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http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/12/24/122528/23

Georgia10's Holiday Update
by georgia10
Fri Dec 24th, 2004 at 09:25:28 PST

As promised yesterday, here it is.  The mother of all updates.  Haven't followed the Ohio issue?  Want to annoy your family be talking about it over dinner? Grab some eggnog, let's dive right in.

1.  Recount Update

Ohio has been recounting its votes by taking 3% of the ballots in each county, hand count, and if the number doesn't match the previous totals, they conduct a hand recount of all the entire county.

There has been some controversy as to how that 3% is to be counted.  They are supposed to take all the votes in the county, and see how much 3% is.  Then they are supposed to randomly select a precinct or precincts that add up to that number.

The results of the recount, with almost all the counties in, is a net gain of Kerry of a couple hundred votes.

Pfff.  

Ah, but there is more, so much more....

2.  Recount Thwarted

A quick point about the "Random" selection of precincts mentioned above.  Read here and here about how "random" some of the precinct selection were.

Moving on.  Ohio law requires that if the voting machine recount doesn't match the hand recount, you have to recount the whole county.

But who needs to go through that legally-required formality?  If the hand count doesn't match, just change the machine:

Rewrite Ohio election law, eh? Well, it looks pretty black and white to me:

I don't see anything in there saying "If the tabulator count doesn't match the hand count, order a new machine."

This is not an isolated incident. When the machine count didn't match the hand recount, counties just changed the machines, instead of following through with a complete hand recount of the county.

Why?  Well, because the machines are always right.  At least that's what Mr. Barbian, employee of Triad (the vote tabulating company) thinks: "The machine is always right."

3.  About those machines....

I won't take up the space here, but if you want to convince your family that there is something seriously wrong with US elections, print out 20 Amazing facts About Elections in the U.S.

In Ohio, we have not only Diebold to deal with, but Triad, a vote tabulating company.  Read wanderindiana's dairy on the Triad family trifecta here.  Here is a map of Triad's influence on Ohio elections:

How much do we trust Triad?  Let me count the ways...

• Triad had remote access to the voting machines during the elections.
  
•  Triad left unofficial vote totals on PUBLIC SERVERS.
  
• Triad is alleged to have came into Hocking County, put a "patch " on a voting tabulator, and instruct the workers on how to put up a "cheat sheat" to ensure that the hand count matches the machine count.
  
• Triad is caught on tape admitting to the same.

And let's not forget Diebold:

• Its President, Walden Dell, stated in a GOP fundraising letter he was committed to "delivering Ohio's electoral votes to the President."  
  
• Not too close for comfort yet?  How about the fact that Walden Dell is a member of President Bush's "Rangers and Pioneers,'' an elite group of loyalists who have raised at least $100,000 each for the 2004 race? "I am one, and proud of it," Dell has proclaimed.
  
• Diebold was sued by the State of California for election fraud, it lied to public officials, and had to pay out $2.6 million to the state.
  
• Diebold techs "reprogammed" the voting machines during the Ohio recount.

Oh, and just yesterday, it was learned that there is a default setting on the voting machines which was...you guessed it...Bush.  Meaning if a voter didn't choose, or if someone resent to default with the easily hackable password of "1111", the vote went to Bush.  This makes sense, considering the countless stories of "vote hopping"

4.  About the guy ordering the machines...

Ohio Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell has been referred to as the 'Katherine Harris' of the 2004 election.  He was Chair of the Bush-Chenery 2004 Campaign in Ohio.  Not at all a conflict of interest, right?

Let's take a closer look at Mr. Blackwell:

* His office maintained secret slush funds:

• It took him six weeks to certify the Ohio votes, which was necessary for the recount to begin.  Six weeks.  To put that into perspective, within the same time frame, Washinton state certified its vote, completed a state-wide recount, and started a second one.
  
• While the Green party was inspecting voting information from minority precincts, Blackwell issued a suprise order, calling for a "lockdown" on any and all materials related to the election, claiming they were not "public records" yet. According to Ohio law, these should have remained public:

.

• Following in the footsteps of Bush, Cheney, and Rice, Blackwell has developed an allergic reaction to making statements under oath.  He has labelled requests to have him testify under oath as "harassment."
  
• Several Ohio senators have been calling on Blackwell to resign.
  
