OT: Elections/Politics thread, part 5

[FatPitcher]

If something is happening in several states that enables widespread 'voting fraud' (to use a proper term of art) I don't see how anyone could possibly take the position that it's not something to be concerned about it.

Would it not concern you if someone piled up all your valuable possessions by the door to make them easier to steal later, because hey, no one has actually stolen anything yet?

I appreciate yours and Jared's links, but that does not justify simply dismissing all registration fraud as harmless.

But I don't think that ACORN's voter registration methods enable widespread voting fraud. ACORN legally has to turn in all of their voter registration forms, even if they are marked as "Mickey Mouse", or even if someone registers 100 times. When turning the forms in, they separate out the dubious ones, and they fire the workers that do things like "Mickey Mouse" registrations.

Then, if Mickey Mouse tries to vote, he won't be able to (unless he has a fake ID). Or if the guy with 100 registrations votes, he'll only be able to vote once (as the elections office likely won't count them 100 times).

So it doesn't seem like there is any evidence that ACORN is enabling voter fraud.

Other than trying to register fictitious voters and register real voters multiple times, sure. You can argue that there's no intent on the part of the organization to commit voter fraud, but that's irrelevant. Incompetent hiring, training, and management has clearly led to voter registration fraud, which is the first step in enabling fraudulent voting. Even if no fraudulent votes are cast as a result, it undermines confidence in the electoral system, because people know that some fraudulent registrations will inevitably slip through, especially in places where registration data inconsistencies aren't being thoroughly investigated. There is certainly far more of a smoking gun here than in the "Diebold gives votes to the GOP!" line that Democrats loved in 2004.

I think reasonable people would conclude that for every cockroach you catch in your house, there are another 100 you never see. Even if it's not intentional, it's a massive assault on the integrity of the voting process. And the same people who line up with ACORN are against stuff like having to have a state-issued ID to vote. Ridiculous...I mean, you have to have that to do something as ordinary as picking up a package at the post office.

As for the "we have to submit all the forms" argument, did ACORN also have to threaten to sue King County to accept 1805 registrations that were over 97% bogus?

I can only imagine how loud the cries of "disenfranchisement!" would be if ACORN registered Republicans rather than Democrats.

[JRod]

There's a difference between voter fraud and voter registration fraud.

And ACORN was the one that actually turned themselves in.

You can't have the first without the second.

And was that before or after they were raided by the FBI?

Except the second isn't happening.

That's because the county clerks or voting officers aren't going to allow it. That's their jobs regardless if they are democrats or republicans. Maybe some in this nation use it a seat to wield partisanship but since they have to be certified by the Secretaries of the various states, they would face legal action. This isn't not counting chads, or eliminating minorities off the voter rolls.

Voter fraud is serious and their are multiple checks in place to make sure this doesn't happen. Voter registration fraud is different. It was ACORN that alerted the officials that they had someone turning in multiple fake forms. And I think ACORN's system sends them through their own system to catch duplicates, which is where ACORN claims they caught this.

There is no widespread proof in this country of voter fraud. None. Believe what you want but the facts of voter fraud are not on your side here.

Hell even if this was Swift boats for McCain registering people, they still wouldn't be able to vote.

[FatPitcher]

I'm not a criminal prosecutor looking for a conviction, nor have I committed a thorough investigation of their activities.

The point is many red flags have been raised about suspicious behavior in many states about ACORN activities. Because there's no smoking gun of a memo that says "hey guys, commit fraud!" we should just ignore what's happening? The point isn't whether or not ACORN employees should be arrested, the point is that we should recognize that what is happening is a problem and look into it.

If something is happening in several states that enables widespread 'voting fraud' (to use a proper term of art) I don't see how anyone could possibly take the position that it's not something to be concerned about it.

Would it not concern you if someone piled up all your valuable possessions by the door to make them easier to steal later, because hey, no one has actually stolen anything yet?

I appreciate yours and Jared's links, but that does not justify simply dismissing all registration fraud as harmless.

OK and why don't you think federal prosecutors under a GOP administration and many state prosecutors under GOP control are looking into it?

