"Carter/Baker Report can't face how the GOP stole America's 2004 election"

[understandinglife]

Carter/Baker Report can't face how the GOP stole America's 2004 election & is rigging 2008

by Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman

September 20, 2005

The stolen elections of 2000, 2002 and 2004 are nowhere to be found in the milquetoast Carter-Baker Report now passing for wisdom on America's broken electoral system.

And unless the public is ready to face the reality that we no longer live in a nation with credible elections, the 2008 balloting is all but over.

As investigative reporters and registered voters living in central Ohio, we witnessed firsthand the outright theft of the 2004 election. We also endured the unwillingness of the Democratic Party to face up to a carefully choreographed "do everything" strategy that gave the presidency to George W. Bush for a second time, and which could make all elections to come virtually moot.

The just-issued report of a special commission headed by former President Jimmy Carter and Bush family consigliore Jim Baker is of little real value.

Much more at:

http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2005/1462

Do try to read the entire article and send it to others, but, more importantly, please join me in calling on Congressman John Conyers to launch his candidacy for President of the United States of America.

And, please urge Skinner to request the DU Activist Group to spread the call for Congressman Conyers to do just that:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=106x23663

He can force the entire Nation to realize that the 2006 Congressional Election and 2008 National Election are effectively stolen unless sweeping reform is implemented. That is more than enough platform given that without an equitable and verified election process America will remain what it became in 2000, a neoconster fascist oligarchy.


Peace.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

1. Haven't read it yet

but my first knee-jerk is that I trust Jimmy Carter to tell it like it is, particularly with regards to elections. He's supervised so many.

But I will read it more completely.

[understandinglife]

2. "The tactics the GOP perfected in Ohio 2004 are now being honed for re-use

... in 2008. Neither Al Gore nor John Kerry nor the core of the Democratic Party has been willing to face the reality that elections in the United States are all but over. This latest wimp report from the Carter-Baker whitewash commission does no better.

Unless our electoral system gets a total top-to-bottom revamp by an informed public willing to deal with the systematic poisoning of American democracy, there is no reason to bother printing the ballots or plugging in the voting machines in 2008.

Ibid.

Truth.


Peace.

[Rex_Goodheart]

3. With all due respect to Fitrakis and Wasserman...

(and I really appreciate all the work they've done) I don't see much actual objective criticism of the details of Baker-Carter's recommendations.

Yes, we know 2000, 2002, and 2004 were stolen. Yes, we know that this report fails to acknowledge those thefts. But if the recommendations are at least workable I'll settle for that. Let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater!

Edited for grammar.

[understandinglife]

6. Spencer Overton: Establishing Procedures for Credible Advisory Commissions

Here is the link:
http://carterbakerdissent.com/procedure.php

And:

The Commission's "Real ID" recommendation is more restrictive than the photo ID proposal rejected by the Carter-Ford Commission in 2001, and more extreme than any ID requirement adopted in any state to date. The Commission's proposal is so excessive that it would prevent eligible voters from proving their identity with even a valid U.S. passport or a U.S. military photo ID card.

Link to full statement:
http://carterbakerdissent.com/dissent.php

And, link to a more extensive rebutal:
http://carterbakerdissent.com/final_carterbaker_rebuttal092005.pdf

You may want to start with these.


Peace.

[understandinglife]

7. Rep Conyers: "this national ID voting card is more of the same old ..."

Make no mistake about it, this national ID voting card is more of the same old Ken Blackwell-style Republican electoral dirty tricks, where Democratic voters are deliberately disenfranchised so that Republicans can win elections. Remember the lack of voting machines in Ohio for Democratic voters? Remember the machines that broke down or registered strange numbers of votes for George Bush or unknown third party candidates? Remember Ken Blackwell’s paper weight requirements for voter registration cards?

Imagine if the Republican party can, in one fell swoop, legally prohibit more than ten percent of voters, most of them poor, minority and elderly voters, most of them Democratic voters, from being able to vote.

http://www.conyersblog.us/archives/00000245.htm

Carter's assessment of the Commission's proposed "solution" is way off the mark. Just as many provisions of Republican sponsored legislation have gone unfunded, this voter ID requirement will meet the same sticky feet and the voters will have to pick up the tab at the end of the day--and that's only if they're lucky. If they're not lucky, they will not get to vote at all--this is the more likely result of a federally mandated voter ID system.

http://www.conyersblog.us/archives/00000246.htm

Peace.

[OneBlueSky]

8. the national ID card component of the report invalidates the whole thing

I'm amazed and disheartened that Carter signed off on this . . . and that he, of all people, didn't delve far enough into the subject to understand what happened in 2004 (not to mention 2000 and 2002) . . .

I know that Carter is neither that uninformed nor that stupid . . . I can only conclude that, like the rest of the commission, he knows about the stolen elections, and he's okay with it . . . or at least not willing to rock the boat, for whatever reason . . .

maybe Baker somehow convinced Carter that disclosing that the elections were stolen would destroy the United States . . . and Carter believes that what the commission is recommending will solve the problem in the future, so he's going along . . .

whatever his reasoning, I'm hugely disappointed . . .

[understandinglife]

9. I am troubled and deeply saddened that Pres Carter is in any way ..

... associated with this train-wreck.

For further context of how big a disaster this "report" is:

Diebold Stock Hits 52-Week Low!

PLUS: More Resounding Thuds from the Baker/Carter Report...or, as it may soon be known, Dr. Robert Pastor's Disaster...

Shares of Diebold, Inc. hit a 52-week low today, for some reason, falling to $44.37/share at Tuesday's close. Perhaps it has something to do with this, but whaddu we know?



In other tales from the last vestiges of American democracy and reaction to the Baker/Carter "Election Reform" fiasco ... Stories on the charlatans behind it, the skinny on the guy who invented it, the warnings he was given and ignored, the Voting Rights groups who laughed him out of the room today, the fallacy it's all built on ... and so much more.

"Turd in the swimming pool" anybody?...

THE ROUNDUP: http://www.bradblog.com/archives/00001849.htm

President Carter has been severely compromised; our America is just about destroyed.


Peace.

[bonito]

4. Carter is speaking tonight

I hope this issue is brought up. I remember reports of him saying our voting system was basically a joke, my head is spinning here a little bit. linkwww.cartercenter.org

[Rex_Goodheart]

5. I did a quick glance at their official report

I was encouraged by what I read on page 34.

Yes, they say we need a VVPAT (Voter-verified paper audit trail), but what page 34 says is that that trail actually consists of paper ballots to be used in recounts... In other words, it's not just some cheap receipt that the voter looks at then throws away, not to be reused again while the computer adds up anything it wants.

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

10. Well entrenched, illegitimate,...

...fascist regimes, have and will never be displaced by an opposition party working within the system. They're displaced internally via revolution or not at all. Sorry, but that's the reality of the situation, folks. Absent the required revolution (our most likely scenario), what we'll see in coming years is the theatrical illusion of free and fair elections maintained for a few more election cycles. Then at some point, after domestic dissent has been thoroughly crushed and the remaining populace is sufficiently numb and docile, elections will be done away with altogether, considered an expensive, unnecessary charade by the new fascist State. Welcome to AmeriKa.

It is said that history repeats itself. That's because it does:

http://www.crisispapers.org/Editorials/germany-1933.htm