• Right before the election, Blackwell was blasted by U.S. District Judge James G. Carr in Toledo, who suggested that Blackwell risked denying large numbers of Ohioans the right to vote on Nov. 2 and "apparently seeks to accomplish the same result in Ohio in 2004 that occurred in Florida in 2000." The judge also conluded : "I cannot be confident . . . that Blackwell will, indeed, fulfill his obligation to this court, Ohio's election officials, and Ohio's voters," the judge wrote."

5.  Lawsuits galore
Dozens of lawsuits have been filed in Ohio.  The central one at this point is that filed Arnebeck, claiming that irregularities/suppression occured, and that without these, Kerry would have won Ohio, and the Presidency.

Arnebeck's lawsuit was dismissed without prejudice on a technicality; he filed two election contests (the presidential election and the election for Supreme Court justice) in the same complaint.  So the complaint was split up, and Arnebeck refiled the presidential election objection.  Deposition requestes were also sent to Blackwell, Bush, Rove, & Co.  

Chief Justice Moyers denied the Green's motion to expedite and impound evidence, finding that "the interests of justice do not warrant consideration of contestors' motion prior to expiration of time for contestees to appear in opposition."  Next, he asked that Arnebeck explain to him why the issue isn't moot, since the electors are already approved for Bush, and since (since he denied the motion to expedite, I might add), all of this won't be completed by January 6th, when Congress approves the electors.

If you every wanted a brilliant lawyer, now is when you need them the most.  Arnebeck has just a few days to file his brief as to why the case should not be thrown out alltogether. Read a lawyer's interpretation of what Arnebeck is up against over at DU.

Up against the clock, it seems that Blackwell's delay six week delay in certifying the vote may have worked...although Arnebeck does have a strong argument in his interpretation of the law.

Kerryites around the nation rejoiced yesterday as Kerry announced he will be filing a motion to expedite in Federal District Court.  Previously, Kerry just wrote letters, and more letters. Filing of the motion was delayed until today or possibly Monday due to inclement weather in Ohio (courthouse was closed...does Blackwell control the weather? hmmm).

6.  Must Reads

• Ohio electoral fight becomes 'biggest deal since Selma' as GOP stonewalls
  
• NYT: Voting Problems in Ohio Spur Call for Overhall
• Must see:  videos of voter suppression and the Fritakis article on suppression here.

7.  Things to Do.

• It's the holidays!  Relax.  Open up gifts and pretend you like them.
  
• Remember that Democracy doesn't take a day off.  Between basting the ham and icing the cookies, take 5 minutes and watch this slideshow on the elections.  Forward it to all your friends.  
  
• Use this nifty site to find your elected officials, or perhaps some Ohio officials, and shot them email, telling them Happy Holidays and all you want for Christmas is a paper trail.

Update [2004-12-24 13:12:24 by georgia10]:: Silly me, I forgot to update the elector sitation. Jesse Jackson says that Kerry conceeded too soon.. Do anyone in Congress think so too?

Senator Boxer from CA is apparently being swayed by the thousands and thousands of people petitioning her to object. But word is she wants the Ohio Reps. to back her up. Contact the OH Congresspeople:

Ted Strickland
320 North Market St
Lisbon, OH 44432
330-420-9050
www.house.gov/strickland
www.stricklandforcongress.com

Marcy Kaptor
PO Box 899
Toledo, OH 43697
419-259-7500
http://votemarcy.com
info@votemarcy.com
Kaptur for Congress

Dennis Kucinich
14400 Detroit Ave
Lakewood, OH 44107
216-228-8850
www.house.gov/kucinich/welcome.shtml
www.kucinich.net


Stephanie Tubbs-Jones
3645 Warrensville Center Rd
Suite 204
Shaker Heights, OH 44122
216-522-4900
www.house.gov/tubbsjones
stjcampaign@aol.com

Sherrod Brown
P.O. Box 141
Lorain, OH 44052
1-866-SHERROD
www.sherrodbrown.com

Until the next update...

Tim Tagaris has a spot-on examination of online fundraising that is becoming a blogosphere cult classic. It is on front page of MyDD, on the front page of Swing State Project, on the front page of Change for America and it was a recommended diary on Daily Kos (where Kos himself recommended it). It also made The Daou Report and Personal Democracy Forum.

If you like his thinking, he is a contributor for the Swing State Project where the has been a great deal of discussion as of late on the topic of online communication.

One of the best posts I've ever read is something you should read if you care the Democratic Party winning. It is on the front page of MyDD, on the front page of Swing State Project, on the front page of Change for America and it was a recommended diary on Daily Kos (where Kos himself recommended it).

You should read it. If you are a consultant you should follow it. If you are a candidate you should hire Tim Tagaris.

