The final round of state Senate recalls in Wisconsin, brought on in response to anti-union legislation by Gov. Scott Walker and state Republicans, have completed today. AP is reporting tonight that the two Democrats up for recall in the state's 12th and 22nd have each retained their seats. TPM has the numbers by district here.

By way of reminder, in Wisconsin most votes are cast by hand-marked paper ballot though tallied secretly by optical-scanners made by Diebold, Sequoia and ES&S. The state does not examine any optically-scanned ballots to assure the machines have tallied accurately after they've already been scanned, other than in the even of a recount if permission is granted by the courts to hand-count ballots. I'm told, but haven't been able to confirm today, that some of the municipalities in the two districts where elections were held today, may have been hand-counting ballots, though centrally, after they've been transported, rather than at the precincts. Given there was only one single race on the ballot today and hand-counting would consist largely of making two separate piles, it seems as if it would have been cheaper and easier (and certainly more reliable and transparent) to hand-count all of the ballots in these recounts. But, sadly, that's not the case. So we're forced to rely, in most cases, on the oft-failed, easily-manipulated computer-reported results from the Badger State. Mack Trucks, if you will, used to deliver pizzas.

Once again, election watchdog Election Defense Alliance (EDA) and a number of other organizations were carrying out Exit Polls at the several sites today, as one of the few weapons left to help avoid and/or ferret out potential election fraud or vote tabulation error. I spoke with EDA's National Coordinator Sally Castleman earlier this evening, and --- unlike during the July primaries and during last week's GOP recalls, no problems have been reported by the Exit Poll teams at the wards.

By way of another reminder, problems with vote tabulation often do not come to light until days, or even longer, after elections. So far, however, there have been pleasantly few reports of problems that I've heard about or been able to find today. There was this odd incident at a Kenosha ward and at another ward there where they reportedly ran out of ballots for a short time (is that report accurate, where it says the County "printed up 300 additional ballots" in a pinch? They can print up ballots just like that??) as turnout was reportedly heavy in most areas today, said to have been on par with a gubernatorial election. That's some good news to report at this hour. If anything changes, of course, we'll let you know.

If the largely unverified results stand as currently reported, there will have been 5 wins total for Democrats --- 2 tonight, 2 last Tuesday, and 1 in July --- in these state Senate recalls. Republicans will have won just 4 of the races, all last week, and will have lost 2 seats, while the Democrats lost none.

Despite their victories, however, the Dems will have fallen one short of re-taking the majority in the state Senate, where the GOP will still enjoy a slim 17-16 advantage. One moderate Republican, however, state Senator Dale Schultz, who voted against the GOP anti-union agenda, may well serve as a firewall against continued radical Republicanism in the state. Nonetheless, after last week's recalls of 6 Republicans, where Democrats picked up 2 seats from the Republicans, the GOP sent out statements declaring "victory" in Wisconsin.

Until Walker's own recall election, which could happen early next year if Democrats are able to gather enough signatures beginning in November, we may be done with the wild string of elections in Wisconsin...at least for now.

I'm not sure what's more obnoxious, the way the Republican Party itself ignores and belittles their own 2012 Presidential candidate Rep. Ron Paul --- who reportedly finished a very close second to Rep. Michele Bachmann, who is receiving tons of attention, in the hopelessly gamed Iowa Straw Poll over the weekend --- or the way the mainstream corporate media ignores and belittles him.

I suppose if Paul wasn't belittled by these jerks he'd get no media attention whatsoever.

No matter your personal or political feelings about Paul, the way he is treated by the establishment elite, the way they, not voters determine who will or won't be a "viable" candidate, is appalling in my opinion.

Jon Stewart, appropriately, let 'em all have it for that last night, asking incredulously: "How did libertarian Ron Paul become the 13th floor in a hotel?!"...

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Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

Controversial Wisconsin state Supreme Court Justice David Prosser has a new special investigator looking into allegations of assault made against him by another sitting Supreme Court Justice.

