From the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll out yesterday...

VelvetRevolution.us (an organization co-founded by The BRAD BLOG) has got a huge billboard truck that will begin driving around D.C. beginning next Tuesday.

This will be on one side...

This will be on the other side...

Feel free to leave your thoughts here in comments about any future signs you'd like to see VR make noise with around Capitol Hill.

While VR has the truck, the cost of getting the billboards made is not cheap. Thanks to the good folks at AfterDowningStreet.org/CensureBush.org for supporting the effort and helping VR raise the funds for the costs of the signage.

Your help is needed as well. Please contribute to the effort here. The Velvet Revolution thanks you...

UPDATE: JPentz of ReallyNews.com has made a printable WORD version of the first graphic available if you wish to make your own noise, in your own hometown!

Pam at The Democratic Daily has links to Kennedy's official statement confirming he supports a filibuster:

Previously, CNN reported John Kerry's support of same. Kerry had earlier posted a call for support asking that Americans support his effort to filibuster...

He then asks for folks to sign this letter in support.

AP has more on the GOP pushing back.

UPDATE: Kerry's office makes it official:

FURTHER UPDATE: Pam now has a Guest Blog from Kerry on the matter...

Robert Byrd falls for the old "Handwritten letter from a 'Democrat'" Ploy and announces he'll support Alito. Yes, Senator, we get many of those same "I'm a Democrat, but I can't abide what my party is doing" notes as well. Constantly. One of the most tired tricks in the Troll Playbook. Sorry to see you fall for it.

In the meantime, Pam from The Democratic Daily, is hearing from her inside sources that Kerry will lead a filibuster. We can't confirm anything of the sort, nor can we deny, but Pam seems to feel strongly about it, so we pass on this link to her report with that caveat. Don't know if Byrd's announcement, which we believe was released after her post, will have any effect on that or not.

UPDATE: Pam updates her item to include a link to CNN's report, posted just minutes ago, that Kerry "will attempt a filibuster".

Whoops...Yesterday (Wednesday, January 24th) was The BRAD BLOG's 2nd Anniversary! And I was too busy to notice.

Oh, well. What a long, strange --- very strange --- trip it's been.

From our very first blog item...to...wherever the hell the world has turned now.

I'd wax more poetically, except that two years in and up since lord knows when this morning and I couldn't be more exhausted. Or could I? Ask me next year around this time if we're still at it.

In the meantime, feel free to leave a Happy Anniversary Gift in the Tip Jar, if you're so inclined. We could still, even after two years, use it! Otherwise, Open Thread here to your heart's content to celebrate! While I sleep.

Thank you all for helping to make this journey possible and so incredibly satisfying day after day, and now year after year. Peace. Soon.

In an editorial titled "Senators in Need of a Spine" in tomorrow's NY Times "the paper of record" gets it right for a change. (Truthout posts the editorial in full, for those note registered with NY Times.) Here are some of the money quotes...

The BRAD BLOG has been calling for such a spine from Democrats (on this matter at least) for the past week. We're glad to see the NY Times join the bandwagon.

The only question now is will the Dems find the courage to do the right thing as they have failed to, with very few exceptions, over the last five years? Or will they roll over yet again at the most decisive moment of the entire Bush "Presidency" and fail to fight for the future of this country, in hopes that all will be forgiven by the base when the 2006 mid-terms come around?

We hope they choose wisely.

According to an earlier report from RAW STORY, your phone calls providing "cover" for the Senators, or lack thereof, may make all the difference.

The Senate switchboard can be reached at 888-355-3588 or 888-818-6641. Democrats.com has many more contacts and details for you.

State and County Elections officials from coast to coast to coast are now in a mad, confused, frustrated scramble trying to figure out how the hell to comply with and make sense of the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) legislation.

HAVA has proven to be an unmitigated disaster, gamed as it was from the start by Congressmen like Ohio's Bob Ney working in cahoots with voting machine companies. The effort has shamefully employed disabilities groups like the National Federation for the Blind (NFB) and American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), who received more than a million dollars from companies such as Diebold, Inc., to help trump up the sympathy factor in order to force jurisdictions to purchase unreliable electronic voting machines (read: junk), said to be needed by disabled voters who would be unable to vote in secret without assistance from others.

As of the 1/1/06 HAVA deadline, Boards of Elections are now officially plunged into complete and utter disarray as they attempt to comply with the reckless and cynical legislation's mandated requirement (dreamt up by the American Voting Machines Vendors who stand to make billions) for at least one disabled-accessible voting device in every precinct around the country --- even in small precincts without a single disabled voter!