The race for DNC Chair - Understanding the evolving role of the DNC itself 

A critical first step in deciding who we want as our next chair is to first figure out what the job is, and what it requires. An article in this week's Economist, excerpted below, does an excellent job at describing how the Republicans now view the job and why they have chosen a 38-year-old strategist as their next chair.

As NDN has been discussing for the past several years, the modern Republican political machine has redefined politics as we know it. Years of investing billions of dollars in their infrastructure have created a vast and complex web of multimillion dollar operations which include think tanks, for-profit media outlets like Fox News, traditional political advocacy groups and, in recent years, a very healthy and strategic set of national, state and local party organizations.

The Republicans understand the division of labor required to run such a political empire, and have a diversified set of leaders to build and manage their affairs - spokesmen like Bush, Colin Powell, Bill Frist, Rudy Giuliani, and Arnold Schwarzenegger; strategists like Karl Rove, Ralph Reed, Grover Norquist; managers like Roger Ailes, Ed Gillespie and Ken Mehlman; intellectuals like those at Heritage, Cato and the dozens of other local and state think tanks; propagandists like Rush Limbaugh and Matt Drudge; and investors like the Coors and Scaife families.

They run their politics like a business. They have strategic plans, targeted outcomes, measures to gauge progress and accountability. As Democrats, we must come to terms with what they have built and how they run their affairs, for today they have a much better system that yields much better results than ours.

Finding someone who can take on Bush on TV is not the biggest or most important part of the job of chairing the DNC. Terry McAulifffe has repeatedly said as much, and the Republicans have clearly recognized this in their recent choices for chair of the RNC. We already have dozens of national leaders well-equipped to take on the GOP each day. They are named Clinton, Kerry, Edwards, Richardson, Gore, Dean, Reid, Pelosi, Obama, Hoyer, Bayh, Lieberman, Vilsack, Landrieu, Menendez, Graham, Salazar, Ford Jr., Nelson, Lincoln, Durbin, Stabenow, Granholm, Rendell, Warner, Biden, Holbrooke, Harman, Spitzer and Emanuel. We could all add more.

What we need at the head of the DNC is someone who can take on Rove, Reed, Norquist and Mehlman. Someone who understands how to defeat the modern Republican machine at its own high-level strategic game; someone who understands the demographic, attitudinal and socio-economic complexities of the coming America; someone who is deeply rooted in the emerging new media world of databases, digital media, satellite and cable television; someone who understands the internet and modern community-building techniques; someone who can speak for the mainstream of the party and connect with its increasingly youthful activist base; someone who has successfully raised money and worked in all regions of this diverse country; and someone who has a proven track record at running a business or political organization.

We cannot lose sight of the fact that the DNC has become a business that could raise as much as $1 billion in the next four years. The day-to-day job of DNC chair requires running the largest and most important political organization that Democrats have in a time when Republicans have vastly improved their political machine, and are using their party institutions in ways we must emulate in the years to come. First and foremost, this job is to be the head of an organization that is the primary vehicle for millions of partisan Democrats to organize and defeat Republicans each day.

Our greatest risk in the chair’s race is selecting someone who may do fine on TV but who cannot turn our $1 billion machine into something that takes on the modern Republican Party at its own game. Our greatest opportunity is getting a strong team in the DNC led by a new chair who can expand on McAuliffe's groundbreaking reforms, build a 21st century Party and start the Democrats back on the winning path again.

We face a simple choice in the race for chair: do we keep doing what we are doing and lose, or do we choose a new direction, a modern path, that can meet the challenges of the 21st century and defeat the new Republicans at their very own game? Friends, this is an extraordinarily important choice we face, and one could have dramatic consequences on our fate as a Party. I hope we will demonstrate courage and choose wisely, but first we must understand clearly what the choice actually is.

---

The Economist
December 16, 2004

"The organisation man"

The Republicans have already taken an important step towards keeping the White House in 2008

THIRTY years ago, political commentators from David Broder down were all busy writing their obituaries of America's political parties. Today the parties are arguably more important than they have been for a century. Partisanship is on the rise; ticket-splitting is on the decline; legislative compromise is a dying art. Politically active Americans are increasingly divided into two well-organised warring tribes, liberals and conservatives, who disagree about the most fundamental issues of life.

An age of political parties is also an age of party mechanics. Races are won not just by charismatic drivers, but by the toilers who spend their lives fine-tuning the political engines. The Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), which help to raise money, support candidates and co-ordinate campaigns, can make all the difference in contests that often depend on mobilising loyalists rather than persuading swing voters.