At the request of Dane County Circuit Judge William Faust, Sauk County District Attorney Patricia Barrett (R) agreed to serve as a special prosecutor regarding the physical assault and battery allegations made by WI Supreme Court Justice Ann Walsh Bradley. Bradley claims that Prosser placed her in a "chokehold" during a contentious argument about the overturning of a lower court ruling on Gov. Scott Walker's controversial and hastily enacted union-busting legislation. The lower court found that it was passed in violation of the state's open meeting law and is therefore null and void. Prosser and his 3 colleagues on the bench who enjoy a 4 to 3 Right-leaning majority on the state's high court, eventually overturned the lower court's ruling. Bradley was in the minority.

According to Tim McCumber, the head of the Sauk County GOP, Barrett is essentially an independent who ran for DA in 1994 as a Republican to get onto the ballot in a GOP-dominated county. Barrett, who is 62 and plans to retire in the fall of 2012, stated that she does not see either the sheriff's or prosecutor's jobs as a partisan one.

Justice Bradley's allegations are also the subject of of an internal investigation by the WI Judicial Commission.

The key question is whether Barrett and the WI Judicial Commission can proceed in their investigations on the basis of the facts and the law? What is at stake is not simply a possible Class A Misdemeanor Battery charge against a sitting Supreme Court Justice. The very survival of the rule of law in the Badger state is spotlighted here. All if this happens with a backdrop of a billionaire-funded, partisan onslaught on fundamental fairness and democracy, not only as it pertains to the electoral process, but in how the state's executive, legislative and judicial branches of government function...

So I forced myself to take a few hours off yesterday. As too often happens, it turned into a busman's holiday.

We took a trip out to closing day at the Orange County Fair in Costa Mesa, CA, had a great time in the bargain, and even shared a bunch of fun/snarky photo tweets throughout the day (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here if you're interested, or are not otherwise already a Twitter follower of @TheBradBlog.)

It was all fun and games and sassy social observation until we had the good fortune to chance upon a booth being run by the Orange County Registrar of Voters Neal Kelley, where two delightful representatives of the office where on hand to help folks register to vote and to offer a demonstration of the country's 100% unverifiable Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting system.

As I would come to learn, the two delightful representatives of the office had no idea that their own e-voting system was actually 100% unverifiable until I explained to them how that was the case. Equally as troubling, as I was testing out one of the Hart Intercivic eSlate demo systems set up for voters to try and learn how to use them, it failed on me while I was running through the demo ballot created for fair goers...one of my selections disappeared entirely...or at least appeared to...

Guest blogged by Ernest A. Canning

Neither the recent claim made by anonymous hacker, Abhaxas, that he/she had hacked into Florida's e-voting database nor the efforts by FL election officials to minimize the breach of its system comes as a surprise to The BRAD BLOG.

In fact, minimization of the vulnerability following the reported hack calls to mind what Roger G. Johnston, Ph.D of the Argonne National Laboratory describes as the Arrogance Maxim:

One would think that Abhaxas had Johnson's Arrogance Maxim in mind. As reported by Doug Chapin of the University of MN, the anonymous hacktivist responded to the official denials by hacking into the FL voting system a second time; posting "a directory listing of the Florida database with the (sarcastic) observation 'Glad you cleaned up, pretty secure now guys'."

As an encore, Abhaxas then hacked into Montana's government website, where he/she exposed 16 databases.

While Chapin acknowledges the vulnerability exposed by the hack, once again, as is his habit over the years, Chapin draws the entirely wrong lessons in pointing to the need for better training and security procedures...

Horrible...

At this hour 4 are confirmed dead with more than 40 injured. Officials say the death toll is likely to rise.

This photo from the ground offers a sense of the scale of this collapse...

Some video of the immediate aftermath follows below...

So, this guy is the front-runner for the 2012 Republican nomination for President of the United States?...

TPM has more context, etc., and you can decide for yourself whether Romney was echoing the absurd Citizens United line there (that corporations are Constitutionally entitled to the same rights as human beings), or whether he was trying to say that what is good for corporations is good for the people who own and/or benefit from them.

But what strikes me is that Romney appears quite flustered and weak in that exchange. The entire tussle, with a few hecklers at the Iowa State Fair serves to make him appear profoundly unPresidential, when appearing Presidential is one of the few things he can be good at...at times. Perhaps Mittens oughta stay away from state fairs...and campaign appearances where actual people get to ask questions and stuff...for a while.