Could it be that they have been looking into it but they haven't seen merit to prosecute or try to get a grand jury to indict?

All this ACORN noise is coming from the political operatives, who incidentally have tried to get prosecutors to investigate.

A bigger issue is the purging of possibly as many as millions of voters from the voter rolls in just the swing states alone. Of course, such purging will probably help the Republican cause so you won't hear any complaints about those actions, even though the magnitude of the problem is much greater.

Google acorn conviction, acorn settlement, acorn fraud, acorn embezzlement, etc. You may stumble across an actual court case or two.

[FatPitcher]

There's a difference between voter fraud and voter registration fraud.

And ACORN was the one that actually turned themselves in.

You can't have the first without the second.

And was that before or after they were raided by the FBI?

Except the second isn't happening.

I recommend google for you, too.

[Feanor]

A bigger issue is the purging of possibly as many as millions of voters from the voter rolls in just the swing states alone. Of course, such purging will probably help the Republican cause so you won't hear any complaints about those actions, even though the magnitude of the problem is much greater.

It's a much, much bigger issue. You only have to look at the shenanigans in Ohio in 2004 to see that.

[JRod]

You can't have the first without the second.

And was that before or after they were raided by the FBI?

Except the second isn't happening.

I recommend google for you, too.

Voter fraud isn't happening. That facts are against you there.

[pk500]

That "damned liberal rag" The Washington Post takes a stand against excessive government regulation of the free market in its lead editorial:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... cmoduletmv

Take care,
PK

[FatPitcher]

Except the second isn't happening.

I recommend google for you, too.

Voter fraud isn't happening. That facts are against you there.

Better go back and re-read.

[RobVarak]

Registration fraud is meaningless. It's still going to take a voter to risk committing a felony to vote under false pretenses.

Holy s***! Well you may find it meaningless, but it is illegal. Glad to see you have been given the power of absolution and clemency, congratulations.

Are you this cavalier about all felonies, or just those that seem to benefit the political party whom you choose to support?

And this quote is the single stupidest thing I've read on the internet in a long, long time. And I read OS sometimes!!

Large-scale, coordinated vote stealing doesn't happen.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.h ... =permalink


http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2005/ ... fraud.html

http://74.125.95.104/search?q=cache:GIr ... d=22&gl=us

It only take a few conspirators to result in large-scale vote and election stealing, and it happens all the damn time! And due to our antiquated and convoluted election laws, it happens more often than it is punished.

Jared,

I thought I was clear in distinguishing between registration fraud (again in and of itself a felony in most cases) and voter fraud.

I simply can't understand how people do not see how the flood of bogus registrations calls into question both the efficacy and the veracity of our electoral process!!

I agree that there is a level of hysterics involved to the extent that only a small portion of the false registrations are likely to result in a fraudulent vote. But again, the sheer volume of fake registrations makes it easier to slip bogus absentee ballots into the system as well as fraudulent voters in the non-ID states. The Help America Vote Act requirements are a joke, and fake ID's proliferate like fungus. It fouls up the recount process by making a larger percentage of the ballots provisional and as I said it also messes up the polls.

As for ACORN itself, it is a natinowide organization which has a history of being convicted of and pleading out of felonies for fraud; And doing so on the taxpayers dime!!

An additional tangential problem stemming from their work is the constant torrent of news stories since the winter about how many hundreds of thousands of new voters Obama is registering. That creates a very real perception that he is riding a wave of new enthusiasm, which has an even more real impact on perceptions of his candidacy. By the time that tens of thousands of those registrations are being tossed out at a time because of fraud, the impact of those stories has been consumed. It's similar to how retractions of libel are seldom remedial because they can never make up for the impact of the initial transgression.

I agree that there is far more smoke than fire when it comes to this issue. But given the fact that even the smallest of these fires threatens the integrity of our electoral process I would think that some would be a bit more concerned about the arsonists.

JRod, it's not the county clerks offices that have to be able to stop voter fraud, it's the precinct-level election judges. These are mostly retired people working for pennies and spending 8-15 hour days horribly and completely confused. These people make Sgt. Schultz look like Rambo.

