Have we had enough of election problems????
Sign these petitions below so our Reps. know we are not kidding anymore.
Meanwhile we collect more enditing evidence against those who have committed election felonies.
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/fairohio/
http://www.usalone.com/cgi-bin/petition.cgi?pnum=698
go to the congressional record
and contact all thes guys that voted against this stinking 2004 election (yes there is a lawsuit pending and people to be prosecuted thus no statute of limitations since there is pending justice)
Jan 6 2005
http://tinyurl.com/2ck84g
choose next page at bottom if link does not bring it up, they don't like direct links for some reason...
senate
http://tinyurl.com/24r3py
Here is a timely request from Paddy Shaffer;
I have a bit of research that needs done, and wondered if any or all of you might want to help with it. Here is what I have in mind, let me and the others here know if you are interested. A couple others that have helped a lot with research, and I'll see if I can get a couple people working on this....
I want the names of all the House and Senate members that stood up and asked to have Ohio's 2004 election investigated in the afternoon on January 6, 2005. Both those who signed, and those who gave a speech in support of it. I was in the Senate Gallery watching the Senators speak, as were many others, some in The Ohio Election Justice Campaign.
I also want their speeches, and contact information. They are in the Congressional Record for that day.
This way they can be contacted, reminded of what they said, and asked to join and support the Ohio Election Justice Campaign. We will also ask that they assist us with encouraging both Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner and Ohio Attorney General Marc Dann to meet with our group and honor our requested 3 hour meeting, and the three requests we have made.
1. Listen to our speakers
2. Present their plan to investigate and do the needed legal prosecution of the 2004 election crimes and subsequent crimes.
3. Have dialoged with us about the plan and explain how the public will be able to follow the progress of the legal work to be certain that it is finally being conducted.
If you are able to set it all up that we can make it available on a link on the Link site, and Steve might also be willing to put it on his Link site. This way it will be easy for many people to utilize it as snail mail so these Congressional members receive it in paper form, or people can cut and paste and use it for our petition letter site, or other email correspondence. They can also be encouraged to share those speeches and their concern with others... and get the group support to grow. Even Hillary Clinton got up and spoke about Ohio's bad election. Barbara Boxer was the only one with enough strength to sign it from the Senate. The US House had about 31 members sign (as I remember, and I'm not certain that is right).
Talk to me, and talk to each other. With your help, can we get this done?
If we can get these members of Congress saturated with paper letters, email letters, phone calls, and get some responses coming back, maybe we can then turn some attention to the others like Marcy Kaptur, Ohio Democrat, US House, who voted to certify Ohio's election, and went to the Ukraine to investigate their election, but didn't look at her own state.
Make it a Powerful Day,
Paddy Shaffer
Founder, Ohio Election Justice Campaign
paddy@columbus.rr.com
(614) 761-0621
Showing posts with label ELeCTION. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ELeCTION. Show all posts
Sunday, September 23, 2007
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Defending the Freedoms of July 4, 1776: America's Hope for the World
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_paul_leh_070704_defending_the_freedo.htm
From Paul Lehto
You gotta stand for something,
Or you’re gonna fall, for anything.
--John Cougar Mellencamp
Those who stand for nothing fall for anything.
--Tom Van Meurs
If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.
–William Somerset Maugham
All Power, Freedom, and Democracy comes from rights. Starting on July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence changed forever how the world thinks of rights, and thereby became one of the most important political documents in the history of the world.
The Declaration of Independence especially was intended not just for Americans, it was declared for the benefit of all of humanity. Benjamin Franklin wrote: “Our cause is the cause of all mankind, and…we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.”
The American Declaration of Independence boldly declared Independence from King George III as a matter of inalienable human rights, and rejected kingly tyranny under claim of divine right. By shifting the idea of who holds rights away from the king, the government and the British East India Corporation and instead in favor of the human beings in We the People, it was as though the Founders had diverted a Nile River of rights. Instead of the blessings of the Creator fertilizing the king’s divine rule, the Founders declared that all people were born with rights, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, and created “self-government” by We the People.
These rights were planted in individual people, who instead had an inalienable human right to create, alter and abolish their forms of government, in addition to various inalienable rights involving life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
As President Ronald Reagan put it “Ours was a philosophical revolution that changed the very concept of government.” The critical second paragraph of the Declaration also tells us governments are only legitimately created through the will of the people and the very reason, the sole reason, governments are instituted is “to secure these rights.” Thus, it is the government’s #1 job to secure you your inalienable rights, to guarantee them and make them real.
Many historians also say that our Nation was the first nation consciously founded upon ideals, instead of race, nationality, religion or class. Enormous faith was placed in the ability of any independent person to use the rules of reason and the principles of liberty and justice in order to “become their own Governors” as John Adams put it. In one word, it was Self-Government or republicanism that was the key to the American Revolution. In two words, the very same thing as republicanism is “representative democracy” (as distinguished from direct democracy, which the Founders generally opposed).
These ideals of We the People were not just being fought on behalf of the 13 colonies, they were sought on behalf “of all mankind.” The subsequent Constitution, arrived at using the Rule of Reason by representatives of the People, was declared by Henry Clay as a gift to “endless, perpetual posterity.” That is, unlike the temporary Articles of Confederation, this Constitution was intended to give principles that could guide America for all time, for perpetual posterity.
Given that the Founders consciously intended to change the history of the world for all of humanity and for all time, they of course did not set out ideals that could be achieved in a day. They set out principles and ideals that could be the guide stars to orient ourselves by. As Carl Schurz wrote: “Ideals are like stars; you will not succeed in touching them with your hands. But like the seafaring man on the desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them you will reach your destiny.”
By maximizing individual human rights and dignity and maximizing liberty, the founders unleashed the greatest colossus of ingenuity and freedom and progress the world had ever seen. The guide stars of liberty and democracy, though not fully achieved, nevertheless worked to inspire ever greater progress. The political history of America can easily be told in terms of making the promises of the Declaration of Independence real, as women and minorities expressly insisted on their rights, citing our Declaration of Independence in support. Thus, while some say that the Founders had some faults, it adds considerably to accuracy to state that in setting forth ideals intended to benefit all of humanity for all time, they could not and did not set out standards that could be achieved in the 1700s or even the 1800s.
And indeed, considering the highest of political moralities and 620,000 civil war dead, President George H.W. Bush (Sr.) wrote: "I sometimes wonder if we've forgotten who we are. But we're the people who sundered a nation rather than allow a sin called slavery, and we're the people who rose from the ghettos and the deserts." Bush Sr. also wrote: " America is never wholly herself unless she is engaged in high moral principle. We as a people have such a purpose today. It is to make kinder the face of the nation, and gentler the face of the world." Whether or not one supported President George H.W. Bush, his evocation of American ideals is consistent with the noble intent of 1776, and the guidance those ideals intended throughout all of history. If any President of the United States wants to accomplish something in our country, for better or for worse, he will invoke this power of American idealism, as George W. Bush did once again in his Second Inaugural Address:
"Americans, of all people, should never be surprised by the power of our ideals. Eventually, the call of freedom comes to every mind and every soul." These ideals are so powerful, they are even used with success in convincing the American public to go to war. Countless millions have died in the name of freedom and democracy or self-government by We the People. President Woodrow Wilson said "Sometimes people call me an idealist. Well, that is the way I know I am an American. … America is the only idealist nation in the world." Americans are often called by their leaders to aggressively achieve American ideals: Indeed, "the American," as President John F. Kennedy said, "builds best when called upon to build greatly." Americans started by building a great Declaration of Independence and Constitution that were intended, as Founder Henry Clay put it, "for endless perpetual posterity." Ideals can indeed work forever because they guide us or remind us even when not yet fully achieved.
But the fundamental freedom of American self-government, the very key of liberty, is being challenged like never before. The sole method of control of the government that Americans have is elections. And in the last several years, the counting of America’s votes has been rendered corruptly secret, invisible and outside the power of any citizen to observe, via the processes and contracts of computerized voting. Secrecy is always the total lack of accountability, because everyone needs information to make someone accountable.
Moreover, because this corrupt secret vote counting is being handled by corporations in invisible trade secrecy of computer software, a government insider that wants to throw an election can manipulate the election computers just as easily as we all manipulate our own personal computers. There is no such thing as security against our own computers that we possess or control. Essentially all of the talk about “security” of computerized voting machines has been restricted to taking them off the internet, which only protects the government against “threats” from the public, but does not do anything to protect We the People from insiders in our government who want to stay in power, sell elections, or have a political issue they strongly wish to favor.
As a result, even though the government’s #1 job and the reason it was formed was to “secure” our rights, our right to “alter or abolish” our government under the Declaration of Independence is totally unsecured, and in fact no longer exists wherever there is a criminal insider in elections. This is the main time if not the only time when we really need our inalienable right to “kick the bums out.”