One thing is for certain though. Fairly or unfairly, that comment is likely to haunt him for a long time to come. I suspect it will become a landmark moment in Romney's political trajectory frankly. That view seems to be shared by both Rachel Maddow, who points out this isn't the first such awkward campaign appearance by Mitt, and by Stephen Colbert as well, who says Romney's "historic" statement yesterday makes him "this generations civil rights champion --- a Dr. Martin Luther, Inc., if you will." (Videos of their takes below.)

Nonetheless, for the moment, even after last night's very lively and entertaining Iowa GOP Debate on Fox "News" (a few, if not all, of the high/lowlights of what TPM describes as 'GOP Fight Night' here), Mitt still remains the man to beat --- though that's not saying much, given the current Republican field a full 15 months away from next year's Presidential election.

Maddow and Colbert video takes on Romney's "Corporations are people, my friend" comment follow...

Okay, so it's Nicole Sandler, not "Micole", but it makes for a more alliterative headline, so too bad.

I'm back on deadline on the exclusive series I've been working on for a few weeks. So, for the moment, here's just a few of the more fun media appearances I've done lately, in the wake of Tuesday's recall elections in Wisconsin. Looks like I was able to help, if only momentarily, to turn the topic --- on a few Progressive airwaves anyway --- away from the idiotically premature horse race nonsense (Iowa Straw Poll anyone?), to the far more important track conditions that otherwise almost never get discussed on air at all...until it's too late...

Stephanie Miller Show (this morning, appx 17 mins total)

Includes my appearance in the first few minutes and then, after I'm gone, continuing discussion of the points raised during it by callers throughout various moments during the rest of the show. One of those moments was a caller who identified himself as Derek Woodward from Alton, PA who was clearly (and purposely) misinformed about the GOP push for disenfranchising polling place Photo ID restrictions.

"Why would you not want to ensure that only the people that can vote are eligible to vote?," asked the Woodward. The responses he received from Stephanie and Jim Ward and a caller or two were great. My work here is done!

Okay, not really. So here's just a couple of articles to support their responses on that question which arises in light of the Rightwing disinformation masters who purposely misinform gullible folks like Woodward...

• How to Cast a Ballot in Indiana if You Don't have a State-Issued Photo ID
• Students, Nuns Denied RIGHT to Vote in Indiana Today Following Supreme Court Approval of State Photo ID Restrictions
• Matthew Vadum, Master of Misinformation, Subverts the Truth With More Democratic 'Voter Fraud' Lies

Ed Schultz Show (this morning, w/ Guest Host Mike Papantonio of Ring of Fire, appx 13 mins)...

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On today's BradCast on Pacifica Radio's KPFK here in Los Angeles, I picked up on all that's transpired over the last several days in the Wisconsin recall mess, as reported at The BRAD BLOG of late, including yesterday's late-night concerns about our old friend Kathy Nickolaus, the GOP activist and County Clerk of Waukesha County which played a key role in last night's drama and reported results.

Other links of note, as quickly referenced during the show, the blocking of exit polls (only) in Waukesha yesterday, the miselading absentee mailers from the Kochs' Americans for Prosperity and the Kochs' AFP front group front man in WI.

After an opening rant or three, my guest, straight from Wisconsin, was former Green Party chair Ben Manski of LibertyTreeFDR.org, MoveToAmend.org, WisconsinWave.org and DemocracyConvention.org on what happened yesterday in the Badger State and how to move the democracy ball forward in the future against the enormous forces working to crush it (even more than they already have.)

As discussed, democracy is now under direct assault, very generally, in at least three and seemingly insurmountable areas:

• Access to the polls (Photo ID restrictions, etc.)
• Overseeing tabulation of votes (E-voting issues)
• Corporate control (Citizens United and the obscene flood of corporate $ bastardizing the entire electoral/democratic system)

Luckily, we were able to solve all three of those issues in 28 minutes of commercial-free radio, the archive of which follows below for your listening pleasure...