[FatPitcher]

A bigger issue is the purging of possibly as many as millions of voters from the voter rolls in just the swing states alone. Of course, such purging will probably help the Republican cause so you won't hear any complaints about those actions, even though the magnitude of the problem is much greater.

It's a much, much bigger issue. You only have to look at the shenanigans in Ohio in 2004 to see that.

Possibly probably! People die, move, and commit felonies. Should they not be purged from voter rolls when they are no longer eligible to vote?

If they are removed incorrectly, and the error is not corrected before the election, they can cast provisional ballots.

[Jackdog]

I didn't make any campaign contributuons to Obama and I don't want my tax money funding an Obama rally like the one in the ACORN video I posted. That was from the ACORN Convention. As a "non profit" "non partisan" entity that gets federal money they should be stripped of all funds unless they do it for all candidates.

[Jared]

Other than trying to register fictitious voters and register real voters multiple times, sure. You can argue that there's no intent on the part of the organization to commit voter fraud, but that's irrelevant.

But there's no evidence of ACORN trying to register fictitious voters and real voters multiple times. ACORN is REQUIRED by law to turn in every single voter registration form that they get. I believe any organization that collects voter registration forms is required to do that, in order to mitigate against a Democratic-leaning org from turning in forms from only Democrats, and vice versa. And if you have an organization that is trying to register people all over, there will be bad apples that do stupid things like registering Mickey Mouse.

The people who register Mickey Mouse should be prosecuted, obviously. And But Mickey Mouse can't vote. And to call it a "massive assault on the integrity of the voting process" is totally exaggerated, given that (again) organizations are mandated to turn in all forms. For example, what percentage of ACORN-submitted forms are fraudulent? If there's this massive assault, then you'd expect a large percentage of ACORN forms to be fraudulent.

Thing is, this is the same issue that is brought up by the Republicans every election. In 2004 and 2006, there were ACORN cries as well. In fact, the Republican New Mexico AG was fired for not prosecuting supposed voter fraud. Though he didn't prosecute it because there was no evidence for it, and himself calls it "a scare tactic". And it's been standard procedure...take these fraudulent forms (that ACORN is required to turn in), insinuate that they're perpetuating voter fraud, and get the Fox News crowd all worked up over nothing. If anything "undermines confidence in the electoral system", it's misleadingly stoking the public's fears of voter fraud when the evidence isn't there.

(As for King County, from what I know ACORN sued because of a deadline issue with some of their forms. Once they found out that the forms were bogus, they backed off the suit.)

[Naples39]

A bigger issue is the purging of possibly as many as millions of voters from the voter rolls in just the swing states alone. Of course, such purging will probably help the Republican cause so you won't hear any complaints about those actions, even though the magnitude of the problem is much greater.

It's a much, much bigger issue. You only have to look at the shenanigans in Ohio in 2004 to see that.

There certainly were many shenanigans in Ohio in 2004.

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

“You have to wonder what’s the point of that, if not to overwhelm the system and get phony registrations on the voter rolls,” says Thor Hearne of the American Center for Voting Rights, who also testified at the hearing. “These were Democratic officials saying that they felt their election system in Ohio was under assault by these kinds of efforts to game the system.”

http://opinionjournal.com/editorial/fea ... =110009189

[Jared]

I recommend google for you, too.

If I google ufo abduction accounts, I might get a whole slew of information of stories of this happening. Doesn't mean that it happened. It would be much better to present the actual evidence of voter fraud that JRod is asking for.

[wco81]

Registration fraud is meaningless. It's still going to take a voter to risk committing a felony to vote under false pretenses.

Holy s***! Well you may find it meaningless, but it is illegal. Glad to see you have been given the power of absolution and clemency, congratulations.

Are you this cavalier about all felonies, or just those that seem to benefit the political party whom you choose to support?

And this quote is the single stupidest thing I've read on the internet in a long, long time. And I read OS sometimes!!