The Republicans clearly won the organisation war this November. The Democrats didn't do badly: John Kerry's popular vote was 12% more than Al Gore's. But the Republicans did better: George Bush's popular vote jumped by a fifth. In the past fortnight both Terry McAuliffe, the outgoing chairman of the DNC, and Howard Dean, the darling of the “Democratic wing of the Democratic Party”, have gone out of their way to praise the Republicans. “We ran the best grass-roots campaign that I've seen in my lifetime,” said Mr Dean. “They ran a better one.”

The Republicans are now consolidating this organisational advantage. While the Democrats face a civil war over who should succeed Mr McAuliffe at the DNC, with eight candidates (including Mr Dean) sparring for the job, the Republicans have already settled on their man for the RNC.

A mere 38 years old, Ken Mehlman does not fit many stereotypes. He isn't a Washington veteran like the current chairman, Ed Gillespie (who retires in January to return to his lobbying firm). He isn't a “character” like the smooth-as-molasses Haley Barbour. He isn't a nationally known figure like George Bush senior. He comes across as a classic company man—the whippersnapper CEO of a data-management company in Plano, Texas, perhaps—rather than a back-slapping pol. But it is impossible to find anybody in political circles, Democratic as well as Republican, who doesn't think that he's the ideal man for the job.

Karl Rove may have been the architect of Mr Bush's victory—the man with the grand strategic visions and the sweeping sense of history. But Mr Mehlman was the mechanic who translated those strategic visions into reality. His main assets are an extraordinary command of detail (his colleagues dubbed him “Rain Man” because he can reel off election statistics much as Dustin Hoffman, in the film, could calculate at a glance the number of toothpicks spilt from a box) and the iron discipline necessary to keep Mr Bush's unruly army together.

In the last election, the Democrats seemed to take the more modern managerial approach: they contracted out much of the grunt work of politics to outside “527” organisations and made extensive use of paid canvassers to register and turn out voters. Trade unions paid 5,000 people to work full-time on the election, for example. By contrast, Mr Mehlman slowly built up a volunteer army of 1.4m loyal Republicans.

The volunteers made much better salespeople than the Democrats' paid hacks. (“Who do you find more believable?” asks Mr Mehlman. “A paid worker from outside or a friend and neighbour?”) They also operated under the political radar; the Democrats systematically underestimated the Republican effort. And they allowed Mr Bush's campaign dollars to stretch much further: in Ohio, the Bush-Cheney campaign had only a couple of hundred paid staff but 80,000 volunteers.

Yet this volunteer army also required an inordinate amount of management. Mr Mehlman dug up Republicans in the corners of America that campaign managers often overlooked—especially the new exurbs. He used all sorts of business metrics: marketing data to find potential supporters, performance measures to make sure they were doing their job and rewards to keep them motivated (successful volunteers were invited to Mr Bush's rallies, for example). He bristles at the idea that Democrats like Mr Dean won the internet wars. The Democrats used the internet primarily for fundraising, he says. The Republicans used it for organising, with 7.5m e-activists.

All revved up and somewhere to go

Mr Mehlman faces two obvious challenges. First, the Democrats are already learning from their opponents. Mr McAuliffe, for instance, waxes lyrical about the Republicans' use of targeted advertising. Second, it is notoriously hard to keep up the enthusiasm of volunteer armies: look at the way the Christian Coalition has faded to a shadow of its former self. Mr Mehlman argues that the best way to keep volunteers motivated is to keep delivering the legislative goods to Bush voters. But it is easy for a second-term president's legislative agenda to stall.

Even allowing for these problems, though, it is plain that Mr Mehlman's Ferrari is in far better nick than his opponents' Lada. The Democrats, after all, are still only talking about how to catch up, not actually doing so. And Mr Mehlman is already laying plans for the next round of elections.

Moreover, the political terrain still looks better for the Republicans. Mr McAuliffe's successor will have to concentrate on shoring up his party's defences: hanging on to core Democratic constituencies such as blacks and Latinos. The Republicans are flourishing in almost all the fastest-growing bits of the country. If the biggest challenge in American politics is reinventing parties for the age of the internet and the exurb, then the Republicans are streets ahead of the opposition.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/12/20/215458/51
Armando's Challenge -- Final Edition
by rincewind
Mon Dec 20th, 2004 at 18:54:58 PST

First, the challenge: as Categorically Imperative put it,

the idea is to post a diary laying out the most comprehensive case possible for there having been fraud in Ohio.  If the case made is at least as convincing as the case that Bush was AWOL from TANG, then Armando will do a front-page post on Ohio fraud.

