A Call for Democrats to Honor Stephanie Tubbs Jones by Spotlighting January 6, 2005

Last week’s death of Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones should have meant so much to every American. Unfortunately, her greatest gift to American citizens and Democracy was largely ignored in the eulogies and obituaries of the mainstream press. It is no wonder, since acknowledging her gift would also reveal their failure to tell us the story when it happened.

Even sadder, Democrats, too, have shied away from acknowledging the Congresswoman’s significance, because then they would have to face their greatest failure AND greatest vulnerability for the 2008 election.

Still, here we are in the week of the Democratic Convention, and the tragedy of Stephanie Tubbs Jones leaving us while still young must surely warrant a dedicated moment of Honor before the world, and this timing gives Democrats – who should be sick of having their votes and elected offices stolen – the opportunity to shine a light on that glorious day, January 6th, 2005, when Congresswoman Tubbs Jones dared to stand up before the joint session of Congress to challenge the Ohio electoral vote count from the November 2004 election.
"Mr. Vice-President, I seek to object to the electoral votes of the State of Ohio."

Unlike 2000, when Vice President Al Gore had to dismiss the challenges raised by many Representatives -- because no Senator was willing to provide the necessary signature -- this time Senator Barbara Boxer rose alongside the Congresswoman. And in that moment, according to one of the few functioning journalists of the time, Bob Fitrakis of the Columbia Free Press, the Voting Rights movement was born.

Congresswoman Tubbs Jones continued, speaking to the House (my emphasis):

I’m duty-bound to follow the law and apply the law to the facts as I find them, and it is on behalf of those millions of Americans who believe in and value our Democratic process, and the right to vote, that I put forth this objection today. If they’re willing to stand at polls for countless hours in the rain as many did in Ohio, then I should surely stand up for them here in the halls of Congress.

This objection does not have at its root the hope or even the hint of overturning the victory of the president, but it is a necessary, timely, and appropriate opportunity to review and remedy the most precious process in our democracy. I raise this objection neither to put the nation in the turmoil of a proposed overturned election, nor to provide cannon fodder or partisan demagoguery for my fellow members of Congress. I raise this objection because I am convinced that we as a body must conduct a formal and legitimate debate about election irregularities. I raise this objection to debate the process, and protect the integrity of the true will of the people.

With this action that day, the report written by Congressman John Conyers, Jr. and the House Judiciary Committee Democratic Staff, based on the hearings they held in Ohio throughout December 2004, entitled Preserving Democracy: What Went Wrong in Ohio, was entered into the Congressional Record.

Still, the Voting Rights movement has been mostly an internet movement, and to this day, the most important issue facing us this November is still largely unknown to most Americans. It is not Iraq (or Afghanistan, or Iran, or now Russia), nor the Economy, nor Healthcare – no, not even Global Warming.

It is Election Theft, as demonstrated so clearly in Ohio in 2004 (see report above).

While it is not a partisan issue, per se, because ultimately all sides lose if we forfeit the value of the vote, the evidence indicates the beneficiary of voting machine errors, voter intimidation tactics, voter registration list purging, etc., has consistently been Republican candidates, from Bush/Cheney in 2004 to Congressman Brian Bilbray in San Diego County in 2006. Karl Rove's RNC operatives, and their corporate partners, have been very busy and very effective. And the more they get away with, the harder it will be to stop this corruption of the one tool that gives Americans Hope - their vote.

Yet, despite evidence brought forward by courageous election officials and Secretaries of State, computer scientists, data experts, citizen activists, and a few remaining investigative journalists and communicators, such as Mark Crispin Miller, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Greg Palast, Brad Friedman, Stephen Rosenfeld, Dan Rather, and Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, most Americans have no idea how frightening real the problem of election theft is.

Why? Because the Democrats themselves have failed to demand fair and accurate elections. This is where they are, as accused, weak on National Defense.

You see, National Defense is not about weapons aimed at other countries. It’s not about wiretaps aimed at citizens.

National Defense needs to be about BRIGHT LIGHTS aimed at the treacherous actions of partisan operatives to manipulate election results.

National Defense should be about BROADCAST MICROPHONES aimed at those who have investigated, and those who have witnessed, and those who have been turned away when they tried to vote.

So, if the Democratic Convention this week has a goal of putting Barack Obama in the White House, then those Democratic leaders who stand before the world need to be willing to say:

We will not let this election be stolen. Our votes will be counted accurately. We now know what has happened before, and this time we won’t be intimidated into conceding.

Stephanie Tubbs Jones told Bob Fitrakis in a 2005 interview:

Here I was placed. I’m the only African American member of Congress in the state of Ohio. I’m in a position to raise the issue. If I don’t, then God’s gonna say, "Why would I put you there if you didn’t have -- if you didn’t do it?"

So, Senator Clinton, you can do this. You can shake the rafters by honoring your dear friend and outspoken supporter, Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones. This could be the greatest gift you give all Americans, the sign that you are a true leader.

Kennedys all, come forward. You know the truth. One of your own, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. has already stood up, and so should the rest of the family - what a powerful statement.

Senator Biden, we know you have the chutzpah and we love you for it. Demonstrate it immediately and it will make a difference.

Barack Obama, you must address this boldly, now, in this venue, because you are very much at risk to be the next failure, and that would break the hearts of all who have been newly encouraged. From Hope to utter devastated cynicism, because you would not do what our late Congresswoman showed up must be done. As you can do.

I call on all of you to speak up.

And I call on all of you readers to contact Senator Clinton, the Kennedys, Senator Biden and Senator Barack Obama, and tell them it is time to stop the Republican destruction of Democracy by declaring that you will not tolerate Election Theft, you will not accept manipulated results, and you will demand Election Justice.

When you doubt that this issue is serious, then watch the movie Uncounted by Dale Earnhardt, go to a screening of Stealing American: Vote by Vote by Dorothy Fadiman, read Loser Take All, listen to podcasts from Voice of the Voters, and go to www.BradBlog.com and www.GregPalast.com.

Then speak up.

Friday Questions for Diane, June 6, 2008

Regarding Senator Clinton as Obama’s veep, I would like to shine a light on the McCain campaign’s hiring of Timothy Griffin. Mr. Griffin was one of those chosen to replace the fired U.S. Attorneys – he was the one known as “Karl Rove’s assistant” and he was specifically put in Arkansas, the better to dig up Clinton dirt. He also resigned suddenly on the day investigative reporter Greg Palast turned over Griffin’s emails from the RNC full of voter caging lists to House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers, Jr.
Isn’t it clear that Rove is drooling over the concept of Clinton ruining the Obama ticket?

Here's someone who could further energize Obama's ticket and would fit in perfectly with his announced intention to not accept lobbyist money: ROBERT F. KENNEDY, JR.

That would be a powerful and deeply satisfying Democratic ticket.

Friday Questions for Diane, May 28, 2008

How can Senator Clinton proclaim herself the voter's advocate in Michigan and Florida -- then sit back while her backers attack Nancy Pelosi for stating her superdelegate vote will support the voter's choice?

***

Kudos are in order again for House Judiciary Committee Chair John Conyers, Jr. for paying attention to evidence that former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, a Democrat, was indicted and imprisoned on trumped up bribery charges, under pressure from Karl Rove. Conyers's committee will hear testimony from Siegelman personally in May.

Meanwhile, in another Judiciary/White House conflict, it was announced that the White House was not going to bother to try to locate the missing emails, because it was too difficult.