Large-scale, coordinated vote stealing doesn't happen.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.h ... =permalink


http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2005/ ... fraud.html

http://74.125.95.104/search?q=cache:GIr ... d=22&gl=us

It only take a few conspirators to result in large-scale vote and election stealing, and it happens all the damn time! And due to our antiquated and convoluted election laws, it happens more often than it is punished.

I don't know what your idea of "large-scale" is but in the first case, a federal judge (whose jurisdiction over a state election was in question) threw out under 1800 absentee ballots and reversed the state senate seat in favor of a Republican, after state judges declined the complaint fro the Republican.

It wasn't clear what the breakdown of the 1800 ballots were but he threw all of them out.

And in the end, the Democratic candidate and two campaign workers were convicted of misdemeanors, opening ballot boxes, no conspiracy to commit fraud.

For all I know, that case is about as legit and politically-impartial as Bush vs. Gore 2000.

The other two cases for were also local elections, one of them again involving absentee ballots. Again, how many votes were involved and what does "large-scale" mean?

There's been ballot stuffing and other voting problems in this nation's history. I'm not claiming that those problems are all behind us or that we ignore them.

But the ones howling about ACORN would have a lot more credibility if they showed equal outrage about Diebold or voter-suppression efforts. Otherwise, it's the same partisan noise you accuse others of.

[Jackdog]

And it's been standard procedure...take these fraudulent forms (that ACORN is required to turn in), insinuate that they're perpetuating voter fraud, and get the Fox News crowd all worked up over nothing. If anything "undermines confidence in the electoral system", it's misleadingly stoking the public's fears of voter fraud when the evidence isn't there.

Generalize much? What gets the BET crowd fired up?

[Jared]

I thought I was clear in distinguishing between registration fraud (again in and of itself a felony in most cases) and voter fraud.

You were...I was addressing other posters. And to make it clear: voter registration fraud is BAD! BAD BAD BAD!

I simply can't understand how people do not see how the flood of bogus registrations calls into question both the efficacy and the veracity of our electoral process!!

Totally understood. And, I think organizations that collect registration forms should definitely work to minimize bogus forms. However, it's law in many states that orgs that collect voter registration forms have to turn everything in; so it's silly to pin voter fraud allegations on ACORN for doing what they're mandated to do. (And Rob, you're not doing this, but it's been a popular refrain from others in the right-wing media.)

As for Obama and new registrations, again, what percentage of the new registrations that have been turned in (either by ACORN, or registering as Democrats, or overall) have been found to be fraudulent? These numbers, I would think, are really important in figuring out how big the problem really is.

And this is a question: I honestly know nothing about what money ACORN gets from taxpayers. Does anyone have any info on that? What are the tax dollars for?

[RobVarak]

But there's no evidence of ACORN trying to register fictitious voters and real voters multiple times.

Huh? ACORN workers have been convicted of falsifying registrations and submitting multiple registrations in several states and indicted and plead out in even more.

[Jared]

And it's been standard procedure...take these fraudulent forms (that ACORN is required to turn in), insinuate that they're perpetuating voter fraud, and get the Fox News crowd all worked up over nothing. If anything "undermines confidence in the electoral system", it's misleadingly stoking the public's fears of voter fraud when the evidence isn't there.

Generalize much? What gets the BET crowd fired up?

No generalization at all. I say this because Fox News has been reporting on ACORN far more than any other news orgs.

http://mediamatters.org/countyfair/200810150009

Updating our earlier tally, since Friday, Fox News had mentioned the community organizing group at least 556 times, according to TVeyes.com.

Let's put that in perspective and help illustrate just how obsessively over-the-top the Fox News coverage has become.

*Number of times CNN has mentioned ACORN since Friday: 67

*Number of times Fox News has mentioned Joe Biden since Friday: 130

*Number of times Fox News has mentioned Sarah Palin since Friday: 541

*Number of times Fox News has mentioned ACORN since Friday: 556

[Jared]

Huh? ACORN workers have been convicted of falsifying registrations and submitting multiple registrations in several states and indicted and plead out in even more.

Clarification needed: There is no evidence that ACORN as an organization is doing these things, as in many of those cases ACORN the organization has turned in the workers that have been indicted. There is ample evidence that people working for ACORN have falsified registrations, submitted registrations for multiple people, etc.

