Guest: Emily Levy of Scrutineers.org; Also: Iran/Israel escalation; Dockworkers strike shuts down ports; Search, recovery -- and climate denier lies -- continue after Helene...
'GNR' Special Coverage: Climate change-fueled Hurricane Helene unleashes widespread death and destruction, as storm victims face daunting challenge of recovery...
Climate change strikes again, killing more than a hundred in 5 states, millions without power, concerns about their ability to vote; Also: Callers ring in before VP Debate...
Hurricane Helene guns for Florida; Global warming doubled odds of Europe's catastrophic flooding; PLUS: Biden promotes climate action at final U.N. address, with a warning...
CA sues ExxonMobil for plastic recycling lies; Cat 3 John strikes Mexico; Three Mile Island coming back to power Microsoft A.I.; PLUS: Climate Week kicks off in NYC...
THIS WEEK: Springfield Follies ... Political Violence ... The Undecidables ... Pro-Life? ... And much more in our latest collection of the week's best toons!...
Bad news for Rs in NC; Trump/Vance lies in OH; GOP Elector scheme in NE; Gaming GA result certification; Vote suppression in TX; Vote expansion in CA...
U.N. weather agency warns of climate chaos...that may already be here; NC storm tops $7B in damage; PLUS: Biden's air pollution policies will save 200,000 lives...
Felony charges dropped against VA Republican caught trashing voter registrations before last year's election. Did GOP AG, Prosecutor conflicts of interest play role?...
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...
Arrest of RNC/Sproul man caught destroying registration forms brings official calls for wider criminal probe from compromised VA AG Cuccinelli and U.S. AG Holder...
'RNC official' charged on 13 counts, for allegely trashing voter registration forms in a dumpster, worked for Romney consultant, 'fired' GOP operative Nathan Sproul...
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...
The other companies of Romney's GOP operative Nathan Sproul, at center of Voter Registration Fraud Scandal, still at it; Congressional Dems seek answers...
The belated and begrudging coverage by Fox' Eric Shawn includes two different video reports featuring an interview with The BRAD BLOG's Brad Friedman...
FL Dept. of Law Enforcement confirms 'enough evidence to warrant full-blown investigation'; Election officials told fraudulent forms 'may become evidence in court'...
Rep. Ted Deutch (D-FL) sends blistering letter to Gov. Rick Scott (R) demanding bi-partisan reg fraud probe in FL; Slams 'shocking and hypocritical' silence, lack of action...
After FL & NC GOP fire Romney-tied group, RNC does same; Dead people found reg'd as new voters; RNC paid firm over $3m over 2 months in 5 battleground states...
After fraudulent registration forms from Romney-tied GOP firm found in Palm Beach, Election Supe says state's 'fraud'-obsessed top election official failed to return call...
After a month off for KPFK's latest fund drive, The BradCast was finally back today in its normal Wednesday 3pm slot on Pacifica Radio's L.A. affiliate (and on other fine networks as well.)
On today's show I was joined by Marcy Wheeler of Emptywheel.net to discuss the madness of Obama's policies for targeting U.S. citizens as "terrorists" without due process, as discussed by AG Eric Holder earlier this week; a Green News Report segment with a major audio glitch and Desi Doyen live in studio; PLUS: the story of IN Sec. of State Charlie White getting off virtually scot-free for three counts of felony voter fraud, the former U.S. Marine who pushed back against the GOP's polling place Photo ID restrictions in TN this week, the good news out of WI concerning that state GOP's own attempt to suppress Democratic-leaning voters and MUCH MORE! Enjoy!
Download MP3 or listen online right here [appx 58 mins]...
Topics ranged from Rocky Anderson to Ron Paul to why elections are held on Tuesday and if they still should be, among other things. The other panelists (both Right-leaning) included PJTV's Alexis Garcia and comedian Avi Liberman. Enjoy!...