Second, I hoped that my previous diaries on this topic would generate lots of fact-filled comments, and serve as a collection-point for the evidence that people think is most persuasive and/or most provable. Didn't happen, oh well.

So I've written up some of the facts I believe are supported by evidence AND persuasive of fraud. It's long, but I hope it's worthwhile. Read on!

Trumbull County

The county's website doesn't provide precinct-level or poll/absentee/prov breakouts, so I've been unable to independently verify Dr Lange's information. He did testify under oath to one of Cong. Conyers' hearings.

Dr. Werner Lange's report, dated Dec 12, 2004:

"All absentee voters must be identified as such by name and residence in the precinct poll books of the precinct in which they are registered. Over 100 precinct poll books in Trumbull County were checked for absentee voters and that number of actual absentee voters was compared to the certified number of absentee votes. There was an inflated difference in nearly every precinct of the five communities examined. The five communities whose poll books were carefully inspected for an absentee vote overcount are: Warren City (311), Howland Township (138), Newton Falls City (34), Girard City (57), and Cortland Township (40). The 106 precincts of these five Ohio communities, about 39% of all precincts in Trumbull County, netted a total of 580 absentee votes for which there were no absentee voters identified in the poll books."

Dr Lange's full report can be read here

============================
Lucas County

The Director of Elections has resigned, and 4 BoE employees have been suspended by the board, pending an unspecified "investigation" into the conduct of the Nov 2 election.

Google-cached page of a
WTOL news report

You may remember that it was also the Lucas County Dem HQ in Toledo that was broken into in Oct.

Google-cached page of a
Toledo Blade article

============================
Greene County

The BoE office was "left unlocked" or broken into over the night of Fri Dec 10 - Sat Dec 11.

Sworn statement of witnesses (PDF)

The witness statements also include a litany of "irregularities" in the registration books and precinct books, which they documented before the BoE Director removed the books and demanded they leave.

============================
Franklin County

Franklin County reported a striking peculiarity in its "Unofficial Abstract of Votes" published on its web site on Nov 3, 2004. On pages 35-39 of the 414-pg PDF document is found a "Ward Recap" for the presidential and senate races. On page 39 are 2 line entries labeled "Absentee 1" and "Absentee 2", both of which are included in the grand-total summary line (I hand-tallied every ward entry, for every column, to verify this fact). The reported results are as follows:

Candidate  Absentee 1  Absentee 2
---------  ----------  ----------
Badnarik         69           70
Bush          10158        10159
Kerry         10025        10025
Peroutka         25           25
Removed           0            0
Write-In          0            0

Fingerhut      7416         7417
Voinovich     11930        11931

Public
Precinct
Count         20680        20680

Does anyone want to calculate the odds of 2 separate bundles of absentee ballots adding up to exactly the same number of ballots? Much less the odds of those 2 separate bundles producing exactly the same or ONE more vote for each candidate?

The "Official Abstract of Votes" published on the Franklin County web site after certification (Dec 6, 2004) is also a 414-pg PDF document, and on page 39 of the "Ward Recap" for the presidential and senate races, there are 3 line entries labeled "Absentee 1", "Absentee 2", and "Absentee 3". The "Public Precinct Count" for "Absentee 3" is 12,124 and the SoS-published number of provisional ballots for Franklin County is 14,446 so it seems logical to conclude that this line item is for the valid, counted provisionals. The reported results for "Absentee 1" and "Absentee 2" are as follows:

Candidate  Absentee 1  Absentee 2
---------  ----------  ----------
Badnarik         81           81
Bush          11426        11312
Kerry         11683        11491
Peroutka         29           29
Removed           0            0
Write-In          4            0

Fingerhut      8576         8511
Voinovich     13393        13340

Public
Precinct
Count         23710        23403

While there are some differences between the votes tallied in "Absentee 1" and "Absentee 2" in the official report, they're still remarkably close. I haven't seen any official declaration of how many absentee ballots were requested/mailed out/returned in Franklin County, nor any thorough examination of the poll books showing the number of registered voters who were marked as absentee; so I can't make any judgment as to whether there really were 47,113 absentee ballots, or 23,710 or 23,403.

A further note: the Franklin County web site has removed the "Unofficial Abstract" PDF file (I had downloaded it weeks ago); the only file available is the "Official Abstract" -- even though the results for the March Primary election still lists both the "Unofficial" and the "Official" abstracts.

