Two media statements released from members of the U.S. House Judiciary Committee indicate that subpoenas will soon be issued in the matter of the allegedly coerced firings of U.S. Attorneys in the Department of Justice. A vote will take place tomorrow in the Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law on whether to issue the subpoenas to Justice Dept. officials Carol Lam, David Iglesias, H.E. Cummins, III, and John McKay to compel them to appear before a subcommittee hearing next week.

As well, The BRAD BLOG has learned the Judiciary Committee will also hold hearings next week on matters related to "Election Reform and Irregularities."

According to a Committee staffer, "subpoenas will be issued" tomorrow in the U.S. Attorney matter. If so, it would be the first time the Democrats have exercised their newly-gained subpoena power since wresting control of Congress from Republicans...

Please feel free to 'splain your vote in Comments below...

Apropos of our earlier article today concerning the fake Fox "News" Channel "comedy" show 1/2 Hour News Hour, Darrin Bell, the creator of Candorville dropped us a note to point to today's strip (see below), which touches on same.

He wrote: "I had to admit to feeling a bit guilty when I read the closing line of today's entry. I am guilty of helping draw more attention to that crap."

Don't worry, Darrin. Even though we wrote that last line, we're still guilty of same. We did write that article, after all. Oh, how we do loves the paradoxes and ironies here at The BRAD BLOG.

We're also happy to see attention drawn to the propagandistic garbage that is the Fox "News" Channel in MSM papers all over the country. Even if it's "only" on the comics page. So, thank you, sir, and keep up the good work!

NOTE: Bell links back to our story from this morning, in his daily blog which he now runs along with each of his strips over at his website. We're happy to return the favor...

BRAD BLOG Guest Blogger Alan Breslauer had a thing or two to say last week about Fox "News'" phony new comedy show and how closely their phony comedy seemed to resemble their phony news.

Elsewhere in the 'sphere and beyond, since the premier of the 1/2 Hour News Hour, others have rung in with their own picks and pans (not suprisingly, mostly 'pans' from the Left and 'picks' from the Right.)

Setting aside the show's lack of, um, funniness (of course, being one of those wacko "Hollywood Liberals" they hamfistedly attempted to skew, I would say that, wouldn't I?) or the shamefully over-"sweetened" laugh track or the predictably stale "Liberal" bashing, what jumped out at me was how the show seemed once and for all to be an out-and-out admission by Fox "News" that they're not really a news outlet at all.

Of course, any intellectually honest observer has recognized that for some time. If they called themselves, more honestly, the Republican News Channel, at least they'd be nearer to telling the truth and Americans could take 'em or leave 'em. At least there would be little pretense that they are anything other than what they are: a crackerjack GOP Propaganda Machine.

But by programming a "comedy" show on their pretend "News" channel, they seem to be admitting, finally, out loud, that they aren't actually about news at all. It wouldn't be the first time, of course. Over Christmas they ran some Texas Baptist Church service nearly wall-to-wall for much of the weekend. Not that that's not "news," of course --- in Fox's world, anyway.

It's been amusing, if painful, to watch FNC's increasingly tortured attempts over the last several years as they try to find something --- anything --- to report on other than the actual news, since any honest reporting thereof would be so devastatingly counter to their own hard right political bias.

An endless war launched without reason and built on lies from the Oval Office itself? Yawn...what happened to that chick in Aruba?! The White House itself, for the first time in history, outting and destroying a major covert CIA intellegence operation monitoring WMD in the Middle East? Not interested...But did ya hear the latest on Anna Nicole?!

So now, with FNC even beginning to run dry on phony outrage, in the latest desperate Fox "News" Hail Mary attempt to fill 30 more minutes of their 24 hour broadcast day with anything but actual news, they've shamelessly set aside all pretense by choosing to fill those 30 minutes with attempts at satirical comedy. Sort of. Not even CNN or MSNBC has crossed that rubicon. Yet. But give 'em time.

While I rather enjoyed the cold opening with Rush and the unusually deer-in-the-headlighted Ann Coulter (both of whom sorta, kinda, almost actually succeeded in making fun of themselves a bit...something wholly lacking from the rest of the show), the rest of it went quickly downhill from there.

Imagine my surprise then, when halfway through the thing, an old acting colleague of mine showed up in one of the mid-show sketches. The first question that popped to mind when I saw Jonathan was, "What the hell must he have been thinking?!"

I gave him a call last week to find out...

