While the media sleeps
Pamela D. Reed | Posted September 11, 2008 9:50 AM
www.thedailyvoice.com

While the American media, for the past 10 days, has been obsessing over "Sister Sarah" Palin, lipstick, pit bulls, polls, moose innards, designer eyewear, up-dos and pigs, a lot of real electoral news-- not to mention domestic and world events--has gone largely unreported. Perched right at the top of the mountain of such issues is a recent report in the New York Times that E. Randall Wertz, the county registrar of voters in Montgomery County Virginia, recently issued two outrageous and confusing (at best) press releases with regard to college student voter registration.

The first of the official missives made several patently false claims: 1) the parents of students who register and vote locally cannot claim their children as dependents; 2) students registering to vote with a local college address risk losing scholarships; and 3) such students will no longer be eligible for coverage under their parent's health and auto insurance.

Coincidentally or otherwise, these official county notices went out in late August, in the midst of a highly successful voter-registration drive at Virginia Tech, the state's largest university which boasts an enrollment of over 25,000 students (over 5,000 of whom are incoming freshmen). At that time Barack Obama supporters had registered thousands of students.
Keep in mind that Virginia is a major swing state that in past years has been reliably Republican; however, this year Barack Obama has made significant inroads, claiming 64 percent to Hillary Clinton's 35 percent in the state's Democratic primary in February. Many political analysts even predict that Obama could actually win the state in November, which would effectively signal nothing less than a historic sea-change in the American electoral map. So, that is the backdrop of this grossly underreported controversy that is reminiscent of Jim Crow era electoral shenanigans.

According to the Times, Sujatha Jahagirdar, program director of the Student Public Interest Research Group's New Voters Project, indicates that her organization "registered 500,000 young voters in 2004, the majority on college campuses, and we've never heard of a single one who lost health insurance, scholarship or tax status because of where they registered to vote. ...There's no issue for snowbirds who live in Iowa but fly to Florida for the winter.''

Understandably, this has all lead to mass confusion and anxiety among students and parents alike. It has also prompted queries from civil rights lawyers who are quick to point out that this practice is in clear contravention of the landmark Supreme Court ruling Symm v. U.S. which clearly established that students can absolutely register to vote using their local college addresses, regardless of their permanent home addresses. Jon Greenbaum, who directs the Voting Rights Project at the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights under Law, condemns the highly suspect activities, saying in the Times that ''what the state Board of Elections has on its Web site," to [him], "sounds like it is discouraging students from registering at their school address.'' You think?

The county registrar, who blames the "mix-up" on an intern tasked with summarizing the state's guidelines in this regard, confirms that some students have elected to withdraw their local registration, fearful that their families will be penalized economically. The registrar claims that his office's "clarification" is driven by his interpretation of the state's election laws. Which brings us to the heart of the matter: the Virginia code with regard to college student voter registration is fuzzy, at best, while the law of the land is unequivocal: A college student can absolutely register to vote using a local address. There is really nothing complicated about it. Still, Werner claims that ''we've asked for more guidance from the state legislature, but they haven't wanted to deal with it.'' The obvious questions here, at least in my mind, are these: "Why ever not?" and "Where are Obama's Ivy League legal experts?"

In response to the public outcry--and the civil rights lawyers--the Virginia State Board of Elections (VSBE) sought to "modify" and "clarify" the legal basis for the misleading communications disseminated by the Montgomery county registrar. What did they do, you ask? Amazingly, they have gone so far as to post on their website a "self-guided questionnaire"--that is not required, and some would even argue that it is not allowed, by law--to "assist" college students in determining their "legal" residency. This harkening back to the very same tactics that the High Court ruled illegal almost thirty years ago when the Waller County Texas registrar of voters, LeRoy Symm, routinely required the students of the HBCU Prairie View A&M University to complete a residency questionnaire that is almost identical to the one on the VSBE website today--in 2008.

What does the Obama campaign have to say about this turn of events? Not much. According to the New York Times, Kevin Griffis, the campaign's state spokesperson said "the release appeared to be a good-faith effort to convey state guidelines, not a politically motivated effort to stop voting by students." Really? Good faith?

What is wrong with these people?! Obama should have a swarm of lawyers blanketing the state, serving notice that he will not sit back and allow Virginia to be the Florida of 2008. Are they so afraid of being accused of "race-baiting" or playing the "race card" that they will not call a spade a spade? This is a clear violation of the voting rights of the students of Virginia Tech. I know it. You know it. The state of Virginia knows it. Barack Obama, the Harvard-trained lawyer knows it. My word! According to the VSEB website, "even the homeless may register by using the site 'where they lay their head at night.'" Why, you might ask, have we heard virtually nothing of this in this, the 24-hour news cycle? Which brings us back to where we started: the corporate media and their shameful and disgraceful enablement of the Republican Party's pollutive and nauseating distraction campaign designed to sneak John McCain into the White House.

