Singer George Michael lends the piano on which John Lennon wrote Imagine to an anti-war exhibition...

Veteran actor William Franklyn, known for voicing the 1960s Schweppes TV adverts, dies aged 81...

twins incest bisexual incest group sex orgy true stories of having group sex hot blonde anal anal passion The Rolling Stones cancel a gig in Hawaii and postpone other tour dates as Mick Jagger suffers throat troubles...

gay daddies bears first time gay sex redhead endometriosis redhead playboy hentai rape porn rescue me rape scene The Rolling Stones postpone a show in the US to allow singer Sir Mick Jagger time to rest his voice...

Social networking site MySpace is to block users from uploading copyrighted music to its pages...

Colombia's vice president is "baffled" by Kate Moss's success following cocaine allegations...

The Red Hot Chili Peppers are leading the way at this years MTV Europe music awards with four nominations...

The Red Hot Chili Peppers are leading the way at this years MTV Europe music awards with four nominations...

Record company EMI sign a deal with the estate of crooner Dean Martin to use the singer's likeness...

Borat creator Sacha Baron Cohen reportedly signs a $42.5m (£22m) film deal starring his character Bruno...

Borat creator Sacha Baron Cohen reportedly signs a $42.5m (£22m) film deal starring his character Bruno...

Borat creator Sacha Baron Cohen reportedly signs a $42.5m (£22m) film deal starring his character Bruno...

Jonathan Ross is dubbed "risque" by Ofcom but not in breach of rules over an interview with David Cameron...

Pop trio Atomic Kitten will reform to play a concert in support of jailed Liverpool football fan Michael Shields...

Pop trio Atomic Kitten will reform to play a concert in support of jailed Liverpool football fan Michael Shields...

Since Karl Rove is so deeply involved with the plotting of the election, flying here and there, -- who is paying his salary? I know he works from out of the White House, isn't this against campaigning laws? I thought congressmen have to maintain a different staff and different location for their campaigning...

I hope GW is good at eating crow because lately and in the coming future he's going to have platefulls. He turned his back on diplomacy with middleastern countries who's help he now needs. Now he's set to have a democratically controlled congress that he has ridiculed and pushed aside that he will need to work with. It just goes to show that arrogance will always come back around to you.

I couldn't help but notice the Post never uses the word "endorse" in the piece on NoVA's Congressional when they wrote up Tom Davis (they do when they get to Jim Moran in the same piece). Davis does not deserve endorsement.

The Post also never mentions Terri Schiavo, who Davis subpoenaed, or ICG Government, who pays Davis's wife for business before his committee.

Davis has included the Post, and other papers and organizations, as an endorser for months on his website in an undated claim that was really from 2004. The Post gaggles over his voting rights bill even though it makes the DC seat temporary, while the Utah seat that offsets it (a Republican one), would be permanent.

The Post says he used his Reform Committee to "good effect" but the Democratic minority on the Committee has a list of 14 subjects it wishes to review, from Iraq contracting to Valarie Plame to the lobbying scandals. The Committee has done a record low amount of oversight for consecutive terms and Davis refuses even to put these matters on the agenda. He STILL never has subpoenaed Jack Abramoff - just his billing records. Probably because Jack has been a personal contributor to Davis and his wife.

The benefits he brings home to his district in the form of earmarks is likely to have much less significance when his party cannot use their majority power to pay him back for the PAC contributions he spreads around to them.

Here's a quote from the 9-11 Report, about earmarks and Homeland Security, a Dept under Davis Committee oversight:

"Pork-barrel politics is expected for bridges and roads--not for defending against a deadly enemy trying to kill thousands of Americans...."

Chris, regarding candidates who "swept" their local papers' endorsements, isn't that also true of Tammy Duckworth who is running against the incumbent Republican in her Illinois district? All 3 major papers in the Chicago area, I think. She's the one whom the RNC is trying to say wants to "cut and run" from Iraq. Only problem is she can't run because she lost both her legs fighting their war for them in Iraq.