============================
Warren County

The lock-out of qualified observers on Election night, in violation of OH law, has never been adequately explained, and as far as I can tell, has never been pursued.

=============================
Recount Issues

First, what they were supposed to do:
OH SoS official recount procedures (PDF)

Of particular note:

Item C.2.a)
Boards of Elections must notify all candidates in the race of the time and place by certified mail not later than five days before an automatic or requested recount is held.

Item C.3.a)
Each candidate in the race is entitled to one witness for each counting team or tabulating unit.

Item E.2.d)
The board must randomly select whole precincts whose total equals at least 3% of the total vote. These precincts' ballots must be manually counted.

Item E.2.f)
If the computer count does not match the hand count, and after rechecking the manual count, the results are still not equal, all ballots must be hand counted.

Now, what actually happened:

=============================
Coshocton County

11/2/04: "Unofficial" Vote Total Released to Press (and published on OH SoS web site)

Bush: 9,121
Kerry: 6,763
Peroutka: 65
Badnarik: 17
Total: 15,966

11/19/04: "Official" Vote Total Released to Press (after processing Provisionals)

Bush: 9,277 (+156)
Kerry: 6,878 (+115)
Peroutka: 67 (+2)
Badnarik: 17 (0)
Cobb: 1 (+1)
Total: 16,240 (+274)

12/06/04: "Certified" Vote Total Announced By Blackwell (and published on OH SoS web site)

Bush: 9,277 (0)
Kerry: 6,878 (0)
Peroutka: 67 (0)
Badnarik: 17 (0)
Cobb: 1 (0)
Schriner: 2 (+2)
Total: 16,242 (+2)

12/14/04: "Pre-Recount" Vote Total Distributed to Recount Observers
[Vote Total Alleged By Coshocton County Officials to be "Official November 2nd, 2004" Vote Total]
(Computer printout dated 12-10-2004)

Bush: 9,839 (+562)
Kerry: 7,378 (+500)
Peroutka: 68 (+1)
Badnarik: 15 (-2)
Cobb: 1 (0)
Schriner: 2 (0)
Total: 17,300 (+1,058)

12/15/04: "Post-Recount" Vote Total Released By Coshocton County
[To Be "Certified" as "Official" Coshocton County Results]

Bush: 9,826 (-13)
Kerry: 7,412 (+34)
Peroutka: 68 (0)
Badnarik: 13 (-2)
Cobb: 1 (0)
Schriner: 2 (0)
Total: 17,319 (+19)

Coshocton County apparently performed a "recount" on 12-10-2004, 4 days in advance of the time scheduled for the "official" recount, without issuing the required notice or permitting authorized witnesses to attend; and apparently "found" 1,077 more valid votes than they had certified 4 days earlier.

The Coshocton Tribune, on 12-18-2004, further muddied the waters by publishing the following totals as "Official Results":

Bush: 9,830 (+4)
Kerry: 7,413 (+1)
Peroutka: 68 (0)
Badnarik: 15 (+2)
Cobb: 1 (0)
Schriner: 2 (0)
Total: 17,329 (+10)

Cobb observer statement

See more/updated info about Coshocton County in this diary by jiffykeen.

============================
Washington County

In addition to other irregularities, the recount in this county appears to have "lost" even more votes than Coshocton County "found". Blackwell certified the following totals (SoS web site):

Badnarik     71
Bush     17,480
Kerry    12,475
Peroutka     69

The totals printed out and given to the recount observers as the FINAL, COMPLETE tally:

Badnarik     68
Bush      15521
Kerry     10958
Peroutka     60

So, somewhere between the certification on Dec 6 and the recount on Dec 15, Washington County lost at least 3,488 votes. No explanation has been given for this discrepancy.

============================
Confirmed tampering with tabulating machines:

Hocking County (Triad technician)
reference here (PDF)

Greene County (Triad technician)
reference here (PDF)

Monroe County (Triad technician)
reference here (PDF) and here

Mercer County (Triad technician)
reference here

Lucas County (Diebold technician)
reference here

Union County (Triad technician)
reference here

============================
Confirmed non-random selection of "3% hand count" in recount procedure:

Monroe County
reference here (PDF)