Is there no shame in that fortress?
***

Last Friday the Miami Herald reported that Roger Stone, infamous RNC operator and friend of Karl Rove, admitted to turning over information he'd gathered on Eliot Spitzer to the FBI last November, just weeks after he'd had to step down from his consulting job for the New York State Republican Party after he'd been caught making threatening phone calls to Eliot Spitzer's elderly father.

Stone was previously involved in the phony riot in Miami in November 2000 that shut down the recount, political stunts with Rove in Texas, and is considered by many analysts to be the anonymous messenger who delivered the two Texas National Guard memos to Ret. Lt. Col. Bill Burkett that were then handed over to Dan Rather's team -- thus bringing down Dan Rather, the 60 Minutes II team that revealed Abu Gharab, and discrediting the National Guard officer who witnessed the scrubbing of Mr. Bush's military records.

It seems to me that it is Mr. Stone, not Mr. Spitzer, who is more dangerous to society.

***

Last Friday the International News Service reported that following Vice President Cheney's visit to Saudi Arabia, the Saudis have held meetings to discuss how to deal with nuclear fallout from attacks on Iran.

The national media has reported that Cheney has backed down from his aggressive plans because of U.S. public opinion, but his "SO?" shows us how little regard he has for us.

Can he be stopped?

Let All the Whores Be Revealed

Today Rob Kall of OpEd News, responding to the reported bidding war between Penthouse and Hustler for access to the prostitute in the Spitzer sting, wrote: Spitzer's Whore Should Not Make A Nickel...

I commented:

Neither should the other Whores. . .

Like the mainstream media that looked the other way when John Conyers, Jr. was holding hearings in December 2004 in Ohio (and sooooo many other times). . .

Like Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter, Tucker Carlson, etc. -- who knowingly distort information to gain favor with the rich and powerful. . .

Like Colin Powell, who was informed by military analysts prior to his United Nations speech that the aluminum tubes were NOT for uranium processing . . .

Like Condoleeza Rice, who -- I can't even begin to list her frightening incompetence, lies, and defensive obfuscations as both National Security Advisor and Secretary of State -- but there was an eery window into her pscyhe when in 2004 New York Magazine reported that at a Washington social event Miss Rice tripped on her words, referring to GWB as "my husb--" before finding the term "President Bush" - this from a woman who has never had an occasion to use the term "my husband". . .

Like every White House appointee who got the job because of ties to industry, Karl Rove, and/or the neoconservatives. . .

Like the Christian Right, who believe they are above Christ's message of compassion and the Golden Rule. . .

Like "Christians United for Israel" -- the lobbyist group founded by Pastor John Hagee (who recently endorsed McCain), which strongly supports Israel's attacks on Hamas, Lebanon and urges attacks on Iran -- while praying for the Rapture/Armageddon, which coincidentally brings the wiping out of the Jewish people. . .

Like the arms manufacturers, who know about the carcinogenic, chemically poisonous vaporized depleted uranium they have let loose . . .

Like all the other Deciders who choose pollution and wealth over the survival of their own progeny -- I mean, really, what can Dick and Lynne Cheney, and their daughter Elizabeth (a chip off the old Vader) and her husband Philip Perry, be telling the grandkids? Just how big are they making that underground safehouse?

Still, even more important than the whores. . .

THE PIMPS.

While it is extraordinarily pitiful to watch yet another man lose everything over the need to get unauthorized, immature, cheating, naughty sex (rather than evolve into an honest meaningful responsible compassionate sexual relationship with his spouse)...

It is also obvious that powerful wealthy interests found Spitzer to be a very testy problem. In addition to Bush and the mortgage bankers, there's also Shell Oil/Giuliani/Broadwater, Roger Stone, and probably many more.

As the truth creeps out, we may end up thanking Spitzer for his weakness, because the light will shine on so many more Pimps and Whores who have been parading as legitimate entities and people, and give us the chance to clean up our system of democracy.

Whatever Spitzer's testosterone was doing, it wasn't for prostitution he was targeted. . .

After spending a couple of early morning hours Googling the likes of John Fund, Michael Garcia, and Roger Smith, I went to my email and there was an email from Greg Palast, entitled "Eliot's Mess and the $200 Million Bailout" -- now available on his website here -- with that cutting edge of brightly lit clarity. Others got close but he nailed it. Uh-gain.

Greg found Spitzer's greatest crime: daring to point the finger at the greatest culprit of our times, Mr. Bush, and his own part in protecting the predatory bank thieves while ignoring the ambushed victims.

If you read nothing else, read Palast's story.

Meanwhile, back in the shooting gallery, I also found an angle that probably carries some weight as well -- though I'm sure Greg's revelation is at the very core.

In fact, the mystery of who would have targetted Spitzer reminds me of Agatha Christie's "Murder on the Orient Express" -- where it turns out that all the suspects murdered the victim that night. They each had strong reasons, and each did the deed.

By Tuesday morning I'd submitted the following to OpEdNews, where it was posted on Wednesday:

*****

Spitzer and the Giuliani Shell Game

March 12, 2008

Is there a connection?

Shell Energy Company, in partnership with TransCanada Corporation, has a proposal awaiting approval by Elliot Spitzer that would allow the companies, working as Broadwater Energy, to build and operate a floating liquified natural gas terminal in Long Island Sound.

The terminal, a 1215 foot barge, could provide Connecticut and New York with a billion cubic feet of the liquified natural gas per day, but, as the Government Accountability Office reported in February of 2007, could also become a firebomb of huge proportions.

This year, Broadwater Energy launched an intense media campaign designed to sway public opinion about both the project and the company, with large publicized donations to Long Island United Way, and a blitz of commercials citing questionable studies and claiming customers will see huge economic savings.

However, the ads have also drawn a backlash, with both local activists and public officials calling for the New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo to investigate the dangerous “false advertising”.

Worth noting is that the campaign was created by none other than Rudy Giuliani’s own Giuliani Partners LLC – hired on to provide security and strategic planning services less than a week after the 2004 presidential election. According to Eric Hatzimemos, a managing director of the firm, “Security, safety, & reliability have been top priorities for Broadwater from the outset.”

This comes from the same law firm that lobbies for the Indian Point Nuclear facility (“as safe as a facility can be”) to be relicensed despite multiple security and safety problems, and for respiratory gas mask manufacturers to be immune from lawsuits for failure to provide protection.

After years of battles between environmentalists and industry, in February all eyes were on New York Governor Elliot Spitzer.

He, in turn, claimed to be waiting for the New York State Department to provide its review of the vast information presented from both sides, due on February 12th. But on February 7th, the State Department announced it had made an agreement with Broadwater which granted a 60 day extension of the deadline to allow for “further discussion of what is a very complex proposal”.

The next day, the New York Department of Environmental Conservation issued its second Notice of Incomplete Application letter to Broadwater Energy, noting that Broadwater’s response to the first Notice was entirely inadequate. Documentation on emissions calculation was lacking, and even with design changes, the barge was projected to destroy 274 million aquatic organisms annually.

Less than a week later, Spitzer was customer number 9.

On March 5, though they did not yet have the required approval of Spitzer and New York State, Shell announced it was ready to begin setting up contracts for purchasing the liquid natural gas that would be brought to New York and Connecticut.

Did they already know they’d won?

*****

Then, at work yesterday, I listened to NPR's The Diane Rehm Show, and her hour on Spitzer. One of her guests was John Fund, from The Wall Street Journal, who uses as a noteworthy credential his authoring the book, of "Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy." So already I know this is one of THOSE guys, the guys pushing the phony crime that is supposed to distract from the real method of election theft and provide fodder for Bush's "good" U.S. Attorneys.