[Jackdog]

And it's been standard procedure...take these fraudulent forms (that ACORN is required to turn in), insinuate that they're perpetuating voter fraud, and get the Fox News crowd all worked up over nothing. If anything "undermines confidence in the electoral system", it's misleadingly stoking the public's fears of voter fraud when the evidence isn't there.

Generalize much? What gets the BET crowd fired up?

No generalization at all. I say this because Fox News has been reporting on ACORN far more than any other news orgs.

http://mediamatters.org/countyfair/200810150009

Updating our earlier tally, since Friday, Fox News had mentioned the community organizing group at least 556 times, according to TVeyes.com.

Let's put that in perspective and help illustrate just how obsessively over-the-top the Fox News coverage has become.

*Number of times CNN has mentioned ACORN since Friday: 67

*Number of times Fox News has mentioned Joe Biden since Friday: 130

*Number of times Fox News has mentioned Sarah Palin since Friday: 541

*Number of times Fox News has mentioned ACORN since Friday: 556

In this case I think it's valid.

If ACORN was in the tank for McCain I'd bet their be more than one network feeding off the story.

[Jackdog]

Huh? ACORN workers have been convicted of falsifying registrations and submitting multiple registrations in several states and indicted and plead out in even more.

Clarification needed: There is no evidence that ACORN as an organization is doing these things, as in many of those cases ACORN the organization has turned in the workers that have been indicted. There is ample evidence that people working for ACORN have falsified registrations, submitted registrations for multiple people, etc.

What about the non-partison aspect? Do you want your money going toward getting McCain elected?

[wco81]

And this is a question: I honestly know nothing about what money ACORN gets from taxpayers. Does anyone have any info on that? What are the tax dollars for?

I heard they get federal money through state and local agencies, which disburse those funds to various community organizations.

Not too dissimilar in process from how faith-based organizations have been receiving federal money.

[RobVarak]

And this is a question: I honestly know nothing about what money ACORN gets from taxpayers. Does anyone have any info on that? What are the tax dollars for?

It's really hard to get a figure for the amount of public money that ACORN gets because it's a leviathan comprised of a whole network of inter-related organizations.

For lack of a better analogy, ACORN is set up like a fraternity. The "national" is a lobbyist group (501(c)4 for IRS purposes, probably...but I'm not sure). The "chapters" are the statewide and regionwide subgroups, many of which are 501(c)(3) non-profits with specific charters. For example one sub-chapter may be dedicated to low-income housing and another to organizing labor and yet another for voter registration.

As for the rules requiring ACORN to hand in the fraudulent registrations, that is nothing more than cover for the organization. After all the harm done by the fraudulent registrations isn't meaningfully diminished by the law. And given the fact that their funding is often directly tied to churning false registrations, there's really no disincentive whatsoever to cheating the system.

The parallels between ACORN and the subprime mess is something I ponder often lately. In both cases you have nominally socially beneficial goals (increasing home ownership and expanding the electorate) funded with public dollars and resulting in a system doing far more harm than good. In both cases activists hid behind their nominal raison d'etre while basically promoting a broader poltical agenda.

Now it's much easier to categorically say that not everyone should own a home than it is to say that some people should not vote. But voting is a right, not an obligation.

I'm skeptical of the societal or political benefit of mobilizing an otherwise disinterested segment of society given the fact that the organization "getting out the vote" is all too often able to take political advantage of their ostensibly altruistic behavior. In other words, does more voter participation in and of itself mean that representative democracy is "better?" My instinct tells me that "organic" improvements in voter participation are indicative of a healthy democracy, while "external" stimulation of the electorate, be it by ACORN and the like or the parties themselves, is simply manipulative.

Geez, this is making me want to go back to reading the Federalist Papers...again! Those guys really thought of everything. LOL

[matthewk]

Then, if Mickey Mouse tries to vote, he won't be able to (unless he has a fake ID).

My state does not have voter ID, so here someone could vote as Mickey Mouse once the name was registered without having to provide any ID.