Mercer County
reference here

Allen County
reference here

Fayette County
reference here

Cuyahoga County
reference here

Huron County
reference here

Lucas County
reference here

Morgan County
reference here

Morrow County
reference here

Medina County
reference here

Fairfield County
reference here

Clermont County
reference here

Washington County
reference here

Hocking County
reference here

Mahoning County
reference here

Holmes County
reference here

Jefferson County
reference here

============================
Confirmed discrepancy between 3% hand count v. machine recount NOT resulting in full-county hand count:

Monroe County
reference here (PDF) and here

Tuscarawas County
reference here

Fairfield County
reference here

Clermont County
reference here

Summit County
reference here

Mahoning County
reference here

Unable to confirm the results of the 3% count:
Lucas County
reference here

============================
Confirmed lack of access to public records (most BoE's claim direct order from Blackwell):

I started to list and reference each county in which this problem was reported, but it became apparent that only a handful of county boards allowed access to the records (disobeying Blackwell's order).

============================

In addition, there are numerous first-hand reports of a variety of "irregularities" in the conduct of the recounts:

• Many counties failed to seal or even lock up ballots and other election materials;

• Many counties refused to allow witnesses to see all stages of the recount process;

• An astonishing number of counties report a PERFECT match between their certified results and their recount results. Given the high proportion of punch-card counties, this strains credulity beyond the breaking point.

I've linked to most of the Cobb observers' reports above, but they're all worth a read.

Therefore, I, Rincewind, hereby submit these witness reports, sworn statements, MSM reports, and numerical discrepancies as evidence that election fraud did occur in Ohio.

http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=17216&c=206 FBI E-Mail Refers to Presidential Order Authorizing Inhumane Interrogation Techniques
December 20, 2004

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: media@aclu.org

Newly Obtained FBI Records Call Defense Department’s Methods "Torture," Express Concerns Over "Cover-Up" That May Leave FBI "Holding the Bag" for Abuses

NEW YORK -- A document released for the first time today by the American Civil Liberties Union suggests that President Bush issued an Executive Order authorizing the use of inhumane interrogation methods against detainees in Iraq. Also released by the ACLU today are a slew of other records including a December 2003 FBI e-mail that characterizes methods used by the Defense Department as "torture" and a June 2004 "Urgent Report" to the Director of the FBI that raises concerns that abuse of detainees is being covered up.

"These documents raise grave questions about where the blame for widespread detainee abuse ultimately rests," said ACLU Executive Director Anthony D. Romero. "Top government officials can no longer hide from public scrutiny by pointing the finger at a few low-ranking soldiers."

The documents were obtained after the ACLU and other public interest organizations filed a lawsuit against the government for failing to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request.

The two-page e-mail that references an Executive Order states that the President directly authorized interrogation techniques including sleep deprivation, stress positions, the use of military dogs, and "sensory deprivation through the use of hoods, etc." The ACLU is urging the White House to confirm or deny the existence of such an order and immediately to release the order if it exists. The FBI e-mail, which was sent in May 2004 from "On Scene Commander--Baghdad" to a handful of senior FBI officials, notes that the FBI has prohibited its agents from employing the techniques that the President is said to have authorized.

Another e-mail, dated December 2003, describes an incident in which Defense Department interrogators at Guantánamo Bay impersonated FBI agents while using "torture techniques" against a detainee. The e-mail concludes "If this detainee is ever released or his story made public in any way, DOD interrogators will not be held accountable because these torture techniques were done [sic] the ‘FBI’ interrogators. The FBI will [sic] left holding the bag before the public."

The document also says that no "intelligence of a threat neutralization nature" was garnered by the "FBI" interrogation, and that the FBI’s Criminal Investigation Task Force (CITF) believes that the Defense Department’s actions have destroyed any chance of prosecuting the detainee. The e-mail’s author writes that he or she is documenting the incident "in order to protect the FBI."

"The methods that the Defense Department has adopted are illegal, immoral, and counterproductive," said ACLU staff attorney Jameel Jaffer. "It is astounding that these methods appear to have been adopted as a matter of policy by the highest levels of government."

The June 2004 "Urgent Report" addressed to the FBI Director is heavily redacted. The legible portions of the document appear to describe an account given to the FBI’s Sacramento Field Office by an FBI agent who had "observed numerous physical abuse incidents of Iraqi civilian detainees," including "strangulation, beatings, [and] placement of lit cigarettes into the detainees ear openings." The document states that "[redacted] was providing this account to the FBI based on his knowledge that [redacted] were engaged in a cover-up of these abuses."

The release of these documents follows a federal court order that directed government agencies to comply with a year-old request under the Freedom of Information Act filed by the ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Physicians for Human Rights, Veterans for Common Sense and Veterans for Peace. The New York Civil Liberties Union is co-counsel in the case.