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UPDATE 3/2/12, 9:40am PT: "The Amazing Atheist's" legion of fans (yes, he's some sort of YouTube star, as noted during the show) are furious with me, apparently, for my remarks directed towards TAA's comments in his video clip as seen during the show above. They have taken to YouTube comments to express their derision, including many on my lack of understanding of our system of democracy, etc, etc. BTW, to be fair, since I didn't get to specifically answer the Electoral College question during the panel discussion, and otherwise wasn't able to fully expound on my third-party thoughts there (and neither was TAA able to respond directly at all to any of our thoughts, due to the way the format works on The Point), I've let TAA, as well as the The Young Turks folks know that I'm more than happy to go one-on-one with TAA and his legion of followers live, anytime, if they are ever interested and feel like hosting such an affair.
[Now UPDATED with audio archives below! Enjoy 'em!]
Mike has the night off! So we're back tonight guest-hosting the nationally-syndicated Mike Malloy Show! And it's primary night in MI and AZ and we'll have not one, but two Presidential candidates as guests tonight!
We'll be BradCasting, as usual, LIVE from 9pm-Mid ET (6p-9p PT), coast-to-coast and around the globe from L.A.'s KTLK am1150 in beautiful downtown Burbank. Join us by tuning in, chatting in, Tweeting in and calling in! Our LIVE chat room will be up and rolling right here at The BRAD BLOG, as usual, while we are on the air. Please stop by and join the fun while you're listening! (The Chat Room will open at the bottom of this item a few minutes before airtime, see down below, just above "Comments" section.)
Scheduled tonight (so far):
MI & AZ PRIMARY RESULTS, or what they are reported to be, anyway. Also, just some of the reasons why you should be concerned that those reported results may not be what they are reported to be!
GOV. BUDDY ROEMER, who is on GOP Presidential ballot both MI & AZ tonight, but who has recently left the party for a Reform Party candidacy and a run for the Americans Elect nomination.
FRED KARGER, who is on the GOP Presidential ballot in MI and, unlike Roemer, still a member of the party for some reason. He's also the first openly gay Presidential candidate and the guy who alerted the world to Mitt Romney's apparent voter fraud in MA!
The Mike Malloy Show is nationally syndicated on air affiliates across the country and also on SiriusXM Ch. 127. You may also listen online to the free LIVE audio stream at affiliate KPTR 1450 in Palm Springs or at WhiteRose Society or via MikeMalloy.com.
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POST-SHOW UPDATE: Maybe someone had a bit too much caffeine today. Well, in any case, it led to a pretty high energy show! And lots of circus music! You can check it all out now for yourself, sans commercials, in the high-octane archives now posted below. Enjoy!...
I actually didn't mean this to be a commercial. I was simply going to share Mike Malloy's brief "Podcast Trivia" question from last Friday night's show since I found it so hilarious and a classic example of why a free world needs Mike Malloy.
In grabbing it from the archives to post the segment here, I also heard his earlier plea for folks to consider subscribing to the Mike Malloy Show podcasts to help the show continue to stay on the air. So I've tacked that to the front of the clip I'd planned to run here below.
I hope you willconsider subscribing, if only as a way to help support Progressive Radio over our public airwaves, since those airwaves have been, by and large, "bought" up by mega-corporations who have removed all true market competition from them (here's just one recent, appalling example), and we have a government either too cowardly or too corrupt to protect them for its citizenry.
So it's up to folks like you and me to do whatever we can. Thanks in advance for your help!
And now, here's the clip that had me LOL'ing on the way home from dinner last Friday night, along with the quick plea from Malloy added to the top. Don't worry. The whole thing is barely four minutes long...
FULL DISCLOSURE: I am a regular guest host for the Mike Malloy Show, and will be filling in once again this Tuesday night (9p-Mid ET), on the night of the Michigan and Arizona primaries. If the gods are with us, I'll have not one, but two different Presidential candidates as my guests that night! So I hope you'll tune in! As ever, we'll have streaming audio links (and a live chat room) during showtime right here at The BRAD BLOG, if you're not lucky enough to live in a town where you can hear Mike Malloy, for free, over our public airwaves (or haven't chosen to pay money to hear him on SiriusXM's channel 127.)
