I TOLD you to keep an eye out, didn't I?

Remember this?


Now there's a Second case of machines swithcing votes for Obama to Mccain in West Virginia

The second occurred over the weekend, for voters in Putnam County, WV:

"I pushed buttons and they all came up Republican," she said. "I hit Obama and it switched to McCain. I am really concerned about that. If McCain wins, there was something wrong with the machines.
"I asked them for a printout of my votes," Ketchum said. "But they said it was in the machine and I could not get it. I did not feel right when I left the courthouse. My son felt the same way."

There are reports that the questionable machines have been recalibrated or pulled, but no information on that is available at the WV Secretary of State's website. Could easily be an innocent error, but how can you know without further information? There is, however, a note about preventing voter fraud.
One would think prevention should start with making sure machines contracted aren't trying to cheat people out of their votes.

Huh. In the meantime, I have found that when the GOP accuses you of something? They are normally the ones doing it. You see... A Republican was arrested yesterday for voter registration fraud

SACRAMENTO -- The owner of a firm that the California Republican Party hired to register tens of thousands of voters this year was arrested in Ontario late last night on suspicion of voter registration fraud.

State and local investigators allege that Mark Jacoby fraudulently registered himself to vote at a childhood California address where he no longer lives so he would appear to meet the legal requirement that signature gatherers be eligible to vote in California.

But Senor Jacoby is potentially in a whole lot more hot water than that. You see, he runs a company, the Young Political Majors, who are hired by the GOP to register voters. And, well, there's a problem:

SACRAMENTO -- Dozens of newly minted Republican voters say they were duped into joining the party by a GOP contractor with a trail of fraud complaints stretching across the country.

Voters contacted by The Times said they were tricked into switching parties while signing what they believed were petitions for tougher penalties against child molesters. Some said they were told that they had to become Republicans to sign the petition, contrary to California initiative law. Others had no idea their registration was being changed.

...

It is a bait-and-switch scheme familiar to election experts. The firm hired by the California Republican Party -- a small company called Young Political Majors, or YPM, which operates in several states -- has been accused of using the tactic across the country.

The various authorities are now investigating. I wonder if this will make the national news?

INteresting. Guess what, my friends. Senor Mark Jacoby has been doing this (its called "voter slamming") since 2004:

About 4,000 students may have been improperly registered at the University of Florida, Florida A&M University and Florida State, officials say. In Tampa, the elections office has received several dozen calls from USF students who were switched to the GOP. USF police also got four complaints from students who described how canvassers deceived them.

One complaint said a group was getting students to sign voter registration cards that were premarked for Republicans. Another student told USF police the group would get students to sign two petitions and then check them off as Republicans after they left.

...

Outside the USF library, Adrienne DeVore, 20, also signed a petition to legalize the medical use of marijuana.

"Can I check Republican?" the woman said. If she did, the Republican Party would help fund their cause, the woman told her.

DeVore, a sophomore, thought that was strange because she didn't think Republicans favored legalizing marijuana.

Her boyfriend repeatedly asked the group whom they worked for. One person told him the Young Republicans. Another said they worked for a company called YPM.

Young Political Majors LLC, or YPM, is a company registered by Mark Jacoby at a Town 'N Country residence.

Jacoby appeared this summer at the election office in Gainesville with a box of about 1,200 voter registration cards. Of those, about 510 voters had switched to the GOP.

Elections Supervisor Beverly Hill spoke with Jacoby and grew suspicious. She randomly called the Republicans to verify they wanted to switch. All of them said, "Absolutely not," Hill said. "They didn't even know they had signed a registration form," Hill said.

Rule number one: When the GOP accuses you of anything, start investigating them. pronto.

Grit TV

The third and final debate . . . and what we learned is that Acorn is destroying the fabric of democracy. John Lewis is out of line. And Joe the Plumber is a target of Democratic class warfare. Meanwhile, the economy isn’t getting better anytime soon and it's been confirmed that the White House explicitly endorsed waterboarding. Secret memos about torture made the cover of the Washington Post this week, but the pickup on the story is slim. Is anyone explaining how we got into this mess and how we might get out of it? In other words who's asking the tough questions? We'll take the bait for a little while as we talk about the best and worst of recent media coverage. Let's talk about Joe the plumber for the next 48 hours!
Liza Sabater of Culture Kitchen points out the extremely clear moment between McCain and Obama in their definition of middle class and grey collar worker - Obama made it clear that if you're making more than $250,000 you're doing really well and can afford to have your taxes adjustment. On the other hand, the candidate whose net worth is $100,000,000 is opposed to the sharing of wealth. How this discussion of money didn't flow into a question or two about the bailout was probably the biggest ommission of a surprisingly solid moderation by Bob Schieffer, according to Rebecca Traister, of Salon. Brandon Brice, joining us from HipHopRepublicans, sticks with the party line -- Joe the plumber needs big government to stay out of his pocketbook.