Thus, the American people, not able to freely kick out the worst criminal cheaters, are not a free people. This is not a “threat” of loss of freedom, it is a present day reality wherever computerized voting and a criminal insider are present.
Given the many very important issues on the ballot, combined with the control of the world’s richest country, many billions in federal contracts, and control of the sole military superpower in the world at stake, it is both naïve and even unpatriotic to believe that nobody would desire to preserve or achieve power over America illegitimately. Our right to vote, and therefore to be master instead of slave, is rendered entirely meaningless if we can not secure an open and public count, controlled by We the People. The government sure can’t audit itself, investigate itself or elect itself, and the government gets 100% of its money and power from one source: elections.
The powerful role of We the People in self-government is, along with the inalienable right to alter or abolish the government, a self-evident fact. Self-evident means that we don’t need to prove these rights or facts, they prove themselves and are completely obvious. There is only one alternative to democracy where we are all tied for #1 most important citizen in the land on account of our equal votes, and that is inequality whereby one person or class rules over another with unequal rights. That is the essence of Tyranny and the opposite of freedom. That is categorically not what the Founders set out to accomplish for all of humanity and for all time.
Everybody wants to be #1 and many want to “rule the world” and so perhaps it is to be expected that corporations have captured our vote counts and made them their private property, literally kicking off We the People as trespassers, even though this is the very heart and soul and democracy. But as soon as we recall our past, recall the importance of freedom as a people, recall that all power emanates from rights, and that rights are supposed to inhere only in people and not kings, governments and soul-less corporations, we will re-invigorate the engines of human rights and freedom that have so excited the American people and the people of the world that they’ve acted as both prime political forces as well as facilitating economic progress by unleashing the enterprise of free individuals.
Americans, once they know what is at stake, will never tolerate a takeover of their country by forces hostile to the common good of the American people and dedicated legally and contractually solely to private profit. If a foreign country could not demand the right to count votes in secret, neither can corporations in America demand the same. Indeed, the two are the same and the effort by a foreign country to take over our elections would be unanimously resisted by all Americans, using the military if necessary. No corporation is our superior, there is no basis for them to have these special privileges of secret counting.
John Quincy Adams spoke on July 4, 1821: “America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government.”
These rights are the tools of democracy. Each generation must use them or lose them. So far every generation of Americans has acted to make the promises of the declaration of independence more real. This one will too, as long as people take the time to remember what the American experiment is all about, remember to defend democracy, remember that compromises of our rights are the same as violations of our rights, and remember that the government has no excuse but to be our servant and guarantee us our rights, especially our #1 inalienable right to “alter or abolish” our own government, or kick the bums out.
If you believe as I believe, then you can see how the power of the Declaration of Independence has melted away the forces of history, bigotry, oppression, and been our guide star for centuries. We are not any longer a free people because of computerized secret vote counting, but this is so obviously improper and such a clear invitation to the grossest corruptions that it simply can not stand the light of day, or the sunshine of publicity.
Already, an August 2006 Zogby poll shows that 92% of the American public support a system of observable vote counting by citizens. This is a totally nonpartisan issue, and high support exists for observable vote counting across every political party and demographic. This is yet another reason why there is simply no excuse for Congress to deny the will of the people in favor of the corporate will to own the heart of our democracy as their own private property. There is also no excuse for asking us to trust these private corporations or officials, our system is not based on trust it is based on checks and balances.
Thus, in fighting to restore our freedom we are incredibly lucky in our generation, that the battle will only involve informing all of our fellow Americans, and watching these vote counting corporations and their election official defenders of secrecy melt before the power of the Declaration of Independence. Today, we have the unique privilege of knowing for sure that we are fighting for freedom and democracy, even as some who have served our country and sacrificed their lives might understandably have had a doubt whether it was truly necessary to sacrifice their lives. But as the Marines say “Ours is not to wonder why, ours is just to do or die.”
If you’d like to see the American Declaration of Independence be restored to its rightful course as the world’s beacon of rights freedom, for all of humanity and for all time, if you believe that America is real and that ideas matter, your help is very needed to spread the word to our fellow citizens, the true and rightful rulers of this country. To do this, please post, email or copy and paste this article in as many places as you can find, and talk about it with whoever you can. Do this today, tomorrow, and the next day, and keep going because the sacred inalienable rights of the Declaration are top news EVERY DAY, regardless of what anyone says.
In distributing this word, we need to let all American citizens know of the unfaithfulness of our government to the principles they are sworn to uphold, and that they are about to vote in the House of Representatives on HR 811 and in the Senate on S1487 which will institutionalize secret vote counting for Senators and Representatives IN THEIR OWN ELECTIONS. This too, this self-serving behavior, will not stand, and can not stand. It would be comical were freedom not so serious.
Many state constitutions and the 1776 Virginia Declaration of Rights state words directly to the effect that “a frequent recurrence to fundamental principles is necessary to the preservation of liberty and free government.” See, e.g., Wash. State Const. Art. I, sec. 32. Thus, in passing word to your fellow citizens, you are literally doing what is necessary to preserve liberty and freedom: remembering the principles of the Declaration and using them as the tools of Freedom and the defenders of democracy.
Whether our freedom as a people is restored soon or not depends on how much each of you acts like Paul Revere and does your part. There’s a simple test here of your status: if you are a one of the co-equal ruler-citizens of this country, you will be alarmed by this and tell as many of your fellow rulers as possible to keep our eyes on the prize and put aside any partisan differences in order to preserve the freedom of ALL Americans on this issue On the other hand, if you have adopted the ways of the slave, you will be fearful, or depressed, or otherwise rationalize inaction in some way: you will not feel empowered. Indeed, rationalization is the process of surrender.
As Thomas Paine reminded America in Common Sense in 1776, “we have the power to begin the world all over again.” He also said “Be free, set up for yourselves, a great destiny is before you, show yourselves worthy of it.” We can all be tied for the most important citizen in our democracy, each with an equal vote, or we can be slaves bossed around by others with no real say, and a government we can’t change that stays stuck on the “Stupid” setting.
We are each free to do nothing for our country. But in this case that may be the last decision the American people are allowed to make by their masters. So please study paragraph 2 of the Declaration of Independence, find out more places to learn at www.psephos-us.org and spread the word. Tell every state and federal politician that it is corrupt to have secret vote counting at all, and unbelievably improper to vote for it for their own elections. It will only be a matter of months, if we all do this, before politicians are doing their rightful job of falling all over themselves to fully restore citizen control of our own elections.
It’s our country, our government, our elections, our representatives, our ballots, our votes, our tax dollars, and our opinions that count. The government has never received a single legitimate tax dollar, or power, except from We the People. They are public servants, not the public’s masters. So educate everyone first, then later on in late summer we’ll have to have a talk with them about who’s really in charge of this country: a refresher course in Independence.
Paul R Lehto
Attorney at Law
lehtolawyer@gmail.com
From Paul Lehto
You gotta stand for something,
Or you’re gonna fall, for anything.
--John Cougar Mellencamp
Those who stand for nothing fall for anything.
--Tom Van Meurs
If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.
–William Somerset Maugham
All Power, Freedom, and Democracy comes from rights. Starting on July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence changed forever how the world thinks of rights, and thereby became one of the most important political documents in the history of the world.
The Declaration of Independence especially was intended not just for Americans, it was declared for the benefit of all of humanity. Benjamin Franklin wrote: “Our cause is the cause of all mankind, and…we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.”
The American Declaration of Independence boldly declared Independence from King George III as a matter of inalienable human rights, and rejected kingly tyranny under claim of divine right. By shifting the idea of who holds rights away from the king, the government and the British East India Corporation and instead in favor of the human beings in We the People, it was as though the Founders had diverted a Nile River of rights. Instead of the blessings of the Creator fertilizing the king’s divine rule, the Founders declared that all people were born with rights, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, and created “self-government” by We the People.
These rights were planted in individual people, who instead had an inalienable human right to create, alter and abolish their forms of government, in addition to various inalienable rights involving life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
As President Ronald Reagan put it “Ours was a philosophical revolution that changed the very concept of government.” The critical second paragraph of the Declaration also tells us governments are only legitimately created through the will of the people and the very reason, the sole reason, governments are instituted is “to secure these rights.” Thus, it is the government’s #1 job to secure you your inalienable rights, to guarantee them and make them real.
Many historians also say that our Nation was the first nation consciously founded upon ideals, instead of race, nationality, religion or class. Enormous faith was placed in the ability of any independent person to use the rules of reason and the principles of liberty and justice in order to “become their own Governors” as John Adams put it. In one word, it was Self-Government or republicanism that was the key to the American Revolution. In two words, the very same thing as republicanism is “representative democracy” (as distinguished from direct democracy, which the Founders generally opposed).
