Yesterday our friends at OpEdNews.Com featured an article that includes an interview with the former CEO of AccuPoll, a voting machine vendor that recently went bankrupt. In the article by Sean Greene of electionline.org the CEO, Dennis Vadura is quoted as saying:

Now, finally, an industry insider and 'mover-and-shaker' has stepped forward to echo what many of us have been saying for the past two or three years. The remaining vendors are doing all they can to prove that Mr. Vadura is right. That fact is borne out by the following two stories:

In Nebraska, home state for Elections Systems and Software (and home of one of the owners of this private corporation, Omaha World-Herald), 69 of 93 counties do not have their paper ballots for early voting even though early voting began on Monday. Nebraska joins Indiana and other states that are not able to conduct elections because ES&S cannot provide the ballots that they are contractually responsible to deliver. In defense of it's partially owned subsidiary, the World-Herald misinforms it's readers with this gem:

There is no new type of ballot required by HAVA and there is no standardized form for optical scanners. This is all just hype to cover-up for the failure of ES&S to do its job.

In another indication of a vendor's failure to meet its contractual duties, the Richmond (IN) Palladium-Item reports that Fidlar Elections, a mid-west representative for Diebold, has failed to deliver paper ballots to 11 Indiana counties that can be read by optical-scanners. The state's mandated absentee voting (early voting) began on Monday and the bad ballots were not reported until Tuesday so all voters who voted on Monday are now being given an opportunity to vote again, when good ballots are received.

Quality control? Apparently not, after all its just elections. As Mr. Vadura correctly states, "You just have to look at the litany of problems and it points at one thing, bad fundamental design, and not enough checks and balances".

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

Video in Streaming Flash format...
Video in Windows Media format...

Yesterday, Mr. Bush delivered another Iraq War PR speech which was sponsored by the nonpartisan World Affairs Council of Charlotte at Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte, North Carolina.

After the speech, Bush accepted questions from the audience. Harry Taylor shamed The President with his question. Taylor mentioned NSA domestic spying, detaining Americans with being charged, policies that hurt the enviroment. Taylor told Bush that he was ashamed of the U.S. Government. Taylor finished his question by saying, "I would hope you have, from time to time, the humility and the grace to be ashamed of yourself... inside yourself."

In this video, Soledad O'Brien interviews Harry Taylor about his televised of berating President Bush.

I'm Guest Hosting the Peter B. Collins show today and have booked an amazing line-up of Guests! Please tune in! This will be our Open Thread for during the show, so comment away!

Showtime is 3p-6p PT (6p-9p ET) on KRXA 540am in Monterey, CA and several other affiliates.
Listen online here! Call in toll-free if you like at (888) 579-2540.

Guests to include...

+ This Modern World cartoonist and blogger, TOM TOMORROW!
+ FAIZ SHAKIR from The Center for American Progress' Progress Report
+ Emery County, UT County Clerk/Hero BRUCE FUNK (Diebold's latest scapegoat!)
+ *** PLUS: The legendary ED ASNER! Yup, Lou Grant his own bad self!

Spread the word! Tune in!

UPDATE 4/8/06: Audio archives from the show now here...

Racing to prepare for Guest Hosting the Peter B. Collins Show later today, so can't give more context for now (more on this during the show today, no doubt), but this out this morning from the Cleveland Plain-Dealer.

Regular BRAD BLOG readers will be familiar with the stories of the three Cuyahoga County, OH Elections Workers who have been indicted on felony charges for gaming the 2004 recount, but this report provides many more details and corroboration from the Prosecutors. It also reminds us, that though the Elections Workers have been indicted on felony charges, they continue to work at the Cuyahoga County Board of Elections! Only in Ohio! (well, okay, maybe Florida, too...)

This is incredibly mind-blowing...Even to us...

UPDATE 1/24/2007: Two of the indicted election officials found guilty of gaming the recount, charged with maximum penalty. Details...

Originally Allegheney County, PA had hoped to use Diebold's electronic voting machines --- until they found out that Diebold machines were hackable.

Then they decided instead to go with Sequoia Voting Systems instead --- until they found out that their machines are hackable too.

Yesterday, with just six weeks left before their primary election, and against the wishes of Allegheny County's Chief Executive who felt it was safer to stay with their old lever systems, Allegheny decided instead to go with new ES&S touch-screen voting machines.

ES&S, of course, is the company whose machines failed all over Texas during the March 7th primary in Texas, leading to state-wide election contest by a Republican former Supreme Court Justice. ES&S saw more than 30% of their memory cards fail in recent pre-election tests in Summit County, OH, more than 1000 cards fail in NC, and their machines failed to work completely this week as early voting began in Indiana.

Good luck with the new ES&S voting machines Allegheny County, PA!

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

Video in Streaming Flash format...
Video in Windows Media format...