Coming back from a break, Diane turned to Fund with a question. This is how it went:

DR: John Fund, is there any indication whatsoever that because of Eliot Spitzer’s behavior and his pursuit of Wall Street ne’er-do-wells that somehow he was targeted?

JF: I think the real targeting came from his personality and his style. THERE IS NOT A SINGLE PERSON IN NEW YORK STATE GOVERNMENT OR IN MANY BUSINESS CIRCLES WHO DIDN'T THINK ELLIOT SPITZER WAS A JERK -- and I’m being very specific here. He would yell and intimidate, threaten people. I mean he told one person I’m going to drive a stake through your heart. He basically said get out of my way to ano– to an assemblyman, saying I’m an f’ing steamroller. He managed to alienate people in his own party, people who would normally have ideological affinity for him. He had anger management issues. So I think that If you end up with 3 enemies in your life you’ve got, you know, an irritant; if you have 30 enemies you have a problem; and if you have 300 enemies eventually people are just going to try to remove you from the stage. I don’t think he was targeted; I think he took himself out because his behavior was so extreme and so far out of the bounds. And I think– I hope we get to some discussion of his civil liberties record here because he did go after some bad guys on Wall Street, he did do some good, but he went to more and more marginal targets, less and less substantial targets, and I think really rode roughshod over due process laws.

****

Okay, I know I just pointed out how many enemies he had, but Fund was so absolute and clearly wanted the public to understand that Spitzer deserved to be hated by reasonable people.

Once a pathetic propagandist. . .

****

So I wrote to Diane's show, in time, I hoped, to have the email read during today's Friday 2-hour review of the week's news:

Let's see, who would want Spitzer gone? Maybe Shell Oil and Giuliani, who are together fighting to get New York to approve an incredibly dangerous liquified natural gas barge in Long Island Sound.

Or maybe even Mr. Bush, who -- as the BBC investigative journalist Greg Palast pointed out -- Spitzer called the "Predator Lenders Partner in Crime" just THIS WEEK in The Washington Post, just before Bernanke provided $200 billion to rescue bankers.

Whatever Spitzer's testosterone was doing, it wasn't for prostitution he was targeted.

****

Meanwhile, on another of the many fronts, on Monday night we heard about Spitzer and prostitution, instead of hearing Congressman John Conyers, Jr. demanding that former White House aides Harriet Myers and Joshua Bolten obey the law and respond to Congress -- announcing the law suit against the two:

"We will not allow the administration to steamroll Congress. Under our system of checks and balances, Congress provides oversight of the executive branch to make sure that government power is not abused. The administration’s extreme claims to be immune from the oversight process are at odds with our constitutional principles on which this country was founded, and I am confident the federal courts will agree."

Phew. There's still hope.

Justice Demanding Justice

March 10, 2008 Press Release:

(Washington, DC) - Today, the U.S. House of Representatives General Counsel filed a civil lawsuit on behalf of the House Judiciary Committee to enforce subpoenas issued by the committee seeking information on the U.S. Attorney firings. The defendants in the case are former White House Counsel Harriet Miers and White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten who were cited by the House for contempt of Congress last month. Last week, the Justice Department refused to present the House-passed contempt citations to a grand jury, contrary to federal law. Based on the House resolution that also found Bolten and Miers in comtempt, the committee is now filing the civil lawsuit to enforce the subpoenas.

"We will not allow the administration to steamroll Congress," Conyers said. "Under our system of checks and balances, Congress provides oversight of the executive branch to make sure that government power is not abused. The administration’s extreme claims to be immune from the oversight process are at odds with our constitutional principles on which this country was founded, and I am confident the federal courts will agree."

Miers and Bolten violated their obligations under committee subpoenas by refusing to appear before the committee or to provide subpoenaed documents. The lawsuit was filed this morning in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia and will be served on Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolton. The Judiciary Committee, as plaintiff, is asking the court to find the following:

(1) Ms. Miers is not “immune” from the obligation to appear before the committee in response to a duly authorized, issued and served committee subpoena;

(2) Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten must produce privilege logs identifying all documents withheld on grounds of executive privilege;

(3) Executive privilege does not cover documents not involving the president or undertaken directly in preparation for advising the president or whose contents are widely-known, previously released or previously the subject of extensive, authorized testimony, and that Ms. Miers’s and Mr. Bolten’s claims of executive privilege are, in any event, overcome by the committee’s compelling need for the subpoenaed testimony and documents.

(4) that Ms. Miers is required to appear before the committee to respond to questions put to her pertinent to the investigation and to invoke executive privilege only if and when appropriate;

(5) that Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten are required to provide, as required by the subpoenas, a detailed privilege log, identifying by author, recipient, date and subject matter those documents responsive to the subpoena that have been withheld on executive privilege grounds;

(6) that Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten are required to produce all non-privileged documents responsive to the subpoenas.

"I do not take this step lightly," Conyers said. "It is extremely rare that Congress must litigate in order to enforce subpoenas and no compromise can be reached. Unfortunately, this administration simply will not negotiate towards a compromise resolution so we must proceed. I look forward to a quick and favorable ruling by the court, so that we can complete our investigation."

The civil lawsuit is the latest step in the year-long investigation into the firings of nine U.S. Attorneys and related matters. Nearly one dozen Justice Department officials have resigned since evidence in the investigation became public, including former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales. Documents turned over by the department indicate that the White House played a substantial role in the development and execution of the plan to force U.S. attorneys to resign.

Contempt Complaint

Rocky's Activism Created by a Tethered Press and Uninvolved Citizenry

by Barbara Bellows-TerraNova, PDA/Utah
Posted by Progressive Democrats of America

Ross C. (Rocky) Anderson left office Monday January 7, 2008 as his second four-year term as mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah, expired. He plans to move his activism into the private arena--Rocky joined the PDA advisory board in September 2007--and has plans to start a non-profit organization serving humanity. PDA extends our hearfelt appreciation to former Mayor Anderson for his courageous stand against the Iraq war and occupation and his leadership on impeachment.

Rocky Anderson's last day as mayor of Salt Lake City included his signature, as well as the signatures of Mimi Kennedy, Tim Carpenter, Ralph Nader, Daniel Ellsberg, Harry Belafonte, and other noted activists, on a letter delivered to Congressman John Conyers, Jr., Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, urging him to investigate the abuse of power by the Bush/Cheney administration.

It was the cherry on the sundae that has been Rocky's double duty as mayor and U.S. citizen/activist. While many in Salt Lake have responded enthusiastically to Rocky's call to protest Mr. Bush's visits to the city, others have been annoyed and have encouraged phone campaigns against the activist mayor.

If these people in Salt Lake are displeased with Rocky Anderson's involvement in protests against the Bush administration and the impeachment movement, they should look to the poor job done by a press that was held back by a few newly-consolidated owners receiving favors from that same administration. Either it was the press-or a public that didn't care to pay attention.