And the Ehrlich endorsement, could their be anything that better summed up the irresponsible judgment of the paper that cheerled us into this Iraq mess? I was impressed with thei logic: basically, the Republicans have made such a mess of things with their one-party rule, that we need to RE-elect a Republican here in Maryland (so we don't have an all-Democrat state). Yes, it's "thank you Sir, may I have another one please"!

Great thinking, guys. Do you use the same logic in your private lives? "My, that contractor did such an awful job for my neighbor's house. I should probably have them remodel my bathroom then."

"Why did Jim Webb only serve for 10 months as Navy Sec'y? Never saw one story about this in the comPost. One would think that voters might want to know.

botched joke - an apt description of John Kerry"

Posted by: | November 1, 2006 10:58 AM

This is why:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_H._Webb,_Jr.#Post-military_career

Mr. Webb is a man of honor. Be nice to have someone like that representing Virginia.

Not to mention Mark Foley, although in that case I think it was his meat...

With the allegations about GOPers Sweeney, Sherwood, Gibbons, and Allen, it now looks like asking a GOP candidate when he stopped beating his wife is not really that unfair.

Our Des Moines Register endorsements are mainly tilting toward the obvious winners. Newspapers need circulation, to do this they need to look informed and appear to be "king makers."

In the last debate between gov candidates Dem Culver and Repub Nussle, Nussle made a disparaging remark about the Register, who was sponsoring the debate! Whoops! The Register endorsed Culver Sunday, although since he is likely to win Culver probably would have been their choice anyway.

But, since Kerry's scheduled appearance to endorse Dem Braley was cancelled after Kerry's stupid remark which is being whipped into a media storm, some "endorsements" do seem to matter or are to be avoided.... like GOP candidates who have been fleeing from Bush.

This close to the election, endorsements won't change many minds, but could rev up the base and "get out the vote."

http://whathappenedtomycountry.blogspot.com

The level of paranoia and conspiracy theory around here simply astounds me. You guys are helping make us look like the "loony left". Give Chris and the other writers a freakin break, folks. How can he be both a shill for the RNC and a target on Katherine Harris' hit list?

Yes, the Washington Post makes frequent copy editing errors. This is not new(s).

Endorsements by celebs can also backfire, a la Springsteen of Kerry in 2004.

http://sandwichrepair.blogspot.com

KOZ-

Anything to say on behalf of the criminal R's in OH?

When the NYT and WaPo are busy selling propaganda and trying to influence elections while desperately trying to maintain the "objectivity" front, the readers lose interest. Jayson Blair.

"botched joke - an apt description of John Kerry"

even as a democrat I can say that's funny

Bobby Wightman-Cervantes

Howard made a very important point - newspapers are slowly lossing circulation -

I would love for someone in the news media to have the courage to poll the following questions.

"Do you believe the newsmedia covers the issues important to you?

or

"Do you believe the newsmedia is in touch with the American people?

In both questions I would be surprised if the media polled higher than 35% - this is in part why endorsements are so worthless -

Bobby Wightman-Cervantes
www.balancingtheissues.com

Why did Jim Webb only serve for 10 months as Navy Sec'y? Never saw one story about this in the comPost. One would think that voters might want to know.

botched joke - an apt description of John Kerry

"He's afriad he won't get invited to the beltway kewl kids cocktail parties anymore--"

Ms. Drindl, I hope you are wrong here, but that would explain the incessant apologist tone of Chris' work, he always seems to be apologizing to someone for what the polls say, whenever they turn down for the Republicans. Sometimes, it is like a cheerleader for a team that is losing "the big game." You still have to cheer, no matter how bad it looks.

But that makes it pretty obvious which team they are cheering for.

I think Rove and Bush are in that "loser- team cheerleader" mode, unless they actually are planning to steal the election again. This time, it may be too big to accomplish, but we won't know until all the ballots are (or aren't) counted.

Unlike many of the posters here, I'd like to agree with Chris that endorsements seem to make little difference. Mike DeWine has received the endorsement of all but one of the "big eight" Ohio newspapers, and yet he is unaccountably losing by a large margin. He's the kind of Republican who is not a right-wing nut, and is in fact in trouble with the right wing because he worked to become one of the Gang of 14.

