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GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal 2012...
VA GOP VOTER REG FRAUDSTER OFF HOOK
Felony charges dropped against VA Republican caught trashing voter registrations before last year's election. Did GOP AG, Prosecutor conflicts of interest play role?...

Criminal GOP Voter Registration Fraud Probe Expanding in VA
State investigators widening criminal probe of man arrested destroying registration forms, said now looking at violations of law by Nathan Sproul's RNC-hired firm...

DOJ PROBE SOUGHT AFTER VA ARREST
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Arrest in VA: GOP Voter Reg Scandal Widens
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ALL TOGETHER: ROVE, SPROUL, KOCHS, RNC
His Super-PAC, his voter registration (fraud) firm & their 'Americans for Prosperity' are all based out of same top RNC legal office in Virginia...

LATimes: RNC's 'Fired' Sproul Working for Repubs in 'as Many as 30 States'
So much for the RNC's 'zero tolerance' policy, as discredited Republican registration fraud operative still hiring for dozens of GOP 'Get Out The Vote' campaigns...

'Fired' Sproul Group 'Cloned', Still Working for Republicans in At Least 10 States
The other companies of Romney's GOP operative Nathan Sproul, at center of Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, still at it; Congressional Dems seek answers...

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The Secret Koch Brothers Tapes...


By Brad Friedman on 9/30/2014 11:26am PT  

Last night on Thom Hartmann's Big Picture TV show...

If you missed either of the stories mentioned above at The BRAD BLOG, our coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court allowing GOP voting restrictions to move forward in OH is here, and our disturbing coverage of longtime GOP operative Nathan Sproul's threat to take legal action against us for reporting accurately on his involvement in the 2012 GOP Voter Registration Scandal (and other similar scandals going back to 2004) is here.

And, again, we totally thank you in advance for any financial support you can offer to help us keep going. Monthly subscriptions are particularly appreciated. We did not receive $10 million from the Republican Party (or any party) as Sproul has over the past decade. You are our only support. Please take 30 seconds to use the table below to help us continue our work. We need your support now more than ever...

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Vacant seat on court since 2010 likely made the difference; Ruling, unless overturned, could result in re-election victory for Walker; Emergency petition to U.S. Supreme Court likely...
By Ernest A. Canning on 9/29/2014 6:02am PT  

With just weeks to go before mid-term elections and a "too close to call" Gubernatorial contest, disenfranchisement and electoral chaos in Scott Walker's Wisconsin reign supreme. And only the U.S. Supreme Court may now be able to do anything about it.

In a 5 to 5 ruling, an evenly divided, en banc U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeal has issued a Cursory Order [PDF], summarily denying an ACLU Petition for an Emergency Rehearing to put the brakes back on the state Republicans' Photo ID voting restriction in advance of the November election.

The ACLU petition followed on the recent extraordinary ruling by three Republican appointees to the federal bench that had vacated a permanent federal court injunction of the law. That injunction, until it was lifted by the three-judge 7th Circuit panel just weeks ago, prevented Wisconsin from enforcing a Photo ID voting law which a U.S. District Court judge had found would likely result in the disenfranchisement of up to 300,000 perfectly lawful registered voters who lack the now-requisite, state approved photo IDs.

As we recently reported, the ACLU, in its emergency petition, argued that it will be virtually impossible for the Badger state's Department of Motor Vehicles to process the number of official state photo IDs that would be required to insure that every lawfully registered voter who desires to vote would get the opportunity to vote in the upcoming Nov. 4 election. Moreover, thousands of absentee ballots that had already been mailed prior to the 7th Circuit panel's lifting of the injunction may not be counted since they did not include notice of the new rules requiring that they must be accompanied with copy of the voter's photo ID.