Perhaps nothing better crystallizes this parallel universe than the quietly incredulous musings of David Gergen, the vaunted advisor to four past American Presidents, reduced, in his capacity as a CNN political analyst, to providing "serious" analysis of the "Breaking News" of Sarah Palin's plane landing in Alaska, all set to bid Godspeed to her eldest son, before his deployment to Iraq the next day. (Even Gergen observed that the timing of young Mr. Palin's departure is almost certainly not random.) At 11:30 p.m. EST, on 10 September (conveniently just moments away from 9/11), he marveled at the "bizarre" and unprecedented blanket cable news coverage, of the sort not normally afforded to heads of state.

Heck, I'll go one better. This is right up there with reportage of the Pope, and then some. I'm with Gergen: "This is wild."

The B.S. is not only in Virginia:


Lose Your House, Lose Your Vote?

Wow kick....that is outrageous, yet typical of attempts to suppress the votes of certain groups for years.

Nothing the republiklans do to affect the vote surprises me.

It's happening here in Wisconsin too. The McCain campaign is sending misaddressed absentee ballot applications to likely Obama voters. This "caging" ploy has been used in other states to bump people off the voter rolls.

Plus, our Republican Attorney General filed a lawsuit this week (!) demanding all registrations going back to 2006 be verified before the November election. Oh, and that same Attorney General just happens to be McCain's campaign co-chairperson.

Well here's more ReTHUGlican bullshit going on in Indiana. I'm sorry but this is why I could never be a part of a party full of son of a bitches like this. They know this is downright wrong. There was a panelist on Bill Maher this past week who believes that one of these states is going to be the "Florida" of 2008 because of the foolishness going on, and that there will be lawyers from both sides crawling all over the place. Obama better have people monitoring this crap, and people stationed at polling places to avoid this kind of pre civil rights mess. This is just a more sophisticated version of Jim Crow politics.

Newsweek: GOP Trying to Suppress Voting

Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana spoke of this when he was interviewed back in April (by another Hoosier BTW) and warned it was coming. So it isn't new or unexpected.

That doesn't make it any less important to keep talking about it.

If the Republicans win by a small majority in Indiana and it decides the election I think the Democrats, or some legal institution interested in fair voting practices, should put themselves in a position to contest it by making an official protest, to the Supreme Court if necessary, now before the election; assuming that has not already been done.

Because of the subject of this thread I will add that this speaks to the core of the difficulty with being a young Black, or hip hop Republican. As African-Americans we have more than most demographics invested in the establishment of a free and unbiased society that treats everyone equally. But the problem is that treating different people equally may require treating them differently. Often untravelled people, such as Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin, would not bother getting such an ID. Should she vote?

I don't think I have ever espoused a 'prediction' here on OutSports. Yet, I will today.

Here it is: We will see riots on election day, particularly where large blocks of Black and African American votes are at stake.

Convince me I am wrong about my prediction?

TRL

There's too much apathy for riots to occur.

The last group to "riot" would be African-Americans. I think there are too many in the black political establishment who remember how effective the previous ones were after King's death and would openly, vehemently and actively oppose it.

As for young African-Americans, Barack Obama would not hear of it. Note his fervent appeal to young black men to start behaving like men, and his calm in the face of overwhelmingly negative attacks - a calm that is starting to play severely on the patience of his supporters of all colors who have contributed to his campaign and who want an equally negative reaction to McCain's negative tactics.

The resistance will build more like a hurricane in the Atlantic than a sudden tornado in the midwest: as resistance in a likely democratic-led Congress to pursuit of the most extreme military adventures of a McCain-Palin administration. It would grow in proportion to the willingness of the public to resist their other anti-social and inhumane policies. Governing will be difficult without a great deal of accommodation on the part of a Republican president. Some might even see this as an opportunity for progressives. I wouldn't.

Assuming such a victory is narrow, which seems likely, and assuming McCain is not physically capable of governing in full capacity, another distinct possibility, Palin's lack of experience on Capitol Hill will become a serious liability. The likely disputed election could tie her administration in knots - and she faces prosecution.

Both Bush and Clinton had the same amount of experience on Capitol Hill as Palin - zero. If McCain wins and does not serve out his term, Palin would assume the Presidency after at least having some exposure to the inner workings of the White House and Capitol Hill, and after having served as the effective head of the Senate. I understand concern about her experience and some of her positions, but some of this commentary is really overwrought.

Overwrought exactly how? Palin could not even clearly address some questions posed by Charles Gibson on very important matters. This is serious because we already have a leader in power who lacked significant knowledge of foreign matters and addressed them poorly despite his seasoned advisors...