Of course, newspapers are dying in circulation and many people get their information from the abominable negative ads.

"He may not win, but he can certainly inflict damange."

DCA2CMH, make sure there are two cameras, because if those bullies in dark suits see you filming them, they might get rough, so you should have another person staged somewhere out of sight to videotape the intimidation as it occurs.

And remember, you can legally ask those blue-suits for thier ID, ewspecially if they are passing themselves off as "official." Be sure and ask them thier names while on camera, because if they continue to intimidate voters and won't give you thier identities, you might just have a legal case.

Come'n Chris. The Post endorsement of Erlich was a throw away. Your affiliation is showing.
Please comment on the Ohio situation. This is the first time "Che" has added anything of value to his many many posts in many many political blogs. Too bad it is so alarming.

IMPEACH CHENEY FIRST!

Use the House to impeach Cheney, and use that impeachment as a clearing-house for ALL the big questions, which could include Rove's election fraud, Cheney's energy-industry task force sellout, the lies leading up to the war, the meetings with Abramoff, the outing of Valerie Plame, the list all goes back to Cheney, Bush is just a pawn.

All of this subterfuge could be uncovered and exposed by impeaching Cheney. Use that event as a clearinghouse for all these revelations.

Then, if there's enought time left, go after Bush. The Cheney impeachment should reveal all the high crimes and misdemeanors necessary to have a very righteous Presidential impeachment this time around.

Whether it removes either of them from office really doesn't matter, this late in the game.

But it will open up the truth for our future reference. And once we know how they cheated, and got away with it, we can improve our laws so that it won't ever happen again.

NEVER AGAIN!

IMPEACH CHENEY FIRST!

Use the House to impeach Cheney, and use that impeachment as a clearing-house for ALL the big questions, which could include Rove's election fraud, Cheney's energy-industry task force sellout, the lies leading up to the war, the meetings with Abramoff, the outing of Valerie Plame, the list all goes back to Cheney, Bush is just a pawn.

All of this subterfuge could be uncovered and exposed by impeaching Cheney. Use that event as a clearinghouse for all these revelations.

Then, if there's enought time left, go after Bush. The Cheney impeachment should reveal all the high crimes and misdemeanors necessary to have a very righteous Presidential impeachment this time around.

Whether it removes either of them from office really doesn't matter, this late in the game.

But it will open up the truth for our future reference. And once we know how they cheated, and got away with it, we can improve our laws so that it won't ever happen again.

NEVER AGAIN!

Harold Ford of Tenn demands Kerry apologise - now that is character - that is what I expact of my party - Harold Ford makes me proud to be a Democrat

Bobby Wightman-Cervantes
www.balancingtheissues.com

I am inpressed with the NYT's previous endorsement of a Republican and its reasoning for changing sides -

In Texas this kind of thought process will never go into the endorsementprocess - Several years ago The San Antonio newspaper could not find one Latino to endorse - In most major cities in Texas the newspapers endorse the worse candidate in the primary who will then become the opponent of the person they already know they will endorse in the general election.

In Texas, for me, if you have a newspaper endorsement it is almost cause for me to vote against you.

What can you say about a state wherein it is legal for a judge to seek the endorsement of a newspaper which is also a defendant in his court in a defamation case? The Dallas Morning News several years ago endorsed a Texas Supreme Court Justice the day after she opined the opinion dismissing a defamation lawsuit against the Dallas Morning news.

My point is, endorsements are worthless - everything is politics and we the people should be cautious about accepting the endorsement of a newspaper with its own political agenda.

Bobby Wightman-Cervantes
www.balancingtheissues.com

There will be hell to pay on the streets of Akron, if the Ohio elections get stolen again.

HEY CHRIS CILIZZA! I've got an idea -- why don't you do a story about something important -- like how democracy is being stolen right under our noses? I've got documentation of dozens of stories of voter intimidations and disinfranchisement. I've got 6000 people in my own county who've been purged off the voter rolls and can't even find out why.

What do you think? Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot about the cocktail parties. I hear DC has the best cocktail weenies...