Following the 5 to 5 decision of the full 7th Circuit (one seat remains vacant, more on that below), the ACLU and other plaintiffs' only recourse for now will be an emergency petition to the U.S. Supreme Court. Given the deadlock by the 7th Circuit and reasoning applied not only by the original U.S. District Court Judge in this case, and also by a 6th Circuit panel in an Ohio early voting case, as well as by six (6) of the (9) U.S. Supreme Court Justices who took part in a landmark 2008 Photo ID decision --- all decisions which were inconsistent with the reasoning applied by the three-judge 7th Circuit panel in the Wisconsin case, which has now been essentially upheld --- a challenge at the U.S. Supreme Court has at least a reasonable prospect of success.

If you're confused, read on. We'll help you make sense of this...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Repubs file 'Emergency Petition for Rehearing' before full court...
By Ernest A. Canning on 9/26/2014 7:48am PT  

Yes, Ohio Republicans are still barred from limiting the early voting period and still required to restore the days and hours they had, yet again, tried to cut off. At least they are barred, again, for now.

On Wednesday, a unanimous three-judge panel of the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeal issued a 50-page ruling [PDF] in which it upheld a lower court's preliminary injunction from three weeks ago that prevented Ohio’s Republican Secretary of State John Husted from implementing a Feb. 19, 2014 GOP-engineered statute, and his own further Directive, which would have drastically reduced the number of early voting days and hours and eliminated same-day registration and voting during the first five days of a previously established 35-day period of early voting in the Buckeye State.

Reflecting the fact that he anticipated an adverse ruling, Ohio's Republican Attorney General Michael DeWine filed an Emergency Appeal for a Rehearing [PDF] by the full 6th Circuit, on the very same day the three-judge panel handed down their decision. His appeal presents essentially the same arguments that have now, repeatedly, been rejected by the courts, first in a 2012 case, Obama for America v. Husted, and now, again, in Ohio State Conference of the NAACP v. Husted...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Latest news in cases of discredited GOP federal judge Mark Fuller, discredited GOP operative Nathan Sproul, and more!...
By Brad Friedman on 9/25/2014 6:35am PT  

On this week's BradCast on KPFK/Pacific Radio...

• Latest developments in the case of Alabama's wife-beating, lifetime-appointed, Republican U.S. District Judge Mark Fuller (pictured above on left): Calls for accountability gain traction, CREDO posts petition for impeachment, horrifying 911 audio and disturbing 2012 documents concerning domestic abuse of previous wife (and children!)

• Bizarre twist in the 2012 GOP Voter Registration Fraud Scandal: Yet another arrest, and Nathan Sproul (pictured above on right), the highly-place, now-discredited GOP operative who headed up the firm at the center of the scandal, threatens The BRAD BLOG with legal action after our 2012 reporting was confirmed by a two-year Florida law enforcement investigation!

• Also, a hint as to why we were excused from jury duty last week; why we don't cover "O, Mighty ISIS"; breaking news in a longtime Scott Walker (R-WI) recall investigation; and his supporters now threatening Democratic voters; and, as usual, Desi Doyen with the latest Green News Report on Climate Week 2014...

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Another Nathan Sproul worker arrested after 2-year investigation of 2012 GOP voter registration fraud scandal in Sunshine State...
By Brad Friedman on 9/24/2014 6:05am PT  

Well, this is an interesting turn of events. It includes a bizarre twist that even we would not have foreseen, involving a Republican operative who is now threatening legal action against us for reporting (accurately) on his companies' relationship to voter registration fraud and deceptive voter registration practices during the 2012 election and in previous cycles.

Remember that massive, multi-state GOP voter registration fraud scandal just before the 2012 election? The one that started in Palm Beach, Florida, spread to several different counties, then several different states? The scandal resulted in the Republican National Committee firing the Arizona firm they had secretly hired for millions of dollars to carry out voter registration drives and get-out-the-vote efforts in a bunch of key swing-states, including Florida, North Carolina, Virginia, Nevada and Colorado in advance of the Presidential Election.

