In an ACORN press release we quoted yesterday, in our article noting the 1.3 million reasons the GOP is working so hard to "Dixie-Chick" the tireless democracy-supporting efforts of the community organization, they courageously declared:

If that unflinching response to the wingnut democracy-haters doesn't underscore how ACORN is not a part of the Democratic Party, I don't know what does. But, in any case, in a comment in response to my article, longtime BRAD BLOG troll "Smithy" wrote this:

Well, for a start, there are exactly zero "fraudulent vote[s] that Acorn produced," no matter what the liar "Smithy," and the rest of the shameless GOP liars, might try to tell you (with exactly zero evidence to back up their obnoxious and dangerous claims).

But I'm happy to thank "Smithy" for the reminder that it is your donations to The BRAD BLOG that keep it going, as we receive no corporate or foundational support, so that we can continue to do our part to "presevre voting rights in this country."

Like ACORN, "we will not be intimidated, we will not be provoked, and in this important moment in history we will not allow anyone to distract us from these vital efforts to empower our constituencies and our communities to speak for themselves."

So if you'd like to help us do just that, please click here to send a BRAD BLOG donation in "Smithy's" dishonor! (If you'd like to be a monthly sustaining supporter of any amount, please use the easy blue box in the right side bar. If you'd like to donate $50 or more one time, we'll be happy to send you a signed DVD of either Murder, Spies & Voting Lies or Uncounted. Your choice. Details here...)

If you'd prefer to donate to any other pro-democracy organization instead of, or in addition to The BRAD BLOG, in the name of "Smithy" and his ilk, please consider one of the following BRAD BLOG-approved groups: ACORN; VotersUnite.org; VoterAction.org; BlackBoxVoting.org; Palast Investigaive Fund; VelvetRevolution.us (Disclosure: We co-founded VR).

...And/or, feel free to support any of the candidates, from any party, who have gone on record pledging to Stand Up For Voters this year for a change!

Thanks, "Smithy"!

P.S. I'll be on The Randi Rhodes Show today at 4:30pm ET (1:30pm PT) to discuss the GOP's ACORN "voter fraud" fraud with Randi. Please consider supporting her and Mike Malloy's underdog progressive syndicator NovaM Radio as well!

The Russians flew into town to talk to me last week. The result, from Russia Today, their huge worldwide English-language satellite/news outlet, follows (appx 3.5 mins)...

For the record, I take little joy or comfort in detailing, to folks from Russia, just how bad the current state of democracy is in the U.S.. Describing the failures of our corporate media to them was not much fun either. But I call 'em as I see 'em.

Describing our elections these days as "Russian Roulette," however, did seem to make some kind of perverse sense on Russian television, even if it's not the first time I've used that turn of phrase that way. But I looked Anastasia Churkina in the eye, found her to be very straight-forward and trustworthy, and we had a very good dialogue. In fact, I was able to get a sense of her soul, so I knew I could trust her.

POST-SCRIPT: Anastasia headed up to Portland to speak to the good Thom Hartmann, on many of the same topics, the day after she was here to interview me. The RT interview with Thom is here.

UPDATE 10/25/08: RT has run another report, with a broader look at the e-voting concerns in our '08 election, featuring clips from Anastasia's interviews with both myself and Thom. The video of that report is now posted here...

Election officials across the country are beginning to make the same statements they make before every election. In order to try to give the voters some confidence they are talking about how they are ready. The voting machines are programmed and tested and all set and this year they will have another successful election. Of course on Nov. 4, just 23 days from today, we will hear the same reports of voter disenfranchisement, long lines at the polls causing voters to give up and not vote, vote flipping on touch-screen machines, and all of the other negative reports, and many will come from the very same jurisdictions that are now talking about being ready.

In a year when turn-out is predicted to be much higher than ever before county election officials should be looking to add polling sites yet in Fairfield Co, Ohio, the county has decided to delete 25 polling sites. This will cause voters to have to travel a further distance to vote and will increase the length of the lines. The county claims they are being forced into this decision by recent rulings from the Secretary of State, Jennifer Brunner. If that is correct then Brunner needs to reconsider her rulings. If the county is just trying to make it more difficult for voters to vote, then Brunner needs to re-direct the county. Either way Brunner needs to take action....

By the way, in case you're wondering, this is the real reason --- about 1.3 million of them, actually --- for the GOP's desperate ACORN "voter fraud" scam...