These ideals of We the People were not just being fought on behalf of the 13 colonies, they were sought on behalf “of all mankind.” The subsequent Constitution, arrived at using the Rule of Reason by representatives of the People, was declared by Henry Clay as a gift to “endless, perpetual posterity.” That is, unlike the temporary Articles of Confederation, this Constitution was intended to give principles that could guide America for all time, for perpetual posterity.
Given that the Founders consciously intended to change the history of the world for all of humanity and for all time, they of course did not set out ideals that could be achieved in a day. They set out principles and ideals that could be the guide stars to orient ourselves by. As Carl Schurz wrote: “Ideals are like stars; you will not succeed in touching them with your hands. But like the seafaring man on the desert of waters, you choose them as your guides, and following them you will reach your destiny.”
By maximizing individual human rights and dignity and maximizing liberty, the founders unleashed the greatest colossus of ingenuity and freedom and progress the world had ever seen. The guide stars of liberty and democracy, though not fully achieved, nevertheless worked to inspire ever greater progress. The political history of America can easily be told in terms of making the promises of the Declaration of Independence real, as women and minorities expressly insisted on their rights, citing our Declaration of Independence in support. Thus, while some say that the Founders had some faults, it adds considerably to accuracy to state that in setting forth ideals intended to benefit all of humanity for all time, they could not and did not set out standards that could be achieved in the 1700s or even the 1800s.
And indeed, considering the highest of political moralities and 620,000 civil war dead, President George H.W. Bush (Sr.) wrote: "I sometimes wonder if we've forgotten who we are. But we're the people who sundered a nation rather than allow a sin called slavery, and we're the people who rose from the ghettos and the deserts." Bush Sr. also wrote: " America is never wholly herself unless she is engaged in high moral principle. We as a people have such a purpose today. It is to make kinder the face of the nation, and gentler the face of the world." Whether or not one supported President George H.W. Bush, his evocation of American ideals is consistent with the noble intent of 1776, and the guidance those ideals intended throughout all of history. If any President of the United States wants to accomplish something in our country, for better or for worse, he will invoke this power of American idealism, as George W. Bush did once again in his Second Inaugural Address:
"Americans, of all people, should never be surprised by the power of our ideals. Eventually, the call of freedom comes to every mind and every soul." These ideals are so powerful, they are even used with success in convincing the American public to go to war. Countless millions have died in the name of freedom and democracy or self-government by We the People. President Woodrow Wilson said "Sometimes people call me an idealist. Well, that is the way I know I am an American. … America is the only idealist nation in the world." Americans are often called by their leaders to aggressively achieve American ideals: Indeed, "the American," as President John F. Kennedy said, "builds best when called upon to build greatly." Americans started by building a great Declaration of Independence and Constitution that were intended, as Founder Henry Clay put it, "for endless perpetual posterity." Ideals can indeed work forever because they guide us or remind us even when not yet fully achieved.
But the fundamental freedom of American self-government, the very key of liberty, is being challenged like never before. The sole method of control of the government that Americans have is elections. And in the last several years, the counting of America’s votes has been rendered corruptly secret, invisible and outside the power of any citizen to observe, via the processes and contracts of computerized voting. Secrecy is always the total lack of accountability, because everyone needs information to make someone accountable.
Moreover, because this corrupt secret vote counting is being handled by corporations in invisible trade secrecy of computer software, a government insider that wants to throw an election can manipulate the election computers just as easily as we all manipulate our own personal computers. There is no such thing as security against our own computers that we possess or control. Essentially all of the talk about “security” of computerized voting machines has been restricted to taking them off the internet, which only protects the government against “threats” from the public, but does not do anything to protect We the People from insiders in our government who want to stay in power, sell elections, or have a political issue they strongly wish to favor.
As a result, even though the government’s #1 job and the reason it was formed was to “secure” our rights, our right to “alter or abolish” our government under the Declaration of Independence is totally unsecured, and in fact no longer exists wherever there is a criminal insider in elections. This is the main time if not the only time when we really need our inalienable right to “kick the bums out.”
Thus, the American people, not able to freely kick out the worst criminal cheaters, are not a free people. This is not a “threat” of loss of freedom, it is a present day reality wherever computerized voting and a criminal insider are present.
Given the many very important issues on the ballot, combined with the control of the world’s richest country, many billions in federal contracts, and control of the sole military superpower in the world at stake, it is both naïve and even unpatriotic to believe that nobody would desire to preserve or achieve power over America illegitimately. Our right to vote, and therefore to be master instead of slave, is rendered entirely meaningless if we can not secure an open and public count, controlled by We the People. The government sure can’t audit itself, investigate itself or elect itself, and the government gets 100% of its money and power from one source: elections.
The powerful role of We the People in self-government is, along with the inalienable right to alter or abolish the government, a self-evident fact. Self-evident means that we don’t need to prove these rights or facts, they prove themselves and are completely obvious. There is only one alternative to democracy where we are all tied for #1 most important citizen in the land on account of our equal votes, and that is inequality whereby one person or class rules over another with unequal rights. That is the essence of Tyranny and the opposite of freedom. That is categorically not what the Founders set out to accomplish for all of humanity and for all time.
Everybody wants to be #1 and many want to “rule the world” and so perhaps it is to be expected that corporations have captured our vote counts and made them their private property, literally kicking off We the People as trespassers, even though this is the very heart and soul and democracy. But as soon as we recall our past, recall the importance of freedom as a people, recall that all power emanates from rights, and that rights are supposed to inhere only in people and not kings, governments and soul-less corporations, we will re-invigorate the engines of human rights and freedom that have so excited the American people and the people of the world that they’ve acted as both prime political forces as well as facilitating economic progress by unleashing the enterprise of free individuals.
Americans, once they know what is at stake, will never tolerate a takeover of their country by forces hostile to the common good of the American people and dedicated legally and contractually solely to private profit. If a foreign country could not demand the right to count votes in secret, neither can corporations in America demand the same. Indeed, the two are the same and the effort by a foreign country to take over our elections would be unanimously resisted by all Americans, using the military if necessary. No corporation is our superior, there is no basis for them to have these special privileges of secret counting.
John Quincy Adams spoke on July 4, 1821: “America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government.”
These rights are the tools of democracy. Each generation must use them or lose them. So far every generation of Americans has acted to make the promises of the declaration of independence more real. This one will too, as long as people take the time to remember what the American experiment is all about, remember to defend democracy, remember that compromises of our rights are the same as violations of our rights, and remember that the government has no excuse but to be our servant and guarantee us our rights, especially our #1 inalienable right to “alter or abolish” our own government, or kick the bums out.
If you believe as I believe, then you can see how the power of the Declaration of Independence has melted away the forces of history, bigotry, oppression, and been our guide star for centuries. We are not any longer a free people because of computerized secret vote counting, but this is so obviously improper and such a clear invitation to the grossest corruptions that it simply can not stand the light of day, or the sunshine of publicity.
Already, an August 2006 Zogby poll shows that 92% of the American public support a system of observable vote counting by citizens. This is a totally nonpartisan issue, and high support exists for observable vote counting across every political party and demographic. This is yet another reason why there is simply no excuse for Congress to deny the will of the people in favor of the corporate will to own the heart of our democracy as their own private property. There is also no excuse for asking us to trust these private corporations or officials, our system is not based on trust it is based on checks and balances.
Thus, in fighting to restore our freedom we are incredibly lucky in our generation, that the battle will only involve informing all of our fellow Americans, and watching these vote counting corporations and their election official defenders of secrecy melt before the power of the Declaration of Independence. Today, we have the unique privilege of knowing for sure that we are fighting for freedom and democracy, even as some who have served our country and sacrificed their lives might understandably have had a doubt whether it was truly necessary to sacrifice their lives. But as the Marines say “Ours is not to wonder why, ours is just to do or die.”
If you’d like to see the American Declaration of Independence be restored to its rightful course as the world’s beacon of rights freedom, for all of humanity and for all time, if you believe that America is real and that ideas matter, your help is very needed to spread the word to our fellow citizens, the true and rightful rulers of this country. To do this, please post, email or copy and paste this article in as many places as you can find, and talk about it with whoever you can. Do this today, tomorrow, and the next day, and keep going because the sacred inalienable rights of the Declaration are top news EVERY DAY, regardless of what anyone says.
In distributing this word, we need to let all American citizens know of the unfaithfulness of our government to the principles they are sworn to uphold, and that they are about to vote in the House of Representatives on HR 811 and in the Senate on S1487 which will institutionalize secret vote counting for Senators and Representatives IN THEIR OWN ELECTIONS. This too, this self-serving behavior, will not stand, and can not stand. It would be comical were freedom not so serious.