Regarding endorsements, I think CC is confusing cause and effect. Newspapers are very good at jumping on bandwagons. Therefore, rather than an endorsement's causing a win for a candidate, you are seeing the secondary effect of someone who was going to win anyway.

Che, your last post was the shortest one I've ever seen from you haha

Drindl-

From one in Columbus....
In '04 I volunteered to shuttle residents of several Columbus nursing homes to polls. I've posted my observations before, but it is worthwhile.

Here's what I saw:
1. At the King St. church precinct, near the OSU campus and the precinct of the largest per-capita gay community in Ohio, men in blue suits were taking down license plate numbers of all cars entering the church parking lot or parking on Neil Ave. If not illegal, it was intimidating.
2. At the Maple Grove church precinct, the parking lot was blocked off and cars were being towed, despite plenty of parking available.
3. At the Cleveland Ave. library precinct, doors were locked long before the precint closed.

This year I'll be volunteering again, and will have my camcorder on hand. Blackwell is a criminal, crook, and thief. He may not win, but he can certainly inflict damange.

I'm a female, che--drindl. I know. I keep trying, anyway. But I know Cilizza will never report what's really going on. He's afriad he won't get invited to the beltway kewl kids cocktail parties anymore--

'Fed up! From Terri Schiavo to Michael J. Fox, one Republican explains why he's switching sides - John Cole: "I don't know when things went south with this party (literally and figuratively- and I am sure commenters here will tell me the party has always been this bad- I disagree with that, and so do others), but for me, Terri Schiavo was the real eye-opener.... I am not really having any fun attacking my old friends- but I don't know how else to respond when people call decent men like Jim Webb a pervert for no other reason than to win an election. I don't know how to deal with people who think savaging a man with Parkinson's for electoral gain is appropriate election-year discourse.

I don't know how to react to people who think that calling anyone who disagrees with them on Iraq a "terrorist-enabler" than to swing back. I don't know how to react to people who think that media reports of party hacks in the administration overruling scientists on issues like global warming, endangered species, intelligent design, prescription drugs, etc., are signs of... liberal media bias."

http://daoureport.salon.com/

Iraq stands up against U.S.
Government orders Sadr City blockade ended immediately; residents rejoice

GHDAD -- U.S. soldiers rolled up their barbed-wire barricades and lifted a near siege of the largest Shiite Muslim enclave in Baghdad on Tuesday, heeding the orders of a Shiite-led Iraqi government whose assertion of sovereignty had Shiites celebrating in the streets.

The order by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to lift the week-old blockade of Sadr City was one of the most overt expressions of self-determination by Iraqi leaders in the 3 1/2-year U.S. occupation. It came after two weeks of increasingly pointed exchanges between Iraqi and U.S. officials, as well as a video conference between al-Maliki and President Bush on Saturday.

Dear Mr. Drdl,

Mr. Cillizza is not going to report about the theft that is going on in Ohio because he is working for the ruling class.

For uncensored news please bookmark:

otherside123.blogspot.com
http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/
www.wsws.org
www.takingaim.info
www.onlinejournal.com

SPREAD THE WORD!!!!!!!!!

Laura Bush, murderess, has now added to her craven credentials by attacking Michael J. Fox. More 'compassion' I guess... but will the media cover it? Of course not!

'In an interview on C-Span, First Lady Laura Bush was asked about Michael J Fox's advocacy for candidates who support embryonic stem cell research. Mrs. Bush responded that it was wrong for Fox and others to suggest that increased support for embryonic stem cell research could lead to cures for Alzheimer's and other diseases.

She concluded with a thinly veiled critique of Fox: "It's always easy to manipulate people's feelings, especially when you are talking about diseases that are so difficult." '

Excerpts from the Sweeney domestic violence 911 call (as reported by the Albany Times-Union) ... [John Sweeney R-NY]

Sweeney's wife, Gaia, placed the emergency call to a police dispatcher in Saratoga County at 12:55 a.m. on Dec. 2, according to the document.
``Female caller stating her husband is knocking her around the house,'' a dispatcher wrote. ``Then she stated `Here it comes, are you ready?' and disconnected the call.