Ladies and gentlemen? Introducing the "Kitchen Table Blog"

Via Racialious

“Citizen Melissa:”

Barack does not look into the camera and decry racism because we are not really Americans. We are not allowed to express our political needs or tell our political histories because when we do it makes other people feel uncomfortable. African Americans are still supposed to be grateful for being saved from the “savagery of Africa,” civilized by the cross, offered the crumbs of capitalism, and given the chance to die for the flag. Our sacrifices and our suffering are still elective courses, not required reading. Barack does not talk to Melissa the professor because if he did he would be labeled a special interest politician, even though worrying about Joe the Plumber is somehow universal. Barack does not mention that he is under special attack because of his race because silence about America’s racial legacy is the price of admission to the social contract.

“Six Packs and Such:”

To glorify Joe Six Pack as the only genuine American, as the real moral and political core of our country, is to invalidate the experiences of all the other folks in America, folks who are people of color, women, non-Christians, city dwellers, or educated. When only Joe Six Pack becomes the target audience for political commercials, tax cuts, legislation, and economic incentives, we ignore the fact that most of this nation does not fit this profile. And finally, we ignore the fact that despite the rhetoric, none of our current political candidates currently fit the Joe Six Pack mode, although some of them have come from humble beginnings. When Sarah Palin indicated that her retirement portfolio lost $20,000 in one week (which means there was much more in there to begin with), she lost her street credentials as a Joe Six Pack wife.

So what did I do?

So you know when you are tagging your posts and if you have already used a particular tag, the program autofills in the tag for you? I hit something and now thats gone. Any idea as to what I hit?

Growing disturbing incidents

More Hate Voicemails directed at ACORN.

Right Wing Watch has the audio:
And for nearly two weeks, ACORN offices across the nation have been subjected to an onslaught of racist and threatening voicemails and emails. We have secured copies of some of the most disturbing and offensive messages and have reproduced them below in order to show the very real consequences of the Right Wing’s overheated and misplaced “voter fraud” rhetoric.

“Hi, I was just calling to let you all know that Barack Obama needs to get hung. He's a fu*&ing ni**er, and he's a piece of shit. You guys are fraudulent, and you need to go to hell. All the ni*&ers on oak trees. They're gonna get all hung honeys, they're gonna get assassinated, they're gonna get killed.”

And then we have this one:

"You liberal idiots. Dumb shits. Welfare bums. You guys just f&*king come to our country, consume every natural resource there is, and make a lot of babies. That's all you guys do. And then suck up the welfare and expect everyone else to pay for your hospital bills for your kids. I just say let your kids die. That's the best move. Just let your children die. Forget about paying for hospital bills for them. I'm not gonna do it. You guys are lowlifes. And I hope you all die."

( Read more... )

What he said

Via:The Field


(Photo: Hat tip to Jill Tubman at Jack & Jill Politics.)
Colin Powell, today on Meet The Press:

"I'm also troubled by - not what Senator McCain says - but what members of the Party say, and it is permitted to be said: such things as, "Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim." Well, the correct answer is he is not a Muslim. He's a Christian; has always been a Christian. But the really right answer is, "What if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country?" The answer's "No, that's not America." Is there something wrong with some seven-year-old Muslim American kid believing that he or she could be President? Yet, I have heard senior members of my own Party drop the suggestion he's Muslim and he might be associated with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
"I feel strongly about this particular point because of a picture I saw in a magazine. It was a photo essay about troops who were serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. And one picture at the tail end of this photo essay was of a mother in Arlington Cemetery. And she had her head on the headstone of her son's grave. And as the picture focused in, you could see the writing on the headstone. And it gave his awards - Purple Heart, Bronze Star; showed that he died in Iraq; gave his date of birth, date of death. He was twenty years old. And then at the very top of the headstone, it didn't have a Christian cross. It didn't have a Star of David. It had a crescent and a star of the Islamic faith. And his name was Karim Rashad Sultan Kahn. And he was an American. He was born in New Jersey, he was fourteen years old at the time of 9/11 and he waited until he could go serve his country and he gave his life."