The firm at the center of the RNC scandal was named Strategic Allied Consulting. It was created and run by Nathan Sproul, a notorious Arizona-based Republican operative with a checkered past, who ran Republican voter registration drives and other on-the-ground GOP activist campaigns. Sproul's name was not used in the legal filings which created Strategic Allied Consulting in advance of the 2012 election, due to his various companies facing voter registration fraud allegations and criminal investigations in a number of states going back as far as the 2004 Presidential election. Because of that unfairly tarnished background, Sproul claimed when the 2012 scandal first surfaced, the RNC didn't want his fingerprints on the operation. The RNC was dodgy about the issue, but fired Sproul and his firm in several states once the scandal came to light, despite having paid millions of dollars for the effort.

The BRAD BLOG broke a number of stories related to the RNC scandal at the time, including details on the very first reports of "hundreds" of fraudulent registration forms turned in to the Palm Beach County, FL Supervisor of Elections after they were collected by Sproul's workers and turned in by the local Republican Party.

In the same series of articles, we also exposed the deceptive (and perhaps illegal) registration scheme employed by Sproul's firms in states where they operated. The scheme involved registration workers trained to pretend to be pollsters asking voters who they planned to support in the Presidential election. If they answered the question correctly (Romney) Sproul's workers would help them register to vote. If the unsuspecting citizen answered the "survey" question incorrectly (Obama), the workers would wish them a nice day, and then move on to the next target.

As we documented with video, email and other records at the time, including admissions by Sproul himself, his firm used this same deceptive tactic in state after state and in a number of recent election cycles.

Now, a two-year Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) investigation has finally wrapped up into the 2012 allegations in that state. It has led to yet another arrest of one of Sproul's workers, found no evidence of conspiracy by the company in that state, confirmed The BRAD BLOG's reporting on their deceptive registration technique, and sent Sproul scurrying to threaten us via email (posted below) with a lawsuit...for something...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By Brad Friedman on 9/23/2014 6:05am PT  

Well, it took long enough for Washington Post's editorial board to take notice of wife-beating U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller, but at least they finally have...

THE CONSTITUTION says that federal judges "shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour" - for life, that is, unless they commit an impeachable offense. Which brings us to the allegations of domestic violence against Mark E. Fuller, a U.S. District Court judge in Montgomery, Ala.

The paper then details the police response to the horrifying 911 call from Fuller's wife Kelli after the Judge reportedly "threw her to the ground, pulled her by the hair, kicked her and hit her in the face" (the actual 911 call is more horrifying still), leaving her bloodied inside their Ritz-Carlton hotel room in Atlanta on August 9th, and the disturbing similarities to the case of the NFL's Ray Rice, who was also allowed off the hook by the court system after beating up his then-fiancee/now-wife, as "first time offenders". (Even though Judge Fuller's previous wife alleged similar physical abuse during their divorce trial).

And then...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




But 2012 docs suggest resignation - even impeachment - would let the apparently repeated domestic abuser off far too lightly
TWO wives AND children allegedly beaten by federal judge with lifetime appointment...
By Brad Friedman on 9/19/2014 6:24pm PT  

[A version of this article now cross-published by Salon...]

Over the last 48 hours or so, during which time I've been largely off the grid on jury duty, the story of wife-beating U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller has finally taken off in the corporate media, as well as among a number of the elected officials who would be responsible for impeaching the 2002 George W. Bush lifetime-appointee to the federal bench.

I couldn't be happier to finally be playing catch-up on this story for a change, as calls for accountability for the federal judge from Alabama's Middle District have now become a "virtual chorus" over these last few days. The state's Governor, as well as both of Alabama's U.S. Senators and its entire Congressional delegation, save for one member (Rep. Mike Rogers), have now called for Fuller's resignation and/or impeachment.

His resignation, however, and arguably his impeachment, would be far too generous for Fuller, as I'll discuss below, given previous allegations --- by his first wife --- that mirror what we now know about him, concerning drug and alcohol abuse, as well as physical abuse of both the first wife and their children...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




'It is not only unreasonable, but also mathematically, logically, and physically impossible that by November 4, hundreds of thousands of voters will learn about the need for ID'...
By Ernest A. Canning on 9/18/2014 1:30pm PT  

With "electoral chaos" said to be reigning in Wisconsin following last week's extraordinary ruling by three Republican appointees to the federal bench, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has filed an Emergency Petition for Rehearing En Banc [PDF] before the full U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeal.