Any questions? If so, first see this and then this, and then read the following list of ACORN FACTS before getting back to me with any of your questions, as I'm happy to help straighten you --- or any of the clueless and lazy media folks who have fallen for the GOP's "voter fraud" fraud --- out, as needed.

The following FACT list is from a recent press release from ACORN, pointing out their success in registering hundreds of thousands of low-income voters whom few others care to go out and register, and the fact that in almost every instance where there have been concerns about registrations turned in by the group (by law, they must turn in all registration forms they collect, problematic or not), it has been ACORN themselves who have first notified officials about the potentially fraudulent or incomplete applications.

The following FACTS need to be read by everybody (apparently), even those who believe they are progressives, yet have fallen for the GOP's Dixie-Chicking of ACORN...

Well, isn't this rich? Tom Feeney --- yes, that Tom Feeney, the one who is alleged to have commissioned vote-rigging software for touch-screen voting machines in 2000, as testified to by former Republican software programmer Clint Curtis in a sworn affidavit, sworn testimony to congress, and a successful polygraph test --- went on Fox "News" this week to decry unsubstantiated charges of "voter fraud" by the low-income voter registration community organization ACORN.

(And if you're done laughing...)

Feeney --- the man who, as Speaker of the FL House in 2000, also promised to award all of the state's electoral votes to George W. Bush no matter what the ballots and Supreme Court had to say about it --- then went on to compare ACORN to the KKK...

As Josh Marshall notes, in his must-read take on the video clips at right from a McCain rally yesterday, it's "Weird. Sad. Surreal."

"There's something else to note too," writes Marshall. "Over the last 48 hours several name brand Republicans have come out and either chided or denounced McCain's borderline incitement. And given how taboo it is to level such criticism of your own nominee at this stage of the election you have to assume these criticisms were only the tip of the iceberg, with a far more intense and angry barrage of criticism voiced privately."

"[L]look at the facial expressions. McCain looks down as he says it and has the countenance of someone who been forced to tell someone else they're sorry," he continues.

"I get from his expression a sense of a man that is, in addition to all the other things he's angry about, is frustrated or angry at the situation he's gotten himself into. But he has sown the wind and now he's reaping the whirlwind."

I want to thank all of those who commented on my rant of yesterday. Your kind comments are very much appreciated. One email I received was especially meaningful to me. The subject line was “In loving memory - Michael, James, Andrew” and after a short bit of encouraging text, and the posters signature line, were three names: Michael Schwerner, James Chaney, and Andrew Goodman. The names were then followed by a little historical reminder of “Freedom Summer” and the part those three heroes played in the Civil Rights Movement.

I realized that we all, all of us, owe it to those three, and all like them, past and present, who have given so much for our democracy, to keep fighting the good fight...

After failing to count votes accurately in a number of recent elections in FL, NJ, and D.C., a report has now been released by the D.C. Board of Elections noting that, as it turns out, Michelle Shafer, official mouthpiece for both Sequoia Voting Systems and the election industry's PR outfit, Election Technology Council (ETC), has once again been misleading the public about Sequoia's bad voting equipment --- both touch-screen and paper ballot systems --- and the fact that they don't work.

The D.C. Board released its report on its investigation into an incident from last month's primary where some 1,500 phantom votes were recorded on Sequoias tabulator after being uploaded from a paper ballot system. There should have been just over 300 votes, instead of thousands, from Precinct 141.

Shafer had originally claimed (as usual) human error and static electricity were to blame. When the incident was first discovered in September, Shafer told the Washington Post: "There's absolutely no problem with the machines in the polling places. No. No."

Turns out, Shafer lied. Again. As the D.C. report notes Sequoia was "too quick to exonerate itself and the equipment used in the tabulation process" and that "the evidence appears to indicate that there was a problem both in equipment (the server) and in the software"...

I’m 61 years old. I’ve been doing this work full-time for nearly the last five years. I long for the days, before I learned so much, when I was ignorant about dirty tricks, phony voter fraud accusations, voter list purges, voter suppression, poorly designed and inaccurate voting machines, absentee paper ballots that have the voters' political parties on the mail-in envelopes (Yes, Broward Co, Florida, does that and strips privacy away from the voters and state law allows them to do it), long lines at the polls, and every other attempt to keep voters from voting and votes from being counted accurately, if at all.