A short time later officer Scott W. Gunsel arrived at the Sweeney home.

The police report obtained by the Times Union indicates that Scott W. Gunsel, a trooper assigned to Clifton Park, responded to the couple's home along a cul-de-sac in a tidily kept neighborhood near the center of town.

"Complainant stated that she and husband got into verbal argument that turned a little physical by her being grabbed by the neck and pushed around the house,'' Gunsel wrote in the narrative portion of the blotter entry, according to the document. ``Suspect had scratches on face. Both parties refused medical attention. Complainant removed to friend's house for the evening ..

So Kerry makes a botched joke and the media take their cue from the Repubs and wonder aloud if he's cost the Dems their chances at winning the Congress back.
Yet Bush can come out a couple days earlier and make the direct statement that if "Democrats get elected - terrorists win" and that barely causes a ripple?

Up here in Canada, if a sitting Prime Minister or heck, an opposition politician had made that statement about voting for the other party, the backlash would have been ferocious - not just in the media but the general public. Is this part of the media believing you need to show more deference to the President and its office?

The question is, will CHRIS CILLIZZA and other reporters TELL THE TRUTH about the massive election fraud now happening in Ohio -- or will they deliver the elections once again to republlican theives?

ELECTION ALARM!! SPREAD THE WORD!!

For uncensored news please bookmark:

otherside123.blogspot.com
http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/
www.wsws.org
www.takingaim.info
www.onlinejournal.com

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_1382.shtml

Will a shocking new GOP court victory and Karl Rove's attack on Ohio 2006 doom the Democrats nationwide?

By Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman

COLUMBUS -- With a major GOP federal court victory, the Ohio 2006 election has descended into the calculated chaos that has become the trademark of a Karl Rove election theft, and that could help keep the Congress in Republican hands nationwide.

Through a complex series of legal maneuvers, and now a shocking new decision from the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the GOP has thrown Ohio's entire process of voting and vote counting into serious disarray. The mess is perfectly designed to suppress voter turnout, make election monitoring and a recount impossible, and allow the Republican Party to emerge with a victory despite overwhelming evidence the electorate wants exactly the opposite.

The disaster in Ohio began immediately after the theft of the presidential election here in 2004. Though the majority of Ohioans are registered Democrats, the gerrymandered state legislature is overwhelmingly Republican. Soon after John Kerry conceded, it passed House Bill 3, a draconian assault on voter registration drives, voting rights and the ability to secure reliable recounts of federal-level elections.

In brief, HB3 stacked a virtually impossible set of requirements onto the voter registration process. As elsewhere nationwide, voting has traditionally involved citizens coming to the polls and signing a poll book. Upon a signature check from a poll worker, a ballot has been given. A similar process has been in effect for absentee ballots. There is no recent evidence this method has encouraged significant voter fraud.

But the GOP's HB3 has imposed a series of draconian requirements for voter ID, including the demand for certain documents very difficult to obtain by many poor, homeless, elderly or other largely Democratic demographic groups.

To further complicate matters, Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell, who is now in charge of the same election in which he is the GOP nominee for governor, has added some additional, entirely arbitrary disqualifying factors of his own. Blackwell was the state co-chair of the Bush-Cheney campaign in the 2004 election, which he also ran while making the key decisions that gave Bush-Cheney a second term in the White House.

On all absentee ballots, HB3 demands an identifying driver's license number, or the equivalent. But Ohio driver's licenses have two codes on them. The "correct" one has two letters and six numbers. The "wrong" one is an eleven-number bureaucratic code that appears above the ID photo.

According to preliminary reports, as many as 10 percent of those sending in absentee ballots so far have included the wrong code, thus disqualifying their vote. The process is so confusing that one Republican federal judge, in a court proceeding, has volunteered the fact that he actually put this same "wrong" number on an application for a rental car, temporarily nullifying his contract. Here in Columbus, Board of Elections Director Matt Damschroder estimates that 5,000 ballots would already be disqualified in Franklin County alone.