Things would surely have turned out differently if Americans had known, for example, about:

-the dismissal of the 1991 insider-trading investigation by the Security Exchange Commission, whose Chairman was old family friend and Bush Sr. appointee, Richard Breedan, into George Bush's sudden dumping of his Harken Oil stock for $848,000 before informing shareholders about the company's financial losses;

-the lack of an investigation into Cheney's insider-trading when he cashed out his stock options at Halliburton for $20 million before the stockholders were informed of the asbestos-injury lawsuits that came with Cheney's arrangement of the company's buyout of Dresser Industries;

-the fact that the riot that shut down the vote recount in Dade County, Florida, on November 22, 2000, was actually manned by Republican aides and operatives flown down from D.C. in Enron and Halliburton jets, whose success was celebrated at a Thanksgiving banquet where they were serenaded by Wayne Newton;

-the 2003 report by the EPA Inspector General stating that the White House altered the wording of the post-9/11 EPA statement on the air safety in Manhattan to completely change its meaning, resulting in the horrendous, debilitating medical problems, suffering and deaths of the courageous first responders, EMTs, cleanup crew, and other workers and residents of New York City;

-the sell-out of every federal agency's purpose with the appointments of industry lobbyists throughout;

-the Office of Special Plans, where appointees from the militarily aggressive Project of the New American Century (whose University of Chicago professor/mentor, Leo Strauss, taught that it was best to subdue the public with "Noble Lies") cherry-picked through discredited intelligence data to build up a threatening Saddam Hussein;

-the multi-level, vast series of irregularities in the 2004 election, which were immediately exposed in the December hearings in Ohio by Congressman John Conyers, Jr., and the Democratic minority, culminating in the January 6, 2005, objection by Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs-Jones and Senator Barbara Boxer to the certification of the election. Conyers' report was inserted into the Congressional Record;

-the largest, record-breaking, donations to the 2005 Bush inauguration by the home-loan industry, whose unregulated business is now wreaking havoc across the world economy;

And that's just off the top of my head. I know. I picked up a book, and another, and another, watched PBS's "Now with Bill Moyers and David Brancaccio", did some Googling, and discovered that the Bush administration was not compassionate, was not conservative, and did not act according to moral values. Surely, this was not the President most Republicans thought they'd elected.

For me, that meant I was moved to begin emailing "Know Bush Facts" and performing Know Bush: Launching Facts That Shock and Awe, A One Person Patriot Act in October 2004 at the main downtown Salt Lake City library.

For Rocky, it meant a call for protest when George W. Bush came to town, giving extremely informative speeches about the specific wrongdoings of the administration, and, ultimately, the detailed development of the legal basis for impeachment of an administration which overstepped both the Constitution and international law and destroyed the moral ground of democracy and human rights the United States once maintained-thus making us all considerably less safe in this world.

If we do not have a free press which informs us, we must have citizens who care enough to pay attention to what our leaders do in our name. If we are unwilling to listen to those citizens who do speak up, then it takes citizens who have greater clout-such as the Mayor of a noted conservative city-to stand up and point out what we desperately need to know.

I, for one, am very grateful to Rocky and am proud that we, as a community, were invited by him to engage in a meaningful response to the kind of power-usurping, questionably elected executive officer that our Founders intended us to stop from ruining our country.

Thank you, sir, for taking it on, and taking the flack. I, for one, will continue to pay attention to your efforts, and I recommend that others do the same. I'm setting up a "Google Alert" today so I can keep up.

A Call for Justice

January 4, 2008*

The Honorable John Conyers, Jr.
Chair, Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives
2426 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington D.C. 20515

Dear Congressman Conyers:

We are writing out of deep concern for our nation. The President and members of his administration have violated, and continue to violate, our Constitution, significant and numerous treaty obligations, customary international law, and laws passed by Congress. However, the federal courts and Congress (even with a Democratic majority) have utterly failed to hold the President and his administration accountable and to put an end to the egregious violations of law and abuses of power.

When the President abuses and exceeds the powers vested in the executive branch, the people of our nation have reason to expect, and our Constitution contemplates, that the other co-equal branches of government – the courts and Congress – will rein in the President, not only holding him to account, but also making it clear that such abuses and excesses will not be tolerated, now or in the future, in our constitutional democracy. When the courts and Congress fail in their duties to challenge and repair abuses of executive power, they condone the abuses and are thereby complicit in undermining our Constitution, our international standing, and our nation’s commitment to the rule of law.

Our nation and our constitutional form of government are at a crucial crossroads. Either we condone and thereby encourage unlawful misconduct by our President and his administration, or we hold them to account and put an end to the illegalities. We can make it clear to the world, including all U.S. citizens, present and future, that we are a nation of laws, that we will support and uphold our Constitution, and that we will not tolerate the undermining of the carefully structured system of checks and balances among three co-equal branches of government. To challenge, disclose and censure the abuses of power by the Bush administration would also serve to uphold our nation’s proud history of support for fundamental human rights, which has distinguished our nation, until now, from those totalitarian, human-rights abusing nations that have kidnapped, disappeared, and tortured people, and deprived them of any semblance of due process.

In a constitutional form of government, which is committed to the rule of law, the courts are a safeguard against unlawful conduct by government officials, including the President. The courts are intended to be a safeguard against tyranny and dictatorship, both procedurally and substantively. Alarmingly, that is no longer the case in the United States.

Recently, a federal court has ruled that the invocation of the “state secrets” doctrine by the Bush administration is sufficient to deny citizens the right to obtain information about whether their communications have been subjected to warrantless governmental surveillance, in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the US Constitution and federal statutory law (the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act). Without the ability to obtain that information, the parties challenging the unlawful governmental surveillance have been held to lack standing to pursue their claims in court. Contrary to earlier false representations by President Bush that warrants were being obtained by his administration before electronic surveillance of communications was being conducted, the federal government is known to have continually and blatantly violated a criminal law passed by Congress and one of the most cherished rights protected by our Constitution. However, astoundingly, there is now no recourse in the federal courts.

The federal courts have even denied recourse to those who, pursuant to the “extraordinary rendition” program, have been illegally kidnapped, disappeared, and tortured by US agents and assignees in other countries. That dangerous lack of accountability has resulted from the indiscriminate acceptance by the courts of the assertion by the Bush administration of the “state secrets” doctrine. The Bush administration has invoked the “state secrets” doctrine 39 times, compared to a total of only six times by other presidents from 1953 to 1976, during the height of the Cold War.

Without action by Congress, these recent court decisions significantly undermine any notion that the rule of law prevails in the United States in instances of presidential abuse of power – and make it clear that no remnant of justice remains in relation to claims that such abuses have caused severe harm to innocent people. These decisions also call into question whether the truth about these abuses will ever be brought to light. All of this is leading our nation toward an unbounded and unaccountable tyranny, completely foreign to what many of us value most about our beloved country.

Because the courts are not providing a means of disclosing, or holding the Bush administration accountable for, serious violations of the law, it is particularly essential that Congress vigorously assume its constitutional prerogative and duty to thoroughly investigate and disclose the truth about the abuses of power and excesses of President Bush, Vice-President Cheney and others in the administration, all of which have caused extreme damage to our country.

Of course, the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives is best suited to conduct any inquiry into abuses of power by the President and others in his administration, particularly when violations of domestic statutory law, the Constitution, and treaty obligations have occurred. As Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, you have an historic opportunity and solemn responsibility, through the holding of hearings, to discover and disclose, and to bring the President and others to account for, the astounding abuses of power and violations of the law arising from the following misconduct, all of which have been severely injurious to our great nation:

• Authorizing, permitting, and condoning the kidnapping, disappearance, imprisonment and torture of people throughout the world, in violation of the US Constitution, domestic statutory law, treaty obligations, and customary international law. (In connection with the investigation of the illegal “extraordinary rendition” program, the Judiciary Committee should consider recommending passage of a compensation bill for Khaled el-Masri, Maher Arar, and others who have been kidnapped, imprisoned and tortured by U.S. agents and who have been denied any recourse to justice in US federal courts.)

