help our business move forward . . .”

And he listed John Kasich for Governor, Rob Portman for Senate and Jim Renacci for Congress.

This isn’t just harrassment, it’s downright illegal, immoral, and reflects bad manners. And I really don’t think Jesus would approve, either.

So yes, the Ohio Secretary of State is investigating, but so far there is no mention of an arrest. Just an apology from Seigfried, citing his “bad judgment.”

No, that wasn’t “bad judgment” that was a crime. It’s also bad judgment to rob a liquor store and blow away the clerk, but it’s also a crime.

An example must be made. Seigfried needs to be disciplined. If not by the State of Ohio, then the Department of Justice.

Or if not them, then McDonalds Corp. needs to strip Seigfried of his franchises.

Voting with eSlate and Justice in Texas

Do you remember back in 2007 when the Texas Democratic Party sued the Texas Secretary of State over the Hart Intercivic eSlate voting machines? About how these voting machines are programmed to possibly mishandle straight ticket votes?

Straight ticket voters, you see, are a little overzealous. They use the straight ticket choice, but then when presented with the ballot with all candidates shown, and the party line vote registered by showing the boxes next to the names filled in with red pixels, some straight ticket voters emphasize their vote by voting for their choice again.

Canceling out their vote by unwittingly deselecting their candidate of choice.

Well the TDP filed suit because of this and other things, and on August 17th of that year the lawsuit was dismissed by Republican federal district judge Sam Sparks.

Ah. Sam Sparks evidently saw nothing in the argument that a Texas voter was being disenfranchised by this particular voting machine if they used it in a way that the voting machine programmer did not anticipate.

In other words, Sparks told the TDP and Texas voters to take their suit and shove it where the sun doesn’t shine.

But imagine my surprise when I went and early voted this past Monday at my favorite Early Voting polling place, and I used the straight ticket option. I then went on to emphasize my dislike of all things Kesha Rogers by moving the cursor over her already selected box and hit the enter button to deselect that vote. Immediately a blue screen popped up with a message, and a warning that I was about to change my straight ticket vote and had deselected that particular candidate.

And did I want to go back or continue.

Sam Sparks didn’t see this particular problem as a problem, but that didn’t alter the fact that Hart Intercivic went ahead and made a change in their programming to correct this glaring infringement of voting rights.

I guess that’s how justice works here in Texas.

It doesn’t, so we all have to become codependents and alter the way we do the business of voting.

And I guess now any voter who can prove that they had their vote cancelled before now because of the problem that Sam Sparks didn’t think was a problem has standing in a new lawsuit.

Right?

The Politics of Burned Up Voting Machines

It takes a one-off event like burning up every eSlate voting machine in Harris County to reveal how Republicans and Democrats differ in the whole issue of voter fraud and voter suppression.

As it turns out if you are a Republican, you are in favor of voter fraud despite the length of time you take wailing about it, and you are also in favor of vote suppression – something that they don’t really strive to deny to any real extent.

If you are a Democrat, you are against both voter fraud and vote suppression.

Nothing could be more clear after reading this article in the Houston Chronicle about the measures being taken to avoid complete chaos in the November election.

Harris County, as it turns out, will be able to replace 2,325 of its 10,000 burned up eSlate voting machines, and will be able to have 4 of them in operation at each and every one of its 736 polling places.

Anyone who has voted with eSlate knows that 4 per polling place is not enough. So as a result, Harris County Clerk Beverly Kaufman, a Republican by the way, has adopted a “hybrid system” wherein a voter who wishes to use a voting machine will have to stand in line for that, but voters will also have the option of using a paper ballot.

They plan on printing up 1.4 million paper ballots.

“I don't think we need to be stingy with them,” Kaufman is quoted as having said.

Now come to find out, this does not sit well with Republican County Chair Jared Woodfill. Woodfill, as it turns out would have preferred to stay with a 100% voting machine system because of voter fraud.

I kid you not.

“It prevents fraud at the ballot box," Woodfill said. "If you revert back to paper, you have a lot of the issues involving voter fraud.”

County Democratic Party Chair Jerry Birnberg, by contrast, couldn’t be happier with the hybrid system, and paper ballots.

“Paper ballots are less vulnerable to fraud, Birnberg said.”

“‘In a paper ballot situation, you can always go back and manually recount,’ Birnberg said. ‘How do you recount an electronic voting machine?’”

How indeed?Like say, not being able to change the vote numbers in the little cartridges that are loaded into the vote counter. Like having a “paper trail.”

The contrast couldn’t be clearer. Republicans prefer voting machines because paper ballots are more vulnerable to voter fraud. Democrats prefer paper ballots because voting machines are more vulnerable to voter fraud.

That and the fact that a 100% voting machine environment in Harris County would mean long lines and frustrated voters all across Harris County, something that Republicans not only look forward to, but actually count on.

