By Brad, from Denver...

Damn bloggers. Following you around everywhere you go, with their nosy little cellphone cameras, writing down every little thing you do or say. Someone should make a law or something...bastards...

P.S. Thanks to the Coloradoans for Voting Integrity (who need a website!) and ProgressNow.org for inviting me to their Denver Roots Camp and for all the great grassroots work they are doing in their fights for truth, justice and the American way! Supermen (and women) all! Looking forward to coming back soon!

Blogged by Brad en route to Denver...

While we put a lot of miles on our car, at our own expense, we're not nearly clever enough to figure out how to get to places like Hawaii or Cape Cod, much less trick the government into picking up the tab like the DoJ's John "Minorities Die First" Tanner.

But we will be visiting lovely Denver for a day or two in December, as we've been invited to speak this weekend at Progress Now's Root Camp on our way back towards Los Angeles.

If you're in the 'hood, please stop by for some Election Integrity strategizing in the Mile High City and to say hello! In addition to discussing EI and blogging at the free conference, we'll also be moderating a Q&A to follow a screening of David Earnhardt's new documentary UNCOUNTED: The New Math of American Elections. Would love to see ya there!

UPDATE 12/2/07: Had a great time in Denver, even with all of those nosy bloggers hanging around!

I did quick 10 minutes this morning on the nationally syndicated Stephanie Miller Show, as Guest Hosted by our friend Bree Walker. The topic: the latest in the Sibel Edmonds case. And if you're not yet familiar with the case, here's a quickie on what it is, why it matters and what you can do about it.

Here's the audio from my appearance this morning on Stephanie's show...

By Brad Friedman from somewhere in Nevada...

"The disconnect from reality was complete," writes Power Line's John Hindraker, in a post aptly headlined "In Another World."

That phrase, along with the headline of his post, featuring paranoid musings from his time on several panels in the "Political Track" at last week's BlogWorld & New Media Expo in Las Vegas, is perhaps the only point on which he and I can most certainly agree. That, and this phrase of his: "Disconnects this total can survive only inside an echo chamber."

Nailed it, John.

Perhaps out of necessity, perhaps out of desperation, perhaps out of the ample cowardice that seems at the core of their very political ideology these days, the wingnuts have created their very own version of reality, smack dab here in the middle of the United States of America. They couldn't take over the real America, at least not entirely, and at least not yet, so they've created their own country, replete with its own set of (ever-shifting) moral and ethical values, its own monetary system, its own set of political ideology, its own President, and its own media network including the crown jewel: its very own cable news channel.

In their Imaginary Land, a covert CIA agent who put her life at great risk for decades in service to her country, in hopes of keeping nuclear weapons out of the hands of Iraq and Iran, is nothing more than "a glorified desk jockey."

The most massive government spending increases in the history of civilization, and the most severe violations of personal privacy in the history of our country, are neither "big government" nor "big brother," they're just the unfortunate necessities of "a post 9/11 world."

George W. Bush is not the irresponsible man who led the deception of the country into an optional and failed and corrupt (beyond all measure of any long-forgotten "outrage" of a UN Oil for Food "scandal") war in Iraq, he is a Churchillian Warrior set to take on the next great challenge in Iran, which threatens the very core of our existence.

These are not points of debate or disagreement. They are acknowledged facts. Those who believe otherwise, no matter the evidence, are little more than whacko moonbats from the lunatic leftie fringe. And George W. Bush's own father never said he has "nothing but contempt and anger for those who betray the trust by exposing the name of our [CIA] sources. They are, in my view, the most insidious of traitors," no matter what the video which doesn't exist has to say about it.

But yet, when their well-constructed, insular world and alternative reality are forced to meet with the real world and real reality, heads begin to spin, self-delusions falter, and their scramble back to the Green Zone of their collective imaginations can't happen quickly enough.

Such was the case last week at BlogWorld, where I was honored to speak on a number of panels with several excellent bloggers from both the progressive and wingnut 'spheres. Most of the wingers with whom I met and/or traded barbs --- including Hugh Hewitt, Glenn Reynolds (Instapundit), Jim Hoft (Gateway Pundit), Rob Nepell (NZ Bear of Truth Laid Bear), Mary Katharine Ham (of Townhall), and Dean Barnett (of The Weekly Standard) --- were genuinely polite, courteous, and cordial, at least in person.

