Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

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For the first time in three years, the President allowed Helen Thomas to ask question during today's press briefing.

Thomas appeared on CNN's Situation Room to explain why she does not accept the President's answer.

If you have no case, just create some perceived enemies, and blame them instead...

It worked for McCarthy, after all.

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

Is this anyway to run a democracy?

Graphic details coming on Monday...Only on The BRAD BLOG...

This morning (Sunday), lawmakers and members of the media in Washington D.C. opened the Op/Ed section of the Washington Post to find VelvetRevolution.us' latest ad waiting for them.

VR is calling on both Democrats and Republicans in Congress to perform their Constitutional Duty and hold the criminal Bush/Cheney Administration accountable for their actions. As well, they must stop the reckless drumbeat towards War in Iran before we find ourselves in yet another disastrous foreign policy debacle.

Bush and Cheney, through their incompetence and dishonesty have lost the right to be trusted for any foreign policy decisions, much less the decision to start yet another unnecessary, unprovoked war in yet another country. It's time for Congress to draw a line in the sand against the Bush/Cheney administration and for the people to stand up and make sure they hear us!

-- The full ad, in a size large enough to read the complete text, is here.
-- A resizable PDF version is here.
-- A petition to demand Congress peform their Constitutional Duty to hold the Bush/Cheney Administration accountable for their actions and stop the march towards yet another ill-conceived war is here.
-- Donations to VR, to help us continue our no-holds-barred ad campaign, can be made here.

Please spread the word! And thank you for the support!

(DISCLOSURE: The BRAD BLOG is a co-founder of VelvetRevolution.us ... and couldn't be prouder.)

ED NOTE: Diebold's Charles "Buck" Jones has sent us an email about the following story, with a scan of a correction published by the Union Tribune concerning the following story. The "Accu-Vote" machines referred to in their story, as originally reported below, are actually "Optech IIIp" optical-scan machines made by ES&S, not by Diebold. The complete correction, reportedly published by the Union Tribune, is posted at the bottom of this blog item. We appreciate the information from Mr. Jones, and only wish that Diebold was as responsive to answering questions and clarifying the mountain of problems and failures in their own machines as they are with ES&S's. We are also delighted to see that Diebold follows BRAD BLOG's reporting so closely. Even on a Saturday.

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Diebold's hackable Accu-Vote (Hack-U-Vote?) machines fail again.

ES&S's "OpTech" (Op-Wreck?) machines fail again.

From New Hampshire's Union Leader on Thursday...

It's notable, by the way, that the Union Leader's story refers to the "Accu-Vote" machines being confiscated, but never mentions the maker of the machines --- in this case, Diebold. (Actually, ES&S, and the machines were "Optech" machines instead. See the clarification below.)

It's unclear from the story whether these were optical-scan or touch-screen machines, but apparently there is some paper that can be counted to get an accurate count of the election, instead of an "Accu-Vote" count of the election. According to the article, "Joyce said she is in favor of recounting ballots, both by hand and by machine." --- so it would seem there is something to actually go back and count.

And yes, the problem is referred to as a "glitch" at one point in the story. As it always is. This time in reference to a heretofore unknown issue (at least to us) concerning "dip switches" on these machines...

The "Glitch" that Would Destroy American Democracy. Cuz we let it.

UPDATE: According to a Diebold employee who notified The BRAD BLOG (see the Ed Note added to the top of this article) the Union Tribune posted the following correction to the story referenced above:

We have not been able to find the correction published on the Union Tribune website, but this New Hampshire state page seems to confirm that Grafton County uses the ES&S "Optech" machines instead of the Diebold "Accu-Vote" machines as most other counties in New Hampshire do.

We've also learned, since running this piece orginally, that New Hampshire does not allow for the use of touch-screen (DRE) machines. So the voting systems in question here, are all optical-scan machines, akin to the Diebold optical-scan machine used in Ion Sancho's recent "hack test" in Leon County, FL which demonstrated that such machines could be hacked to cause election results to be completely flipped without a trace being left behind.

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

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CNN's Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider awards Senator Feingold the "Political Play of the Week" for his bold introduction of a resolution to censure President Bush.

Bill Schneider describes Feingold as "principled" while he suggests that other Democrats might need "Spines. Backbones. They help you stand up for what you believe."

Schneider says "Acting on principle need not be political suicide."

Guest Blogged by John Gideon

As reported on March 9 and March 10 by The BRAD BLOG the folks in Summit Co. OH have discovered massive problems with memory cards on ES&S Electronic Voting Machines in recent tests. Some 30% of the cards completely failed.