So far the wave of absentee ballots pouring into the county boards of elections indicate an extraordinary percentage of Ohioans will vote absentee this year. Many are likely hoping to avoid distrusted electronic voting machines, as well as the long, racially-biased lines that tainted the 2004 election.

In response to reports of large numbers of absentee disqualifications, a federal lawsuit has been filed by a Cleveland homeless advocacy group and the Service Employee's International Union. The suit was then deemed to be a related action to the landmark King Lincoln civil rights filing that resulted in a September ruling preserving the ballots from Ohio 2004, and was sent to Judge Algernon Marbley, who made that decision.

Last week Judge Marbley threw out the HB3 drivers license requirement for the absentee ballots. On Wednesday, November 1, he will hold a hearing on whether to void all the HB3 requirements that are poised to disqualify tens of thousands of likely Democratic voters on election day.

Blackwell himself did not appeal Marbley's ruling. He is trailing by as much as 30 points in some Ohio polls. He has been seriously hurt by the widespread belief that he stole the 2004 election, and is reluctant to be openly identified with yet another mass disenfranchisement of Ohio voters.

Instead, Ohio's GOP Attorney General Jim Petro did appeal Marbley's decision. And on Sunday, October 29, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals stayed Marbley's suspension of the driver's license number requirement on the absentee ballots, casting the entire process into deep confusion.

This ruling means that county boards of election that were telling voters they did not have to include the drivers license number on their absentee ballot after Marbley's decision must now resume telling them they must include that number.

The decision sends a strong signal that if Marbley overturns the HB3 voter ID requirements for citizens coming to the polls, that too is likely to be appealed and then overturned by the Court of Appeals.

Indeed, if Marbley throws out the rest of the HB3 after the Wednesday, November 1, hearing, a final ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court on all these procedures may not come until within hours of election time.

In other words, Ohio's lame duck GOP attorney general, and the GOP-dominated federal court system, are now in the process of pitching the entire electoral process in the state of Ohio into a spiral of chaos.

HB3 and Blackwell's arbitrary directives have already devastated Democratic voter registration drives and caused thousands of mostly Democratic potential voters to wonder about their true eligibility to cast a ballot on November 7.

The mainstream media is portraying this latest episode as a blood feud between Petro and Blackwell. But the real winner is the Bush White House, which has every reason to suppress the vote November 7.

Blackwell is trailing so badly in the polls it's hard to imagine a theft big enough to allow him to win. But the critical U.S. Senate race between the GOP's incumbent Mike DeWine and U.S. Representative Sherrod Brown is very close. So are numerous congressional races throughout the state, any one of which could help decide who controls the U.S. House of Representatives.

The tactics being tested and used here in Ohio are certain to surface in various forms around the U.S. HB3, for example, has quintupled the fees charged by the state for a recount. In Ohio 2004, the Green and Libertarian Parties obtained a flawed and ultimately worthless recount for about $120,000. A similar statewide recount for the 2006 U.S. Senate race would cost about $600,000.

But Blackwell has decimated even the previously feeble safeguards for such recounts, making them even more illusory than they were in 2004. HB3 has also removed any state recourse in the case of a contested election here for the U.S. Senate or House, or for the presidency.

So even if a recount showed a clear theft, the state courts are barred from jurisdiction. The only appeal now allowed would be a direct plea to the federal courts or Congress.

On the other hand, HB3 provides no special system for monitoring the electronic voting machines on which about half the state's ballots will be cast. Though a paper receipt is now required for all electronic voting machines, there is no method by which the Diebold, ES&S, Triad and other touch-screen computers or electronic tabulators can be reliably protected from tampering.

Based on reports from the Conyers Congressional Committee, the Government Accountability Office, the Brennan Center, Princeton University and the Carter-Baker Commission among others, the vote count reported by Ohio's voting machines could be flipped by J. Kenneth Blackwell or other election official -- or even amateur hackers -- in a matter of moments, with a few simple keystrokes.

In sum: there is no way such a manipulation could be definitively stopped, monitored, proven or reversed.