It was kinda nice not knowing about all of those issues. Oh, maybe someone would bring up the old story about ballot boxes floating in the bay. What bay was that? San Francisco? Lake Michigan off of Chicago? The Hudson River? The location seems to have changed with the person telling the story.

It was nice thinking our democracy actually worked the way our founding fathers envisioned it would. It was nice thinking that, no matter for whom I voted, the majority voice was heard. Now, it just feels dirty and somewhat depressing.

I know way too much. It was nice being ignorant...

From AP...

Since we could use some good news around here for a change, we're happy to highlight yet another conservative decision to honor both the Constitution and the rights of all Americans to enjoy equal protection under the law...

Congratulations to the free peoples of Connecticut, and thank you to their Supreme Court for pushing back against those --- Democratic, Republican, or any other --- who would attempt to re-interpret the Constitution and/or liberally create new laws in order to try and discriminate against any American.

Too hilarious... This is not an Onion headline! From AP, within the last hour...

UPDATE: 10/10/08: Oops. The official bi-partisan state report has now been released, and Palin has been found to have illegally abused the power of her office. MSNBC's coverage here...

The GOP's October "Surprise" continues...Even as it's no surprise at all that they are hoping to cause absolute bedlam at the polls. They are off to a good start, as the Democrats seem to be caught flat-footed, despite years of warnings about all of this.

The latest Republican assault on democracy began earlier this week with a 'stunt' raid in (swing state) Nevada, then unsubstantiated allegations in (swing state) Missouri last night (raid coming soon, no doubt), and just hours ago as AP reports, it's (swing state) Ohio...

[Update: In an updated version of the AP report quoted above, it's noted that Sheriff Fisher is "a Republican," that Green County is "rich with Democrat-leaning college students," and that Fisher requested the voter information after "he had been inundated with phone calls from people concerned about possible fraud." In other words, no actual evidence of anything, just angry Republicans, fired up by chasing their own tails after Fox/RNC told them too. Smelling the rats here, yet?]

Of course, the GOP's ACORN "Voter Fraud" Scam was picked up today by John McCain on the stump (and, mercilessly, on Fox "News" all morning, naturally). Here's McCain putting the scare tactics first, and democracy and country second, if even that high on his list. Here's the shameful video...

“When I finally saw the results of our [EVEREST] tests, I thought I was going to throw up. I didn’t think it would be that bad. And it was — it was awful. I looked at it on a Saturday morning, and that night I went to bed and woke up [just before 4:00 on] Sunday morning going, “Oh my God.” I never wake up on the weekends — trust me.”
Jennifer Brunner, Ohio's Secretary of State, when asked in a recent interview about the state’s EVEREST evaluation of the voting machines used in Ohio.

The group of potential voters that has participated the least in past years has probably been students. From all reports students seem to be engaged in this year’s election and will be turning out in large numbers. That can only be a good thing. However, it seems that some are doing all they can to keep the students away from the polls. Our second “Featured” article discusses the actions being taken to disenfranchise student voters and the counter-actions to enfranchise them.

We've been reporting on the GOP's October "Surprise" over the last few days (challenges to Democratic voter registrations in a number of states, and, perhaps more notably, their bogus PR campaign to charge that ACORN, a community organization that heroically registers millions of low-income voters who nobody else bothers to, is committing "voter fraud." See here, here and here, for example.)

But the November Surprise, as we've been trying to warn for many months (if not years), will undoubtedly be the thousands who show up to the polls to vote on November 4th, only to find out that they have somehow "fallen off" the voter rolls.

We've urged folks to check their registrations, even if they recently voted in a primary election, to make sure they haven't been purged (info on how to do that quickly in all 50 states, right here).

Late last month, CBS News reported on voter purges occurring in at least 19 states across the country, many of them swing states, naturally.

Today, the New York Times has published a scathing report, based on a detailed investigation revealing that "Tens of thousands of eligible voters in at least six swing states have been removed from the rolls or have been blocked from registering in ways that appear to violate federal law."

We've got to run out to host an hour of "Election Year Special Coverage" right now on KPFK/Pacifica, (guests to include filmmakers Patty Sharaf of Murder, Spies & Voting Lies: The Clint Curtis Story and John Ennis of Free For All!: One Dude's Quest for Democracy), so here are some very notable, must-read excerpts from the Times full report for the moment. So, we may have more thoughts on all of this later today, but for now, please read on!...