Many state constitutions and the 1776 Virginia Declaration of Rights state words directly to the effect that “a frequent recurrence to fundamental principles is necessary to the preservation of liberty and free government.” See, e.g., Wash. State Const. Art. I, sec. 32. Thus, in passing word to your fellow citizens, you are literally doing what is necessary to preserve liberty and freedom: remembering the principles of the Declaration and using them as the tools of Freedom and the defenders of democracy.
Whether our freedom as a people is restored soon or not depends on how much each of you acts like Paul Revere and does your part. There’s a simple test here of your status: if you are a one of the co-equal ruler-citizens of this country, you will be alarmed by this and tell as many of your fellow rulers as possible to keep our eyes on the prize and put aside any partisan differences in order to preserve the freedom of ALL Americans on this issue On the other hand, if you have adopted the ways of the slave, you will be fearful, or depressed, or otherwise rationalize inaction in some way: you will not feel empowered. Indeed, rationalization is the process of surrender.
As Thomas Paine reminded America in Common Sense in 1776, “we have the power to begin the world all over again.” He also said “Be free, set up for yourselves, a great destiny is before you, show yourselves worthy of it.” We can all be tied for the most important citizen in our democracy, each with an equal vote, or we can be slaves bossed around by others with no real say, and a government we can’t change that stays stuck on the “Stupid” setting.
We are each free to do nothing for our country. But in this case that may be the last decision the American people are allowed to make by their masters. So please study paragraph 2 of the Declaration of Independence, find out more places to learn at www.psephos-us.org and spread the word. Tell every state and federal politician that it is corrupt to have secret vote counting at all, and unbelievably improper to vote for it for their own elections. It will only be a matter of months, if we all do this, before politicians are doing their rightful job of falling all over themselves to fully restore citizen control of our own elections.
It’s our country, our government, our elections, our representatives, our ballots, our votes, our tax dollars, and our opinions that count. The government has never received a single legitimate tax dollar, or power, except from We the People. They are public servants, not the public’s masters. So educate everyone first, then later on in late summer we’ll have to have a talk with them about who’s really in charge of this country: a refresher course in Independence.
Paul R Lehto
Attorney at Law
lehtolawyer@gmail.com
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Thom Hartmann On Stealing Elections
http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_thom_har_070621_the_ultimate_felony_.htm
The hot story in the Blogosphere is that the "erroneous" exit polls that showed Kerry carrying Florida and Ohio (among other states) weren't erroneous at all - it was the numbers produced by paperless voting machines that were wrong, and Kerry actually won. As more and more analysis is done of what may (or may not) be the most massive election fraud in the history of the world, however, it's critical that we keep the largest issue at the forefront at all time: Why are We The People allowing private, for-profit corporations, answerable only to their officers and boards of directors, and loyal only to agendas and politicians that will enhance their profitability, to handle our votes?
Maybe Florida went for Kerry, maybe for Bush. Over time - and through the efforts of some very motivated investigative reporters - we may well find out. Bev Harris of www.blackboxvoting.org just filed what may be the largest Freedom of Information Act [FOIA} filing in history), and bloggers and investigative reporters are discovering an odd discrepancy in exit polls being largely accurate in paper-ballot states and oddly inaccurate in touch-screen electronic voting states Even raw voter analyses are showing extreme oddities in touch-screen-run Florida, and eagle-eyed bloggers are finding that news organizations are retroactively altering their exit polls to coincide with what the machines ultimately said.
But in all the discussion about voting machines, let's never forget the concept of the commons, because this usurpation is the ultimate felony committed by conservatives this year.
At the founding of this nation, we decided that there were important places to invest our tax (then tariff) dollars, and those were the things that had to do with the overall "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" of all of us. Over time, these commons - in which we all make tax investments and for which we all hold ultimate responsibility - have come to include our police and fire services; our military and defense; our roads and skyways; our air, waters and national parks; and the safety of our food and drugs.
But the most important of all the commons in which we've invested our hard-earned tax dollars is our government itself. It's owned by us, run by us (through our elected representatives), answerable to us, and most directly responsible for stewardship of our commons.
And the commons through which we regulate the commons of our government is our vote.
About two years ago, I wrote a story for these pages, "If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines," that exposed how Senator Chuck Hagel had, before stepping down and running for the U.S. Senate in Nebraska, been the head of the voting machine company (now ES&S) that had just computerized Nebraska's vote. The Washington Post (1/13/1997) said Hagel's "Senate victory against an incumbent Democratic governor was the major Republican upset in the November election." According to Bev Harris, Hagel won virtually every demographic group, including many largely black communities that had never before voted Republican. Hagel was the first Republican in 24 years to win a Senate seat in Nebraska, nearly all on unauditable machines he had just sold the state. And in all probability, Hagel run for President in 2008.
In another, later I also wrote an article at the request of MoveOn.org and which they mailed to their millions of members, I noted that in Georgia - another state that went all-electronic. "USA Today reported on Nov. 3, 2002, 'In Georgia, an Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll shows Democratic Sen. Max Cleland with a 49%-to-44% lead over Republican Rep. Saxby Chambliss. 'Cox News Service, based in Atlanta, reported just after the election (Nov. 7) that, "Pollsters may have goofed" because 'Republican Rep. Saxby Chambliss defeated incumbent Democratic Sen. Max Cleland by a margin of 53 to 46 percent. The Hotline, a political news service, recalled a series of polls Wednesday showing that Chambliss had been ahead in none of them.'" Nearly every vote in the state was on an electronic machine with no audit trail.
In the years since those first articles appeared, Bev Harris has published her book on the subject ("Black Box Voting"), including the revelation of her finding the notorious "Rob Georgia" folder on Diebold's FTP site just after Cleland's loss there; Lynn Landes has done some groundbreaking research, particularly her new investigation of the Associated Press, as have Rebecca Mercuri and David Dill. There's a new video out on the topic, Votergate, available at www.votergate.tv.
Congressman Rush Holt introduced a bill into Congress requiring a voter-verified paper ballot be produced by all electronic voting machines, and it's been co-sponsored by a majority of the Democratic members of the House of Representatives. The two-year battle fought by Dennis Hastert and Tom DeLay to keep it from coming to a vote, thus insuring that there will be no possible audit of the votes of about a third of the 2004 electorate, has fueled the flames of conspiracy theorists convinced Republican ideologues - now known to be willing to lie in television advertising - would extend their "ends justifies the means" morality to stealing the vote "for the better good of the country" they think single-party Republican rule will bring.
Most important, though, the rallying cry of the emerging "honest vote" movement must become: Get Corporations Out Of Our Vote!
Why have we let corporations into our polling places, locations so sacred to democracy that in many states even international election monitors and reporters are banned? Why are we allowing corporations to exclusively handle our vote, in a secret and totally invisible way? Particularly a private corporation founded, in one case, by a family that believes the Bible should replace the Constitution; in another case run by one of Ohio's top Republicans; and in another case partly owned by Saudi investors?
Of all the violations of the commons - all of the crimes against We The People and against democracy in our great and historic republic - this is the greatest. Our vote is too important to outsource to private corporations.
It's time that the USA - like most of the rest of the world - returns to paper ballots, counted by hand by civil servants (our employees) under the watchful eye of the party faithful. Even if it takes two weeks to count the vote, and we have to just go, until then, with the exit polls of the news agencies. It worked just fine for nearly 200 years in the USA, and it can work again.
When I lived in Germany, they took the vote the same way most of the world does - people fill in hand-marked ballots, which are hand-counted by civil servants taking a week off from their regular jobs, watched over by volunteer representatives of the political parties. It's totally clean, and easily audited. And even though it takes a week or more to count the vote (and costs nothing more than a bit of overtime pay for civil servants), the German people know the election results the night the polls close because the news media's exit polls, for two generations, have never been more than a tenth of a percent off.
We could have saved billions that have instead been handed over to ES&S, Diebold, and other private corporations.
Or, if we must have machines, let's have them owned by local governments, maintained and programmed by civil servants answerable to We The People, using open-source code and disconnected from modems, that produce a voter-verified printed ballot, with all results published on a precinct-by-precinct basis.
As Thomas Paine wrote at this nation's founding, "The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which all other rights are protected. To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery."
Only when We The People reclaim the commons of our vote can we again be confident in the integrity of our electoral process in the world's oldest and most powerful democratic republic.
Thom Hartmann (www.thomhartmann.com) is a Project Censored Award-winning best-selling author and host of a nationally syndicated daily progressive talk show. www.thomhartmann .com His most recent books are "The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight," "Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights," "We The People: A Call To Take Back America," and "What Would Jefferson Do?: A Return To Democracy."
