Perhaps I missed the announcement on the Fox News Channel, but at some point over the last few days, the official number of U.S. Military deaths in Iraq (may not include troops who died after evacuation due to injuries received in country) went over the 1,300 mark to 1,304.

We congratulate Mr. Bush on his continuing "catastrophic success".

We also take note that as of today, The Washington Post is reporting that a majority of Americans finally understand that this war was "not worth fighting".

Wow. Who knew?

While the bulk of the mainstream media seems to be sitting on their hands, the Internet-only news organization RAW STORY is actually making calls, confirming info, and advancing the story as the very model of what investigative journalism used to look like in this country.

To that end, RAW STORY followed up today on an article published by The BRAD BLOG last week, in which we issued a point-by-point reply to the "full statement" of Yang Enterprises, Inc. (YEI) in regards to the explosive Clint Curtis charges we broke here two weeks ago.

Those charges concerned, amongst other things, the allegation that Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) asked Curtis to create "vote-rigging software" back in a 2000 meeting at YEI where Curtis worked at the time. Feeney was then their corporate attorney and registered lobbyist, as well as a Florida state legislator who would shortly thereafter become Speaker of the Florida Legislature.

In RAW STORY's piece this morning, editor John Byrne was able to get a short reply from a YEI Vice-President concerning the evidence we posted refuting the companies claim that Hai Lin Nee (a/k/a Henry Nee) "has never been an employee of YEI." Nee had plead guilty in October of this year to espionage charges concerning the shipment of Hellfire Anti-Tank Missiles parts to China, and was named by Curtis in his affidavit [PDF] as being an "illegal-alien" working for YEI and having added "wiretapping routines" to software that YEI was contracted to create for NASA and other companies.

In our reply to that, we published several "Weekly Time Reports" (received via Public Records Requests) submitted by YEI to the Florida Dept. of Transportation (FDOT). The time cards with YEI stationery were signed by Nee and indicated that he worked as a "Consultant" for the company as many as 60 hours a week on the "Electronic Document Management System" contract (EDMS) that YEI had with FDOT.

We also posted several emails in our article replying to YEI's "full statement" --- including one from Nee himself, and another from the CEO's exective secretary, Mike Cohen --- which indicated that Nee, did in fact work at YEI in apparent contradiction to both the "full statement" on the YEI website, and the comments above from Weaver.

Additionally, RAW STORY was able to contact Tom Yowell, the Special Agent assigned to the FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force in Orlando Florida, concerning his email to Clint Curtis indicating that YEI was "under investigation by another Division of the FBI."

Yowell confirmed to RAW STORY that he did in fact send that email to Curtis on Nov. 22nd, 2004 as The BRAD BLOG first reported.

But then Yowell seemed to do a bit of interesting backtracking on the matter...

In their "full statement", YEI had claimed they were "not under investigation by the FBI". Which Yowell's email to Curtis would seem to dispute.

Why a Special Agent for the FBI Joint Terorrism Task Force would tell a concerned citizen one thing via Email after he reported a number of activities concerning YEI and then begin backtracking only after the information became public knowledge is a question that we will continue to look into as this remarkable story continues to develop...

In the "Tom Feeney - In his own words" section of his official U.S. House of Representatives website page, Mr. Feeney (R-FL) reposts an Op-Ed he penned for the Orlando Sentinel --- apparently not ironically --- entitled "FLORIDA GETS IT RIGHT ON ELECTIONS".

The Op-Ed was published --- apparently not ironically --- on April 1, 2004 (April Fools Day).

In the piece, Mr. Feeney offers some well-informed opinions of the "unnecessary and devisive", "destructive lawsuits" challenging Florida's voting system by "vocal naysayers, who for partisan reasons are doing their best to portray the Sunshine State's voting technologies in a negative light."

The entire piece is certainly worth a read in full! If only for so many such --- apparently not ironic --- turns of phrase!

But there were two --- not ironic at all --- passages which, for some reason, leapt out at us this evening [emphasis added]:

What Mr. Feeney modestly fails to note in that paragraph is that he --- as Speaker of the Florida state legislature in 2000 (where he remained until joining the U.S. House in 2002) --- was himself, apparently, one of those "state legislators who helped position Florida to make the necessary changes in the state's voting processes and technologies." At least as Clint Curtis would tell us.

But aside from that, Mr. Feeney's right! That commitment has paid off!

Though for all of Mr. Feeney's hard work in changing "the state's voting processes and technologies" it seems that he may be the "ill-informed" one on some of these matters. Just look what he had to say in the same --- apparently not ironic --- Op-Ed in regards to voter-verified paper trails [emphasis once again added]:

Well, that's odd...And not at all ironic! And it may even be news to the entire state of Nevada!