Download MP3, or listen online below...

P.S. I'll be live on Stephanie Miller's show tomorrow (Thursday) at 8am PT, and then on Ed Schultz radio show at 10am PT. Tune in if you're inclined!

AP's running totals are here. TPM's "scoreboard", which breaks down by race, but not by county, but does offer percentage of vote reported, is here. Some pre-election poll results for comparison are here.

1:32am CT: State Democrats now retract their previous charge of "election tampering" (as posted in the 11:54a update below). The full statement/retraction from WI Democratic Party chair Mike Tate, via TPM:

Lame, Dems. You don't charge election tampering and evidence of fraud when you ain't got none. Want some? Try counting the actual ballots in Wisconsin rather than relying on oft-failed, easily-manipulated computers to do so. You might be amazed at what you find.

12:51a CT: AP is now calling it for Darling (R) over Pasch (D) in the 8th district, 39,471 to 34,096 (54% to 46%) with all but one counting unit in Milwaukee County reporting. That means if tonight's unverified results do not change, the Democrats failed to win enough seats for a takeover of the majority in the Wisconsin state Senate. Republicans are reported to have retained 4 of their seats tonight, while Democrats are said to have taken over 2 in today's unprecedented, historic recall elections.

Pasch has said (see 12:09a update below) she would not be conceding tonight and neither her nor the state Democratic Party would have any further comments for the evening, even in response to the Dems claims of "tampering" in Kathy Nickolaus' Waukesha County (see 11:54p update below).

For night owls & election integrity mavens: I'll be on KGO am810 in San Francisco tonight (Tuesday) at 11:30p PT (1:30a CT) with Peter B. Collins to discuss what we know about Wisconsin results tonight, today's shut down of exit polling only in Waukesha, the Koch's Americans for Prosperity dirty tricks leading up to today, and undoubtedly a bit on Kathy Nickolaus' long and storied history. If you're not in SF, you can listen live online here.

(For "morning owls", I'll be on Nicole Sandler's Radio or Not Wednesday morning at 8:30am PT/10:30a CT. And for "afternoon owls", I'll be on my own show on KPFK/Pacifica 90.7FM here in Los Angeles at 3:30p PT/5:30p CT Wednesday. You can listen to that one live online here. I suspect we'll be talking about WI on all of the above.)

12:16a CT: As she told me she would (see 11:54p update below), Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus has just updated her results with the final counting unit now included. Her totals in Waukesha are now, Darling (R): 9,449 - Pasch (D): 4,767.

That last (previously) unreported counting unit was the largest of the 11 total in the 8th District section of Waukesha County. It was the Village of Menomonee Falls, Wards 14, 15 & 21. They report a total of 1,956 votes from the three wards making up that unit.

I've posted a copy of those results here [PDF], just in case Nickolaus forgot to hit the save button.

12:09a CT: 8th District Democratic candidate Sandy Pasch told supporters an hour or so ago that the race would be too close for her to call tonight. Her @SandyforSenate account just now tweeted: "Neither Sandy or the Democratic Party will issues any statements tonight. Thank you very much for your support tonight."

11:54p CT: I just spoke with Waukesha County Clerk Kathy Nickolaus to ask her why there was one outstanding reporting unit still unreported (Village of Menomonee Falls, Wards 14, 15 & 21) in her posted results (reposted here [PDF]).

She told me: "They were absentee ballots, I just got it in, I'm just printing it. The municipal clerk just faxed it to me 5 minutes ago."

I asked why they were so late in coming, she said: "They were so busy they didn't get their absentee ballots done during the night, so they had to get them done after that."

Within the past hour, the WI Democratic Party issued a statement, accusing Nickolaus of "tampering" with the results. Here is their full statement:

Tate offers no additional evidence to support his claim of "tampering".

At this hour, according to AP, based on computer-reported results, the Rs have held 3 seats, Ds have picked up 1, but the last, in state Senate District 8, is still too close to call. Here are their numbers at this hour (and prior to Nickolaus posting the last unreported unit in her county.):

[8/10/11: Now UPDATED with statement from the WI Government Accountability Board concerning the problem for Exit Pollsters in Waukesha County yesterday. See bottom of article for statement.]