Hinderaker was the exception, but perhaps that's to his credit. If his comments during the panel on which we spoke together ("Political Blogs and the Political Press: From Antagonists to Co-Players?"), along with his shamefully lazy blog coverage of same and his generally off-putting demeanor are any indication, Hinderaker has no interest whatsoever in anything or anyone that doesn't fit into his well-guarded perception of "reality." At least he makes few bones about it...

Guest blogged by Jon Ponder, Pensito Review.

Here's a great photo of your host, Brad Friedman, and our mutual friend, Pam Spaulding, the inimitable blogmistress of Pam's House Blend, taken at BlogWorld in Las Vegas.

Brad and Pam spoke on a panel titled, "The Power of the Political Blogosphere."

We've come a long way, baby. I guess. The world o' blogging, I mean. At least since I was accidentally sucked into the vortex back in early 2004.

Apparently, we now even rate our own "trade show," as the very first "Blog World & New Media Expo" is scheduled for this week at the Convention Center in Las Vegas, where I've been invited to speak.

So what do we have to trade exactly? I'm not entirely sure, but I suppose I'll find out this Thursday and Friday, when I'll likely be trading barbs, at least, on several panels in the show's "Political Track," along with such exemplary wingnuts as Hugh Hewitt, John Hindraker, and oh, so many more that the cat will no doubt be dragging in.

On the other hand, I'm happily looking forward to meeting many of the fine not-wingnut bloggers out there that I've known as little more than email addresses for many years. This from BlogWorld's blog item by the expo's director, Rick Calvert...

Panels I'll be participating in (if I can get there in time) and at which I hope you'll stop by if interested:

Thursday 11/8, 10:15am-11:45am
The Power of the Political Blogosphere - Professor David Perlmutter, Hugh Hewitt, Dave Nalle, Pam Spaulding, Taylor Marsh, Brad Friedman

Thursday 11/8, 2:45pm-3:45pm
Blogging to Effect Non-Partisan Grass Roots Change - Rob Neppell (N.Z. Bear), Brad Friedman

Friday 11/9, 3:00pm-4:00pm
Political Blogs and the Political Press: From Antagonists to Co-Players? - Professor David Perlmutter, John Hinderaker, Mary Katharine Ham, Brad Friedman

The Expo's homepage is here, the full conference schedule is here. Wish me luck. And please come by if you can!!!

I'll speaking tonight at 7:00pm down in Orange County, for the Laguna Beach Democratic Club, on matters of Election Reform and whether or not your vote will count in upcoming elections.

If you're in, or near, the hood, please stop by the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Laguna Beach, 429 Cypress St., N. Laguna, CA, and say hello! Or show up and give me some tough questions for a change! More info here or via 949-497-8240.

Note to the Laguna Beach Republican Club: I'll be happy to come speak to you guys too, if you ever care to invite me!

We're back again tonight filling in as Guest Host during drive-time for the good John Scott on the "Progressive News" program on San Francisco's Air America affiliate Green 960am (formerly "The Quake").

Tonight we'll be joined by NAOMI WOLF, author of The End of America: A Letter of Warning To A Young Patriot, on the rapidly creeping fascism in American society.

We'll also have news from the Republican and Democratic debates this week, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly fighting to save their asses (again), America's shameful turn into a "Bed-Wetter Nation" and the question of who you fear more, Iran's President or America's?

Plus another Green News Update from our own Desi Doyen, more Daily Voting News from VotersUnite.org's John Gideon and your calls at 1-866-960-5753.

Agent 99 will once again host an Open Thread here during the show (Hit the Comments link below, and then post and refresh to your heart's content.)

Please join us for another rip roaring two-hour BradCast at 4pm PT (7pm ET)! Listen up on-air at 960am in the Bay Area or LIVE streaming online here!

POST-SHOW UPDATE/ARCHIVES

HOUR 1: Guests Naomi Wolf scaring the crap out of us, and John Gideon with today's daily voting news.
Download MP3 or listen here...

HOUR 2: CA Sec. of State Debra Bowen gives us a call, plus Desi Doyen's Green News Update and a rant on American cowards.
Download MP3 or listen here...

We're delighted to fill in as Guest Host during drive-time tonight for the good John Scott on his "Progressive News" program on San Francisco's Air America affiliate Green 960am (formerly "The Quake").