• Authorizing and permitting the arrest of US citizens without charges, and causing them to be held, indefinitely and incommunicado, without access to an attorney, without the right to challenge the lawfulness of their confinement through the great writ of habeas corpus, without a trial, and under inhumane circumstances.

• Authorizing, permitting, and condoning the electronic surveillance of US citizens’ communications, including emails and telephone conversations, without a warrant, in violation of the US Constitution and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

• Engaging in an illegal war of aggression against Iraq, in violation of the Kellogg-Briand Pact, the Nuremberg Covenant, and the United Nations Charter (all international treaty obligations, which, under the Constitution, comprise the supreme law of the land), following a public campaign comprised largely of fictitious and fraudulent representations intended to persuade the people of the United States that the war was justified by self-defense. The fraud was comprised of outright misstatements of material fact and by withholding material information known to President Bush and members of his administration that was directly contrary to the representations of President Bush, Vice President Cheney, and others in the administration to Congress and the American people.

• Abusing and exceeding the executive power, and undermining the constitutional principle of separation of power, through the issuance of a record number of signing statements following the enactment of legislation by Congress. These signing statements have led to an unprecedented disregard by the executive branch, including administrative agencies, of federal statutory laws, and to the assertion of an unbounded dictatorial “unitary executive” presidential power, during the so-called “war on terror,” an undeclared “war” that is geographically and temporally unlimited.

In addition to inquiries into the above grave criminal misconduct and other gross abuses of power, we urge that Judiciary Committee hearings include an inquiry into the use of false propaganda by members of the Bush administration, which has served as the source for articles in the news media that misled many of the people in the United States and elsewhere concerning the supposed “threat” posed by Saddam Hussein and the execution of the war. When our government lies to the people, with the aid of an inept and credulous news media, our democracy is at grave risk.

Hearings on the matters described above could be held for the purposes of (1) disclosing serious criminal misconduct and egregious abuses of power, (2) accountability, and (3) deterrence. Crucial to our constitutional democracy and a commitment to the rule of law is a determination of the facts of abuse and illegal misconduct, then conveying that the outrages of the Bush administration are not reflective of American values, and that our proud nation will not condone the subversion of our values, our laws, or our Constitution by any president or members of his or her administration. Such a result would also vindicate Congress’s vital role as a co-equal branch of our government that will zealously protect its role, rights, and responsibilities under the Constitution.

We urge you, as Chair of the House Judiciary Committee, to commence hearings without further delay in connection with the above described violations of law and abuses of power by President Bush and members of his administration. To embrace the opportunity to discover and disclose the truth, and to provide for the sort of accountability, transparency, and openness due to any democratic people, will be an important step toward a national recommitment to the rule of law, a renewal of international respect, and a return to the national values we Americans have always cherished for ourselves and our posterity.

Respectfully,

George McGovern, Ralph Nader, Robert A. Feuer, Rocky Anderson, Blase Bonpane, Theresa Bonpane, Ramsey Clark, Mimi Kennedy, Andy Jacobs, Jr., James Abourezk, Daniel Ellsberg, Noam Chomsky, Paul Findley, Kevin Zeese, John Nichols, Tim Carpenter, Marcus Raskin, Jonathan Kozol, Harry Belafonte

[*Bold and italic emphasis by BBT]

Even NPR Finally Says So

It's been very difficult to forgive NPR for its complete lack of coverage of the hearings in Ohio held by Congressman John Conyers and the Democratic minority of the House Judiciary Committee in December 2004, immediately following the shocking reversal of Senator John Kerry's lead in the polls, the vote, and ultimately the entire Presidential election.

I especially can barely listen to Neal Conan. To understand why, history is beginning to show that his response to an apparent flood of emails seeking real news reporting and discussion seemed to be decidedly patronizing.

BUT TODAY -- MINUTES AGO -- at the top of the 11:00AM MDT hour, NPR announced that the Secretary of State of Ohio, Jennifer Brunner, has announced that ALL of the DRE electronic voting machines used in the 2004 election in Ohio were completely vulnerable to manipulation and could not be trusted.

In addition, NPR reported, this problem also applies to voting machines used in other states as well.

For example - UTAH - RIGHT HERE IN UTAH!!!! GOT IT?!!!!!!!

Those are DIEBOLD machines!!!!!!
At long last, let's all say it.

Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner's announcement and report are here.

Go here to read the article by long-time election 2004 reporters Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman.

Then demand paper ballots from your own Secretary of State for the 2008 elections.

IT CAN BE DONE.

Taking Every Opportunity to Point Out the Voter Caging Trick

Today, Monday, July 9th, 2007, NPR's Talk of the Nation discussed "The Military Vote".
I couldn't call in at the time, so I've posted at their Blog of the Nation. It hasn't shown up yet, as they sometimes take a great deal of time (especially in non-business hours), but meanwhile. . .

Recent reports from Greg Palast of the BBC reveal that many who are in the military serving overseas had their votes deliberately thrown out -- not counted -- in the 2004 election.

It was called "Voter Caging". Registered voters whose addresses were in low-income African American neighborhoods, homeless shelters, and military bases in the United States were sent registered letters, with the envelopes marked "Do Not Forward" requesting that the voter confirm his or her mailing address by return mail.

Those voters who did not respond had their names removed from the voter registry lists. If they tried to vote in person, their votes were challenged and never counted. If they voted from overseas, their votes were tossed, without notifying the voters.

This was a deliberate method of removing the votes of low income voters, particularly African Americans, who statistically are more likely to vote for the Democratic ticket.

The program was run by a clever operative at the Republican National Committee. His name is Timothy Griffin, and he is the friend of Karl Rove's who received the appointment to be the United States Attorney in Arkansas, replacing Bud Cummins, who was investigating another Republican election operative, Mark "Thor" Hearne, spokesman for the phony "non-partisan" American Center for Voting Rights, pushing the non-issue of Voter Fraud to distract from the real issue of vote theft, formerly General Counsel for BushCheney 2004.

Is your head spinning? The point is --

In 2004, thousands of votes sent from our overseas military personnel, fighting for democracy, were illegally dumped on purpose by the Republican National Committee.

The story isn't over. When U.S. Attorney Timothy Griffin learned that House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. had met with reporter Greg Palast and seen the evidence, he immediately resigned.

And Conyers has said that he isn't done with Griffin yet.

NPR, my friend of over 30 years, has not reported this.

To check this story out, go to www.bradblog.com and/or www.gregpalast.com.

The story does continue. Today, Brad posted Paper: Internal Memos Contradict Florida Bush Team's Statements Concerning 'Voting Caging' Prior to '04 Election
Docs Based on Pre-Election Meetings in Duvall County Reveal Issue Was Repeatedly Discussed Despite Denials by Local Bush/Cheney '04 Election Chairman
DoJ Continues to Review U.S. Senator's Demand for a Full Investigation....

Justice - Purging the Purgers

For Participants --
Today, at the U.S. Social Forum in Atlanta 2007
And
Everywhere else...

The U.S. Attorney Firings Scandal is not just about the Politicization of Government agencies.

It is about Election Theft - both Past and Future.

It is about Rewarding . . .

and Protecting. . .

the Thieves.

It is also about our letting it - or not letting it - happen.

It is about the Press - Investigating and Reporting.

It is about Paying Attention - or not.

Then it is about being Responsible for what we've Learned - and doing something.

After all, what if the actual recipient of the most votes in either of the last two Presidential elections had actually become President?