The verdict is still not in on how the fire at the Harris County warehouse got started. I have my suspicions, but that is neither here nor there. What is important now is to realize that whoever conceived of this failed to realize that when news hits the streets that Harris County, the most populous voter concentration in the state lost each and every one of their voting machines in a fire at a warehouse where a Republican was responsible for their storage – keeping all of their eggs in one basket, as it were – it is obvious that the Republican County Clerk will bend over backwards to alleviate the situation That she will go into panic mode to do it. And in doing so, go against the express wishes of her party chair.

Because not to do this practically invites the Justice Department to take over the whole election process in Harris County.

I guess they should have thought of that before striking that match.

When All Else Fails . . .

Burn up the voting machines.

It really can’t get more obvious than this, can it? 52 days before Early Voting starts for this pivotal 2010 midterm election, Harris County, one of the most populous counties in the state of Texas, representing 15% of those who vote in elections, lost each and every one of their Hart InterCivic eSlate voting machines in a warehouse fire on Friday.

The fire was first reported in the wee small hours of the morning.

But Houston’s arson investigators still don’t have a clue as to how the fire was started.

Hart InterCivic doesn’t have a clue either. They just don’t know how many new and used eSlate machines they have in their current inventory. Gosh darn it all, no one keeps a count, it seems.

Now there has been a lot made of the fact that Harris County, which encompasses most of the City of Houston is a Bill White stronghold, and that a voter suppression effort on the part of Republicans, you know, like burning up all the voting machines, would most probably help Rick Perry retain the Governor’s office. But I’m not so sure that this was the intent here. There is so much more at stake in 2010.

Like 3 State House seats.

With Democrats holding 73 House District seats, Democrats are just 3 seats away from taking control of the State House in 2011. Need I remind you of the fact that 2011 will be the year that Texas redraws its congressional boundaries? Need I also remind you of the fact that Texas stands to gain 3 additional Congressional seats as a result of population growth recorded by the 2010 census?

This is a huge, huge year. That we stand a good chance of replacing a rightwing reactionary Republican governor with someone who actually knows how to get things done is really beside the point.

Look at local state house races for instance. Dwayne Bohac of HD 138, entirely within Harris County is an ethics-challenged candidate who has lots of experience in voter suppression. If Dwayne Bohac can be turned out of office by Kendra Yarbrough Camarena we are a third of the way toward the goal of retaking the State House.

Likewise Kristi Thibault. Thibault took HD 133, also entirely within Harris County, away from Republican Jim Murphy in 2008 by a mere 497 votes and is set for a rematch with Murphy this fall. A loss there could offset a possible win by Camarena.

Want a formula on how to hijack an election, arguably in a local sense, an election that is actually more important than the one in 2008? First, go paperless. Have voting machines where there is no paper trail to record who actually won the election.

Then burn them all up.

Al Greene: Is It Voter Fraud?

Well it’s worse than I thought. Having an ignorant electorate nominate a virtual unknown to face Jim DeMint in the general election this fall is actually a better and more hopeful scenario than what appears to be unfolding in the post-election investigation that is now ongoing in South Carolina.

Vic Rawl, the populist Democrat who actually did have a chance to take out Jim DeMint in the fall – DeMint was going to be painted as a DC Insider – has three teams looking at the ballots that resulted in Al Greene’s nomination.

And they are finding some suspicious trends.

Trends like Al Greene actually receiving more votes in 25 precincts than there are registered voters in those precincts.

Shades of Texas.

Trends like Al Greene doing significantly better than Rawl on paperless/electronic ballots cast on Election Day, and Rawl doing significantly better than Greene on paper ballots cast by absentee voters.

Significantly better. From Politico:

“In Lancaster County, Rawl won absentee ballots over Greene by a staggering 84 percent to 16 percent margin; but Greene easily led among Election Day voters by 17 percentage points.

Trends like cast votes disappearing off the face of the earth:

“In only two of 88 precincts, do the number of votes Greene got plus the number we got equal the total cast.”

Trends like an unknown candidate receiving huge majorities:

“Greene also racked up a 75 percent or greater margin in one-seventh of all precincts statewide, a mark that Ludwig notes is even difficult for an incumbent to reach.”

Trouble is, what do you do about it? There were so many documented cases of voter fraud in the 2000 and 2004 elections, but nothing came of it. Nothing came of it except that, with electronic voting machines more common than ever, it is easier than ever to commit vote fraud at the polls.

Republican operatives were highly successful in 2000 and 2004 and got their people elected with ease in two close elections. In 2008 there were just too many votes out there and the fraud that I still believe was attempted was unsuccessful in getting the desired result. What I fear, though, is that this primary in South Carolina was just a trial balloon to see just what they can get away with – how extensive can voter fraud be before someone cries foul?