Thus Ohio enters the last week prior to this most critical mid-term election in recent memory in utter vulnerability and chaos. Tens of thousands of absentee ballots already cast are in limbo. Their ultimate status may not be determined until hours before election day, if then. Hundreds of thousands of potential voters remain uncertain about what, if any, forms of identification they will be required to include on their absentee ballots or to present at their polling stations. If the experience of 2004 is repeated, many of those polling stations will be incorrectly listed on the secretary of state's official web site.

Thousands of Ohio citizens may also not know if they are actually registered to vote. All 88 of Ohio's county boards of election are effectively controlled by Secretary of State Blackwell. Since 2000, without official notification, some 170,000 voters have been stripped from the registration rolls in Cuyahoga County (Cleveland), 170,000 in Franklin County (Columbus), 105,000 in Hamilton County (Cincinnati) and 28,000 in Lucas County (Toledo).

Overall, nearly 500,000 registered voters are known to have been eliminated from the rolls in overwhelmingly Democratic districts in a state where 5.6 million people voted in 2004, and where George W. Bush won with an alleged margin of less than 119,000 votes. There is no evidence similar eliminations have occurred in Republican areas.

While reports of widespread purges have not proved true, there is increasing evidence that county boards of elections used voter notification cards required by HB3 that were returned by the post office to flag hundreds of thousands of voters' names at the polls throughout Ohio and force them to vote provisionally. An Erie County official placed the number of flagged voters at about 24 percent in his county.

Blackwell has further ruled that citizens who vote with provisional ballots at their correct polling place but in the wrong precinct (which may be housed in the same building) will not have their vote counted. Back ups of provisional voters created long lines in 2004. The only safe place to cast a provisional ballot is at the county board of elections, but often these votes are disqualified because voters fail to check off a small affirmation box, or do not supply a date of birth or other requested technical information.

Ohio's electoral process is thus once again sinking into a fog of confusion, disenfranchisement and theft perfectly designed to prolong the GOP control of the government. There is every reason to believe that in the week now remaining before the actual election, the GOP and its allies in the federal court system will use the escalating chaos to their advantage in attempting to keep control of the U.S. Congress, here and in other states.

The definitive question hovering over the future of American democracy thus remains: who will do what about it, and when?

This article originally appeared in The Free Press.
Bob Fitrakis & Harvey Wasserman are co-authors, with Steve Rosenfeld, of WHAT HAPPENED IN OHIO: A DOCUMENTARY RECORD OF THEFT AND FRAUD IN THE 2004 ELECTION, just published by the New Press. Fitrakis is of counsel, and Wasserman is a plaintiff, in the King Lincoln lawsuit. Fitrakis is an independent candidate for governor, endorsed by the Green Party; Wasserman is author of SOLARTOPIA! OUR GREEN-POWERED EARTH, a.d. 2030, available via www.solartopia.org.

I now understand the psychosis of Mark Halperin [ABC news director and Chris' pal] and his desperate need to cravenly beg for acceptance among the neonazis like Hugh Hewitt--Mark's father was a liberal, you see. Apparently an Oedipal struggle much like bushbaby rebelling against Papa Bush. Unfortunately, all of us are trapped in it.

What greenwald says here about the lengths that the so-called 'liberal media' will go to appease the far right explains so much of the baseless Democrat-bashing and baiting we have seen for so long...

'Apparently, the most traumatizing and horrifying thing that could ever happen to Mark Halperin is for Bush followers like Hugh Hewitt to think he's a liberal. It is self-evidently very important to Halperin -- on an emotional and deeply personal level -- to demonstrate that he is one of them, or at least not one of those liberals. To achieve this, he made an extraordinary vow to Sean Hannity when trying to win Hannity's approval, in which he pledged that the media would spend the next two weeks compensating for all of their anti-conservative sins over the past decades, and now he is engaged in a truly debased and highly emotional crusade to obtain Hugh Hewitt's affection.

I really question whether someone who has obviously made it such a high priority to obtain a very personal form of right-wing absolution can possibly exercise appropriate news judgment. If Halperin is willing to expend this much time and energy and shower Hewitt with such gushing praise -- and if he's willing to make such a public spectacle of himself when doing so -- all in order to convince Hewitt that he isn't liberal, won't that goal rather obviously affect Halperin's news coverage? Isn't there something extremely unseemly about the political director of ABC News engaging in such an intense campaign to win the approval of one of the most blindly partisan, extremist Bush followers in the country?