This article is copyright by Thom Hartmann, but permission is granted for reprint in print, email, blog, or web media so long as this credit is attached and the title is unchanged. Published on Thursday, November 4, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1104-38.htm
The hot story in the Blogosphere is that the "erroneous" exit polls that showed Kerry carrying Florida and Ohio (among other states) weren't erroneous at all - it was the numbers produced by paperless voting machines that were wrong, and Kerry actually won. As more and more analysis is done of what may (or may not) be the most massive election fraud in the history of the world, however, it's critical that we keep the largest issue at the forefront at all time: Why are We The People allowing private, for-profit corporations, answerable only to their officers and boards of directors, and loyal only to agendas and politicians that will enhance their profitability, to handle our votes?
Maybe Florida went for Kerry, maybe for Bush. Over time - and through the efforts of some very motivated investigative reporters - we may well find out. Bev Harris of www.blackboxvoting.org just filed what may be the largest Freedom of Information Act [FOIA} filing in history), and bloggers and investigative reporters are discovering an odd discrepancy in exit polls being largely accurate in paper-ballot states and oddly inaccurate in touch-screen electronic voting states Even raw voter analyses are showing extreme oddities in touch-screen-run Florida, and eagle-eyed bloggers are finding that news organizations are retroactively altering their exit polls to coincide with what the machines ultimately said.
But in all the discussion about voting machines, let's never forget the concept of the commons, because this usurpation is the ultimate felony committed by conservatives this year.
At the founding of this nation, we decided that there were important places to invest our tax (then tariff) dollars, and those were the things that had to do with the overall "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" of all of us. Over time, these commons - in which we all make tax investments and for which we all hold ultimate responsibility - have come to include our police and fire services; our military and defense; our roads and skyways; our air, waters and national parks; and the safety of our food and drugs.
But the most important of all the commons in which we've invested our hard-earned tax dollars is our government itself. It's owned by us, run by us (through our elected representatives), answerable to us, and most directly responsible for stewardship of our commons.
And the commons through which we regulate the commons of our government is our vote.
About two years ago, I wrote a story for these pages, "If You Want To Win An Election, Just Control The Voting Machines," that exposed how Senator Chuck Hagel had, before stepping down and running for the U.S. Senate in Nebraska, been the head of the voting machine company (now ES&S) that had just computerized Nebraska's vote. The Washington Post (1/13/1997) said Hagel's "Senate victory against an incumbent Democratic governor was the major Republican upset in the November election." According to Bev Harris, Hagel won virtually every demographic group, including many largely black communities that had never before voted Republican. Hagel was the first Republican in 24 years to win a Senate seat in Nebraska, nearly all on unauditable machines he had just sold the state. And in all probability, Hagel run for President in 2008.
In another, later I also wrote an article at the request of MoveOn.org and which they mailed to their millions of members, I noted that in Georgia - another state that went all-electronic. "USA Today reported on Nov. 3, 2002, 'In Georgia, an Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll shows Democratic Sen. Max Cleland with a 49%-to-44% lead over Republican Rep. Saxby Chambliss. 'Cox News Service, based in Atlanta, reported just after the election (Nov. 7) that, "Pollsters may have goofed" because 'Republican Rep. Saxby Chambliss defeated incumbent Democratic Sen. Max Cleland by a margin of 53 to 46 percent. The Hotline, a political news service, recalled a series of polls Wednesday showing that Chambliss had been ahead in none of them.'" Nearly every vote in the state was on an electronic machine with no audit trail.
In the years since those first articles appeared, Bev Harris has published her book on the subject ("Black Box Voting"), including the revelation of her finding the notorious "Rob Georgia" folder on Diebold's FTP site just after Cleland's loss there; Lynn Landes has done some groundbreaking research, particularly her new investigation of the Associated Press, as have Rebecca Mercuri and David Dill. There's a new video out on the topic, Votergate, available at www.votergate.tv.
Congressman Rush Holt introduced a bill into Congress requiring a voter-verified paper ballot be produced by all electronic voting machines, and it's been co-sponsored by a majority of the Democratic members of the House of Representatives. The two-year battle fought by Dennis Hastert and Tom DeLay to keep it from coming to a vote, thus insuring that there will be no possible audit of the votes of about a third of the 2004 electorate, has fueled the flames of conspiracy theorists convinced Republican ideologues - now known to be willing to lie in television advertising - would extend their "ends justifies the means" morality to stealing the vote "for the better good of the country" they think single-party Republican rule will bring.
Most important, though, the rallying cry of the emerging "honest vote" movement must become: Get Corporations Out Of Our Vote!
Why have we let corporations into our polling places, locations so sacred to democracy that in many states even international election monitors and reporters are banned? Why are we allowing corporations to exclusively handle our vote, in a secret and totally invisible way? Particularly a private corporation founded, in one case, by a family that believes the Bible should replace the Constitution; in another case run by one of Ohio's top Republicans; and in another case partly owned by Saudi investors?
Of all the violations of the commons - all of the crimes against We The People and against democracy in our great and historic republic - this is the greatest. Our vote is too important to outsource to private corporations.
It's time that the USA - like most of the rest of the world - returns to paper ballots, counted by hand by civil servants (our employees) under the watchful eye of the party faithful. Even if it takes two weeks to count the vote, and we have to just go, until then, with the exit polls of the news agencies. It worked just fine for nearly 200 years in the USA, and it can work again.
When I lived in Germany, they took the vote the same way most of the world does - people fill in hand-marked ballots, which are hand-counted by civil servants taking a week off from their regular jobs, watched over by volunteer representatives of the political parties. It's totally clean, and easily audited. And even though it takes a week or more to count the vote (and costs nothing more than a bit of overtime pay for civil servants), the German people know the election results the night the polls close because the news media's exit polls, for two generations, have never been more than a tenth of a percent off.
We could have saved billions that have instead been handed over to ES&S, Diebold, and other private corporations.
Or, if we must have machines, let's have them owned by local governments, maintained and programmed by civil servants answerable to We The People, using open-source code and disconnected from modems, that produce a voter-verified printed ballot, with all results published on a precinct-by-precinct basis.
As Thomas Paine wrote at this nation's founding, "The right of voting for representatives is the primary right by which all other rights are protected. To take away this right is to reduce a man to slavery."
Only when We The People reclaim the commons of our vote can we again be confident in the integrity of our electoral process in the world's oldest and most powerful democratic republic.
Thom Hartmann (www.thomhartmann.com) is a Project Censored Award-winning best-selling author and host of a nationally syndicated daily progressive talk show. www.thomhartmann .com His most recent books are "The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight," "Unequal Protection: The Rise of Corporate Dominance and the Theft of Human Rights," "We The People: A Call To Take Back America," and "What Would Jefferson Do?: A Return To Democracy."
This article is copyright by Thom Hartmann, but permission is granted for reprint in print, email, blog, or web media so long as this credit is attached and the title is unchanged. Published on Thursday, November 4, 2004 by CommonDreams.org
http://www.commondreams.org/views04/1104-38.htm
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Martians Actually Landed
Nice perspective Paul!
From Paul Lehto, Lawyer In the Bilbray Busby debacle in San Diego.
In 1938 when Orson Welles' War of the Worlds scared the bejesus out of the United States, the Martians actually landed, as reported on the radio, (according to the blog below) right near Congressman Rush Holt's Princeton, New Jersey district office. Give or take a mile, it seems to me. But that's close enough for government work.
The Martian landing is commemorated by a plaque in Van Ness Park, and you can see the plaque in a picture on this blog. http://ipbiz.blogspot.com/2007/06/can-you-spot-martian.html
It is not known if the invasion directly or indirectly caused any of the provisions in HR 811. In any case, HR 811 sounds so much like reform, it fools a lot of people!
Also within a mile or so of the Martian landing and Congressman Holt's district office are the offices of the vendor Avante. http://www.google.com/maps?hl=en&pwst=1&q=avante&near=Princeton,+NJ&cid=0,0,2084074158486265394&ll=40.346984,-74.654380&spn=0,.02&sa=X&oi=local&ct=image Avante calls itself "the world's first" maker of voter-verified paper records for DREs -- and is clearly an employer in Rush Holt's congressional district. http://www.avantetech.com/ It's doubtful that any Avante executives contribute to Holt's campaigns in any way, no sense in looking into such things.
Avante also has a bunch of interesting Homeland Security products, like the "Baggage Handling And Air Transport Security Solution" Plus an ID tag that allows folks to be tracked. It looks like they've got TRAKKER trademarked several times. ACCESS-TRAKKER, LIVESTOCK-TRAKKER and (yes, indeed) Vote-TRAKKER (world's first voter verified paper record!!). Of course, the Vote-TRAKKER won't track who you are or HOW you voted, or anything else. That's why it's called TRAKKER, silly!!