Perhaps Mr. Feeney missed this information posted on the website of his good friends at the Sequoia Voting Systems corporation:

As a completely unrelated and not-ironic-at-all side note, Mr. Feeney has still refused to return the phone calls of many reporters seeking comment from the Congressman in the two full weeks since The BRAD BLOG began reporting on allegations that he sought to create "vote-rigging software" from Yang Enterprises, Inc. (YEI) --- in his hometown of Oviedo, FL --- back in 2000 where he served as corporate counsel and registered lobbyist while concurrently serving as Speaker of the Florida Legislature. (See our "Special Coverage" sidebar at right for more info.)

On that point, Mr. Feeney may deserve the benefit of the doubt, however. We cannot know for certain, after all, if his office has "the companion technology" necessary to return such phone calls.

As such, any expectation that he or his staff would be able to use such "evolving technology" --- such as the telephone --- in order to do so, might well be "unrealistic as of today".

Where's the media? They're right here...and they're paying attention to reporting by The BRAD BLOG. I urge you to count no chickens in regards to coverage by major media on this story, friends. It's a rather explosive story, and the big boy media folks need to cross all their t's and dot all their i's before letting loose with these charges!

Of course, feel free to let them know about it! And ask them to cover it!

Until those media big big boys jump in however (and there's at least one very big big boy that I hear has been sniffing around this story!) take note of a few of the other recent Clint Curtis media appearances in one form or another...

FULL VIDEO TESTIMONY...

• The full Clint Curtis sworn testimony before members of House Judiciary Committee is now available here. (Previously, we only had links to a portion of his testimony, which did not include his naming of Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) as having asked him to write the "vote-rigging software prototype! This clip now includes all of Curtis' testimony!)

  · Streaming Windows Media Player version available here!
  · Streaming RealPlayer version is now available here.

ON RADIO...

• Live on Sunday! Curtis was on the Mark Levine radio show for an hour today. Levine is on an "inside the beltway" D.C. station (WAGE AM-1200), but he also streams live via the web. UPDATE: The archive of today's broadcast is now available here! Listen up!
• Curtis was on the Ed Schultz radio show broadcast nationwide on Thursday, but unfortunately I failed to capture the interview while I was finishing up my response to YEI's "full statement" on the Curtis charges. I've contacted the producers of the show and am hoping to get the audio to post or link to here soon.
• Audio from Curtis' radio appearances on Air America Radio and the Thom Hartman program during Week 1 of this scandal, are linked this previous item.

IN PRINT...

• Feeney's hometown paper, The Seminole Chronicle covered the story very smartly yesterday. We spoke about it in detail, and linked to it right here...
• Bob Fitrakis, the excellent investigative journalist and Senior Editor of Columbus' Free Press who has been doing so much good work on the entire Ohio mess, covered Curtis' testimony to the Judiciary Committee members in Ohio last Monday, in an article on the hearings right here. Fitrakis describes Curtis' testimony as "riveting". (The Free Press website seems to be "down" as of this posting, let's hope it gets back up in good order soon, and has not come under the same type of DDos hack-attacks that The BRAD BLOG suffered when we first began reporting on Election Irregularaties after Nov. 2nd! Given the tremendous coverage that FP has been offering, however, it wouldn't surprise me a bit.)
• Adam Smith covered the Curtis story in The St. Petersburg Times last Sunday. But while including a response from YEI's "outside general counsel", Michael A. O'Quinn, on the matter, Smith failed to note that O'Quinn was Feeney's old lawpartner for years in Florida and that there was no evidence for O'Quinn's "disgruntled employee" charge which was later dropped in YEI's full statement. Smith is a decent columnist, but dropped the ball on that matter! Smith can be politely informed about this important oversight at adam@sptimes.com

INTERNATIONAL MEDIA...

• Curtis is scheduled to interview with the great German investigative journal Der Speigel shortly. Marc Pitzke is covering the story for the magazine. We'll let you know when that article appears, and if an English translation being made available.
• TV Asahi (a CNN affiliate from Japan) is working up a piece on Curtis for their "Hodo Station" program. Interesting that Japan may beat the US to a TV story on Curtis! Though perhaps their story may make CNN take notice of it!

As I hinted earlier, however, there is at least one major TV network news operation looking into this story. I don't want to say too much about who that is, as I don't wish to spook things for the moment, and as well, I've not yet been personally able to confirm it with the producers. But I've now heard about it from several different reliable sources.

As always, more info on all of the above as it becomes appropriate to publish here, soon!