My scheduled guests tonight include: Congresswoman SUSAN DAVIS (D-CA) on her effort to amend the Rush Holt Election Reform Bill to include a restriction on the use of DRE touch-screen voting machines; ERIC BOEHLERT of Media Matters on Dan Rather and CBS, the truth about Dubya's National Guard service (or lack thereof) and other colossal MSM failures; and our big gay blogfather, MIKE ROGERS of PageOneQ and BlogActive on his "outing" of Sen. Larry "I Am Not Gay" Craig and much more. (Mike promises to break another congressional scoop for us tonight as well!!!)

Plus a Green News Update from our own Desi Doyen, Daily Voting News from VotersUnite.org's John Gideon, your calls at 1-866-960-5753 and whatever the hell us comes up or breaks between now and then that I feel like covering.

As usual, this blog item will be an Open Thread during the show, hosted by the frequently gruff but always lovable Agent 99. (Hit the Comments link below, and then post and refresh to your heart's content.)

The two-hour BradCast begins at 4pm PT (7pm ET)! Listen up on-air at 960am in the Bay Area or LIVE streaming online here!

POST-SHOW UPDATE/ARCHIVES

HOUR 1: Guests Rep. Susan Davis and Eric Boehlert, plus Green News Update from Desi Doyen.
Download MP3 or listen here...

HOUR 2: Guest Mike Rogers (with an exclusive scoop!) and John Gideon with breaking Daily Voting News. Plus a few laughs in our top of the hour news with Sebastian Koonz...
Download MP3 or listen here...

[UPDATED POST-SHOW]

Santa Cruz County Clerk, Gail Pellerin joined us on the Peter B. Collins Show again tonight, live, to follow up on last week's interesting and rather spirited (at times, contentious-ish) hour.

The audio archive and full text transcript of last week's hour is posted here if you missed it.

The audio from this week's show, along with the transcript, courtesy of Santa Cruz voter Emily Levy of VelvetRevolution.us.

Since last Friday's show, CA SoS Debra Bowen has pronounced that the voting machine "sleepovers" Pellerin told us she'd planned for her Sequoia voting systems again in 2008 "don't comply with the security requirements" for those voting systems in California.

As well, we've gotten the opportunity to chat a bit via email with Pellerin since then, and are encouraged that we can begin working more together than apart, as is necessary, I think, for Election Integrity advocates and Elections Officials. It's the voting machine companies who are the real villains in this matter, and they've been quite successful at driving an opportunistic wedge between advocates and officials.

UPDATE, AUDIO & TRANSCRIPT: The show went very well. Pellerin stuck around for the entire hour and it was a great discussion with several interesting and newsworthy revelations, along with some very good callers as well. I think we may be getting somewhere. At least I'm hopefully tonight for the good folks of Santa Cruz...

Speaking tonight at an event sponsored by the Democratic Westside Progressives here in Los Angeles, along with election attorney Paul Lehto and local election integrity champion Judy Alter.

The event begins at 7pm tonight at the Westside Pavillion Mall , 10850 Pico Blvd., Community Room, 3rd Floor Food Court (map here). More info: 310-490-3858.

I'm going to try to focus on the topic "Why Paper Trails Do Not Work" and will also be taking questions, as usual. If you're in the hood, come on out and say hello!

I'll withhold most of my personal thoughts here for the moment, since Gail Pellerin, County Clerk for Santa Cruz County, CA, has agreed to come back to continue this discussion on the Peter B. Collins Show this Friday. For the moment then, I'll just let you listen and offer your own thoughts on this conversation from last Friday's show.

Pellerin and I appeared on PBC's radio show to discuss issues of Election Integrity, CA SoS Debra Bowen's "Top-to-Bottom Review" and the Sequoia Voting System that Pellerin uses in Santa Cruz, the hometown of former CA SoS Bruce McPherson.

She is on the public record as having said last July at the public hearing in Sacramento for Bowen's TTB Review: "I can guarantee that every eligible vote is counted accurately," about which, you can imagine, I challenged her on the show. As well, in the interview (complete audio below) she commits to sending her voting systems home yet again on "sleepovers" with poll workers in next year's elections. I also had a thing or two to say to say about that, as you may have guessed. Suffice to say, it was a lively interview.

Pellerin --- presumably a Democrat, as she once worked in the CA state assembly for then-Speaker Willie Brown --- was scheduled only for the first half-hour of the show, but fortunately called back for the final segment to answer some of the questions that I didn't have time to ask her about when she was on the air. I greatly appreciate her willingness to do so and to stand up to the fire.

You'll want to stay tuned for that final segment.