ES&S, the largest voting machine provider in the country, attributed the problem to low or dead batteries on the PCMCIA memory cards. At the time, we inquired as to whether other states using ES&S equipment might be experiencing similar problems. The reporter covering the story for the Akron Beacon Journal told us she was able to get no response from ES&S --- but was then given an assurance that ES&S had contacted their customers to inform them about the concerns.

A week ago Tuesday, Texas experienced loads of problems (or "glitches" as Voting Machine Vendors and Election Officials enjoy minimizing them as) in their Primary Elections. Just a few of those reported in newspapers the day after are listed here.

Then yesterday the Akron Beacon Journal reported that, in fact, ES&S had contacted North Carolina. North Carolina, who lost some 4,500 votes completely via an electronic voting machine in Cartaret County during the 2004 Presidential Election, began checking their ES&S memory cards and have so far found more than 1,000 cards that to be bad!

Summit County, OH has also now confirmed that two-thirds of the cards failed due to "battery issues"; the rest failed due to "read-back errors".

It is important to point out that North Carolina state law requires any voting vendor to alert the state if there is a problem found on any voting system in another state that may be a problem in North Carolina. The law worked very well or the state may never have been warned except by the voting activist community who raised the 'red flag'.

Still unanswered is whether the recent myriad problems with ES&S systems in Texas had anything to do with the memory card failures. Also still unanswered is if there are any problems in other states like Indiana or West Virginia where primary elections are soon to be held and ES&S machines are in place.

ALSO: A newly released study of the reliability of voting systems shows that those voting systems studied and presently being sold across the country are one-third as reliable, at best, as an incandescent light bulb.

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

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Last week the U.S. military announced plans to handover control of the infamous Abu Ghraib prison to Iraqi authorities.

Chris Floyd points out that the Pentagon quietly retracted the idea that Abu Ghraib would be closed in the near future. The following statement was released by the Pentagon:

Regardless of when (or if) the U.S. closes Abu Ghraib, NGO's and Iraqi citizens agree that prisoners will continue to be abused in other facilities throughout Iraq. According to Khalid Rabia'a, spokesman for the Baghdad-based Prisoners' Association for Justice (PAJ):

The video in this post is a news report by the independent Arab News Network (ANN) broadcasting out of London, England. In the video, several Iraqis share their thoughts on the closing of Abu Ghraib and the continuing prisoner abuse in Iraq.

Special to BRAD BLOG by BTC News White House Correspondent Eric Brewer

Today I finally got another chance to get Scott McClellan riled up. Ever since the last time I did it, back in January, he's been lucky enough or tricky enough to avoid having to call on me, but today, the briefing room wasn't quite as crowded as it has been, and I got my chance to ask a question that has been puzzling me ever since the Director of National Intelligence, John Negroponte, testified to the Senate on http://www.btcnews.com/btcnews/1195\" target="_blank">February 2 that:

Among the many reasons (detailed by BTC News chief Weldon Berger in his article that I linked to above) that Negroponte's statement was odd are the following: 1) Iran-connected Shiites now dominate the U.S.-backed government in Iraq, 2) IED attacks have been coming primarily from the Sunni insurgency, and 3) Iran would have nothing to gain from helping its U.S.-supported allies in Iraq attack coalition forces with IEDs.

Then last Monday, President Bush repeated Negroponte's claim in a speech that appeared to be the opening round in a new "drumbeat to war" against Iran. But the administration is perhaps getting sloppier, for the next day it appeared that not everyone was on the same page. When Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Peter Pace was asked about the claim with these words, "Do you have proof that they are, indeed, behind this, the government of Iran?", Gen. Pace replied, "I do not, sir." Immediately afterward, Secretary Rumsfeld also failed to endorse the accusation, saying:

So today I asked Scott if he could clear up this slight inconsistency. Our exchange follows...

Wow...today's Washington Post has a nifty illustrated chart today comparing the security and inspection of Las Vegas Slot Machines versus that for Electronic Voting Machines.

Click to see his comparisons...

(Hat tip to emailer Beth H.!)

Following up on his "Whistling Diebold" column last week, Tribune Media Service's Bob Koehler stays on the case in his nationally syndicated column this week. He begins this way...

Koehler goes on to describe the astounding situation that Leon County, FL Election Supervisor Ion Sancho --- the hero who revealed that Diebold optical-scan machines can be hacked without a trace left behind --- finds himself in.

As well, Koehler cites and quotes your humble webmaster (two MSM cites of your friendly neighborhood BRAD BLOG in as many days? What's happening here?!). Finally, he concludes thusly...

NOTE: I'll be on the air today with Sancho on Houston's KPFT 90.1 FM as guest hosted by occasional BRAD BLOG Guest Blogger, Pokey Anderson at 5pm PT (8pm ET). You can listen live online here.

