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In Cleveland as in Kiev by Jesse Jackson Evidence Mounts That The Vote May Have Been Hacked by Thom Hartmann Voters to challenge US election by Julian Borger ELECTION FRAUD in 2004 Computerized voting is just a gateway to fraud By: Ray Molzon Targetting Diebold - Why War? Diebold's Political Machine Electronic voting funded by the radical Christian right.

Critics of the Ohio count have ... pointed to the case of an electronic voting machine found to have credited President Bush with 3,893 extra votes in a suburb of Columbus where only 638 people voted. State officials have said those votes will not be included in the final certified totals... Exit polls on election day suggested that the election could be heading towards a Kerry victory, deepening the despair in Democratic ranks at the Bush win. The anomaly was blamed on the exit polls... Julian Borger December 1, 2004 The Guardian A group called Alliance for Democracy has been pursuing legal challenges to the Bush victory in the recent US elections. After concerns in the 2000 US election that Bush was given an undeserved victory by a partial Supreme Court, many states tried to reform their voting procedures.The main benificiary of this policy was Walden O'Dell, chief executive of Diebold Inc., the man whose company supplies the majority of new electronic voting technology in the United States. In a fund-raising letter sent to Republicans on August 14th 2003, he said he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." Even more interesting allegations about the removal of any democratic right for the US citizens to choose their President in a free and transparent election have been focussing on the operation of the machinery and software itself. From Texas to Florida, a White House-linked clandestine operation paid for "vote switching" software. The manipulation of computer voting machines in the recent presidential election and the funding of programmers who were involved in the operation are tied to an intricate web of shady off-shore financial trusts and companies, shady espionage operatives, Republican Party politicians close to the Bush family, and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) contract vehicles. Bush-Cheney Vote Fraud Conspiracy: The Evidence by WAYNE MADSEN (ONLINEJOURNAL.COM)   Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything. Josef Stalin ------------------------------------   Voters to Challenge US Election in Washington Wednesday December 1, 2004 The Guardian George Bush's victory in the US presidential election will be challenged in Ohio's supreme court today, when a group of Democratic voters will allege widespread fraud. President Bush clinched re-election by winning the state of Ohio on November 2 by a margin of 136,000 votes over the Democratic candidate, John Kerry. Despite claims of fraud and technical glitches, Senator Kerry decided that they were not big enough to affect the result and conceded the election on November 3. However, Cliff Arnebeck, a lawyer representing a group of voters challenging the Ohio result, claimed new analysis of various anomalies suggested it was rigged. "We'll be calling for a reversal of the result based on evidence developed in the course of litigation," Mr Arnebeck told The Guardian yesterday. "Exit polling and substantial irregularities excluded votes that should have been counted. There is evidence that votes cast for one candidate were moved to the column of the other candidate." Mr Arnebeck, a legal adviser to a liberal group, Alliance for Democracy, said the "contest of election" lawsuit will be presented to a judge from the Ohio supreme court today on behalf of at least 25 disgruntled voters. He said he expected other voters and organisations to join the case. Ohio's secretary of state, Kenneth Blackwell, has until Monday to certify the result. His office did not return calls seeking comment yesterday but his spokesman, Carlo LoParo, told the Associated Press news agency: "There are no signs of widespread irregularities." Mr Arnebeck said that hearings held in Ohio cities have brought to light new evidence of malpractice. He said one voter of a pro-Republican group caught destroying Democratic registration documents in Nevada before the election, had also been operating in Ohio. Critics of the Ohio count have also pointed to the case of an electronic voting machine found to have credited President Bush with 3,893 extra votes in a suburb of Columbus where only 638 people voted. State officials have said those votes will not be included in the final certified totals. There have also been complaints focused on punch card ballots, of the type which caused chaos in Florida in 2000. Voting involves making a hole in the ballot against the chosen candidate by punching out a small piece of card, a chad, with a stylus. In the 68 Ohio counties where the ballots were used this year, according to some groups protesting at this year's election, vote counters were unable to determine a vote for the president, but did register votes for other offices. The veteran civil rights leader, Reverend Jesse Jackson, is spearheading the call for an Ohio recount. "We can live with winning and losing. We cannot live with fraud and stealing," he said earlier this week. The election challenge will be reviewed by a single judge out of the seven members of Ohio's supreme court, who may let the election stand, declare another winner, or throw out the result, forcing a recount or even a new vote. The ruling can be appealed to the full court. Exit polls on election day suggested that the election could be heading towards a Kerry victory, deepening the despair in Democratic ranks at the Bush win. The anomaly was blamed on the exit polls, but Mr Arnebeck argued that it was evidence of malpractice.