Daniel Hopsicker suggests that war of the worlds was actually a psych warfare experiment. See, e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_of_the_Worlds_%28radio%29 and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_War_of_the_Worlds_(novel ) OThers say that's bull.
I only wish this would have been disclosed so that we would know that HR 811 was an important Homeland Security TRAKKER project, I would have realized more readily the need.
Paul R Lehto, Juris Doctor
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Palast: US Attorney Resigns Following Conyers’ Request for BBC Documents
US Attorney Resigns
Following Conyers’ Request for BBC Documents
Published June 1st, 2007 in Articles
by Greg Palast
June 1, 2007
Tim Griffin, formerly right hand man to Karl Rove, resigned Thursday as US Attorney for Arkansas hours after BBC Television ‘Newsnight’ reported that Congressman John Conyers requested the network’s evidence on Griffin’s involvement in ‘caging voters.’ Greg Palast, reporting for BBC Newsnight, obtained a series of confidential emails from the 2004 Bush-Cheney campaign. In these emails, Griffin, then the GOP Deputy Communications Director, transmitted so-called ‘caging lists’ of voters to state party leaders.
Experts have concluded the caging lists were designed for a mass challenge of voters’ right to cast ballots. The caging lists were heavily weighted with minority voters including homeless individuals, students and soldiers sent overseas.
Conyers, Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee investigating the firing of US Attorneys, met Thursday evening in New York with Palast. After reviewing key documents, Conyers stated that, despite Griffin’s resignation, “We’re not through with him by any means.”
Conyers indicated to the BBC that he thought it unlikely that Griffin could carry out this massive ‘caging’ operation without the knowledge of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Rove.
Griffin has not responded to requests by BBC to explain this ‘caging’ operation. However, in emails subpoenaed by Conyers’ committee, Griffin complains to Monica Goodling, an assistant to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, about the BBC reporter’s reproduction of caging lists in Palast’s book, “Armed Madhouse.”
In the email dated February 5 of this year, Griffin stated that the purpose of ‘caging’ was to identify “fraudulent” voters. This contradicts one explanation of the Bush campaign to BBC that the lists were of potential donors and not in any way created to challenge voters.
Griffin confidentially wrote: “The real story is this: There were thousands of reported illegal/fake voter registrations around the country, so some of the Republican State Parties mailed letters welcoming new voters to the newly registered voters. … The Republican State Parties ultimately wanted to show that thousands of fraudulent registrations had been completed.”
Last Wednesday, Goodling testified under a grant of immunity before the House Judiciary Committee that Gonzales’ Deputy Paul McNulty, “failed to disclose that he had some knowledge of allegations that Tim Griffin had been involved in vote ‘caging’ during his work on the President’s 2004 campaign.”
Goodling’s testimony prompted Conyers’ request to the BBC for the Griffin emails.
Last night Palast showed Conyers a Griffin email from August 2004 indicating that Griffin not only knew of ‘caging,’ but directed the operation.
**********
And check out this story from Slate: Raging Caging - What the heck is vote caging, and why should we care?
Greg Palast is the author of the New York Times bestseller, ARMED MADHOUSE: From Baghdad to New Orleans — Sordid Secrets and Strange Tales of a White House Gone Wild. For information, go to www.GregPalast.com
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Holt Bill Will Result In Vendor "Gains" Being "Locked In" Under The US Constitution
Go here to sign a petition to your National representatives to stop the secret election machinery (STOP Holt Bill HR811) and read reasoning behind it. Please forward, it is your democracy at stake.
http://www.usalone.com/cgi-bin/petition.cgi?pnum=638
Add to Mark Crispin Miller's comments below, and Nancy Tobi's opednews article referenced below and available at http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_nancy_to_070528_hr_811__28the_holt_bil.htm this very important point showing that "incremental progress" is an illusion in many ways because the Holt bill will result in vendor "gains" being "locked in" under the US Constitution:
Under the Contracts Clause and the Takings Clause of the US Constitution, governments can not constitutionally impair the value of contracts in existence or "take" property for a public purpose. This means that there is no "incremental" progress available in the next Congress if the provisions of the Holt bill inspire more contracts for technology development -- those contracts are "locked in" under the US Constitution.
Moreover, "incremental progress" or "don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good" is a clever misnomer when it comes to RIGHTS. This is so because a compromise of a right is nothing less than the violation of the same right. Do you want "incremental" free speech? Incremental democracy? The fact that Holt proponents are not even MAKING DEMAND for democracy such as in the manner below, shows the lie or the defect in their approach: no wonder they are so frustrated they think that this is all that democracy can get with the present Congress. If so, our government servants are now indeed our Masters.
The central problem with the pro-Holt approach is that it constantly slips into a "balancing test" of comparing positives and negatives and says "something is better than nothing" but balancing tests are never appropriate in the area of rights: Rights Trump competing values, thus I can speak whatever content I wish no matter whether the government and 80% of the public disagree with me.
This "balancing test" approach of pro-HR 811 folks is not just wrong, it is not merely a problem, it ignores and completely fails to consider Democracy and its rights and values at all! Compare this reality with the quote from James Madison at the bottom of the Nancy Tobi opednews article below and see which side YOU come out on.
Freedom and Democracy are easily lost when they are not even allowed to be at the negotiation table, and when quoting our nation's most important principles, rights and Founders is considered "blowhard" "18th Century Statesmen" -- the very terms used to describe me and my quotation of Madison, Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence on this, our Memorial Day Weekend. No wonder our democracy is dying or dead when, in a manner of speaking, Thomas Jefferson is not allowed to be at the negotiation table, and our most inalienable rights are dismissed by Holt proponents as "philosophy" "encomium" or mere "inspiration."
Folks, make no mistake, since our Democracy depends on it. Quotes from "18th Century Statesmen" like these are the TOOLS OF DEMOCRACY. They are guide-stars for our direction and they are tests for whether a voting system complies with the needs of democracy. They worked for women's suffrage and for Martin Luther King in I HAVE A DREAM.
HCPB? I've no choice but to support it because in the democracy race for voting systems, it is Running UNOPPOSED. Only by arguing non-democratic values like efficiency can we get to any other voting system. But as Harry Truman said, if you want efficiency, you'll get a dictatorship.
Paul Lehto
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Mark Crispin Miller
Date: May 28, 2007 7:47 AM
Subject: [MCM] Don't say we didn't warn you
To: BLOCKED
The Holt Bill's supporters won't debate about it publicly. Why not?
Because the bill is indefensible, as this important piece makes very clear.
Please read and circulate this sharp analysis--or, if you support the bill,
and find fault with the facts or logic here, please try to persuade someone
in your camp to stand up and make the pro-Holt case in public.
MCM
OpEdNews
Original Content at http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_nancy_to_070528_hr_811__28the_holt_bil.htm
May 28, 2007
HR 811 (The Holt Bill): Let the debate begin
By Nancy Tobi
There is a raging and often destructive debate among voting activists. The source of the discord is "The Holt Bill", a piece of federal election reform legislation named for its primary author, Democratic Congressman Rush Holt from the great state of New Jersey. The destructive nature of the exchanges among activists has led some of us who oppose the bill to propose, in the best of our American democratic traditions, a public debate on the merits of the bill.
We who oppose believe anything that stands to so dramatically transform, and possibly violate, the nature of American democracy deserves robust public debate, based on facts and principle.
Congress has already held its so-called public hearings on the bill, but those hearings were stacked with many pro-811 witnesses, and the few opponents of the legislation were not debating what we oppositional citizens believe are the real issues that need a good, public airing:
•
The bill violates state sovereignty and cements control over the nation's voting systems in the hands of four white house appointees.
The bill codifies into federal law the use of secret vote counting technologies in the United States of America.
The bill mandates impossible, ineffective and controversial audit and reporting requirements and timetables.
The bill confuses technology with democracy , embracing the tenets of the one over the other.
The bill furthers the misguided and undemocratic direction initiated with the Help America Vote Act that replaces observable voting with verifiable voting
Unfortunately, in what appears to be a desperate desire to keep the rhetoric flying and the facts suppressed from any public discourse, supporters of the bill have refused every offer for real public debate.
Some of the more vocal supporters of the bill state that if we opponents are questioning the confusing language of the bill, it must be that we are not as "intelligent" as they are. Sort of like the way a sales person for an exclusive item will look down his nose and tell you, "if you have to ask what it costs, you obviously can't afford it."
If we have to ask what this bill means to our democracy, we are obviously in the wrong shop.
I, for one, would like to see robust debate on the merits of this complex bill. For one thing, the principles of democracy are at stake.