Well heck. If big boy bloggers Kos and MyDD are brazen enough to rally their minions to receive nominations for The 2004 Koufax (Best Blog) Awards, why can't we? (On the presumption that we may actually have minions to rally, of course.)

As The BRAD BLOG only fired up our muckraking keyboard in January of '04, we weren't even aware such awards existed until a day or so ago, but we are delighted to see that a few of you have already nominated us in a few different categories!

So...if you are inclined and --- with no humility whatsover --- might we submit to you The BRAD BLOG for your consideration...

• Here's an explantion for those categories.
• Here is the latest open thread on which you can POST YOUR NOMINATIONS AS COMMENTS. (Just scroll to bottom of page, and fill out the comment form.)

...It looks like a few folks have already nominated BRAD BLOG for "Best Single Issue Blog" for our coverage of "Grand Theft America" (though we never really meant to be a "Single Issue Blog" until the forces of nature seem to have propelled us in that direction beginning, oh, sometime around 4am on Nov. 3rd or so!), and for "Best Series" in regards to our Clint Curtis reportage and even for our exposure of the "White House Website Scrubbing" scandal!

And The BRAD BLOG even received a few for "Best New Blog" and "Most Deserving of Wider Recognition"!

It is, as they say, an honor "just to be nominated".

Alex Babcock, editor and reporter at Florida's Seminole Chronicle has just filed a tremendously good story on the explosive Clint Curtis allegations which we originally broke here last week!

Finally! A smart and thorough print media account of this extraordinary story! And in Tom Feeney's hometown paper no less!

And as if that isn't good news enough, unlike previous coverage in both Wired Magazine and The St. Petersburg Times, Babcock does not allow the "outside general counsel" to Yang Enterprises, Inc (YEI) to skate on their scurrilous charges made against Curtis several days ago!

As we mentioned in several previous stories on this, YEI's attorney Michael A. O'Quinn of "Fowler and O'Quinn P.A." had made a general statement over the weekend smearing Curtis as "a disgruntled former employee" and claiming that his "allegations are categorically false."

What both Wired and St. Petersburg Times failed to point out in covering O'Quinn's statement was that O'Quinn --- as well as being a campaign contributor to Feeney along with Dr. and Mrs. Yang --- is also Feeney's former law partner from as late as 2002 when the firm was known as "Fowler, Barice, Feeney and O'Quinn P.A."!

Babcock does not make the same mistake, and responsibly offers some context for Feeney's long-term association with O'Quinn as his former law partner.

While Babcock was unable to pin down O'Quinn in regards to any supporting evidence for the "disgruntled former employee" charge --- one that so far seems to have zero basis in reality, and which was notably dropped from YEI's "formal statement" on the matter issued last Tuesday --- Babcock does somewhat speak to O'Quinn's all-new suggestion that Curtis is "motivated by money".

He points out that Curtis has stated, as also confirmed in an interview with RAW STORY, that he has no interest in the $200,000 reward being offered by Justice Through Music for evidence of vote fraud in 2004.

In regard to Hai Lin Nee (a/k/a Henry Nee) who Curtis has charged with adding "wiretapping routines" to software that YEI built for NASA and other projects --- and who was indicted and plead guilty to espionage charges earlier this year --- Babcock notes that YEI "said that the man named by Curtis as the recipient of NASA-related information has never worked for the company."

Babcock did not note, and the information may have come too late to meet his deadline, our report yesterday which revealed "Weekly Time Reports" and several emails indicating that Nee did, in fact, work for the company.

We hope Babcock will follow up soon in that regard, as well as continue to report on this topic. To that end, I'd hope that you folks would send a quick email to the paper thanking them for their coverage, and encouraging Babcock --- and Michelle Yoffee-Beard who also contributed to the story --- to continue to report on this very troubling story! (The same, by the way, is true for any of the reporters who prove courageous enough to get the truth out there on this issue!)

You can email Alex Babcock via this link.

While Bill O'Reilly was busy lying to his radio listeners this morning about "Liberals" and "Progressives" (e.g. "Liberals believe Government can solve all of our problems, and they believe the bigger the Government, the better!"), Media Matter's David Brock was standing by, waiting to hear back from the "cowardly" Master of the Loofah, O'Reilly.

From Brock's no spin letter to O'Reilly:

By the way Mr. O'Reilly, David Brock is gay, so I'm certain a manly-man like yourself should be able to take him on without a problem...Right?

We're just looking out for you, Bill.

The swell end o' evening post I made last night just before "shutting down" got eaten by Blogspot and never posted.

The gist was that posting was light yesterday while working on a number of things, with a number of people related to a number of items we've been reporting here of late. And that I'd rather get it right, than get it fast. So for that we beg your patience.

