Enter Bob Fitrakis, attorney, author (another dissector of Ohio 2004), and activist, to say that the board of elections is bipartisan, but if all decisions ascend to the secretary of state, who in 2004 was Blackwell, how can they be bipartisan? Blackwell the leftist advocate of voters rights in college before he slid to the inverse, notoriously (we find out later).
Well, contrary to the conclusion of Kerry’s lawyers that nothing went amiss in Ohio 2004, a report released by Congressman John Conyers (currently head of the House Judiciary Committee) concluded that countless irregularities and illegal behaviors generated from Blackwell’s office or the shenanigans of his ally, the president of then-Diebold, Wally O’Dell, who promised the election to Bush (as did Jeb in Florida in 2000)
What precisely did Blackwell do? He had registration forms printed on 80-pound paper and for a time, as long as he could get away with it, ruled that no other registration forms were valid, thus eliminating thousands from the voter rolls—an eccentric and, as far as I know, unprecedented piece of misplaced ingenuity.
He confused voters about locations of polls, shuffled precincts, located three to four precinct tables in one room so that myriad others had to fill out provisional ballots when their correct precinct comprised another line of voters in the room.
Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones makes a brief appearance to wonder why Blackwell claims to be happy to see her at a public hearing when she reminds him that he refused to shake her hand before the hearing.
According to Jennifer Brunner, secretary of state from 2006 onward, Blackwell dishonored his office. She promised a fair election in 2008.
The controversial CNN “Independent” duo Lou Dobbs and Kitty Pilgrim stay on screen long enough to mention the votes that jumped from Kerry’s name to Bush’s on the Diebold screens. If a voter persisted, the screen would go blank, claiming “no vote status.”
There is so much more. A visit to Diebold headquarters revealed, at least and at most, that Diebold was pronounced dee-bold and not dye-bold. Their motto, later quoted by the Dude, was “We won’t rest.” If I was given a no-bid contract of $100 million, I wouldn’t rest either, would you? That’s not all. Blackwell owned 170 shares of Diebold stock.
In Miami [Ohio] County, Dude found out about jammed paper rolls in the DREs. Why did such monstrosities still exist in 2006? Brunner made them illegal after she took office
Added Fitrakis, such no-bid practitioners usually go to jail rather than lead the nation. Who, Bush? No, another B, black-well so instrumental in installing a white-sick into another four-year disaster.
Brad Friedman, famous blogger and journalist, added some consolation: other brands of machine are no better. Privatized contracts, injects Palast. Sound familiar? Halliburton? Or is it KBR? Or is it Blackwater?
Blackwell hired the webhosts who had publicized Swiftboat Veterans for Truth on line.
Mark Crispin Miller reported the instance when a Diebold operative showed up at one polling location to “fix” the machinery and once done, warned the election officials not to turn off the computer connected to the tabulators; the same sort of hacking occurred in all 44 counties in Ohio. When whistle-blower Sherole Eaton, deputy director of elections in Hocking County, dared to protest, Blackwell had her fired.
Whence came these machines anyway? A bill written by a drunk criminal who happened to be a congressman in Ohio at the time, Bob Ney, bribed by another “designer” crook, Abramoff. One upshot of the law HAVA (Help America Vote Act), created in the wake of Florida 2000 to counteract the destructive punch card machines, was the provisional ballots, for all those voters who can’t prove their qualifications, whose votes are counted last if at all.
Caging lists, victimizing black voters and military and homeless, are the brainchild of Carl Rove, whose prior profession was direct mailing. These lists involved willful deception and intimidation—phonebanks calling blacks with lies, threats not to vote or else be arrested for unpaid parking tickets or unpaid child support.
“Every time I hear the word election, I reach for my wallet,” remarks Palast soon after.
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