You watch the interview by Bill O'Reilly and listen to Obama's answers- he clearly knows his foreign policy despite his "lack of experience" and had Joe Biden as his running mate, whom also is well versed in foreign policy. Hillary Clinton's knowledge would rival both of theirs as well.

Palin truly is scary- "I can see Russia"- ask her about Israel and Iran, Pakistan and she was truly showing her lack of experience- and she is the one who will directly be advising John McCain?

The Republicans ripped Obama for never having been to Iraq- and she hasn't yet. Karl Rove ripped the potential of having Kane from Virginia nominated as VP- indicating that the choice would be made for purposes beyond choosing someone who was qualified- then had to endorse Palin despite her lower credentials. So yeah its scary.... and I don't see how the commentary is overwrought. This is serious shit.

Assuming McCain will serve out his term is an actuarial unlikelihood. His health record is not the best and his Vietnam wounds show in his motions already. He has shown fatigue - both mental and physical - just from the campaign. I suspect Palin will have a much higher learning curve than either Clinton or Bush who were governing executives in more populous states.

And as unfashionable as it may be to mention it, the woman does still have 5 children, one of whom has special needs; and an upcoming grandchild to a teenage mother. I doubt any househusband, Todd Palin or whoever, will be up to the task of juggling all of those balls alone, assuming he doesn't have to go to prison.

I suspect the pressures, plus her past management style, and assumed support of the so-called Bush doctrine of pre-emption, would combine to eventually cause her to act brashly in her foreign policy decisions for political reasons. Amidst all this, unless she can get the charges tossed out as VP, how will she handle Troopergate? I know her supporters consider her Superwoman but we all should become realistic about likely eventualities.

I think it's overwrought to predict "riots on election day."

As I said, I think it's completely legitimate to have concerns about Palin's experience thus far, but the use of such words and imagery is disturbingly similar to the scare tactics we've seen from Rove and his acolytes over the past eight years.

I posted something about this in the Palin thread, but should have talked about it here. To reiterate, voter fraud is wrong, and every single incident should be investigated. But liberals must be living in some serious fantasyland if they think that they are always the victims of fraud and evil R people are always the perpetrators. There were plenty of incidents of Democratic fraud in the 2004 election (keeping St. Louis polling sites open well after their official closing time, slashing the tires of get-out-the-vote Republican staff vehicles) as well as incidents of Democratic fraud over the years (voter fraud was rampant in Chicago, which could have tipped Illinois and therefore the 1960 election to Nixon).

And it's same old, same old. ACORN, the Association of Corrupt Organizations for the Registration of Noneligible voters, oops, I meant, the Association of Community Organizers (LOVE those community organizers!) for Reform Now, is up to its old tricks yet again, with duplicate and fraudulent voter registrations in Detroit, Cleveland, and Milwaukee.

And you are absolutely right. Its wrong whether you are a Democrat or Republican. But in targeting certain groups, particularly low income populations with little means, whose Jim Crow antics do you think are more successful. Again, wrong no matter who is doing it, but considering the history of suppression and Jim Crow antics against blacks and other minorities in this country, to try and make it seem like these postings are somehow less meaningful only because they are pointing out Republican antics is not making me feel any less disgusted by it. So please....post where Democrats are trying this same kind of thing in Republican areas this election. I'm not saying that there aren't any. I'm just saying I haven't been reading them anywhere.

You haven't, huh? Well lemme help you out, Terp. Rudy's right about ACORN, a "Community Organizing" group, founded by 2 "Community Organiziers", and they register potential Democrat voters (evidently this group has a history of not being troubled by registering Fictional Characters and Dead People). Their history is fraught with fraud, investigations, and numerous lawsuits against their "Voter Registration" drives. In fact, the bruhaha over the firing of those 8 DOJ Attorneys a couple of years ago was so trumpeted by the left and the media as abhorrent, yet they neglected to mention that they were fired precisely because they were refusing to do much in the way of prosecuting VOTER FRAUD CASES, many of which involved ACORN bogus registrations. But don't take my word for it, read it for yourself, since you say you haven't read anything about Fraudulent Democratic Voter Registration:

http://www.thebulletin.us/site/index.cfm?n...76361&rfi=8

And how about THIS little gem that was excepted from The Wall Street Journal concerning the incestuous link among Fannie Mae; Freddie Mac; House Democrats; ACORN and Barack Obama:

The Wall Street Journal also had this to say about ACORN

"Operating in at least 38 states (as well as Canada and Mexico), Acorn pushes a highly partisan agenda, and its organizers are best understood as shock troops for the AFL-CIO and even the Democratic Party. As part of the Fannie Mae reform bill, House Democrats pushed an "affordable housing trust fund" designed to use Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac profits to subsidize Acorn, among other groups. A version of this trust fund actually passed the Republican House and will surely be on the agenda again next year.