California's new Secretary of State, Debra Bowen, has flatly rejected a request from Riverside County, CA County Supervisor Jeff Stone to participate in a "hack test" challenge originally proposed to Election Integrity Advocates in response to their concerns about security and accuracy for the county's electronic touch-screen voting machines, The BRAD BLOG has learned.

In a letter sent to Stone last week obtained by The BRAD BLOG (posted in full at the end of this article), Secretary Bowen found that though there was no state law to prohibit such a test, her office would not participate, in part due to the narrow restrictions initially insisted upon by Supervisor Stone.

In her reply to a letter sent in early January to outgoing Secretary of State Bruce McPherson just days before he would leave office, Bowen wrote, "I am not aware of any state law that would prohibit the type of security test that you described in your letter." Unlike Bowen, the former SoS had been seen as far more favorable towards relaxed security issues for electronic voting.

As The BRAD BLOG originally reported last December, Stone had initially challenged local Election Integrity advocates "a thousand to one," during a public hearing, that a programmer would be unable to "manipulate" the county's voting system.

In her letter to McPherson Bowen joined other computer security professionals who had previously rejected Stone's unilateral suggestions for ground rules, calling them "overly narrow," potentially giving voters a "false sense of security." Stone had written to the former SoS that just "15 minutes would be allotted" for the test and the programmer who accepted the challenge --- noted computer security expert Harri Hursti --- would be prohibited from using any tools or reaching around the back of the machine. "In every sense," Stone wrote, "he would be like any voter on Election Day approaching a voting unit at the polls."

Bowen, however, balked at Stone's unilateral ground rules, writing in response...

As well, Bowen also highlighted the point made by Election Integrity Advocates, computer security professionals, and even the Baker/Carter "Blue Ribbon" National Election Reform Commission that made the point that the greatest threat to e-voting security likely comes from election insiders, such as officials or poll workers who have been allowed to take pre-programmed, election-ready systems home with them in the days prior to the election as allowed by Riverside County.

Such insider access is seen as a far greater threat to security than that from voters on Election Day. As Bowen wrote in reply...

"We were looking for any impact the change to paper ballots may have had on New Mexico's historically high undervote rate. When we found the dramatic drop in Native American precincts, we were shocked," says New Mexico's Theron Horton. The Election Defense Alliance (EDA) activist added, "something was going on with the DREs in those precincts in 2004."

Something indeed.

Details now out from New Mexico reveal that undervote rates dropped precipitously in both Native American and Hispanic areas after the state moved from DRE (Direct Recording Electronic touch-screen) voting systems in 2004 to paper-based optical-scan systems in 2006. In Native American areas, undervote rates plummeted some 85%. In Hispanic communities, the rate dropped by 69% according to the precinct data reviewed by EDA, VotersUnite.org and VoteTrustUSA.org.

Ellen Theisen, then-Executive Director of VotersUnite.org, reviewed the original high undervote rates in the state after the 2004 elections, but hadn't broken it down to compare DRE/touch-screen vs. Op-Scan precincts. "When I heard of Theron's work," Theisen says in today's press release, "I performed the comparison, and found that it's the paper ballots that made the difference in the minority precincts."

New Mexico banned the use of DREs across the state after their disastrous experience with Sequoia touch-screen voting machines during the 2004 Presidential Election. They now require a paper ballot for every vote cast statewide.

As he signed the bill which banned DREs into law in early 2006, New Mexico's Gov. Bill Richardson wrote a letter to Election Officials in all 50 states, warning that while "some believe that computer touch screen machines are the future of electoral systems...the technology simply fails to pass the test of reliability."

"One person, one vote is in jeopardy if we do not act boldly and immediately," Richardson implored, while decrying the failures of DREs in his state and supporting paper ballots. "When a vote is cast, a vote should be counted," he wrote.

The BRAD BLOG has reported on the urgent need to ban disenfranchising DRE voting systems --- with or without a so-called "paper trail" --- from all American elections.

Here's an easy to understand graph from the short, two-page report [PDF] published on the New Mexico data over the weekend along with the raw data at VotersUnite.org:

Any questions?

Both Doonesebury and our friend Darrin Bell's Candorville take on the "DemocRAT" issue in today's Sunday strips.

In addition, Bell has turned blogger at his www.Candorville.com site and has been providing additional commentary about his various strips. Today he writes, in part, as a companion to his Sunday toon that though George W. Bush refers to it as the "Democrat Party"...

Both strips follow in full...

The Christine Jennings (D) campaign has just sent us a statement concerning today's release of the state-commissioned audit of the flawed election during her race against Vern Buchanan (R) last November in Florida's 13th Congressional District.