Touch-screen (DRE) voting machines created by mega-corporations like Diebold, Inc. and ES&S have been proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt, to be unsecure, hackable, unreliable and finally, not fully accessible by many segments of the disabled community. Meanwhile, the one electronic-based device in which voters with disabilities have expressed the most interest, the AutoMARK system, has reportedly been kept largely out of the marketplace through a number of means. ES&S, the voting machine company who managed to secure exclusive rights to distribute the AutoMARK system, has reportedly been overpricing it in favor of their own DRE systems. As well, there have been a number of reports of ES&S sales reps being actively dissuaded from properly demonstrating that system in pitches to potential customers around the country.

As well, states such as Florida and many others have been incredibly slow at certifying the system --- which prints a readable, verifiable, recountable paper ballot with every vote cast --- even while they've already giving their blessings to DRE systems made by both Diebold and ES&S, despite the demonstrated inaccuracy, hackability and secret-software that employs "interpreted" source code, explicitly banned by HAVA guidelines.

With the rapid approach of the 2006 primary elections, the question is now: What the hell are these Boards of Election around the country going to do, to both meet HAVA requirements for voters with disabilities and provide all voters with some semblance of an accurate, reliable, recountable, democratic means of casting their vote in secret and with some certainty that it may be counted, and counted correctly?

Comes now, with not a moment to spare, an ingeniously simple, non-electronic device to allow voters with disabilities of all sorts to be able to cast their own vote, in secret, and with the knowledge that their paper ballot will accurately reflect their intent.

Say hello to the Vote-PAD, the little paper and plastic voting assistive device, that just may save American democracy...

In just one more story which illustrates the many undemocratic dangers of allowing private companies to "own" our public elections, Diebold, Inc., one of America's largest Voting Machine Companies is currently blocking citizens in Alaska from viewing election data from the 2004 general election!

"All Alaska races from 2004" are now being questioned, said a Democratic party official in a written letter to the state Elections Director.

Questions have begun to arise about results from that election, including the reported revelation that "district-by-district vote totals add up to 292,267 votes for President Bush, but his official total was only 190,889."

The BRAD BLOG has obtained a copy of the letter sent yesterday by Jake Metcalfe, chair of the Alaska Democratic Party to Whitney Brewster of the Alaska Division of Elections. The letter responds to Brewster's refusal to supply the party with the requested data files and outlines a number of additional concerns about the reported 2004 election results.

The complete letter is available for download here [PDF].

Anchorage Daily News covers the emerging controversy today. Some highlights here [emphasis ours]:

Never mind, of course, that Diebold's "company secret" has been available for download from the Internet for years, since the company --- who claims to specialize in security solutions --- left the information sitting unprotected on a public download site.

The full story is here...

(Hat tip to our friend Peter B. Collins of KRXA 540-am in Monterey, CA for the lead!)

UPDATE 2/7/06: Alaska capitulates...sort of. Details now here...

The Palm Beach Post covers Clint Curtis in an article yesterday, headlined "Paper-trail advocate to air rigging concerns". The detailed article is occassioned by Curtis' "official audience this week with the committee advising Palm Beach County on voting technology."

Those not familiar with the extraordinary tale which we broke exclusively back in December of 2004, can read a short summary of the remarkable story here. It essentially concerns Curtis' sworn allegations that former Florida House Speaker, now U.S. Congressman Tom Feeney (R-FL), asked him to create vote-rigging software back when Curtis worked as a programmer for the Oveido, FL software firm Yang Enterprises Inc. (YEI). At the time, Feeney, in addition to leading the FL statehouse, was also the general counsel and a registered lobbyist for YEI.

The story also concerns Curtis' long-standing and now-verified claims that YEI was employing a now-convicted Chinese spy and was also engaged in massively overcharging on contracts such as the one it had with the Florida Department of Transporation. As well, there is the startling tale of the untimely, and unexplained demise of the Florida Inspector General, Raymond Lemme, who had been investigating Curtis' charges against YEI and Feeney. Curtis has since passed a polygraph test concerning these charges.

The Post piece covers much of the territory, of course, that BRAD BLOG readers familiar with our year-long plus Clint Curtis coverage will know well by now. Apparently, reporter George Bennett has spent quite a bit of time reading our work here, which we are happy to see.

The downside of the Post article, is the usual misrepresentation of information disquised as "balance" that we see so often these days, not just in coverage of Curtis, but in the MSM in general. Eg., Bennett feels it important, and properly so, to give YEI's attorney's rebuttal to Curtis' charges. But, of course, Bennett then fails to point out that YEI's attorney is also Feeney's old law partner dating back to just prior to his joining the U.S. Congress. Bennett also fails to point out that both YEI and their attorney continue to be large donors to Feeney and that Feeney has continued to lie about his ongoing relationship with the company.