Acorn and its affiliates have pulled some real stunts in recent years. In Ohio in 2004, a worker for one affiliate was given crack cocaine in exchange for fraudulent registrations that included underage voters, dead voters and pillars of the community named Mary Poppins, Dick Tracy and Jive Turkey. During a Congressional hearing in Ohio in the aftermath of the 2004 election, officials from several counties in the state explained Acorn's practice of dumping thousands of registration forms in their lap on the submission deadline, even though the forms had been collected months earlier."

Really?

So democrats pushed a bill that would use profits from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (the two mortgage giants that the US government had to bail out) to subsidize ACORN? Isn't that interesting? Isn't it also interesting that Obama is the 2nd largest recipient of Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac donations in the whole United States government between 1989-2008, 2nd only to Democratic Senator from Connecticut Christopher Dodd who is the chairman of the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee that both Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac report to directly.

I could post hundreds more, but you get the idea. My personal favorite is the dumping of all their "voter registrations" onto the desks of these polling places (many of which are staffed by 1 or 2 people) on deadline day - which is always 30 days out from Election Day. Their strategy is patently obvious: it leaves little or no time for verification, which is precisely what they want. This way their traveling bands show up again on Election Day and start handing out things like cash & cigarettes as bribes for people to go in and claim to be the unverified frauds (and I wonder if this isn't why the Democrats in Congress are vehemently opposed to Voter ID Legislation requiring voters to present verifiable ID's in exchange for a ballot ). And our now-bankrupt Federal Mortgage Companies were paying for this all along!!

And none of this is surprising (although it's more than a little eyebrow-raising that Barack Obama, a member of the Senate for less than 1 term, got the 2nd highest amount of bucks from the now failed Freddie & Fannie). One of the most reliable polling outfits among the many is The Battleground Poll because it measures trends more than specific races. And since polling groups are businesses that want to be HIRED, they have a vested interest in being accurate despite their personal leanings. Battleground is reliable for one essential reason: their questions never change, no matter who they ask or where they live. And it has one pollster from each party: Celinda Lake for the Democrats and Ed Goeas for the Republicans. They've done polling for 15 cycles over the last decade, and most interesting is their question D3. This asks people that when they view politics or political events do they consider themselves 1) Mostly Liberal; 2) Somewhat Liberal; 3) Moderate; 4) Somewhat Conservative; or 5) Mostly Conservative.

Their August 20th results to this question are exactly like they have been since they began: Mostly Liberal - 9%; Somewhat Liberal - 27%; Moderate 2% (the big joke in the media is exposed here, of a Huge Moderate Population - there isn't one); Somewhat Conservative - 40% and Mostly Conservative 20%. Most important about these results is not just their consistency over the numerous polling cycles they've done, but that this is how respondents identified themselves - these figures aren't results interpreted by the pollsters. Given that Conservatives clearly outnumber Liberals (60% to 36%) in America today, it's no surprise that groups like ACORN work to register fraudulent voters on behalf of the Democrats. They're the ones that need it.

That's why there will be numerous attempts to vehemently demonize Sarah Palin by the Left and the media. They understand the nature of the threat she is to them: she fires up the Conservative Base, and a fired-up conservative base VOTES, in big numbers (e.g., Reagan won in 2 Landslides). Thats why the Left always looks for Mark Foley-type or Larry Craig-type gay sex scandal stories to expose, especially right before Election Day - they want the Conservative Base to stay home and not vote. Liberals were desperately hoping McCain would pick Lieberman or Ridge for VP because they knew the majority of Conservatives would have hated either one of them. Sarah Palin sent the Democrats reeling.

Of course all of this could be moot since Obama is proving more & more to be a horrific choice for the Left as a candidate, saying things nowadays in his speeches that are so easy to prove as untrue that fellow Democrats are rushing to the microphones to say what he just said wasn't true, so as to distance themselves from him. This happened this past week when he spoke in Colorado telling the throng how he, in January, "...outlined a plan to revive the economy that formed the basis for a bipartisan stimulus package that passed the Congress". One small problem: he did no such thing, nothing he "outlined" was the basis for anything, and moreover, he wasn't even in the chamber to vote on the bill when it eventually did come up for a vote. As long as Obama keeps fabricating stuff like that which is easy to disprove it might not matter how many fraudulent voter registrations ACORN has. Does Obama think he can get away with making stuff up like that out of thin air and presume no one will bother (or dare) to question him? These are clear signs of a desperate megalomaniac.

Thanks for that voicemale...I did not know about any of that, and its disturbing. However, not disturbing enough to make me change my vote considering what stories have also been written about McCain and his lobbyist links and his lies, as well as more stories coming out about "Sister Sarah" (which seem to be getting stranger and stranger) and her lies. But, again...I say its all wrong. ACORN needs to stop that foolishness and there should be deeper investigations to stop voter fraud. Whether Republican, Democratic, or Independent....no one should be manipulating something so important.