See our earlier full coverage of the state reports here...

"The audit of Sarasota County's voting system was flawed, incomplete, and provides even more compelling reasons for the Christine Jennings campaign to seek a thorough investigation by outside experts," the statement begins.

The complete Jennings statement follows below...

Late this afternoon, the state of Florida released a state-commissioned audit report detailing their investigation into the contested U.S. House Election in Florida's 13th Congressional district between Christine Jennings (D) and Vern Buchanan (R).

In two lengthy and carefully worded reports, released along with a statement from the new Secretary of State, Kurt Browning (R), the state audit report [PDF] concludes that "The audit team found no evidence to suggest or conclude that the official certified election results did not reflect the actual votes cast."

A statement issued in response by People for the American Way (PFAW), who, along with VoterAction.org, are representing the voter plaintiffs contesting the election in the state, have described the report as "a whitewash." Their statement, posted in full at the end of this article, points to the partisan makeup and conflicts of interest in the commission empaneled by the state to examine the firmware of the paperless ES&S iVotronic touch-screen voting machines used in the race.

The report "is the result of a flawed process overseen by people with a stake in the outcome," said PFAW President Ralph Neas in the statement, which also details a number of other flaws in the state's "independent" commission.

Additionally, The BRAD BLOG has found that details in one of the reports actually contradict both Browning's statement and the conclusion of the state's official audit. The reports, as well, reveal a stultifyingly complex process being employed to manage the most basic point of any election: The simple task of adding one plus one plus one...

Utah wants to hold a Presidential Primary Election. But they seem to have run into a new snag...

Oh, well. What was that they were saying about these systems saving the taxpayer money?

(Hat-tip to the Utah Election Official who brought this to our attention. Bless you. And good luck.)

And as our good friend, the legendary and mysterious Freeway Blogger, mentioned when he alerted us to the above, "Remember, it's not what you say, it's how many people read it."

Pass it on.

San Francisco is considering "upgrading" their voting systems to use Sequoia machines. They are demanding that the company publicly disclose their software source code for all to see. It's called transparency. That's a good thing.

But Sequoia is refusing. Yesterday, there was another discussion/debate on the topic at an SF Board of Supes hearing. The San Francisco Examiner reported this laugh line from the Sequoia spokeshole:

For those just joining the fun, who may be unfamiliar with guffaw-worthiness of Bennet's claim about concern for the security of his company's shitty voting systems, we'll refer you to this small sampling of previous relevant BRAD BLOG articles:

• Pro E-Vote Professor Accidentally Hacks Sequoia Voting System
• Sequoia's 'Yellow Button' Allows Voters to Vote As Many Times as They Want
• Sequoia Spokesperson Against Hack Testing of Touch-Screen Machines in Riverside County, CA
• Princeton Prof. Buys Sequoia System on Internet, Hacks It in 10 Seconds

...Along with a heads up that we'll have more --- much more --- on Sequoia's "concerns" about the security of their voting systems (or lack thereof) in a detailed investigative report in the very near future...

Was on Air America's Politically Direct with David Bender last night responding, in part, to Rep. Rush Holt, who was a guest on the show himself last week. (Interestingly enough, the show is sponsored by our friends at People for the American Way - PFAW.)

We spoke about the Holt Bill (good and bad), the Democrats (good and bad), and much more on the entirety of Election Integrity in an exceedingly jam-packed 20 minutes full of info (it was tape delayed out here in Los Angeles, so I got to listen to me while falling asleep...you can hear the coffee kick in about 4 or 5 minutes into the interview. )

Thanks to David for the overly generous description as "The Paul Revere of the Election Integrity Movement"...But I'll take whatever I can get! As he said, "One if by land, two if by sea, three if by Brad!"...

-- Brad on Politically Direct, 2/21/06 [MP3, 20 mins minutes]

Here's why...and how you can do it in 60 seconds...

(And thanks mightily to those of you who have already answered the call!)

In case you missed it, this one-minute video is our choice for High-larious Wingnut Highlight of the Week from last Sunday's news shows.

Watch as Chris Wallace comes 'this close' to passing out in confusion after screwing up while trying to differentiate between Bush's latest flip-floppery on North Korea and the much-decried deal Bill Clinton made with them years ago. Of course, the Bushies were against it all before they were for it.

As it rolls, Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) just looks on, smiling with the satisfaction of knowing he just owned Wallace on live Wingnut TV...

(Note: YouTube has been acting up today, so if it says "Video Not Available" when you try to play it, try again in a minute or so.)

(Thanks Alan Breslauer for the vid!)