The American people deserve to hear honest debate on if and how this proposed election reform supports the fundamental principles of American democracy without which our elections are nothing but a sham.
As well, the language of the 62 page bill is so dangerously ambiguous in so many critical areas, that we ought to expose the ambiguities to the light before HR811 becomes the law of the land and our elections are thrown to the courts to decide what means what.
And finally, public debate is called for because of the complex, often conflicting, and seemingly impossible and impractical requirements of the bill. These requirements are outrageously expensive, the costs of which will be borne in large part by American property taxpayers as the nation's towns, cities, and counties struggle to meet the bill's unfunded high tech mandates.
And a careful analysis of the bill's timelines, equations, and reporting requirements indicates they just don't seem to add up to anything that will actually work in the real world. This fundamental flaw in the bill puts every state in the nation at risk if it forces them to try to run legal elections when the law itself is unsupportable.
This is not the birthright of democracy the framers of the U.S. Constitution bequeathed us.
The Holt Bill, in its former incarnation as HR 550, languished in committee under the former Republican majority, and was never released to the full House for a vote. With the Democratic takeover, the bill resurfaced in its current incarnation, HR 811. Within days of the November 2006 victory, Dem leaders were predicting the swift passage of election reform. They were going to "own" the issue that had been stymied under the Republican rule.
Unfortunately, the new leadership was stuck holding the same moldy bag of election reform that had been decaying in the former Republican majority's pantry. And time was not kind to the Holt Bill. As it languished, its unpleasant odor wafted through the ranks of citizen activists, many of whom, one by one, began to experience an unmistakable squeamishness about the bill.
When HR 550 was whisked out of the pantry, washed down, spiced up, and placed on the table of the House Administration Committee in its new form as HR 811, many former supporters found they could no longer stomach the bill, even in its shiny new form. One might even say, especially in its shiny new form.
The ranks of ordinary citizens, who laboriously studied the bill and its implications, the nation's election officials, counties, legislators, and even the e-voting industry itself, uniformly rose in loud and raucous opposition to its passage.
HR 811 quickly became a disputed and controversial bill, left only with its primary supporters being well funded lobbying groups like Common Cause, MoveOn, TrueMajority, Verified Voting and VoteTrustUSA.
Nonetheless, rumors abounded that the bill was going to be "fast tracked" through the Committee, on to the House floor, where it would be swiftly passed by a leadership-sponsored "unity" Democratic vote and dropped into the laps of the American people.
But apparently the bill's controversial nature has slowed down the fast track. Now the bill sits on the table, waiting for someone to take a bite. But while it is tempting and delectable to some activists and their seemingly well funded lobbyists, others of us are as repelled by the odor emanating from the bill as ever before.
The arguments proposed by HR 811 proponents are as effective in addressing the problems of the bill as spitting on a house on fire:
• "This is the best bill we can get passed by Congress."
• "If we don't pass this bill now we won't have any election reform in place for 2008."
• "Even if the bill supports secret vote counting, at least we'll force the states to conduct election audits."
• "At least our elections will be, if not observable by the citizenry, verifiable by 'qualified' persons and 'experts'."
• If you oppose the bill you are not as intelligent as we are.
The problem is that the defects of the bill are not small and can not be dismissed , as has been attempted with each new version of the bill, through copyediting, wordsmithing, and vagaries of text. In fact, the bill's flaws touch at the deepest levels our very notions, ideals, traditions, and fundamental constitutional rights with respect to American democracy.
In a recent email exchange inviting Holt proponents to a public debate, activist and attorney Paul Lehto was accused by a central Holt Bill proponent of "blowing hot air and quoting 18th century statesmen." Does this mean that this particular HR 811 proponent, whose organization has recently hired a high powered lobbyist just to get the bill passed, agrees with what George W. Bush is rumored to have stated, that our Constitution is "just a piece of paper"?
God bless Paul Lehto for quoting "18th century statesmen." They are the revolutionary spirits and first American patriots, who rose in opposition to a centralized power that used its authority to make bad and dangerous decisions for the people of this country. It is to them that we owe our freedoms and our dignities.
It is not enough for us to breeze past their messages and to sit content in our air conditioned homes, driving our Mercedes, eating our abundance of food.
Our country, the United States of America, was founded on ideals and principles, the principles of freedom and democracy, bolstered by robust public dissent, dialog, and debate. It is the strength of these principles that have enabled us to become the greatest superpower on earth. It is the words of those "18th century statesmen" that we must shine like a beacon to light for us the way forward, to remind us that our country is a country of the rule of law, and the basis and foundation for that rule of law is the U.S. Constitution.
This revolutionary document and declaration of democratic principles, written in the midst of much public debate and honest dissent and discourse, has stood the test of time. Our Constitution must be in the forefront of everything we do when tinkering with anything as crucial as the foundation of our democracy: our elections.
Lehto provides this quote from 18th century statesmen, American patriot and founder James Madison:
. . . [T]he Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny. . . . The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost." --James Madison
Lehto also reminds us that the principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence are clear: we the people are the masters, our elected officials are the servants. Our democracy guarantees us the right to "kick the bums out" when our servants are misbehaving. And this means that we can not allow our elected representatives to enact laws facilitating the rigging of our elections, debasing the tenets of our democracy, and enshrining secret vote counting, which is the foundation of fascism and not democracy.
Lehto, like Madison, reminds us that this right is worth defending, at whatever the cost.
We who oppose HR 811 believe that a public debate on the merits of this legislation is not too high a cost to pay in defense of our country.
Authors Website: www.democracyfornewhampshire.com
Authors Bio:
Nancy Tobi is the author of numerous articles on election integrity, including "The Gifts of HAVA: Time to Ask for a Refund," "What's Wrong with the Holt Bill,"and "We're Counting the Votes: An Election Preparedness Kit." She is Legislative Coordinator of Election Defense Alliance, co-founder of Democracy for New Hampshire and Chair of the New Hampshire Fair Elections Committee. Her writings may be found at www.electiondefensealliance.org and www.democracyfornewhampshire.com
--
Paul R Lehto, Juris Doctor
plehto@psephos-us.org
425-422-1387
http://www.usalone.com/cgi-bin/petition.cgi?pnum=638
Add to Mark Crispin Miller's comments below, and Nancy Tobi's opednews article referenced below and available at http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_nancy_to_070528_hr_811__28the_holt_bil.htm this very important point showing that "incremental progress" is an illusion in many ways because the Holt bill will result in vendor "gains" being "locked in" under the US Constitution:
Under the Contracts Clause and the Takings Clause of the US Constitution, governments can not constitutionally impair the value of contracts in existence or "take" property for a public purpose. This means that there is no "incremental" progress available in the next Congress if the provisions of the Holt bill inspire more contracts for technology development -- those contracts are "locked in" under the US Constitution.
Moreover, "incremental progress" or "don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good" is a clever misnomer when it comes to RIGHTS. This is so because a compromise of a right is nothing less than the violation of the same right. Do you want "incremental" free speech? Incremental democracy? The fact that Holt proponents are not even MAKING DEMAND for democracy such as in the manner below, shows the lie or the defect in their approach: no wonder they are so frustrated they think that this is all that democracy can get with the present Congress. If so, our government servants are now indeed our Masters.
The central problem with the pro-Holt approach is that it constantly slips into a "balancing test" of comparing positives and negatives and says "something is better than nothing" but balancing tests are never appropriate in the area of rights: Rights Trump competing values, thus I can speak whatever content I wish no matter whether the government and 80% of the public disagree with me.
This "balancing test" approach of pro-HR 811 folks is not just wrong, it is not merely a problem, it ignores and completely fails to consider Democracy and its rights and values at all! Compare this reality with the quote from James Madison at the bottom of the Nancy Tobi opednews article below and see which side YOU come out on.
Freedom and Democracy are easily lost when they are not even allowed to be at the negotiation table, and when quoting our nation's most important principles, rights and Founders is considered "blowhard" "18th Century Statesmen" -- the very terms used to describe me and my quotation of Madison, Jefferson and the Declaration of Independence on this, our Memorial Day Weekend. No wonder our democracy is dying or dead when, in a manner of speaking, Thomas Jefferson is not allowed to be at the negotiation table, and our most inalienable rights are dismissed by Holt proponents as "philosophy" "encomium" or mere "inspiration."
Folks, make no mistake, since our Democracy depends on it. Quotes from "18th Century Statesmen" like these are the TOOLS OF DEMOCRACY. They are guide-stars for our direction and they are tests for whether a voting system complies with the needs of democracy. They worked for women's suffrage and for Martin Luther King in I HAVE A DREAM.