SECOND NOTE: My hourlong interview with Ion Sancho from Feb 28th's edition of The Young Turks radio show, during one my Guest Host stints, is now available online here [MP3]. It's an amazing interview methinks, Sancho is awesome in this one, if you didn't hear it or watch it live at the time.

FINAL NOTE: The Turks have asked me back to Guest Host along with them tomorrow (Friday), and I'm trying to clear the time right now. If I'm able to do so, it'll be posted in the "Media Appearances" box at the top of the BRAD BLOG front page so you can listen and/or watch along at home (or via Sirius Satellite).

Guest blogged by David Edwards of Veredictum.com

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Earlier today, Senator Russ Feingold held a press conference on his resolution to censure President Bush for illegal warrantless wiretapping.

This video includes Feingold's question and answer session with the press. Reporters' questions were not audible so the blank audio has been trimmed out to save time.

Senator Feingold has posted the complete transcript of the press conference on his website as well as this statement which appears to be partially directed towards his Democratic colleagues:

Let's drop a few names and monger a few rumors.

Spent a few hours in the recording studio today (on the Ides of March) recording a section for the audio version of investigative journalist Greg Palast's new book --- to be released this June.

In the bargain, I got to spend some quality time hanging and chatting with both the legendary Ed Asner and the unstoppable Janeane Garofalo who are amongst the many notables recording sections of the book for the audio version. More on those two in a minute.

Palast's latest is called ARMED MADHOUSE: Who's Afraid of Osama Wolf?, The Best Legal Whorehouse in Texas, The Scheme to Steal Election '08, No Childs Behind Left And Other Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Class War. A title so long, I feel like I've read the book already.

(Pre-order the hardcover here, or the audio version here.)

Haven't read the book yet beyond the passages I recorded today and the snippets I heard from Asner and Garafalo. But judging from all of that, the book looks to be another scandalous hoot. Moreover, I couldn't be happier to have been asked to read some of the sections concerning Leon County, FL, Elections Supervisor Ion Sancho (or, as Palast refers to him in that chapter, "one of the Lords of the Voting Universe.") Fortuitous timing, that.

Since it's not out yet, perhaps the cover has yet to be finalized...and so, here's a pull-quote that I hope Palast will feel free to use, if inclined, at least on the inside flap:

"Like most Americans, I don't read books. But if I did, Greg Palast's Armed Madhouse would be the first one on my list!"

Or perhaps this one:

"Once again, Greg Palast proves that nothing is sexier than a hard-boiled Jewish investigative journalist/gum-shoe hot on the trail of Electoral Fraud in the United States!"

Or even:

"The only thing more informative and entertaining than Palast's newest book is the audio version of Palast's newest book!"

As mentioned, had the opportunity while there to spend some time hangin' with Asner and Garafalo. While I'd heard through various grapevines that Asner's wife is a BRAD BLOG fan, it turns out he too keeps an eye on these pages from time to time.

That said, since his wife is indeed a reader here, I can't say too much more about our conversations, lest Ed be completely evicted. Though I was pleased to learn that this affable and wise-cracking hero of mine from way back originally hails from Kansas City, KA --- just a few hours down the road and across one state line from my old St. Louis home.

As for Janeane, an interesting tidbit mentioned --- amongst conversations of the Madness of Coulter and other Disturbing Signs of our Times --- was that, as of the first of the year, she chucked her computer entirely! Since unplugging all together, she reports, she feels like a new woman. Or, at least, is feeling a freedom she hasn't felt in years.

I can relate. You have no idea how much I wish I could unplug entirely at times. I'd recommend you folks find the opportunity do so as well, but that would make as much sense as Diebold recommending state officials use hand-counted paper ballots.

While she says she has no prob doing her radio show and her current gig on The West Wing without either email address or net access, I've yet to figure out how I can pull of the same thing and still be a blogger. But I'm working on it.

But since Janeane no longer goes online at all, I'm sure she'll never notice it if I report to you that she showed up an hour late, was drunk as a skunk, wouldn't stop doing blow off of Ed Asner's bare chest, and recorded her chapter of the book entirely in the nude! You shoulda been there!

(NOTE to Ed's wife: just kidding!) (NOTE to Sam Seder: don't mention any of this to Janeane, I promised her I'd keep it all off record!)

Also in da house was the winsome actress and frequently arrested activist, Shiva Rose McDermott, wife of The Practice's Dylan. Unfortunately, I didn't get to spend more than a minute or two with her, so I can't report much more than she was gorgeous, smart, delightful and simply appalled by Garafalo's outrageous behavior, particularly after Janeane went outside and started beating up a homeless guy. Even I thought that was way out of line.

It was nice to spend a few hours away from the machine.