How much human suffering - in this generation and generations to follow - would not happen if Bush/Cheney never took the White House?

So, what is the appropriate punishment for conspiracy to usurp executive power by sabotaging the Presidential elections? What about financial liability for the damages, both at home and abroad?

The Lawyers in charge - both as Lobbyists and Justice Department Protectorates - have had to be on their toes, and out of the Limelight.

And the news media has had to be, well... bought.

Yet there are still some who dare to pry - and to tell what they've found. These days they are rare, and tend to be a bit obnoxious in their fervent determination be heard.

The two I have depended on for years are Greg Palast and Brad Friedman. Funny enough, they have each separately provided enormous specific details about different operations by the Bush/Cheney/RNC's election campaigns that are now hovering at the edge of the dangerous spotlight of the U.S. Attorney Purge scandal, making this administration and its operatives squirm (and, as of June 28th, 2007, claim Executive Privilege).

It's time to push them into the spotlight and bang our pots and pans. So here's what you need to know:

PURGING THE PURGERS

It started with Greg Palast .

In December 2000 Greg had the story that should have changed history, but the major media didn't want to touch it. On December 4th, 2000, one week before Bush v Gore went before the Supreme Court, the online magazine Salon posted his article "Florida's flawed 'voter cleansing' program", describing Florida Secretary of State Katharine Harris's purging approximately 173,000 names from the Florida voter registry based on a deliberately inaccurate list of Florida felons. [1.]

The article was overlooked and Harris got away with it.

Leading up to the 2004 election, emails from the Republican National Committee were accidentally sent to the wrong address, and then were forwarded to Greg. The emails included attachments titled "Caging Lists" and were proof of another Republican vote-purging strategy. He wrote about it on January 26, 2005 with the Reverend Jesse Jackson in their article "Jim Crow Returns to the Voting Booth" [2]:

"In November 2004, for the first time since the era of the Night Riders, one major political party launched a program of mass challenges of voters on Election Day. Paid Republican operatives, working from lists prepared by the party, fingered tens of thousands of voters in Ohio, Florida and elsewhere, questioning their right to a ballot.

"One of these secret 'caging lists' was obtained by BBC Television from inside Republican campaign headquarters in Florida. Every one of the voters on those sheets resided in African American neighborhoods, excepting a few in precincts of elderly Jewish voters.

"These lists helped Republican poll workers challenge voters on the basis of an alleged change of address. An analysis of one roster showed that several of those facing challenge were African American soldiers whose address changed because they were shipped overseas.

"Challenged voters were shunted to 'provisional ballots,' which, in Ohio and elsewhere, were not counted on the flimsiest of technicalities."

Palast's June 2006 book, Armed Madhouse: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, China Floats, Bush Sinks, The Scheme to Steal '08, No Child's Behind Left, and Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War, went into further detail about the caging lists, and his article of June 16, 2006, "Buffalo Soldiers Scrubbed by Secret GOP Hit List" names Republican national Research Director and Deputy Communications chief, Tim Griffin, as the operative distributing thousands of names and addresses to state campaign chairmen and party leaders as "Caging lists". [3]

"Here's how the scheme worked: The RNC mailed these voters letters in envelopes marked, "Do not forward", to be returned to the sender. These letters were mailed to servicemen and women, some stationed overseas, to their US home addresses. The letters then returned to the Bush-Cheney campaign as 'undeliverable.'

"The lists of soldiers of 'undeliverable' letters were transmitted from state headquarters, in this case Florida, to the RNC in Washington. The party could then challenge the voters' registration and thereby prevent their absentee ballots being counted."

In addition to the military home addresses, letters were sent to homeless shelters, and...

"A check of the demographics of the addresses on the 'caging lists,' as the GOP leaders called them indicated that most were in African-American majority zip codes."

Now it is 2007, and in the midst of a scandal about fired U.S. Attorneys, we learn that Karl Rove's former deputy was named to replace Bush appointee Bud Cummins as U.S. Attorney for Arkansas, with Cummins forced to resign five days later. Any deputy of Karl Rove's who is suddenly given a new job should be looked at, and sure enough, that deputy was none other than Timothy Griffin.

Since that news appeared, Greg has done his best to point out the connection, and has written about it extensively in frequent articles, such as the blunt "Bush's New US Attorney a Criminal?" on March 28th. [4]

The release of the paperback version of his book, so full of additional material that he changed its title to to Armed Madhouse: From Baghdad to New Orleans - Sordid Secrets and Strange Tales of a White House Gone Wild [5], exploded with a party on May 1st with Air America Radio's Randi Rhodes and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. at the New York Community Church.

This excellent timing has given him more opportunities for appearances with Common Dream, BuzzFlash, Ring of Fire Radio [6] ), Scoop [7], and Democracy Now [8] ) - spreading this important story - though still only reaching a smaller audience.

Then former White House Liaison for the Justice Department Monica Goodling testified before the House Judiciary Committee and at the top of her opening written statement, she nailed Deputy Attorney General Paul McNulty for not being "fully candid", saying he...

"...failed to disclose that he had some knowledge of the White House's interest in selecting Tim Griffin as the interim U.S. attorney in the Eastern District of Arkansas, inaccurately described the department's internal assessment of the Parsky commission, and failed to disclose that he had some knowledge of allegations that Tim Griffin had been involved in vote- cadging during his work on the president's 2004 campaign." [9]

Though that revelation slipped past without much ado, Palast shined a light on it in his May 29th "The Goods on Goodling and the Keys to the Kingdom". [10]

Two days later, Palast met with John Conyers, Jr., the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, to interview him for the BBC. Palast showed Conyers the caging lists. Palast reports that Conyers response was, "We're not through with Griffin by any means."

That same day, May 31, 2007, Timothy Griffin suddenly resigned as the U.S. Attorney in Arkansas, effective the next day. [11]

Griffin's attempt to play the victim was rebuked by "The Tears of a Clone" on June 15, 2007 [12], and by June 18th, the younger brother of the late Attorney General Bobby Kennedy stood up to demand the truth. That day, Senator Edward Kennedy and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse announced that they had sent a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez at the Department of Justice:

"We write to request that the Department of Justice promptly investigate allegations that the Republican National Committee engaged in "vote caging" during the 2004 elections. We also ask that you investigate whether any Department officials were aware of allegations that Tim Griffin had engaged in caging when he was appointed United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Arkansas, and whether appropriate action was taken. Caging is a reprehensible voter suppression tactic, and it may also violate federal law and the terms of applicable judicially enforceable consent decrees." [13]

Two days later, on June 20, it was reported that Arkansas Senators Blanche Lincoln and Mark Pryor were also in support of the investigation. [14].

When Paul McNulty appeared before the House Judiciary Committee on June 21, 2007, to try to expand upon his original testimony Congressman Conyers was more pointed in his questions.

