D_Raay
11-16-2004, 12:54 PM
http://www.ilcaonline.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=1012&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
On Thursday, Nov. 11, a step was taken toward finding at least part of the answer. Cliff Arnebeck, the Columbus, Ohio-based attorney who is counsel for Common Cause’s Ohio chapter and the Alliance for Democracy, announced that the groups would pursue a recount of the Ohio vote . Arnebeck said the Green Party and Libertarian Party presidential candidates each agreed to file for a recount, providing the $110,000 filing fee could be met. He announced that a fund drive was underway, as was putting pressure on the Kerry campaign to pay for it. In coming days, Ohio’s provisional ballot count is likely to be finished. That starts a five-day clock during which a recount can be formally requested. As of Monday morning, Nov. 14, $200,000 had been raised toward an Ohio recount—all but assuring it will happen.
But many voters have yet to consider the intricacies of the recount procedure. They're still trying to comprehend what exactly went wrong. By now, many people have heard about discarded or spoiled ballots in Ohio that could have cost Democrats tens of thousands of votes (as claimed by journalist Greg Palast). They’ve heard of the computerized voting machines that caused thousands of votes for Bush to be erroneously added in single precincts. And they’ve heard declarations by BlackBoxVoting.org (Bev Harris and Andy Stephenson) that they’ll make the biggest ever Freedom of Information Act request to get to the bottom of it.
But something else also happened in Ohio’s urban precincts that hurt Democrats as much as these much-publicized snafus—something so simple many election protection observers, and certainly the national press, missed it.
What Wasn't There
Across Ohio’s minority-rich cities, there were fewer voting machines than during past elections, including March’s presidential primary. As the number of voters grew by as much as 50 percent in some precincts, according to pro-Kerry field organizers, the number of voting machines on Election Day shrank by a third. Precincts that usually had five machines only had three.
The lack of voting machines was a disaster.
“I don’t think this story has been told,” said Miles Gerety, a public defender from Bridgeport, Conn., who went to Ohio as a legal observer and discovered this trend by overhearing elderly voters talk about fewer machines. “The press and election protection people weren’t looking for this. They were looking for poll challenges. But this is the perfect way to suppress the vote.”
The shortage of voting machines didn’t just create long lines. It kept thousands of new and longtime voters from casting ballots in the state’s minority communities—the Democratic strongholds. The accounts of people who had to leave the polls for work or family obligations were everywhere. But on Election Day, very few Democrats realized this was happening. They just saw long lines.
10,000 "mistakes", and it's just a coincidence that Bush gained by all of them, only conspiracy theorists think otherwise. The funny thing is that the media is engaged in a conspiracy to deny any investigations it to the mathematically proven fraud.
On Thursday, Nov. 11, a step was taken toward finding at least part of the answer. Cliff Arnebeck, the Columbus, Ohio-based attorney who is counsel for Common Cause’s Ohio chapter and the Alliance for Democracy, announced that the groups would pursue a recount of the Ohio vote . Arnebeck said the Green Party and Libertarian Party presidential candidates each agreed to file for a recount, providing the $110,000 filing fee could be met. He announced that a fund drive was underway, as was putting pressure on the Kerry campaign to pay for it. In coming days, Ohio’s provisional ballot count is likely to be finished. That starts a five-day clock during which a recount can be formally requested. As of Monday morning, Nov. 14, $200,000 had been raised toward an Ohio recount—all but assuring it will happen.
But many voters have yet to consider the intricacies of the recount procedure. They're still trying to comprehend what exactly went wrong. By now, many people have heard about discarded or spoiled ballots in Ohio that could have cost Democrats tens of thousands of votes (as claimed by journalist Greg Palast). They’ve heard of the computerized voting machines that caused thousands of votes for Bush to be erroneously added in single precincts. And they’ve heard declarations by BlackBoxVoting.org (Bev Harris and Andy Stephenson) that they’ll make the biggest ever Freedom of Information Act request to get to the bottom of it.
But something else also happened in Ohio’s urban precincts that hurt Democrats as much as these much-publicized snafus—something so simple many election protection observers, and certainly the national press, missed it.
What Wasn't There
Across Ohio’s minority-rich cities, there were fewer voting machines than during past elections, including March’s presidential primary. As the number of voters grew by as much as 50 percent in some precincts, according to pro-Kerry field organizers, the number of voting machines on Election Day shrank by a third. Precincts that usually had five machines only had three.
The lack of voting machines was a disaster.
“I don’t think this story has been told,” said Miles Gerety, a public defender from Bridgeport, Conn., who went to Ohio as a legal observer and discovered this trend by overhearing elderly voters talk about fewer machines. “The press and election protection people weren’t looking for this. They were looking for poll challenges. But this is the perfect way to suppress the vote.”
The shortage of voting machines didn’t just create long lines. It kept thousands of new and longtime voters from casting ballots in the state’s minority communities—the Democratic strongholds. The accounts of people who had to leave the polls for work or family obligations were everywhere. But on Election Day, very few Democrats realized this was happening. They just saw long lines.
10,000 "mistakes", and it's just a coincidence that Bush gained by all of them, only conspiracy theorists think otherwise. The funny thing is that the media is engaged in a conspiracy to deny any investigations it to the mathematically proven fraud.