As well, be sure to tune in this Friday at 5pm on the PBC Show (listening link here), where she has agreed to come back and pick up where we left off. I greatly appreciate her willingness to do so. The continued discussion can only benefit voters both in Santa Cruz (one of the locations where Peter's show is heard live on the air) and across the nation, where Elections Officials and Election Integrity advocates must continue to find ways to work together to solve our problems and push back at the damaging, cynical, divisive, selfish, and inaccurate propaganda being forwarded by the Voting Machine Companies.

NOTE 9/22/07: Pellerin returned for another full hour on 9/21/07, the week following this broadcast, in order to follow up on this week's interview. That subsequent second interview and text transcript has now been posted here...

-- Santa Cruz County, CA, County Clerk Gail Pellerin and Brad Friedman on the Peter B. Collins Show, 9/14/07 (appx 41 mins. w/ commercials now removed):

Complete text-transcript of the hour now follows below...

Well, that's somewhat amusing. An 800 number that I just gave out to folks while on the Thom Hartmann Program for the U.S. Capitol Switchboard has now apparently been switched to an "adult" phone service! Whoops!

Please use this one instead: 1-800-828-0498

I've just tested it, and it gets you through to Congress. Successfully. Though perhaps not as much fun as the other number, this one will allow you to ask for your Congress Members and tell them it's time to ban DRE touch-screen voting machines once and for all! No more excuses.

Even the New York Times editorialized just last week that "electronic voting has been an abysmal failure" and then they went on (finally!) to call for a federal bill "banning the use of touch-screen voting machines."

Rep. Susan Davis (D-CA) has filed an amendment to the fatally flawed Holt Election Reform Bill (HR 811) that restricts such machines, but even that doesn't go far enough. Worse, the House Rules Committee may not even allow her amendment to be debated or added to the bill. So call your reps, and demand that they amend the Holt Election Reform Bill (HR 811) to ban touch-screen voting machines and to require a paper ballot for every vote cast in America!

Holt's bill does not do that right now --- no matter how much propaganda you are given to the contrary by the bill's supporters!

Please don't dial the other number that I gave out on the air. As Peter B. Collins --- who's sitting in for Hartmann today --- said: that number is apparently for Sen. David Vitter's private use only. Our apologies for the confusion. Especially to the Senator.

Blogged by Brad from somewhere in Colorado...

Have just been asked to fill in, at the last minute, as Guest Host for Mary Ann Gould on her Voice of the Voters radio program tonight at 8pm ET (5pm PT).

Please join us as I jump in to host her show as heard on the air on WNJC 1360AM in Philadelphia and South New Jersey (Rush Holt country!), and across the world via this online listening link.

We'll have more details on today's breaking Holt bill information, the Davis amendment, and other late-breaking voting news.

As we're doing this at the last minute, without guests or preparation, we'll be happy to take your calls, questions and thoughts at 856-227-1360. As usual, VoV and BRAD BLOG stalwart John Gideon of VotersUnite.org, a weekly regular on the show, will also be joining us to discuss all the latest!

Please join us, call us, and otherwise consider this an Open thread for use during the show! (Hit the Comments link below, let us know what's on your mind and then hit REFRESH to keep up with the conversation!)

POST-SHOW UPDATE: Thanks for those who tuned in! Apologies to those who had a bad net stream. Apparently we overloaded their stream. Here then is the archived hour, with all of the day's Rush Holt news, and guests Bob Fitrakis, Bruce Funk, Paddy Schaeffer and John Gideon.

Brad Guest Hosting Voice of the Voters, 9/5/07 (appx. 1 hour)...

Here's an in-depth, in-person interview I did with Tom Klammer for his Tell Somebody show last week in Kansas City, MO, on KKFI. This is the first part of the interview, and he promises to run the rest next week. The conversation was on Election and Media issues in Missouri and across the country, including more on GOP anti-democracy, vote-suppressor Thor Hearne from the hometown of the headquarters for his law firm, Lathrop & Gage. A bit of drama is added, as if it's needed, as thunder is heard throughout the interview.

Brad Friedman interviewed on Tell Somebody with Tom Klammer, aired 8/24/07 (appx. 35 mins):

UPDATE: Part Two of my interview with Klammer was run on the following Friday. Here is that show, featuring the rest of our in-depth interview, focusing on the failures of touch-screen voting and duplicity by the voting machine companies.

Brad Friedman interviewed on Tell Somebody with Tom Klammer, Part Two aired 8/31/07 (appx. 39 mins):