The ACLU is seeking the immediate reinstatement of the District Court's injunction of the state Republicans' Photo ID voting law. The lower court had previously found the statute to be, in no uncertain terms, in violation of both the U.S. Constitution and the federal Voting Rights Act.

When they later file briefs, the ACLU and other attorneys representing the plaintiffs in Frank v. Walker will undoubtedly go into greater depth to explain how the three GOP members of the 7th Circuit panel erroneously interpreted the U.S. Supreme Court's 2008 decision in Crawford vs. Marion County Elections Board and how the WI law, "Act 23", is "materially different from" the Photo ID law passed by Indiana Republicans and approved by SCOTUS in 2008.

The emergency filing, however, zeroes in on what the ACLU describes as chaos and disenfranchisement that will likely be caused by an "extraordinary decision" last week, which, they say, seeks to effectuate a "slapdash implementation" of a radical and complex change in the Badger State's election law just seven weeks prior to the November 2014 general election...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




ALSO: Two Alabama Congresswomen, a Democrat and a Republican, call for accountability, possible impeachment by the U.S. House...
By Brad Friedman on 9/17/2014 12:33pm PT  

On Tuesday night's All In with Chris Hayes on MSNBC, at the end of a segment on the NFL's growing domestic violence controversies, he finally delved into the outrageous case we've been reporting in great detail since early August, when Alabama's federal U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller was arrested and charged with beating his wife bloody in an Atlanta hotel room.

Hayes plays audio from a portion of the 911 call from Fuller's wife, including the segment in which it sounds as if she is being repeatedly struck, as later cited by the 911 dispatcher. "Please help me. He's beating on me," she is heard crying afterward.

Hayes' brief segment on the Fuller wife-beating case --- with a promise to cover the story more in the future --- begins just after the 4:00 minute mark in the video below...

Atlanta Police say that when they responded to desperate 911 call from the Ritz-Carlton on the night of August 9, the wife's face and legs were bloodied and bruised, and that it appeared she had been dragged around the room by her hair. The room smelled of alcohol, but Judge Fuller appeared to otherwise be unscathed.

Several weeks after his arrest, Fuller took a plea deal in exchange for a pre-trial diversion program that will allow him to avoid prosecution and have his record entirely expunged after completion of once-a-week domestic violence counseling for 24 weeks. That, despite indications two year ago that he had also beaten his previous wife and had both drug and alcohol problems.

Unless he resigns or is impeached by the U.S. Congress, the George W. Bush-appointee to the federal bench in the Middle District of Alabama will continue to serve out his lifetime appointment for $200,000/year.

Two Congresswoman from Alabama, a Republican and a Democrat, have now called for accountability in the case of Fuller. They are the first members of Congress to speak out on the matter, despite outrage expressed from a number of elected officials in both the House and Senate over the NFL/Ray Rice domestic abuse scandal...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By Brad Friedman on 9/16/2014 11:48am PT  

Though I am not being paid to play, I will be speaking for free a few minutes after the 7:50p showing of documentary filmmaker John Wellington Ennis' latest years-in-the-making masterwork, Pay 2 Play: Democracy's High Stakes, on Wednesday (9/17) out here in L.A.

I'm also in the film, but don't let that keep you from coming if you're anywhere near the 'hood. As usual, our friend Mr. Ennis (director of one of my favorite Election Integrity films, FREE FOR ALL!: One Dude's Quest to Save Democracy - click that link to watch the great trailer!) has put together an ingenious, enlightening, very funny and very frustrating portrait of our post-Citizens United democracy and what the hell there is left to do about it. It also features some fantastic stories and terrific voices, many of whom you may be familiar with.