That's just one example of the downsides. The upside, however, is hopefully the additional attention to Curtis' story at a time when a host of new questions are arising concerning Tom Feeney's corruption (he was, you know, on one of those now-infamous trips to St. Andrews to play golf, like Tom DeLay and Bob Ney, for example!)

In addition to this latest article, we have reason to believe there will be still more information and coverage elsewhere of the continuing Clint Curtis saga soon...

UPDATE 1/31/05: We were contacted today by George Bennett, author of the recent Curtis piece in the Palm Beach Post. He had the following reply to this blog item:

The BRAD BLOG appreciates Bennett's clarification, and we're happy to post it here for the record.

Saddam Hussein's intolerable use of weapons of mass destruction against enemies; unprecedented aggression against and occupation of a country which posed no threat to his own; routine kidnapping, torture, murder and secret prison system; wholesale slaughter of citizens from other countries; imprisonment of political rivals held for years without charges; and secret spying on his very own countrymen without court order or legislative approval, demonstrates beyond a reasonable doubt that this so-called "President" was a dangerous rogue, a tyrant, and a grave threat --- of the highest order --- to worldwide peace, stability and democracy.

His immediate removal from unelected power was...and is...a completely justified imperative.

The BRAD BLOG has obtained the official transcript of last week's congressional hearings on warrantless NSA wiretapping as authorized (on at least thirty occassions) by the Bush Administration. The event was officially titled, "CONSTITUTION IN CRISIS: DOMESTIC SURVEILLANCE AND EXECUTIVE POWER".

The hearing, chaired by ranking House Judiciary Committee minority member, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), was held in the basement of the Rayburn building last Friday after the Republican leadership once again (as they did for hearings on the "Downing Street Documents" last year) refused the Democrats a formal hearing room to conduct the congressional oversight forum. That, despite the House having been in recess on Friday and the official hearing rooms otherwise vacant.

C-SPAN carried the hearings live as seven House members sat on the panel to hear testimony and question the following expert witnesses:

As The BRAD BLOG reported in an exclusive prior to the hearing, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, who has defended the Administration's warrantless wiretapping of American citizens on U.S. soil as "legal", despite the prohibition against such activity as outlined by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), was invited to give testimony as well in defense of the Administration's position. He declined to appear, as did any other representative from the Bush Dept. of Justice.

On the day prior to the hearings, however, the DoJ issued a 42-page document declaring the warrantless wiretaps of American citizens on U.S. soil to be "legal". Judiciary Committee member Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) spoke to that document during the hearings, commenting that "making their argument longer did not make it any better." The statement received laughter from the hearing room. Van Hollen followed up by charging:

Some remarkable testimony was given by each of the witnesses at the hearings. It's all now available in full, via the complete 122-page transcript.

-- Complete Transcript of House Democratic Hearings on Warrantless NSA Wiretaps [PDF]

Several of "The Jersey Girls," who were widowed in the 9/11 attacks, have issued a statement in response to the Bin Laden audiotape released last week which excoriated Bush for his failure and apparent disinterest --- "I don't know where he is. You know, I just don't spend that much time on him ... I truly am not that concerned about him." --- in hunting him down "dead or alive", as he once acted like he was promising.

Further, they criticize him for having "sanctioned the torture of individuals, breached constitutional safeguards regarding the privacy rights of U.S. citizens and started an illegal war in Iraq."

Not to mention their enumeration of the various 9/11 Commission recommendations that Bush has all but ignored to this day, some four years and four months since the deaths of their husbands.

This graf however, in particular, caught my eye:

While we agree with the general sentiment, we have just one quibble: Bush should resign now for his unprecedented Constitutional transgressions. There is no reason to wait for the next attack, and indeed it would be insane to do so. Especially as this rubber-stamp Congress will do everything in their power to avoid an impeachment --- as appropriate as would be right now --- in deference to their Political Party's "Commander-in-Chief".

Bush would never have the courage or fortitude or integrity or simple manliness to stand up and face down any impeachment proceeding. He'd go running away with his tail between his legs like the chickenhawk he is, once it became clear that virtually any such impeachment proceedings would have him dead to rights.

So why not show some sense of honor and dignity now, Mr. Bush, by leaving the office which you have tainted and stained beyond even Bill Clinton's wildest wet-dreams?