The polls in Wisconsin closed moments ago. So far, so good in the state's unprecedented recall elections today, at least according to the bulk of media reports throughout the day. Turnout was reportedly very high, nearing or even exceeding rates from the 2008 Presidential election in some areas. "It's astronomically high," according to Matt Rothschild, Editor of The Progressive in Madison, WI, with whom I was just on air with on Santa Fe Public Radio's KSFR to discuss today's recalls.

The contests in six state Senate districts could mean removal from office for the GOP Senators facing recall today following their support of Gov. Scott Walker's anti-union agenda. If Democrats take three of those seats --- and hold onto the two Democrat seats up for recall next Tuesday, they would retake the majority in the Senate. The Assembly, the Senate and the Governor's office all went to Republicans in last November's wave election.

While reports of problems with electronic voting systems frequently don't come to light until after polls close --- sometimes days and even weeks later --- we've heard of very few problems so far at least. With most of the voters in the state today voting on hand-marked paper ballots, voters shouldn't get held up by malfunctioning machines. Even in cases where the op-scanners fail to work --- and that has been the case, reportedly, in at least one ward in Fond du Lac --- voters can vote and their ballots can be tallied later by a different computer.

That WI doesn't bother to check any of the op-scanned ballots by hand to assure the machines are tallying them correctly is a different problem entirely, but one we discussed in our item earlier today and, depending on what results look like tonight, may need to discuss again later.

But so far, so good today, as far we can tell, except for yet another problem with Exit Pollsters --- an echo of similar problems that occurred during the July primaries --- where again today they were blocked from doing their work at a polling place in Butler Village...in Waukesha County...

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This is it. The citizens of Wisconsin respond to Governor Scott Walker's anti-union agenda today at the polling place with six Republican state Senators facing unprecedented recall elections all on the same day.

If Democrats succeed in winning three of today's races they will wrest control of the state Senate from the GOP in what is clearly being regarded by all sides as a referendum on Walker's radical agenda. (Democrats will also have to defend two seats of their own in two more recall elections next Tuesday.)

Yesterday, Public Policy Polling (PPP) came out with their final round of polls from over the weekend finding, in the four races surveyed, the Democrat with a healthy lead in one district, the Republican with a healthy lead in another, and two races too close to call either way, both statistical dead heats. PPP polled the other two races back in June, finding the D leading in one and the R leading in the other. (Eric Kleefeld at TPM has a few additional numbers from alternate sources.)

According to the pre-election polls then, this thing is believed to be incredible tight all around. Some $40 million is being spent on these races (only $3.75 million was spent on the entire slate of 15 Senate seats and all 99 Assembly seats last November) and dirty tricks are likely to be flying. But the bottom line seems to be that nobody knows what might happen given the unprecedented nature of six recall elections happening at once --- in the middle of Summer. There is simply nothing to compare this to.

The one thing about which all pundits and partisans and partisan pundits seem to agree at this hour: It'll all about turnout.

That's almost true. In addition to turnout, it'll also come down to the electronic vote tabulators used across the Badger State. Most municipalities in WI allow voters to vote on hand-marked paper ballots, but most of those ballots will be tallied only by oft-failed, easily-manipulated computer op-scan systems. Additionally, to their shame, the state has absolutely no mechanism for post-election human examination of optically-scanned ballots to ensure the computers have tallied them accurately. Once the computers (made by Diebold, ES&S and Sequoia) report the supposed results, there is no double-checking of those computer tallies other than in the event of a recount...and readers of The BRAD BLOG know how well those go in the state of Wisconsin.

So we'll be watching as close as we can today, and hope that voters in WI will be doing the same, from the moment wards open at 7am CT through close at 8pm CT and then throughout the tallying of ballots after polls close inasmuch as they can. Photographs and video tapes of ballots bags and poll tapes at the wards at the end of the night will be a very good idea tonight at every polling place.

If you spot any problems or concerns you feel we should know about --- in the media or at the polls --- please feel free let us know. We'll do our best to keep an eye on comments today. In the meantime, we'll be praying for six blowouts...one way or another.