Mark Halperin is really showing his true colors here, and it is extremely unpleasant to watch. Part of me really hopes -- just for the sake of Halperin's dignity -- that he sends no more pleas to Hewitt and that he stops seeking benedictions from the likes of Sean Hannity. But ultimately, it's necessary to put one's personal concern for Halperin to the side because this exercise is truly revealing. The need of journalists to please right-wing extremists and convince them that they are good and fair is very pervasive among the national media, and Halperin's highly emotional interaction with Hewitt is placing a high-powered microscope on how that dynamic works. As ugly as it is, it is highly instructive.

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/10/more-on-mark-halperins-sad-little.html

I missed the last couple of postings so just cuaght up with the marijuana banana [sounds like Mr. DeWine has gotten into some Mellow Yellow] news and the George Allen Mob's thuggery. Then there was the R candidate [what was her name again] who threatened to slap the Green candidate in the wheelchair. Man, these are MEAN people, vicious thugs. We all knew that, that's why 'compassionate' conservative was always such a joke, don't know how they keep a straight face whenn talking about that.

I think that's why Bush always has these facials tics and contortions and smirks -- he's trying really hard not to laugh out loud at what he's saying. Even he knows its a crock.

'Iraqi citizens went out into the streets of Baghdad to celebrate the removal of the checkpoints, which were set up, at least in part, to aid troops in the search of the kidnapped American soldier. The Post is alone in pointing out the blockade also was set up to search for Abu Deraa, who is thought to be a prominent death squad leader. The WP also mentions Mahdi Army members, who answer to Moqtada al-Sadr, were present in the streets of Sadr City on Tuesday morning to ensure citizens respected a strike the Shiite cleric and his followers had announced to protest the blockade.'

It depends upon the newspaper and how they do it. If they do it on the editorial page and give reasons (advocacy) for the endorsement, then it could sway some of the readership. In a one newspaper or one big newspaper town, it counts. Where there are several with niche readerships, it has less effect. I have yet to see local TV outlets endorse anybody, (except maybe FOX). I wonder when that will start.

The Post's endorsement of Ehrlich could matter in a big way? I doubt it.
It may remind subscribers of the Post's shaky liberal credentials and bring to mind the word 'irrelevance', but I don't see it swaying any voters.
Do you have any reason for the claim other than being of the Post yourself?

Bringing up the fact that Katherine Harris hasn't won any major paper endorsements just put on you her hit list. Way to go Chris, I guess she'll be bad-mouthing you in her new book.

Newspaper endorsements here in the South only matter to liberal Democrats. Us Republicans have already figured out that the endorsement of a conservative is an attempt to temporarily blindfold a bias and circumvent the possibility of a complete breakdown in circulation.

Thank you for the article, though I have a great idea for next time. Encourage a network television station to do an investigative report on endorsers such as the National Education Association or the local Police Benevolent Association. Then you can prove that only a handful of people are making the endorsement, while the general membership are intelligent enough to use their own logic at the voting booth.

>>>...the endorsement could make a different.

>>>...regularly shown Farrell and Shays running even,, so even the...

Who the heck is editing? Any one of us can do better than this. Pretty embarrassing for an establishment like WaPo.

Primarily endorsements are a garnish.

http://intrepidliberaljournal.blogspot.com

In only a few cases do newspaper endorsements really make a difference, as far as I'm concerned. However, in statewide races, newspaper endorsements in certain locations propably matter much more than endorsements of other papers in other locations.

However, endorsements of people matter alot. Take the Mo. and Va. senate races, both very close. Micheal J. Fox endorsed McCaskill in a very open and heart wrenching way due to stem cell research. Think that matters in a really close race? We'll find out, but I think it could. In Va., George Allen got a strong endorsement from a man with legendary statues in Va, senior senator John Warner. Think that matters to the people of Va.? There are many more factors than just paper endorsements, but they could matter in close races.