It's time for Bush, and his criminal co-conspirator Dick Cheney, to resign from office immediately in order to save this country from one more day of inexcusable exposure to attack from terrorists, but even more so, for Bush/Cheney's demonstrated and unmitigated loathing of American Values, their unapologetic failure to uphold their oaths of office to "protect and defend the Constitution of the United States", and, once and for all, to put an end to the metastized cancer of the unprecedented Executive Shame they have brought to the great United States of America.

Last month, we reported how the George W. Bush administration has effectively gutted the beloved, 40-year old Voting Rights Act. He has done so by allowing political appointees in the Department of Justice to override the recommendations of career attorneys in the Voting Rights division who had recommended against the Georgia Photo ID Requirement Law and Tom Delay's Texas Congressional Redistricting Scheme.

In both cases, the career attorneys at DoJ had written lengthy memos opposing the new laws --- 4 out of 5 of them in the GA case, 8 out of 8 in the TX case --- only to be overruled by Bush's political cronies. Dan Eggen of The Washington Post broke both of those stories, with some exemplary reporting, after obtaining the leaked memos.

Later, the DoJ mandated that no such written opinions would be allowed in the future.

Eggen, on Page A1 of Monday's WaPo, now has more on the fallout and allegations of politics being played with the VRA within DoJ, as Bush continues to dismantle as many American Values as he can before leaving office...Here's some highlights (or lowlights, as the case may be)...

We're torn between complaining about Washington Post's delinquency in covering anything to do with our crumbling electoral system and jumping for joy that they've actually filed a credible report on the problems we (and many other "conspiracy theorists", "sore-losers", "tinfoil hat wearers", "anarchists" and "insurgents") have been yelling and screaming about for months --- if not years!

Given our endlessly optimistic nature, however, and the dearth of honest-to-God reporting by the Mainstream Corporate Media on these matters since...well, forever...we'll go ahead, slap a siren on this item, and focus on the "victory" side of things!

In tomorrow's paper, page A6, in a "Special to The Washington Post", Zachary Goldfarb covers the matter of last month's hack of Diebold optical scan machines in Leon County, Florida which completely flipped the results of a mock election test without a trace being left behind.

As well, for the first time, WaPo even discusses some of the findings of the non-partisan Government Accountability Office (GAO) 107-page report on the failures of electronic voting machines which was released last October!

The story cannot be good news to Diebold and the other voting machine vendors, however. They've all had it pretty easy up until now as the Mainstream Corporate Media has played into their "company line" that such concerns were the stuff of "conspiracy theorists" and "sore-losers". Goldfarb even recognizes the fact, even if he doesn't call WaPo on being one of the media outlets who have contributed to Diebold and Friends' appalling ability to marginalize Election Integrity advocates with such insultingly dismissive and democracy-loathing remarks:

Well, there it is. In plain black and white WaPo ink! Go figure!

Goldfarb goes on to make the case quite clearly concerning the Diebold hack as pulled off by Finnish computer security expert Harri Hursti, including Diebold's pathetic response to it:

Well, God Bless America...Perhaps the Mainstream Corporate Media is finally paying attention! Go read the whole thing with your own eyes!

We've heard tell of another major news organization that may soon roll out legitimate coverage of these matters as well.

Can it be that we are finally not alone? Stay tuned...

Such was the sometimes contentious, sometimes exasperating atmosphere, apparently, in Sacramento this week when State Senator Debra Bowen, transparent election champion and Democratic candidate for Secretary of State convened a hearing on the current electoral mess in the Golden State. The hearing was held by the Senate Elections, Reapportionment and Constitutional Amendments Committee which she chairs.

County Election Registrars from all over the state were called to give a report on how things are going (not well, apparently) and Election Integrity advocates filled the gallery to witness the goings on.

There was actually quite a bit of coverage by the media, some better than others, but overall, it's nice to see an open forum for oversight and discussion of the state of democracy in this state. All the while, so much that is involved with the most fundamental element of democracy --- the vote --- has been done in secret corridors of power, darkened Boards of Election back rooms, Private Corporation board rooms, and of course, inside the uninspected, none-of-your-business software of completely untrustworthy, unaccountable electronic voting machines.

Articles hit late this week on Wednesday's hearings in the LA Times, Oakland Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Vallejo Times Herald and elsewhere. While the "facts" offered by some of the reports were at times less than accurate, we note that it's remarkable how many Journalists deign to cover such issues when they are granted "legitimacy" by an officially sanctioned Government Inquiry. (Just a thought to those of you who actually get paid for this sort of thing, from someone who doesn't...but we've long advocated Journalists cover what is newsworthy. Not only what politicians have instructed them to be newsworthy.)

Let's take a look then at some of the coverage, including our own on-the-air conversation on Friday evening with Bowen...