Conyers: Thank you Madam Chair. Now you never, did you just say you didn't know anything about caging?
McNulty: What I said was that when I was asked that question at the Senate hearing, all I knew about the subject was that there was an article.
Conyers: Was that article by Greg Palast about African American soldiers scrubbed by secret GOP hit lists? Dated June 16, 2006? Was that it as you recall?
McNulty: That's the article I'm referring to.
Conyers: And didn't Monica Goodling tell you that caging might come up at the hearing as she was briefing you?
McNulty: Yes that's correct.
Conyers: And did it come up?
McNulty: It did.
Conyers: And you didn't, & your response was you never looked at the caging even though Goodling told you. You saw the Greg Palast article & it was put in your in briefing testimony for the Senate in your briefing book
McNulty: Right.
Conyers: And you didn't look at the material in your briefing book outside of the article?
McNulty: Mr Chairman I didn't read the article, I was aware the article existed because Senator Prior referred to it in his testimony right before I got up to testify & Ms Goodling had raised the issue the day before. But I had not read the article & not become familiar with the issue, even if I had read that article Mr Chairman, if I just may say so, even if I had read that article, & I was asked that question again by Senator Schumer, I would still be very careful before I started speaking because, information based upon just one article
Conyers: But there was more in your briefing book.
McNulty: There was another Tim Griffin e-mail which gave his explanation of that article which I have now seen but I hadn't read before I testified.
Conyers: So could I infer that caging of black voters may not have been one of the high items on your list as your responsibility as Dep AG?
McNulty: Well I'm not sure what you mean by that.
Conyers: What I mean by it is, Goodling told you about it, it's in your case, it's in your Senate testimony & yet you fail to answer questions on the subject before the Senate & you tell me even now, as of today have you looked at it yet?
McNulty: I have now read the article & I've read that e-mail
Conyers: I mean the whole subject matter of caging. I mean this disenfranchises lots of people. Well first of all, you know caging is challenging lists of voters that are usually minority voters
Unidentified voice: Would the gentleman yield because I think Ms Goodling's testimony slightly inaudible
Conyers: Wait a minute, let me just finish my question, I'll get back to you Chris, I always do, you know that. But we've got a whole chain of testimony, this is one of the big issues that came out of, at least a couple of major elections of this country, & you're saying 'yes I was told about it, yes it was in my tab in the briefing book for Senate testimony & yes I looked at Palast's article but I didn't read it'. Why does it not generate much concern or attention to you this for me, voter rights is one of the big problems that we have in terms of having it enforced in the Department of Justice? [15]

*******

Then there was Brad Friedman. It was during my frantic Googling in the wake of the unfathomable outcome of the 2004 election that I discovered bradblog. The press was ignoring the ground swell of doubt, but I dug daily for information on the Ohio recount and hearings by the Democratic minority members of the House Judiciary Committee.

A story and an affidavit jumped at me, about a computer scientist named Clint Curtis revealing a dark story about Republican Congressman Tom Feeney commissioning software in 2000 to change electronic voting results - presumably to be ready for the dastardly deed by Democrats, but suddenly appearing more ominous. Anywhere I found the affidavit, it always had the green and gold www.bradblog.com logo at the top, marked Exclusive! [16]

A little obnoxious, but very interesting... especially when bradblog also followed Curtis's testimony before some of the Committee members. [17]

In those painful early months after the election, I continued writing my Know Bush Facts, covering Conyer's January 6th report, "What Went Wrong in Ohio?"[18], the private inauguration luncheon for the most generous donors and what they wanted for it, and was in the midst of gathering info on Bush's military records and the vengeful two-fer strike on Dan Rather and Bill Burkett, when I saw the announcement on March 24, 2005 -

George W. Bush created a new Federal Election Reform Commission, to be lead by Jimmy Carter and - further down in the story, far less noticeable - James A. Baker, III.

I gasped.

While better known as the former Secretary of State, my earlier research had shown that Baker's far more important role as the lawyer whose firm, Baker Botts, had been setting up and rescuing George W. Bush at least since his early days in baseball, oil and illegal Harken stock dumping, and that he had lead the legal charge on the 2000 election that landed George in the White House - and he was General Counsel for The Carlyle Group. This was clearly a set up to protect Bush and election theft. I dropped everything to tear into this.

Bradblog was already on it. And he had lots more.

On March 22, 2005, Brad wasted no time in discrediting the expert witness designed to counter the evidence of voter suppression in Ohio presented Conyer's team, "Blackwell Finally Testifies in OH as a New 'Voters Rights' Group Appears 'Talon News-style' out of Nowhere...." [19]

Congressman Bob Ney (now in prison) chaired the House Committee on House Administration and finally got around to holding hearings on the 2004 election. On May 21, Mark F. (Thor) Hearne testified as a leader of the "non-partisan" American Center for Voting Rights, the only voting organization invited to testify.

Brad also nailed Hearne as being the National Election Counsel to Bush-Cheney '04 and Missouri counsel to Bush-Cheney 2000, positions he failed to disclose to the Committee. In additional, Brad reported that this great ACVR, with its 31 page report pushing allegations of "criminal voter fraud", appeared for the first time on only four days earlier, when it posted a website on March 17th.

Later on that same March 22nd 2005, Brad had more in "New 'Non-Partisan' 'Voting Rights' Org Appears Little More than Republican Front Group!". The publicist for ACVR was Jim Dyke, the Communications Director for the Republican National Committee. [20]

Over the next few days, Brad was amazing, tracing the domain registration of the ACVR to Dyke Associates in D.C., and sending a camera crew to visit the address of its Dallas office - only to find a dinky mail box in a Dallas UPS Store - odd, because neither Hearne nor Dyke were in Dallas --

Mystery Solved! Location of 'American Center for Voting Rights' Found! Exclusive Photographs! Photos Suggest ACVR Website Developers Most Likely Very Very Tiny Republicans! [21]

On April 12th 2005, Brad reported that Mark F. "Thor" Hearne, General Counsel to the American Center for Voting Rights, was listed on the Advisory Academic Board of the Carter Baker Commission, and that John Conyers, Jr. had just written to Jimmy Carter, voicing his strong concerns about the inclusion of James Baker on an Election Reform Commission at this important time. [22]

Conyer's communication with both Carter and Dr. Robert Pastor, the Executive Director of the Commission, was fruitful, and on April 21st, Conyers telephoned Brad to thank him personally for his diligent effort in educating the public as to the "unacceptable" make up and direction of the Commission, and to let him know he would continue to meet with members of the Commission over the next few months and put the word out through his own blog. [23]

On August 2005, the ACVR released its absurd counter-Conyers report, "Vote Fraud, Intimidation & Suppression In The 2004 Presidential Election" which was publicized throughout the right wing internet and through such media as Rush Limbaugh, and then was used continually to push the non-issue of fraudulent voting and voting registration. [24]

And every time the ACVR, Hearne, Dyke, or its later token pseudo-Democrat Brian Lunde did anything, Brad was there to cover it, with constant reminders of its illegitimate claims and phony non-partisan guise.

Jack Abramoff's name came awfully close, on the way to indicting Bob Ney, Hearne still tried to push voter fraud, and was allowed a seat on the Board of the now-discredited Elections Assistance Commission, but for the most part, the Republican operatives slithered back to work on other trickeries.

Brad was pretty busy himself, finding much to stir up in 2006. December 2005 brought not only the revelations about NSA and domestic spying - Diebold met Hursti in Florida, and the proof was in - HACK HACK HACK HACK HACK. [25] So 2006 found Brad at the forefront of busting Diebold [26], Sequoia, ESS, HAVA, and the EAC, primary fumbles, Secretaries of State, both heroic and slimy election officials, unmarked ballots, overpriced recounts and demanding each vote be counted fairly.

Then, the annoying spokesman/expert of the American Center for Voting Rights - Mark J. "Thor" Hearne - popped up in the shadows of the U.S. Attorney Purge, looking nervous, so Brad took a look. And the more Brad looked, the more dirt Brad found, once again.

Jim Dyke had moved on to work for Dick Cheney's office, and Thor Hearne was back at his Missouri law firm, Lathrop & Gage LC.