Other documents released by the ACLU today include:

• An FBI email regarding DOD personnel impersonating FBI officials during interrogations. The e-mail refers to a "ruse" and notes that "all of those [techniques] used in these scenarios" were approved by the Deputy Secretary of Defense. (Jan. 21, 2004)
• Another FBI agent’s account of interrogations at Guantánamo in which detainees were shackled hand and foot in a fetal position on the floor. The agent states that the detainees were kept in that position for 18 to 24 hours at a time and most had "urinated or defacated [sic]" on themselves. On one occasion, the agent reports having seen a detainee left in an unventilated, non-air conditioned room at a temperature "probably well over a hundred degrees." The agent notes: "The detainee was almost unconscious on the floor, with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been literally pulling his own hair out throughout the night." (Aug. 2, 2004)
• An e-mail stating that an Army lawyer "worked hard to cwrite [sic] a legal justification for the type of interrogations they (the Army) want to conduct" at Guantánamo Bay. (Dec. 9, 2002)
• An e-mail noting the initiation of an FBI investigation into the alleged rape of a juvenile male detainee at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. (July 28, 2004)
• An FBI agent’s account of an interrogation at Guantánamo - an interrogation apparently conducted by Defense Department personnel - in which a detainee was wrapped in an Israeli flag and bombarded with loud music and strobe lights. (July 30, 2004)

The ACLU and its allies are scheduled to go to court again this afternoon, where they will seek an order compelling the CIA to turn over records related to an internal investigation into detainee abuse. Although the ACLU has received more than 9,000 documents from other agencies, the CIA refuses to confirm or deny even the existence of many of the records that the ACLU and other plaintiffs have requested. The CIA is reported to have been involved in abusing detainees in Iraq and at secret CIA detention facilities around the globe.

The lawsuit is being handled by Lawrence Lustberg and Megan Lewis of the New Jersey-based law firm Gibbons, Del Deo, Dolan, Griffinger & Vecchione, P.C. Other attorneys in the case are Jaffer, Amrit Singh and Judy Rabinovitz of the ACLU; Art Eisenberg and Beth Haroules of the NYCLU; and Barbara Olshansky and Jeff Fogel of CCR.

The documents referenced above can be found at: http://www.aclu.org/torturefoia/released/fbi.html.

This last week has been much talk across the blogosphere about retiring Conrad Burns in 2006. Kos floated the name of Jon Tester, the philosopher-farmer who will begin serving as Senate President in a couple weeks.

Over at Left in the West, Matt Singer evaluates Tester's prospects against Burns by saying, "The newly minted Senate President is a badass...The man has 7-fingers and a real chance to win."

Kos's post titled, "Montana on the road to swing state" has this to say:

I little while ago I wrote: I am a Reform Democrat because I want Democrats to budget for change. I want us to have non-dedicated resources available to quickly create and distribute large programs in reaction to changing situations. I want Democrats to plan for favorable unknowns and be prepared go big when they present themselves. I believe the battle never ends I want our Democratic Party ready for a campaign that never ends. I want to expand on this and introduce the concept of Discretionary Political Warfare as an example of how post-modern politics can utilize military strategy and create Democratic Political Special Forces.

Thinking back on Senator Kerry's loss, here is what Mary Beth Cahill had to say about the Swift Boat ads: "This is the best $40,000 investment made by any political group." Forty years after the Daisy Ad that Democrats pioneered we are still entirely unprepared to politically engage in a leveraged manner. Considering that Democrats will spend around a billion dollars between now and the 2006 election I suggest we invest in creating multiple cells of extremely well trained operatives with the financing necessary to engage in Discretionary Political Warfare. As a minority party we have the most to gain by creating guerrilla political units that can operate independently and at will. Progressives have hundreds of organizations focusing on different progressive issues but how many organizations do we have with the mission to fight the GOP? I'm not talking about electing Democrats, I just talking about attacking Republicans. Attacking the GOP I want an organization that is only tasked with fighting the GOP. I would actually like to see multiple, independent organizations. I would like each organization to have a small number of highly trained, post-modern hacks. Political Special Forces. No rules and high expectations. I want organizations that scan the morning news and decide who to hit that day. If five of these cells each hit the same GOP Congressman, I think that is wonderful. I want real-time politics and no roadblocks. I believe we will see this sooner of later. I'd like Democrats to lead the way so we can capture the early adapter benefits. The internet demands this type of politics.