Also, that I believe we've finally (after moving to three different servers in the last week) have found a server that can properly accomodate traffic and other needs of the original BRAD BLOG (in theory). And to that end, I've begun porting over posts from BRAD BLOG TOO as reposts over on BRAD BLOG so that we may soon have everything eventually again in one easy to find, easy to search location (in theory).

I've also got quite a few Clint Curtis related media notes to share with you, some rather notable, and I will be doing so today along with a few other things.

So please standby, and we thank again for your patience and support...

I don't believe Tom Feeney meant to be ironic here...

From the front page of yesterday's The Hill:

I don't like to report anything here until I've had chances to independently verify and add to it. However, as there are several things in the background that I'm currently working on, and there are several important items rolling out of Ohio, I'm gonna post some links for you guys to check out.

NOTE: I haven't done any independent vetting on these items, so please use your own judgement about the sources they come from. But some seem quite notable, so I want to get them out there!

• AP is reporting: Ohio Justice Throws Out Election Challenge - "The Ohio Supreme Court's chief justice on Thursday threw out a challenge to the state's presidential election results.

  The 40 voters who brought the case will likely be able to refile the challenge.

  Chief Justice Thomas Moyer ruled that the request improperly challenged two separate election results. Ohio law only allows one race to be challenged in a single complaint, he said." (DRUDGE is linking to this one, of course!)

• RAW STORY is reporting: Kerry campaign issues letter to Ohio Secretary of State demanding recount tampering investigation - "Senator Kerry's and Senator Edwards' state counsel for Ohio has issued a letter to Ohio Republican Secretary of State and Bush-Cheney '04 chair Kenneth Blackwell demanding an official investigation into voting machine tampering in Hocking County. They have the letter online."
  RAW STORY also has much more on late Ohio developments!
• "mtnester" on DemocraticUnderground.com Discussion (unconfirmed info, will try to get more on this!): Ohio, Fairfield County, suspends recount - "At 4 pm [Wednesday], after failing to get a match of hand counted ballots with punch card tabulator (ESS), two hand counts and two times through machine, after stating they were awaiting a call back from that company to have a new machine delivered, less than 30 seconds later convened a board meeting, voted to suspend recount, to await a new machine from ESS, and recount will be re-done Saturday, same exact precincts, the building is now closed, you are to exit the facility. BOE [Board of Elections] blaming issues on "machine failure" in order to avoid the now required entire county hand count. Precints were not random, they were selected by BOE, one from the Dem and one from the Repup."

More Later...On these and Clint Curtis items as well...

The Greens, Libertarians and --- yes --- Kerry-Edwards 2004 have just added "election tampering" to a civil suit filed against the state of Ohio. The fine folks at RAW STORY have the scoop and the court docs online.

One of several American Heroes of the moment, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), just finished up on MSNBC's Countdown. We only caught the last few minutes in which Conyers said in regards to their hearings on Ohio Election Irregularities that not a single Republican member of the Judiciary Committee had time to join; "The fact that Republicans didn't join us isn't our problem...it's their fault."

Hear, hear, Mr. Conyers.

We hope to post a link to the full video interview which discussed a number of the latest Ohio concerns when our friends at CrooksAndLiars.com make it available (hint, hint)! UPDATE Here's the video link! Apparently Conyers is calling for an FBI investigation into the Triad incident!

ANOTHER UPDATE: Looks like C&L has now posted the Cliff Arnebeck interview from yesterday Hannity & Colmes on Fox "News"(!) --- I guess I wasn't dreaming last night.

And, for a refreshing change of pace, there's this delightfully-not-life-and-death nor democracy-collapsing story of the couple in Madison County Ohio who, apparently, voted twice on Election Day after learning their absentee ballots were not to be found on Election Day.

They were found soon after. And now, the $2.2 million London School Districts levy initiative, which lost by a single vote, may hang in the balance as Mr. and Mrs. Wilbur and Betty France --- who voted against --- decide if they will withdraw two of their votes.

We thank our Email tipster from a Clear Channel station (yes, Clear Channel) in Columbus, Ohio for sharing the story.

Apparently, each single vote still makes the difference to at least some parts of this crazy world. An idea that a few of us democracy-lovin' dissidents have been suggesting for quite a while.

It has been well over a week since The BRAD BLOG first released our original exclusive article on the "WHISTLEBLOWER AFFIDAVIT" of Clint Curtis.

In his affidavit, Curtis accused U.S. Rep. Tom Feeney (R-FL) of asking him to create a "vote-rigging software prototype" program while Curtis worked for Yang Enterprises Inc. (YEI) in a meeting at YEI in October of 2000.