I joined Thom Hartmann on his Big Picture TV show last night to discuss The BRAD BLOG's exclusive report from earlier in the day confirming the Virginia State Attorney General's newly launched criminal investigation into the 1,500 allegedly fraudulent signatures turned in by the Gingrich Campaign in their failed attempt to be included on the VA GOP Primary ballot...
By the way, since we broke the news yesterday morning, several outlets have picked up and/or confirmed our report. Though, frankly, not as many as one would think given the nature and scope of the story. Certainly not as many who would have picked it up had either the now-defunct ACORN, or any Democrat been accused of doing the very same thing.
Other than our report, Tommy Christopher's coverage at Mediaite was probably the most detailed (and included both my name and a link to our story), followed by Dan Roem at National Journal (who credits the story to having "broke in the liberal blogosphere" --- though at least he included a link here...even though that link was broken when I last checked), then Julian Walker at The Virginia-Pilot (who didn't bother to credit anybody for the story) and NBC4-Washington who, in their short piece, did manage to mention and link properly to The BRAD BLOG.
There were a few other mentions (Dave Weigel at Slate, for example) but, far and away, the greatest way our stories are spread are by you guys and others spreading the word yourselves through comments at other sites, email, and via Twitter and Reddit. (The comments on the posting at Reddit --- where a huge number of folks up-voted the story --- were very, um, enlightening, as you'll see if you bother to read them.)
Of course, Fox "News", who mentions, actually highlights, every time an ACORN worker is accused of farting over the years (whether they actually farted or not) has yet to say a word about this story. Wonder why.
Just thought you might be interested in how folks sometimes deal --- or don't --- with original, exclusive stories that we break here. Sometimes they pick them up, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they offer appropriate credit, quite often they don't. That, despite the hundreds of stories we've broken over the years, with an impeccable record for accuracy and independent verifiability in just about every damned one of them.
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Please support The BRAD BLOG's fiercely independent, award-winning coverage of your electoral system, as available from no other media outlet in the nation, with a donation to help us keep going (Snail mail, more options here). If you like, we'll send you some great, award-winning election integrity documentary films in return! Details right here...
If we were President of the United States, we'd be termed out by now. But we were never fans of term limits around here anyway. So, since eight is never really enough, let's go for nine.
In defiance of all our foes (as if we have any) --- and even our own predictions on dark days --- today is the 8th anniversary of The BRAD BLOG! We're still here. Get used to it!
Someday I'll have to stop to look back on all of our extraordinary accomplishments during this tremendous journey, but we've got an election to keep an eye on and a collapsing native and burning world to save, so no time for much more than a quick moment to mark the occasion, and keep moving forward.
As I noted briefly over the weekend, none of what we do here can be done without your help. While others claim independence, we truly are independent. No corporate or foundational help here (not that I'd say no to any of it --- we could really use it!), but that means we really do rely on the kindness and generous support of our readers.
To that end, as much as I hate it, here comes my usual annual plea...
Please consider supporting The BRAD BLOG with a "birthday gift" of any amount you'd like. The larger, the better, naturally, if you are able to afford it and still take care of more pressing priorities. On the day we learn that Mitt Romney makes some $33k a day --- simply by doing nothing --- while paying a lower tax rate than most of you and me, we'll be happy just to make this month's rent and put some gas in the tank (both literally and figuratively).
One-time donations are, as ever, tremendously appreciated. Even more so are sustaining, automated, monthly contributions of any amount you can comfortably afford. For the latter, please see the form in the light blue box mid-way down our right sidebar. Monthly sustaining support is a quick and easy matter to create, via credit card or PayPal, as you prefer, and will hopefully take you less than three minutes or so to set up. My great thanks to the handful of you who have been monthly supporters for so long. It truly means the world!
But most of all, my greatest of thanks for reading The BRAD BLOG, sharing what you've learned here by passing it on, through email, through word of mouth, through letters to the editor, through clicks of the REDDIT and RE-TWEET buttons, etc. For that, and more, I thank you, along with the other frequent contributors here, like Desi Doyen and Ernie Canning, as well as those behind the scenes who help moderate comments and correct my terrible spelling errors and everyone else who has ever helped to keep our campfire burning.