The New York Sun reports that a court filing by Patrick Fitzgerald reveals that President Bush authorized blanket leaks of classified information to reporters. According to the court filing of Libby's testimony to the grand jury, the Vice President Cheney told Libby that President Bush had authorized him to leak classified information from the National Intelligence Estimate.

David Shuster who has been following the "Plame case" closely reports on the breaking news for MSNBC. The Raw Story has more information.

(As posted DU, by "elehhhhna." Hat tip Pokey A.)

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

Video in Streaming Flash format...
Video in Windows Media format...

Brian Doyle is the second DHS employee to be recently charged with sexual offenses involving a minor.

Fox News' John Gibson focuses the massive resources of his new organization like a laser. Fox pierces the headlines, bringing their lucky viewers the big picture and the hard unfiltered facts.

Please excuse the sarcasm but this clip is pretty bad. First, Fox under-reports the arrest of a DHS official for sexual offenses. Then, they show their true desire to report on this subject with a nearly laughable interview.

Jane Skinner talks to Michael Blank, an "internet minuteman", with a four day old plan to clean up the net. Skinner highlights Blank's single-page website called JailBaitJustice.com.

Maybe there should be a law preventing the words "fox" and "news" from appearing together.

Posting this in full here because Roll Call is subscription only, and I had trouble reading the text due to a funky background at Sunlight Foundation where Paul Blumenthal ran this piece today.

In case you don't finish reading the whole thing, a plug is included right here for Clint Curtis who is running against Tom Feeney (R-FL) for his seat 24th District seat in the U.S. Congress. When you read the story, you'll see why it's important to help Clint Curtis raise money for his run! His website is www.ClintCurtis.com and donations can be made right here.

Feeney learned his lessons well from his #1 supporter (and vice versa) in the U.S. House, the disgraced and indicted Tom Delay.

Curtis is the software programmer who has alleged that Feeney asked him to create electronic vote-rigging software back in 2000. His extraordinary story, including details of the polygraph test that Curtis passed, and video-tape of his sworn testimony before members of Congress is summarized here.

And now, back to Feeney and the big bucks...

(Thanks to emailer Sharon A. for the heads up!)

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

Video in Streaming Flash format...
Video in Windows Media format...

A newly released report from Amnesty International provides additional evidence of secret CIA "black site" prisons located in Africa, Asia and Europe. The report also details the CIA's practice of "rendering" prisoners to foreign countries to be tortured or detained.

In this video, BBC gives an overview of the new report. Anne Fitzgerald, senior Advisor for Amnesty, explains details of the CIA's rendition flights. The final clip contains an interview with Muhammad al-Assar who was detained in a CIA "black site" prison for 2 years. He was then "rendered" to Yemen where, under orders from the U.S., he was imprisoned for another year.

I'll be sitting in as Guest Host for the good Peter B. on KRXA 540am up in Monterey, CA (and syndicated on several other affiliates) this Thursday from 3p-6p PT (6p-9p ET).

If you're not nearby, you can listen in online right here. Let's see if we can overload their servers --- And give us a shout to say hey at 888-KRXA-540. Let's see if we can break their phone lines.

====

Kick-ass guests now lined up for Thursday's show!...

+ This Modern World cartoonist and blogger, TOM TOMORROW!
+ Emery County, UT County Clerk/Hero BRUCE FUNK (Diebold's latest scapegoat!)
+ PLUS: The legendary ED ASNER! Yup, Lou Grant his own bad self!

And Much Much More! Spread the word! Tune in!

UPDATE 4/8/06: Audio archives from the show now here...

Guest Blogged by John Gideon

Proving that local TV News stations actually can serve their viewers by actually investigating stuff that matters, and then reporting on it, Indianapolis' WISH-TV 8 does it again. In yet another report on local election problems, WISH-TV has been keeping their viewers informed with a series of stories on voting issues.

"Well, once again, a Voting Machine Company is breaking Indiana law and violating county contracts," the story by reporter Pam Elliot began.

Last night, WISH TV 8 reported on the failure of Elections Systems & Software (ES&S) to perform up to their contract with their customers. That contract: to provide ballots to voters and touch-screen voting equipment that actually works.

Johnson County Indiana was supposed to have their ES&S iVotronic DRE (touch-screen) machines set-up and in use for "absentee voting". However, contrary to their contract and, as WISH TV reports, in violation of state law, ES&S has failed to program the counties "smart cards" with ballot definitions. Which means the voting machines are of no use.

Also missing are printed paper ballots for Johnson County and nearly two-dozen other counties across the state. Which means that in order for these counties to conduct "absentee voting" they will have to copy paper ballots and provide those to the voters.

But perhaps more troubling, as reported by the WISH-TV 8 "I Team" (Investigative Team):

And what does the Secretary of State have to say about this situation? He had the same reaction as many who have misinformed their counties into buying voting systems that were not really necessary...

And what does ES&S have to say about all of this? Why, they blamed the counties, of course.

But WISH TV didn't let 'em get away with that. They concluded their report with just the facts m'am:

-- WISH TV's written report is here...
-- WISH TV's video report is here...