On March 15, 2007, Brad wrote EXCLUSIVE: New Details on the Phony 'Voter Fraud' Angle in the U.S. Attorneys Purge Scandal... An Insider's Report from a New Mexico Election Attorney on the Firing of David Iglesias and the Rove/DoJ/Republican Efforts to Create a 2004 'Voter Fraud' Scare in the State... RELATED? - The GOP 'Voter Fraud' Front Group ACVR Goes Suddenly AWOL!.[27]

This treat tells the story of the ties between voter fraud accusations, the sudden disappearance from the Internet of the American Center for Voting Rights, the scrubbing of its website and references to it anywhere near Hearne's name, and the release of an important new study by Lorraine Minnitte, Ph.D. entitled "The Politics of Voter Fraud", finding that voter fraud is extremely rare and that allegations are frequently politically motivated.[28]

On April 19, 2007, the day Alberto Gonzalez testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Brad's headline was a headspinner:

A Direct, As Yet Unreported Connection in the U.S. Attorney Purge Scandal Leading Straight to the White House - Arkansas U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins Was Fired Just After Reports Surfaced of Investigation into Law Firm of Top Level White House/GOP Operative and Close-Friend-of-Rove, Thor Hearne - Prosecutor Was Replaced by Rove Aide Timothy Griffin...

And there was that name from the Greg Palast side - Timothy Griffin. [29]

Brad's digging revealed that [Hold on to your hats] Hearne's law firm in Missouri, Lathrop & Gage LC, was running an extremely tangled and corrupt scheme - franchising satellite state licensing offices to provide millions of dollars to the generous supporters of Missouri Governor Matt Blunt (son of Republican House Minority Whip Roy Blunt), so those supporters could better support.

The Missouri U.S. Attorney who should have investigated this, Todd Graves, bowed out due to a contract for motor vehicle licenses held by his wife's company. Graves abruptly resigned, and was replaced by Bush's appointee to the DoJ's Civil Rights Division, the inexperienced but loyal Bradley J. Schlotzman (who recently testified that he had sometimes bragged about all the Republicans he'd hired at the Division).

The responsibility of investigating the Missouri governor then went to the U.S. Attorney for Eastern Arkansas, Bud Cummins.

In "THE UNDERLYING CRIME: White House Interference into a U.S. Attorney's Criminal Investigation in Missouri", Brad reported that when Cummins' investigation of Governor Blunt and the Lathrop & Gage LC legal team was reported in May 2006, Hearne's years of RNC/Karl Rove operations and ties came in handy. He was able to bring on board the powerful Dallas corporate defense attorney and Department of Justice Corporate Fraud "Point Person", William B. Mateja, who personally telephoned U.S. Attorney Cummins several times to ask if he was investigating his client, Governor Matt Blunt. [30]

A couple of weeks go by and on June 5, 2006, Bud Cummins was told by the Director of the Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, Mike Battle, that he would be expected to resign, and in September, Timothy Griffin was sent to train with Cummins, presumably as his assistant.

On the day that Brad tied Hearne's Missouri law firm to the Attorney Purge scandal, April 23rd, Lathrop & Gage's CEO (and soon to be Chairman), Tom Stewart, suddenly left on a 90 days sabbatical. On May 17, 2007, it was announced that he was gone for good. [31]

Okay, did you follow that?

Don't worry, you won't be tested - yet. The good news is that Bradblog has his key articles on Thor Hearne and the American Center for Voting Rights listed chronologically here or just go the website www.bradblog.com and look for the Special Coverage section (currently on the right and down a bit, where you can select: "American Center for Voting Rights". GOP 'Voter Fraud' Scam.

While you're there, stroll around a bit. There are links to other areas of very Special Coverage, published articles, media appearances, archives of his radio show, and even his other career in theatre and film.

Both Greg Palast and Brad Friedman are happy to accept donations on their websites and by mail to support their investigative work.

SO NOW, THE SIMPLE VERSION OF ALL OF THE ABOVE:

I. Greg Palast www.gregpalast.com

A. Investigative Reporter for BBC Newswatch, Harpers, Democracy Now! Ring of Fire Radio and more

B. Reported after 2004 election that Kerry won, but the Republican tactic of caging lists and dumping votes, managed by RNC operative and Karl Rove assistant Timothy Griffin, caused tens of thousands of votes for Kerry to be dumped.

C. Story returns in U.S. Attorney Scandal when Timothy Griffin is discovered to be the Gonzalez-appointed interim U.S. Attorney in Arkansas, where he can best dig for dirt on Hilary Clinton. On learning that Congressman John Conyers, Jr. has met with Palast, Griffin suddenly resigns.

II. Brad Friedman www.bradblog.com

A. Participant in USSF 2007 - Investigative Blogger, Activist, and radio host with special expertise in elections, contributor to Huffington Post and more

B. Reported after 2004 election that “non-partisan” American Center for Voting Rights’ expert spokesman, Mark “Thor” Hearne, is RNC/BushCheney operative spreading disinformation about vote fraud to counter real evidence of vote theft and suppression.

C. Story returns in U.S. Attorney Scandal when Thor Hearne gets U.S. Attorney Bud Cummins fired and replaced by Timothy Griffin to stop investigation into his law firm’s fundraising for Republican governor with franchised state license fees. On learning that Conyers and Leahy are paying attention, the ACVR suddenly disappears.

DEMAND THESE STORIES GET NATIONAL ATTENTION. WRITE, POST, CALL EVERYONE, EVERYWHERE.
DEMAND THE USURPERS BE STOPPED. It is your responsibility now.

Resources

1. http://www.gregpalast.com/floridas-flawed-voter-cleansing-program-saloncoms-politics-story-of-the-year/#more-937 or http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/12/04/voter_file/index.html.
2. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/opinion/209316_palastjackson26.html
3. http://www.gregpalast.com/massacre-of-the-buffalo-soldiers/
4. http://www.gregpalast.com/bushs-new-us-attorney-a-criminal
5. http://www.gregpalast.com/order-the-book/
6. http://www.ringoffireradio.com/show.asp?jid=160 ; http://www.ringoffireradio.com/show.asp?jid=167 ; http://www.ringoffireradio.com/show.asp?jid=169 ; http://www.ringoffireradio.com/show.asp?jid=173
7. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0704/S00338.htm
8. http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/14/1426254
9. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/transcripts/goodling_testimony_052307.html
10. http://www.gregpalast.com/the-goods-on-goodling-and-the-keys-to-the-kingdom/
11. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4620
12. http://www.gregpalast.com/the-tears-of-a-clone/#more-1762
13. http://kennedy.senate.gov/newsroom/press_release.cfm?id=56FBB230-3DBB-43FB-BE74-1110CF30FE16
14. http://www.arkansasnews.com/archive/2007/06/20/WashingtonDCBureau/342468.html
15. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/documents/mcnulty_transcript_062107.html
16. http://www.bradblog.com/Docs/CC_Affidavit_120604.pdf
17. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1050
18. http://www.truthout.org/docs_05/010605Y.shtml
19. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1276
20. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1277
21. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1283
22. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1317
23. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1342
24. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=1651
25. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=2157
26. http://www.bradblog.com/Diebold.htm
27. http://www.bradblog.com/index.php?p=4276
28. http://projectvote.org/fileadmin/ProjectVote/Publications/Politics_of_Voter_Fraud_Final.pdf
29. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4429
30. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4447
31. http://www.bradblog.com/?p=4568

See also this posting here.