That's eight. Buckle up. Here comes nine.
With love and respect and a continuing wish for peace....
-- Brad
What a difference two years and one brutally ugly, obscenely cash-based GOP Primary Election cycle makes. One wonders if even Republicans, at this point, are finally beginning to realize the problems wrought by the U.S. Supreme Court's infamousCitizens United decision two years ago yesterday.
If this Rasmussen poll can be believed, the Right-leaning polling firm now finds that 58% of Americans are calling for new campaign finance laws. That's up from three years earlier when, as ThinkProgress notes, a majority of the nation, according to the same polling firm, felt that it would be "good" if then-existing campaign finance laws were struck down by the court.
Well, they got their wish two years ago yesterday. Wonder how they feel about it now.
To mark yesterday’s somber and embarrassing anniversary, John Wellington Ennis, filmmaker of the wonderful, smart, insightful and often deftly amusing 2008 documentary FREE FOR ALL!: One Dude's Quest to Save Democracy, has another one on the way. The new one will focus on our now even-sorrier state of "democracy" in the long dark shadow of Citizens United. While the new feature-length film, Pay 2 Play: Democracy's High Stakes is due later this year, yesterday Ennis released a short documentary, based on some of the work he's done on that film, focusing on how Citizen's United came about, and what is has meant to the nation.
His new soulful short, Citizens United: How Did It Happen? follows below. I'm honored to say that I appear in it myself, but it's very good anyway. Ennis has a few additional thoughts on it all right here today. But, at the very least, you owe it to yourself to give his new short documentary below a look on this 2nd anniversary of the horrific SCOTUS decision that is actively undermining our absolutely most central values as a nation...
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By the way, The BRAD BLOG's 8th(!) anniversary is this Tuesday! Unfortunately, we have not been the recipient of secret millions from corporate "people" in the wake of Citizens United. In fact, we have never enjoyed either corporate or foundational support for our completely independent work here, and continue to rely almost solely on you, our readers, to keep going. We have survived this long, barely, thanks to you! But we desperately need your support to continue.
Please consider an 8th Birthday donation to The BRAD BLOG to help us continue our important work in what is guaranteed to be a long, ugly and difficult Election Year, when your help here is needed the most. Also quite welcome are sustaining monthly donations of any amount you choose! For that (or our snail mail address for olde tyme paper check contributions), please see the light blue box about halfway down the right sidebar of all of our pages. Anything you can offer is greatly appreciated! My sincere thanks in advance!
[Now UPDATED with tonight's nightmarish audio archives below! Enjoy!!!]
Mike has the night off! So we're back! Guest hosting the nationally-syndicated Mike Malloy Show on Friday the 13th! It's a Nightmare on Malloy Street!...
We'll be BradCasting all the horror LIVE from 9pm-Mid ET (6p-9p PT), coast-to-coast and around the uprising globe from the studios of L.A.'s KTLK am1150 in beautiful downtown Burbank. Join us by tuning in, chatting in, Tweeting in and calling in! Our LIVE chat room will be up and rolling right here at The BRAD BLOG, as usual, while we are on the air. Please stop by and join the fun while you're listening! (The Chat Room will open at the bottom of this item a few minutes before airtime, see down below, just above "Comments" section.)
Scheduled tonight (so far):
YOUR WORST NIGHTMARE! Me! With three hours over our public airwaves to talk about Iowa, New Hampshire & South Carolina voting nightmares! The nightmare that is Election 2012! And other related and unrelated nightmares!
GRAEME ZIELINSKI, Spokesman from the Wisconsin state Democratic Party, with some late breaking news on the "Recall Scott Walker" effort in the Badger State!
PLUS! The fraud that is James O'Keefe; the "cold" War against Iran; the failure that is the NY Times; the GOP wants more corporate money in campaigns; and all the nightmares on your minds, via your calls over your public airwaves at 877-520-1150 and your tweets to @TheBradBlog!...
The Mike Malloy Show is nationally syndicated on air affiliates across the country and also on SiriusXM Ch. 127. You may also listen online to the free LIVE audio stream at affiliate KPTR 1450 in Palm Springs or at WhiteRose Society or via MikeMalloy.com.