It seems ES&S has a long and proud history of failing the voters of Indiana. Back in late 2004, just two weeks after the Presidential Election, The BRAD BLOG ran a story highlighting a series of reports from WISH TV filed back in April of 2004. Here's some of our coverage at the time...

"Outright fabrications and mistruths" from ES&S?! Knock us over with a feather. See our November '04 story for more details and links to the excellent WISH TV video reports from April.

Feel free to write a thank you note to reporter Pam Elliot for knowing what important news looks like and then caring enough to actually report on it.

Other than that --- sssshhhh --- don't tell anyone! It's better if nobody learns about this stuff.

(Additional snark for this story provided by Brad)

Video in Streaming Flash format...

"She punched a cop! She punched...a cop!" said Sean Hannity on last night's Hannity & Colmes without any actual evidence for the charge and before any trial --- something he accuses many others of doing. But only when the alleged perp is a Republican, of course.

That was just after he accused "people who weren't even there" of turning this into a racial incident.

The guest, a former LAPD Detective who refused to play along with Hannity, pointed out that she's a 6 term Congresswoman and acknowledged that it's the Capitol Hill Police's job to recognize her. To which Hannity lied, "Yeah, but she was gone for like 5 years in there."

Needless to say, Hannity, as always, was wrong. Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D-GA) was swiftboated and defeated by a Republican effort during her 2002 Democratic primary after she dared to ask out loud: "What did this Administration know and when did it know it?" concerning the events of 9/11. (A clip which Hannity played again during the segment last night for no apparent reason other than to keep the swiftboating alive --- he followed the clip by saying, without a hint of irony, "It seems that there's a proclivity here to jump to false conclusions, amongst Cynthia McKinney in particular.")

Anyway, McKinney was not in Congress from 2002 through 2004 when she was re-elected. Hardly the "5 years," as quoted by Hannity to try and back up the Capitol Hill Police (who recently admitted they "screwed up" while dealing with another such "security incident" involving a well known person who shouldn't have been hassled in the first place.) McKinney has been back in Congress now for a full year and half since being re-elected.

Ya know, we'll see how it all plays out as things move forward, but it occurs to us that Cynthia McKinney has a security disagreement with a cop who, all agree, didn't get hurt. A warrant is sought for her arrest and Fox "News" (and the rest of the media) can't get enough of it.

George W. Bush, on the other hand, has a security disagreement with an entire sovereign nation and starts a full blown war because of it. More than 2,500 American citizens are now dead, scores of thousands wounded and many more Iraqis than that have been killed because it. Nobody issues a warrant for the arrest of George W. Bush and Fox "News" and rest of the media couldn't give a damn about any of it.

That's what we call Fair and Balanced.

One thing we know --- McKinney's black and a woman and a Democrat and none of those things could possibly have had anything do with any of this.

(Thanks David Edwards for the video.)

IRONY ALERT UPDATE: "DeLay Says He'll File Ethics Complaint Against McKinney"... (Thanks Kat!)

Guest Blogged by John Gideon, VotersUnite.Org and VoteTrustUSA.Org

Summit County has recently had problems with failed memory cards as related by The BRAD BLOG on March 9 and March 10. As reported at the time, as many as 30% of the cards completely failed initial testing in the county. A few days later, corresponding tests in North Carolina found more than 1000 of the cards failed. The memory cards, amongst other things, store the vote tabulations from elections.

New tests now in Summit County have also revealed additional failures on both memory cards, and the voting machines "firmware" as well.

Today the Akron Beacon Journal has revealed that Summit County has discovered 28 more bad cards in a batch of what was supposed to be good cards as sent to them by ES&S specifically to replace the previous bad ones.

The Beacon-Journal reports:

The Beacon-Journal is also now reporting that ES&S has found a problem with the firmware --- the software which is embedded into the system's hardware --- on their touch-screen machines that are used in counties across Ohio and across the country. ES&S is currently in 41 of Ohio's 88 counties.

Other states and counties who use ES&S should be made aware of the problems, since ES&S does not seem to be doing so.

On the firmware issue, the Beacon-Journal reports...

According to a late report from AP tonight, Ohio's Sec. of State (and Co-Chair of the Bush/Cheney '04 Re-Election Committee) J. Kenneth Blackwell, "accidentally invested" in Diebold last year...

The "discovery" (that he owns shares in Diebold, not that Diebold is the only company to meet HAVA standards --- which they don't) occurred during some ethics filings as the Governor's race, in which Blackwell is a candidate, heats up in the Buckeye State...

According to a Rasumussen poll released on Friday, Blackwell currently trails the likely Democratic nominee for Governor, Rep. Ted Strickland by a 10 point margin of 50% to 40%.

Strickland beats Petro as well in a face-to-face match-up by even more: 47% to 34%.

Strickland appears to be widening the gap against both of them. But count no chickens yet. This is, after all, Ohio.