------------------------------------------------------------------http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,1368713,00.htmlIn Cleveland as in Kiev by Jesse Jackson Wednesday December 8, 2004 The Guardian In the Ukraine, citizens are in the streets protesting what they charge is a fixed election. Secretary of State Colin Powell expresses this nation's concern about apparent voting irregularities. The media give the dispute around-the-clock coverage. But in the United States, massive and systemic voter irregularities go unreported and unnoticed. Ohio is this election year's Florida. The vote in Ohio decided the presidential race, but it was marred by intolerable, and often partisan, irregularities and discrepancies. US citizens have as much reason as those in Kiev to be concerned that the fix was in. Ohio determines the election. But because of mounting irregularities, the vote in this state was not certified until this Monday, 34 days after the election. People of conscience demand that a full and complete investigation of these irregularities is undertaken. Their outrage is made intolerable by the fact that the secretary of state in charge of the count, Ken Blackwell, holds, like the disreputable Katherine Harris of Florida's fiasco in 2000, a dual role: he is secretary of state with control over voting procedures and co-chair of George Bush's Ohio campaign. This foul and ugly conflict of interest is unacceptable - and made grotesque by the voting irregularities in the state. A thorough investigation, count and recount of Ohio's vote should be made. Blackwell reversed the rules on provisional ballots that were in place in the spring 2004 primaries. These allowed voters to cast provisional ballots anywhere in their county, even if they were in the wrong precinct, reflecting the chief rationale for provisional ballots - to ensure that those who went to the wrong place by mistake could have their votes cast and counted. But Blackwell ruled belatedly and bizarrely that voters could cast provisional ballots only at the proper precinct. Unsurprisingly, this was to disqualify disproportionately ballots cast in heavily Democratic Cuyahoga County. Blackwell also permitted the use of electronic machines. In one precinct in Franklin County, an electric voting system gave Bush 3,893 extra votes out of a total of 638 votes cast. Votes are counted in a secret electronic program created by a private corporation, Diebold Co, headed by a Bush partisan, under the supervision of a state election official who co-chairs the Bush campaign. There is no paper record, no way to audit the votes, no way to do a recount. Blackwell also presided over a voting system that resulted in quick, short lines in the dominantly Republican suburbs, and four-hour and longer waiting lines in the inner cities. Wealthy precincts received ample numbers of voting machines andvoting places. Democratic precincts received inadequate numbers of machines in too few polling places that were often hard to locate; this caused day-long waits for working people who could least afford the time. Then there is the count itself, that smells like a rotten fish. In Ohio, as in Florida and Pennsylvania, there was a stark disconnect between the exit polls and the tabulated results - the former favouring John Kerry, the latter Bush. The chance of this occurring in these three states, according to Professor Steven Freeman of the University of Pennsylvania, is about 250 million toone. It gets worse. In one of dozens of examples, Ellen Connally, an African-American supreme court candidate running an underfunded race at the bottom of the ticket, received over 100,000 more votes than Kerry in four counties. She ran better than Kerry in areas where she wasn't known and didn't campaign, than she did where she was known and did. There should be a federal investigation of the count in Ohio and a recount should be done where possible, supervised by neutral officials. In Cleveland, as in Kiev, citizens have the right to know that the election is run fairly and every vote counted. Citizens have the right to election officials who try to facilitate voting, not impede it. Citizens have the right to voting machines that keep a paper record and allow for an independent audit and recount. This country needs no more Floridas and Ohios. We call for a constitutional amendment to guarantee the right to vote for all US citizens and to empower Congress to establish federal standards and non-partisan administration of elections. Harris and Blackwell are insults to the people they represent, and stains upon the president whose election they sought to insure. Democracy should not be for export only. Jesse Jackson is president of the Rainbow/Push coalition, which is supporting the legal action to secure a recount in Ohio. ( A version of this article first appeared in the Chicago Sun Times )

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