So if you're in the L.A. area on Wednesday night, please stop by for the screening and say hey afterword! Here's the deets...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By Brad Friedman on 9/15/2014 7:13pm PT  

On Monday's Politics Nation with Al Sharpton on MSNBC, during a segment on the NFL/Ray Rice domestic violence scandal, the issue of the wife-beating U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller finally made it on to air, thanks to MSNBC contributor Goldie Taylor who was joining Sharpton along with CBS Sports Radio reporter Dana Jacobson to discuss the latest in the NFL case.

Fuller, as The BRAD BLOG has been fairly relentlessly covering over the past month, was arrested for beating his wife bloody in a hotel room in August, before being allowed to take a plea deal allowing him off the hook with a pre-trial diversionary program that would expunge his record entirely, and leave him to continue his life-time appointment to the federal bench in the Middle District of Alabama. Fuller, a George W. Bush appointee, can only be removed from his $200,000/year job via impeachment by the U.S. Congress.

While the Rice case has been covered extensively over the past week by both the corporate media and elected officials, following the public release of a video showing the NFL star knocking out his wife in a hotel elevator, the Fuller matter has received very little coverage. As we reported last week, it's also received very little outrage from elected officials in Congress who might otherwise have brought articles of impeachment by now, had their been video tape of Fuller's bloodied wife pleading for an ambulance and help from police at Atlanta's Ritz-Carlton hotel in early August.

Following a segment concerning the 16 female U.S. Senators who wrote to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell last week to demand a "zero tolerance policy" for domestic abusers in the league, Taylor noted the irony of the Senators failing to call for the impeachment of Fuller, despite the fact that, unlike in the NFL, those elected officials actually have direct control over the removal of federal jurists from the bench.

Beginning at around the 7:10 mark in the video posted below, in response to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D)'s appearance on Sunday's Face the Nation on CBS explaining the Senators' demand for accountability from Goodell, Taylor broached the topic of Fuller...

GOLDIE TAYLOR: ...But what I have to ask Sen. Gillibrand and the others who signed that letter --- I am very pleased and very proud that they stood up and called the NFL out on this --- but what about Judge Mark Fuller down in Alabama? Why haven't they called for his impeachment? Why this case [Rice], and why not the other [Fuller]? I've heard a lot of people talk about this...

REV. AL SHARPTON: Mark Fuller, for our viewers who don't know, is a federal judge who had been...

TAYLOR: Absolutely, a federal judge...who beat his wife here in Atlanta, got a diversionary program, but no one has called for his impeachment...

SHARPTON: ...and still on the bench!

TAYLOR: ...why not that?

SHARPTON: Still on the bench.

TAYLOR: ...and still on the bench, and still has his job.

DANA JACOBSON: Because the NFL is in the spotlight right now, and I think that's a big part of it...

Note to Jacobson: The "NFL is in the spotlight right now", because you folks in the corporate media have finally helped put them there. That's fine, and certainly long overdue. But you can also help put a member of the federal bench who sits in judgment of others, and who arguably beat his wife far more viciously than Rice did, and who also appears to be a repeated wife abuser, in that same spotlight.

As a Twitter user aptly commented tonight in response to the MSNBC segment this afternoon, "#MarkFuller is more of a threat to society than Ray Rice ever will be."

True. In any event, thanks to Taylor for finally bringing this issue to MSNBC viewers. Perhaps it'll catch on. It damned well should.

Here's the complete video from the 9/15/2014 episode of Politics Nation with Al Sharpton. Much more of our coverage of this case is linked below it...

* * *

UPDATE 9/17/2014: MSNBC's Chris Hayes plays portion of 911 call from Fuller's wife, in which she is heard being repeatedly struck. Full story now here...