Curtis also accused YEI of employing Hai Lin Nee (a/k/a Henry Nee), who Curtis described as "an illegal-alien" who had placed "wiretapping modules" into software created by YEI for NASA, the Florida Dept. of Transportion (FDOT) and others with whom YEI had contracts.

Yesterday we released court documents showing that Nee plead guilty, in October of 2004, to one of the charges related to attempted shipments of Hellfire Anti-Tank missile parts to China for which he was indicted last March after a four-year sting operation by the U.S. Immigration & Customs Encorcement (ICE) agency. Nee was allowed to go free with 3 years probation and a $100 fine.

Back in 2000, the time of Curtis' "vote-rigging software prototype" claims, Feeney was a corporate attorney and a registered lobbyist for YEI, an engineering firm in Feeney's hometown of Oveido, FL.

While serving as counsel and lobbyist for YEI, Feeney was also a Florida state Legislator who would shortly thereafter become Speaker of the Florida House. In 1994, Feeney was Jeb Bush's running-mate in his original failed bid for Florida Governor.

Feeney's lawfirm at the time, where he was a partner, was "Fowler, Barice, Feeney, & O'Quinn P. A." which is now known as "Fowler & O'Quinn, P. A." since Feeney has left to serve in the U.S. House where he sits on the House Judiciary Committee.

As "outside general counsel" for YEI, Michael A. O'Quinn, Esquire (a campaign donor to Feeney, along with company owners Dr. and Mrs. Yang) issued a short statement on Saturday on behalf of YEI suggesting that Curtis was "a disgruntled employee".

We discussed and answered in detail to O'Quinn's charge in this BRAD BLOG article, reporting that we have yet to find any evidence to suggest that Curtis was "a disgruntled employee". We pointed out that Curtis resigned from YEI in December of 2000 and stayed, at Mrs. Yang's request, for another six weeks until they were able to find a suitable replacement for him. We posted other evidentiary details to that effect in the article, and discussed the "farewall party" that YEI reportedly threw for Curtis at the time.

YEI posted a brief statement on their website at the end of last week, announcing that "An official statement will be forthcoming", that "all" of Curtis' allegations were "100% FALSE!!" and instructing "God" to "Bless America." The BRAD BLOG discussed that statement originally here, and then again in more detail here.

And yesterday, YEI's "official statement" was finally posted on their website.

We will respond to that below, with evidence that seems to demonstrate that, at least part of their statement, is patently untrue. But by way of reminder, since our original story was posted at the beginning of last week, Curtis, who claims to have been "a long-time Republican" has since that time...

• Met with and been interviewed by Democratic staffers on the U.S. House Judiciary Committee in D.C. (where Feeney is also a member)
• Met with and been interviewed by members of the office of U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) who is a member of the Senate's Science, Technology and Space sub-committee which oversees NASA on Capitol Hill
• Has been extensively interviewed by --- and is now being aided by --- Citizens for Ethics & Responsibility in Washington (CREW), the watchdog organization who helped prepare the recent ethics charges against Republican majority leader Sen. Tom Delay
• Has told his story via interviews on a number of radio outlets including Air America Radio and The Thom Harmann program and will today be on the Ed Schultz radio program at 5:05pm ET
• And on Monday of this week, gave startling sworn "jaw-dropping", public testimony to U.S. Judiciary Committee members in in a public hearing held on Voting Irregularities in Columbus, Ohio.

At this time, The BRAD BLOG is unaware of any claim that Curtis has made either publicly, in any of his official interviews, media interviews, in his sworn affidavit, or in the extensive interviews that we have done with him that has yet been proven to be untrue in any way.

In fact, quite a few articles by various media outlets over the past week have confirmed a fair number of the charges that Curtis has made, and there is an extensive paper trail of newspaper articles and public records documenting and corroborating many of his claims going back at least as far as a three full years.

While it's still The BRAD BLOG's official position that Clint Curtis may either have his facts wrong or may not be telling the truth about some portions of his story, we have as yet been unable to unearth any evidence to suggest either of those possibilities is the case. Indeed, all our checking so far into public records and extensive interviews with individuals who have known Curtis for some time and/or are familiar with his case for a number of years all seem to corroborate the veracity of Curtis. As at least three different people who know him, but who were not present for and therefore cannot confirm the specific "vote-rigging software prototype" story, have told The BRAD BLOG, "Clint doesn't lie."

We have found nothing to contradict that sentiment so far.

That said, let's take a look at the unsigned and unattributed statement released by YEI yesterday on their website, and at some of the documentary hard evidence which would seem to dispute or disprove at least a portion of their official statement...