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POST-SHOW UPDATE: Tonight's show was a NIGHTMARE! Don't believe me? You can now listen to the full show, sans commercials, in the archives posted below. (You can also read the nightmarish chat room archives below too!) Be afraid...Be very afraid!...
[Now UPDATED below with the archives from the year's final Malloy Show below! And it was a fun one! Enjoy!]
Tonight it's our final night guest hosting the nationally-syndicated Mike Malloy Show for the year and, the final Mike Malloy Show of the year, for that matter! It's also our last one before the 2012 voting finally begins...
For our New Years Eve Eve show, we'll be BradCasting again LIVE from 9pm-Mid ET (6p-9p PT), coast-to-coast and around the uprising globe from the studios of L.A.'s KTLK am1150 in beautiful downtown Burbank. Join us by tuning in, chatting in, Tweeting in and calling in! Our LIVE chat room will be up and rolling right here at The BRAD BLOG, as usual, while we are on the air. Please stop by and join the fun while you're listening! (The Chat Room will open at the bottom of this item a few minutes before airtime, see down below, just above "Comments" section.)
Scheduled tonight (so far):
END OF THE YEAR/BEGINNING OF ELECTION YEAR ROUND-UP: Everything we've yet to get to this year, and everything you'll need to know as the zany 2012 election year circus will finally get under way!
VISITS FROM FRIENDS: In addition to (hopefully) lots of calls from you guys, we may have a few visits from a few friends o' the blog!
PLUS! Anything and everything that's on your minds at year's end as 2012 awaits, via your calls over your public airwaves at 877-520-1150 and your tweets to @TheBradBlog!...
The Mike Malloy Show is nationally syndicated on air affiliates across the country and also on SiriusXM Ch. 127. You may also listen online to the free LIVE audio stream at affiliate GREEN 960 in San Francisco or at WhiteRose Society or via MikeMalloy.com.
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POST-SHOW UPDATE: Had a great last-show-of-the-year show tonight! LOTS of fun! If you missed any part of it, the full, commercial-free audio archives are now posted below (along with the archives from tonight's chat room). A really lively end-of-year show! Until next year, enjoy!...
The BRAD BLOG was the first to report that the former disgraced Speaker of the House turned Republican Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich had admitted to committing massive "voter fraud" --- thousands of cases --- in his failed attempt to qualify for the Republican Presidential Primary ballot in his home state of Virginia.
Our report on Wednesday came just minutes after Gingrich's caught-on-video admission to a voter in Iowa that his campaign had "hired somebody who turned in false signatures."
"Oh, it was just a mistake," the one-time front-runner for the GOP nomination claimed. "We turned in 11,100 — we needed 10,000 — 1,500 of them were by one guy who frankly committed fraud."
To our knowledge, however, Gingrich has yet to divulge the identify of the "one guy" who "frankly committed fraud" to law enforcement officials.
We noted that by the same (completely disingenuous) standards that the GOP and its cable TV arm, Fox "News", has long applied, for years, to the now-defunct community organization ACORN (which never committed any actual "voter fraud" or even "voter registration fraud", though a few of its workers committed the later, as discovered by ACORN themselves who promptly turned them into authorities), Gingrich was, himself, the purveyor of "massive voter fraud".
And now it looks like Chris Hayes, filling in on MSNBC for Rachel Maddow last night, picked up --- "from the Department of Shameless Schadenfreude" --- on the same theme, pointing out that Gingrich himself had previously slammed ACORN in a 2009 op-ed, in which he falsely declared that "ACORN has a long history of engaging in voter fraud," due to the exact same thing Gingrich now refers to as little more than "just a mistake". (Ironically enough, in that piece, Gingrich used the fraudulent ACORN "Pimp" Hoax video tapes created by James O'Keefe, Hannah Giles and Andrew Breitbart as the basis for his entire op-ed lie.)
Here's the short video from MSNBC last night, and a few more words to follow detailing how what Gingrich Campaign did was far worse than anything ACORN was ever found to have done...