HCPB? I've no choice but to support it because in the democracy race for voting systems, it is Running UNOPPOSED. Only by arguing non-democratic values like efficiency can we get to any other voting system. But as Harry Truman said, if you want efficiency, you'll get a dictatorship.
Paul Lehto
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Mark Crispin Miller
Date: May 28, 2007 7:47 AM
Subject: [MCM] Don't say we didn't warn you
To: BLOCKED
The Holt Bill's supporters won't debate about it publicly. Why not?
Because the bill is indefensible, as this important piece makes very clear.
Please read and circulate this sharp analysis--or, if you support the bill,
and find fault with the facts or logic here, please try to persuade someone
in your camp to stand up and make the pro-Holt case in public.
MCM
OpEdNews
Original Content at http://www.opednews.com/articles/opedne_nancy_to_070528_hr_811__28the_holt_bil.htm
May 28, 2007
HR 811 (The Holt Bill): Let the debate begin
By Nancy Tobi
There is a raging and often destructive debate among voting activists. The source of the discord is "The Holt Bill", a piece of federal election reform legislation named for its primary author, Democratic Congressman Rush Holt from the great state of New Jersey. The destructive nature of the exchanges among activists has led some of us who oppose the bill to propose, in the best of our American democratic traditions, a public debate on the merits of the bill.
We who oppose believe anything that stands to so dramatically transform, and possibly violate, the nature of American democracy deserves robust public debate, based on facts and principle.
Congress has already held its so-called public hearings on the bill, but those hearings were stacked with many pro-811 witnesses, and the few opponents of the legislation were not debating what we oppositional citizens believe are the real issues that need a good, public airing:
•
The bill violates state sovereignty and cements control over the nation's voting systems in the hands of four white house appointees.
The bill codifies into federal law the use of secret vote counting technologies in the United States of America.
The bill mandates impossible, ineffective and controversial audit and reporting requirements and timetables.
The bill confuses technology with democracy , embracing the tenets of the one over the other.
The bill furthers the misguided and undemocratic direction initiated with the Help America Vote Act that replaces observable voting with verifiable voting
Unfortunately, in what appears to be a desperate desire to keep the rhetoric flying and the facts suppressed from any public discourse, supporters of the bill have refused every offer for real public debate.
Some of the more vocal supporters of the bill state that if we opponents are questioning the confusing language of the bill, it must be that we are not as "intelligent" as they are. Sort of like the way a sales person for an exclusive item will look down his nose and tell you, "if you have to ask what it costs, you obviously can't afford it."
If we have to ask what this bill means to our democracy, we are obviously in the wrong shop.
I, for one, would like to see robust debate on the merits of this complex bill. For one thing, the principles of democracy are at stake.
The American people deserve to hear honest debate on if and how this proposed election reform supports the fundamental principles of American democracy without which our elections are nothing but a sham.
As well, the language of the 62 page bill is so dangerously ambiguous in so many critical areas, that we ought to expose the ambiguities to the light before HR811 becomes the law of the land and our elections are thrown to the courts to decide what means what.
And finally, public debate is called for because of the complex, often conflicting, and seemingly impossible and impractical requirements of the bill. These requirements are outrageously expensive, the costs of which will be borne in large part by American property taxpayers as the nation's towns, cities, and counties struggle to meet the bill's unfunded high tech mandates.
And a careful analysis of the bill's timelines, equations, and reporting requirements indicates they just don't seem to add up to anything that will actually work in the real world. This fundamental flaw in the bill puts every state in the nation at risk if it forces them to try to run legal elections when the law itself is unsupportable.
This is not the birthright of democracy the framers of the U.S. Constitution bequeathed us.
The Holt Bill, in its former incarnation as HR 550, languished in committee under the former Republican majority, and was never released to the full House for a vote. With the Democratic takeover, the bill resurfaced in its current incarnation, HR 811. Within days of the November 2006 victory, Dem leaders were predicting the swift passage of election reform. They were going to "own" the issue that had been stymied under the Republican rule.
Unfortunately, the new leadership was stuck holding the same moldy bag of election reform that had been decaying in the former Republican majority's pantry. And time was not kind to the Holt Bill. As it languished, its unpleasant odor wafted through the ranks of citizen activists, many of whom, one by one, began to experience an unmistakable squeamishness about the bill.
When HR 550 was whisked out of the pantry, washed down, spiced up, and placed on the table of the House Administration Committee in its new form as HR 811, many former supporters found they could no longer stomach the bill, even in its shiny new form. One might even say, especially in its shiny new form.
The ranks of ordinary citizens, who laboriously studied the bill and its implications, the nation's election officials, counties, legislators, and even the e-voting industry itself, uniformly rose in loud and raucous opposition to its passage.
HR 811 quickly became a disputed and controversial bill, left only with its primary supporters being well funded lobbying groups like Common Cause, MoveOn, TrueMajority, Verified Voting and VoteTrustUSA.
Nonetheless, rumors abounded that the bill was going to be "fast tracked" through the Committee, on to the House floor, where it would be swiftly passed by a leadership-sponsored "unity" Democratic vote and dropped into the laps of the American people.
But apparently the bill's controversial nature has slowed down the fast track. Now the bill sits on the table, waiting for someone to take a bite. But while it is tempting and delectable to some activists and their seemingly well funded lobbyists, others of us are as repelled by the odor emanating from the bill as ever before.
The arguments proposed by HR 811 proponents are as effective in addressing the problems of the bill as spitting on a house on fire:
• "This is the best bill we can get passed by Congress."
• "If we don't pass this bill now we won't have any election reform in place for 2008."
• "Even if the bill supports secret vote counting, at least we'll force the states to conduct election audits."
• "At least our elections will be, if not observable by the citizenry, verifiable by 'qualified' persons and 'experts'."
• If you oppose the bill you are not as intelligent as we are.
The problem is that the defects of the bill are not small and can not be dismissed , as has been attempted with each new version of the bill, through copyediting, wordsmithing, and vagaries of text. In fact, the bill's flaws touch at the deepest levels our very notions, ideals, traditions, and fundamental constitutional rights with respect to American democracy.
In a recent email exchange inviting Holt proponents to a public debate, activist and attorney Paul Lehto was accused by a central Holt Bill proponent of "blowing hot air and quoting 18th century statesmen." Does this mean that this particular HR 811 proponent, whose organization has recently hired a high powered lobbyist just to get the bill passed, agrees with what George W. Bush is rumored to have stated, that our Constitution is "just a piece of paper"?
God bless Paul Lehto for quoting "18th century statesmen." They are the revolutionary spirits and first American patriots, who rose in opposition to a centralized power that used its authority to make bad and dangerous decisions for the people of this country. It is to them that we owe our freedoms and our dignities.
It is not enough for us to breeze past their messages and to sit content in our air conditioned homes, driving our Mercedes, eating our abundance of food.
Our country, the United States of America, was founded on ideals and principles, the principles of freedom and democracy, bolstered by robust public dissent, dialog, and debate. It is the strength of these principles that have enabled us to become the greatest superpower on earth. It is the words of those "18th century statesmen" that we must shine like a beacon to light for us the way forward, to remind us that our country is a country of the rule of law, and the basis and foundation for that rule of law is the U.S. Constitution.
This revolutionary document and declaration of democratic principles, written in the midst of much public debate and honest dissent and discourse, has stood the test of time. Our Constitution must be in the forefront of everything we do when tinkering with anything as crucial as the foundation of our democracy: our elections.
Lehto provides this quote from 18th century statesmen, American patriot and founder James Madison:
. . . [T]he Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny. . . . The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost." --James Madison
Lehto also reminds us that the principles embodied in the Declaration of Independence are clear: we the people are the masters, our elected officials are the servants. Our democracy guarantees us the right to "kick the bums out" when our servants are misbehaving. And this means that we can not allow our elected representatives to enact laws facilitating the rigging of our elections, debasing the tenets of our democracy, and enshrining secret vote counting, which is the foundation of fascism and not democracy.
Lehto, like Madison, reminds us that this right is worth defending, at whatever the cost.
We who oppose HR 811 believe that a public debate on the merits of this legislation is not too high a cost to pay in defense of our country.
Authors Website: www.democracyfornewhampshire.com
Authors Bio:
Nancy Tobi is the author of numerous articles on election integrity, including "The Gifts of HAVA: Time to Ask for a Refund," "What's Wrong with the Holt Bill,"and "We're Counting the Votes: An Election Preparedness Kit." She is Legislative Coordinator of Election Defense Alliance, co-founder of Democracy for New Hampshire and Chair of the New Hampshire Fair Elections Committee. Her writings may be found at www.electiondefensealliance.org and www.democracyfornewhampshire.com
--
Paul R Lehto, Juris Doctor
plehto@psephos-us.org
425-422-1387
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