* * *

Recently related stories at The BRAD BLOG:

8/11/2014: "Federal Judge in Don Siegelman Case Arrested, Charged with Abusing Wife in Atlanta Hotel"
8/25/2014: "Federal Judge Who Was Arrested for Beating His Wife (and Who Sentenced Don Siegelman) Is Now Hoping to Avoid Prosecution Altogether"
9/5/2014: "BREAKING: Federal Judge Who Presided Over Siegelman Case and Who Recently Beat His Own Wife Bloody Strikes Deal to Avoid Prosecution"
9/10/2014: "NFL's Ray Rice Loses Job for Knocking Out Wife, Federal Judge Mark Fuller Keeps Lifetime Appointment After Beating Wife Bloody"
9/15/2014: "Republican Senior Federal Judge, Domestic Abuse Experts Call for Accountability for Wife-Beating U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller"




Outrage slowly growing after plea deal to avoid prosecution, retention of lifetime appointment to federal bench...
By Brad Friedman on 9/15/2014 6:05am PT  

Last week, we wrote about the disturbing similarities (and differences) in the wife-beating cases of the NFL's Ray Rice, who knocked out his then-fiancée/now-wife in an Atlantic City hotel elevator in mid-February, and that of Alabama's U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller, who beat his wife bloody in an Atlantic City hotel room in early August.

Despite the allegations in the now-sealed 2012 divorce documents from his first wife, suggesting that he also beat her up (as well as their kids), Fuller, like Rice, is being treated as a first time offender by the court system, and being allowed to enter a pre-trial diversion program to avoid prosecution entirely. Both will avoid prosecution and have their arrest records completely expunged, as if the beatings never happened, upon completion of domestic abuse counseling. Rice has agreed to attend sessions for a year; Fuller has agreed to once-weekly domestic abuse counseling for just 24 weeks.

Rice eventually lost his job after video of his assault was published. Fuller, unless he's impeached by the U.S. Congress or chooses to resign, will keep his $200,000/year lifetime on the U.S. District Court in Alabama's Middle District. He has indicated he intends to continue his job sitting in judgment of others, stating, after the court agreed to the plea deal early this month, that he "look[s] forward to...returning to full, active status" on the federal bench.

We detailed some of the very few calls from media for Fuller to step down or be impeached, as well as the (so far) tepid reaction from elected officials --- the very same ones who have made their "outrage" known about the Rice case --- who are largely ignoring the Fuller case, even though the violence in his case was arguably much worse. According to the Atlanta Police, he struck and kicked his wife repeatedly, dragged around the hotel room by her hair, leaving bruises and blood on her face and legs, and in the hotel bathroom. According to the reported details of the desperate 911 call from his wife, asking for an ambulance, she is heard being struck and repeatedly crying: "Help me, please. Please help me. He's beating on me."

But the outrage about the wrist-slap treatment of a wife-beating federal judge seems to be growing --- very slowly, but growing --- including a scathing denunciation of Fuller by a fellow Republican federal jurist, this one a senior judge from the District of Nevada, who decries the plea deal allowed to Fuller and writes, "Given what happened in that hotel room, no one should trust his judgment in a federal trial courtroom"...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




Republican voter suppression laws getting huge boost from GOP jurists in WI and NC, where hundreds recently disenfranchised...
[Now UPDATED at bottom of article with additional info from the court order]
By Brad Friedman on 9/12/2014 3:51pm PT  

[This article now cross-published by Salon...]

Wisconsin's Republican Gov. Scott Walker notched a huge victory today at the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. The ruling could very well result in the controversial Governor's re-election this November --- at the expense of untold thousands of legally registered voters who may now not be able to vote at all this year.

This morning, a three-judge panel heard Walker's appeal to the federal ruling that previously struck down his Photo ID voting restriction law. By afternoon, almost immediately following the hearing, the three GOP-appointed federal judges (a Reagan appointee, and two George W. Bush appointees) restored the restrictive voting measure [PDF] in advance of the November general election.

As reported by the Journal Sentinel:

The move by the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals clears the way for the state to implement the law for the Nov. 4 election, though it does not stop the ongoing appeal over whether the measure is unconstitutional.

"The state of Wisconsin may, if it wishes (and if it is appropriate under rules of state law), enforce the photo ID requirement in this November's elections," the unsigned two-page order reads.

Even before the ruling came down, reports from the courtroom earlier today had suggested that it wasn't looking good for those fighting for voting rights there, and that the judges might even order the previously struck-down law to be implemented before this year's mid-term elections, where Walker faces a neck-and-neck re-election contest with his Democratic opponent, Mary Burke.