[Now UPDATED with audio archives from tonight posted below!]
We're back again tonight (and tomorrow night) guest hosting the nationally syndicated Mike Malloy Show as the end of the hellish year draws near and the next hellish year will soon begin. LOTS to discuss tonight, so hope you'll tune in!
We're BradCasting again LIVE 9pm-Mid ET (6p-9p PT), coast-to-coast and around the uprising globe from the studios of L.A.'s KTLK am1150 in beautiful downtown Burbank. Join us by tuning in, chatting in, Tweeting in and calling in! Our LIVE chat room will be up and rolling right here at The BRAD BLOG, as usual, while we are on the air. Please stop by and join the fun while you're listening! (The Chat Room will open at the bottom of this item a few minutes before airtime, see down below, just above "Comments" section.)
OCCUPYING FOR ACCOUNTABILITY I'll be joined in studio by several OccupyLA'ers who will share their stories of horrific treatment at the hands of the LAPD, as we try to bring some accountability. Also will speak with the great independent citizen journalist/web-streamer Spencer "OakFoSho" Mills on his quest for accountability for LAPD Officer Escamilla.
PLUS! More than I have time to mention here, and everything else that's on your minds as the 2012 circus is about to begin to begin, via your calls over your public airwaves at 877-520-1150 and your tweets to @TheBradBlog!...
The Mike Malloy Show is nationally syndicated on air affiliates across the country and also on SiriusXM Ch. 127. You may also listen online to the free LIVE audio stream at affiliate GREEN 960 in San Francisco or at WhiteRose Society or via MikeMalloy.com.
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POST-SHOW UPDATE: A whole lotta show in three short hours! Now you can listen to the whole thing in about an hour and half in the commercial-free audio archives posted below. I believe that you'll find it well worth the time! Money back if not! (And see ya tomorrow night!)...
We thought it'd be a slow-ish night while guest hosting the nationally syndicated Mike Malloy Show on Christmas Eve Eve tonight. Boy were we wrong! (We'll also be filling in next Thursday and Friday, by the way.) Hope you can tune in tonight! It'll be worth it!
We'll be BradCasting LIVE 9pm-Mid ET (6p-9p PT), coast-to-coast and around the uprising, pre-Christmas globe from the studios of L.A.'s KTLK am1150 in beautiful downtown Burbank. Join us by tuning in, chatting in, Tweeting in and calling in! Our LIVE chat room will be up and rolling right here at The BRAD BLOG, as usual, while we are on the air. Please stop by and join the fun while you're listening! (The Chat Room will open at the bottom of this item a few minutes before airtime, see down below, just above "Comments" section.)
LORI COMPAS, the leading organizer of WI's "Recall Fitzgerald" campaign, demanding an apology from state Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald who inaccurately claimed that she and her fellow petitioners were committing fraud in their signature gathering efforts to have him recalled along with Gov. Scott Walker.
PLUS! Everything else that's on your minds, via your calls over your public airwaves at 877-520-1150 and your tweets to @TheBradBlog!...
The Mike Malloy Show is nationally syndicated on air affiliates across the country and also on SiriusXM Ch. 127. You may also listen online to the free LIVE audio stream at affiliate GREEN 960 in San Francisco or at WhiteRose Society or via MikeMalloy.com.
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POST-SHOW UPDATE: It was a Christmas miracle! Nothing but good news (mostly) on the Malloy Show tonight! How often does that happen?! (Ever?) Plus some rockin' holiday music from our awesome engineer Tony Sorrentino! Lots of stuff to keep you feelin' good over the holiday weekend, all now posted below, commercial-free as our holiday gift to you! Enjoy!...
Or by Snail Mail Make check out to...
Brad Friedman
7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594
Los Angeles, CA 90028
The BRAD BLOG receives no foundational or corporate support.
Your contributions make it possible to continue our work.
About Brad Friedman...
Brad is an independent investigative
journalist, blogger, broadcaster, VelvetRevolution.us co-founder,
expert on issues of election integrity,
and a Commonweal Institute Fellow.