Instituting the law at this late date, the plaintiffs argued, would cause extraordinary confusion. "I think it would be extremely irresponsible for a court to do something that would so change the landscape not only for the (state Division of Motor Vehicles) but for election officials," Larry Dupuis, legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Wisconsin told the Journal Sentinel after today's hearing.

UC Irvine election law professor Rick Hasen noted the same earlier today, before the ruling had come down, explaining why it would be "a very bad idea" to implement this law "just before the election."

Making matters worse, and more confusing for voters and elections officials, the WI GOP's Photo ID voting restriction covers absentee ballots as well as polling place voting, unlike most similar laws enacted by Republicans in other states, where only in-person voting is effected. But, according to the Journal-Sentinel (in a report now replaced online by an updated version on the court's late ruling), the fact that thousands of absentee ballots have already gone out to voters this year without an explanation on them that Photo ID needs to be supplied when they are returned, could result in even more disenfranchisement in the Badger State...

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By Brad Friedman on 9/12/2014 6:05am PT  

In an earlier life, I played a fake news man for some years. The character, which shared my name, was a slightly dumber Colbert-type rightwinger, though it pre-dated Colbert. (As I've previously noted, the line between fake news man and real one is uncomfortably thin.) At one point during that period, there had been an epidemic of well-publicized shootings. One of them was the Columbine Massacre. I remember using the satiric character, even at the time, to rail against the media for making the killers famous by headlining their names and plastering their faces on front pages and magazine covers, etc. In other words, for giving them exactly the infamy they likely sought in the first place.

You may have noticed we haven't written much about ISIS here. One of the reasons is because that's precisely what they'd like us all to do. And, since they emerged as the latest big scary menace on the world stage a few months ago, along with glossy and often horrible PR videos and a fairly sophisticated social media presence, the mainstream media and the political world seem to be all too happy to grant them every last bit of the very publicity they seek.

As of Wednesday night, it looks as though President Obama is similarly happy to take the ISIS bait and grant them the honor of being elevated as the latest Public Enemy #1 of the United States of America. The precise direct threat they pose to the U.S. at this time remains unclear. At least I haven't been able to figure it out and Obama's speech on Wednesday night made it no clearer. But the GOP war hawks seemed to be thrilled with it all, and party-line Democrats seem to be offering few, if any, objections either. The military industrial complex is certainly rejoicing over their newest apparent windfall.

To be clear, all available evidence suggests that ISIS or ISIL or the Islamic State is most certainly dangerous (at least to those within their expanding vicinity), extremely ruthless, and extraordinarily barbaric. Still, granting them the fame or infamy they seek --- be it in the mainstream media or from the U.S. Government, much less from the bully pulpit of the Presidency --- seems to be playing precisely into their hands. I'm not interested in doing so.

It's also, at least according to this report from Associated Press published just hours before the President's speech on Wednesday, exactly what their PR masterminds have been working towards. Another very public over-reaction to a most-likely "exaggerated" threat described by the AP as "no unstoppable juggernaut" and "wield[ing] outsize influence" thanks, in no small part, to their mastery of social media...

--- Click here for REST OF STORY!... ---




By Brad Friedman on 9/10/2014 11:36am PT  

Part 1 of this week's BradCast on KPFK/Pacifica Radio: How the NFL's Ray Rice knocked out his wife in a hotel elevator, lost his job and outraged America --- and how U.S. District Court Judge Mark Fuller beat his wife bloody in a hotel room, will have his arrest record expunged, gets to keep his lifetime appointment to the federal bench and very few in America seem to give a damn.

Part 2: What would you do about ISIS if you were President? Callers, lots of 'em, share their thoughts. I share a few of mine in kind. Nobody gets a free pass.

Plus, Desi Doyen and the latest Green News Report, and a few more items here and there in what was a very lively show this week. You should listen to it.

Download MP3 or listen online below...




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